How to record GOOD footage for your videos

[343N]

Okay, so you want a let's play, but you're afraid that you're horrible at capturing footage and you want to fix that?

Well, Step 1. Record at a 16:9 ratio (usually 1280x720) Why? so you dont have those GODAWFUL blacklines in your videos, such as my perfect example of this:

[img width=800]http://dl.dropbox.com/u/19296530/Things/Images%20of%20other%20stuff/Technic%20LP%20tutorialthing/step1blackbars.png

"But, 343N! This is too small a resolution for me to see with my eyes!", well, if your monitor is 1920x1080 supported, you can record in that resolution and render it at 1280x720 or if your internet is fast enough/you can waste enough harddrive space for it, keep it at 1080p. Also, if it's 720p/1080p it gets marked up in the Search for Youtube, so people might even find your videos easier when they search for "minecraft lets play"

Step 2. Don't use bandicam (or for the love of god dont use HYPERCAM2 UNREGISTERED). Use something like FRAPS or Dxtory (haven't tried it but it's pretty good apparently). If you're going with fraps you'll want to purchase the full version or your let's plays aren't going to get anywhere with a annoying as dicks watermark.

Step 3. When recording, make sure your computer can handle AT LEAST 25 FPS WHEN RECORDING (fraps has a handy fps counter that doesnt show up on footage, it looks like this: ) , otherwise it'll look shitty and people wont like it

"But 343N! I'm too poor to afford a new computer!" Well, there's no solution than steal your parents credit card if you're young enough and buy a tonne of parts, but yeah, like I said you're practically screwed out of your mind if you have a computer with a pentium 4 and a 64MB VRAM Integrated Chipset.

Step 4. get nasal spray

Step 4. After recording, you'll be thinking "Why THE JESUS IS MY FILE GONIG TO TAEK 5 DAYS TO UPLOAD, PLZ FIX YUtUB" Well no, it's not youtubes fault

It's yours You have two options (that I use, whatever use whatever I don't care) that you can use which are the best (for me atleast) to render (and edit out mistakes) your video in. Windows Movie Maker, or Sony Vegas, now I choose sony vegas because it's easy as poo to use once you get the hang of it and have a attention span larger than a dolphin. Okay, so you've edited your whole video, now if you're using Windows Movie Maker, (THIS SMALL BIT IS NOT COMPLETE YET) However, if you're using Sony Vegas, go to Render As > Windows Media Video .WMV > Click on 3Mbps Video > Customize Template > Video > Resolution 1280x720 (or 1920x1080 if you recorded at that res) > OK > Render. Now I'm not going into whatever errors you get with sony vegas on your rendering part but it should render fine. Once rendered you grab that file and upload that bitch onto youtube.

Step 5. DO NOT ADD ANNOTATIONS AT THE START OF THE VIDEO SAYING "plz subscribe" or you'll be looked at as a subscriber count whore or something

I hope this helped you turn your lets plays from something semi-decent (a.k.a shitty) into something good!