My Second Video Might Be Watchable

Ok, I finally completed the second version of the first video, Entra External Identities. I chose to make a version 2 because the first video just wasn't the quality of material I want to produce. This second version is...better by far, although still not quite where I want to be quality and value wise. But I continued to learn so much about editing, scripting, recording myself, recording the screen, and implementing other items into the video in order to emphasize my points, that this video is a clear win for me.

I rehearsed. I had a script this time instead of a general outline. I recorded multiple takes of each section, and even each sentence in some sections. But still, my delivery is wanting. I also tend to look to my screen too quickly after each take, to the point I can't edit it out cleanly. So you'll see my eyes go to the screen after every take, which isn't a good thing. My tone could use some variety as well. I'll continue practicing my delivery. Hopefully the 3rd video will be a noticeable improvement in this regard.

Speaking of the script, it was definitely an improvement having one this time. That said, I followed it too closely and it was absolutely obvious in the video. There was no room for natural speaking, only rehearsed. I'll need to work at this as well.

From a technical viewpoint, this video is orders of magnitude beyond the first one. I'm almost proud to tell people to go watch it. The first video took about 10 hours to draft up the concept, rehearse, record, and edit. This one took about 40 hours. That's a lot...

I learned a ton of new editing tricks in Davinci Resolve that really cut the time down from what I was doing in the beginning. A few learned keyboard shortcuts can drastically improve efficiency when editing the audio and video lengths.

I also recorded the content in chunks. Practically each sentence or paragraph was it's own video and audio recording. This made for short recordings to work with, which I thought would be better. I now think it's much worse. Importing and organizing all of the individual recordings took a couple of hours in itself. I think recording audio and video in 1-3 takes might make the editing process that much faster. All I would need to do is line them up initially, and begin cutting them simultaneously to keep them in sync. This method would make for very large files, but quick editing rather than lining up the audio waves on 50+ separate recordings, then adjusting their lengths.

Key Takeaways

• My delivery is improving, but has miles of work ahead
• Scripts are great. Incorporate some natural speaking as well
• Don't make 50+ separate recordings you'll need to individually edit later. Make 1-3 long recordings to reduce time spent sorting, cutting, and aligning clips