Did you enjoy this video? Want to know how to get the best video background for your business? Click here for more details.
Video Transcript: The last thing is backgrounds. When you’re shooting something, if you’re shooting something about you presenting something on a regular basis, having a good background is important, a backdrop. People notice those things, people look behind you. Right now I’m talking but you keep looking at the screen because there’s something behind you.
Generally a simple one is good when it comes to using videos for marketing purposes. I would recommend a black backdrop in internet video production just because it is simple. If you’re standing in front of it, try not to wear dark colours. You want to wear something contrasting against it. That’s what we use with our set up and it’s really effective because it just gives a simple background.
You can use a sheet. We talked about MacGyver at the start, you can use sheets, whatever you can. A thicker fabric is better because then it just hangs better, you don’t want creases because cameras can pick up that type of thing and you need a stand obviously to hold it.
Green screens, now green screens are amazing and they can help you do lots of things. They can be very tricky though. Green screens need to be lit separately to the subject. I don’t know if you remember but in the show reel I showed you, it was a PowerPoint slide and there was a little guy talking down in one corner. We shot him in front of a green screen and chroma keyed it out, which you’ve probably heard of. So we keyed out the green colour. What that means is, and this is why they use green screens, because it is a uniform colour that in editing programs you can remove that colour.
The reason they use green screens more than blue screens now is because not many people have lime green eyes but people have blue eyes and sometimes they found that they got rid of the blue screen and the people’s eyes, and it was scaring children. So they stopped using it.
With a green screen it’s about having consistent light. If you really want to use one, the way we do it is, you get two lights on the green screen, lighting it separately and then you light your subject separately to that so you get an even light. Otherwise you get these dark spots and things like that. When you go into your editing program and try to get rid of the green, there will be a strip of dark left there and that is endlessly problematic. So that’s why it’s really important to get it clean. It can be done in iMovie.
David: I was going to add to green screen as well. My gut feeling is, unless you’re going to do it well and do it right, don’t do it at all. It can look really tacky when you do it and you’re not doing it well and they’ve got a green glow outside and they’re not quite cut very well and a bit jagged if you haven’t done it right. So I think green screen, once you get comfortable and once you get someone who can help you set it up, then maybe look into it. Otherwise, in my personal opinion, I think it looks a little bit tacky. Some people think it looks more professional, but I tend to disagree.
Question: I tried out some green screen material, and if you’ve got something like, in our case it was yellow. Everything was going great until the guy held up the yellow book and there was nothing I could seem to do to get it to blend out. The yellow seemed to fade into the green or something.
Ben: Yes, yellow is close to green so if it’s in that spectrum then it’s going to get blended into it.
David: During the break we’ll give you some tips on things that you can do.
Ben: The reason it looks like you get little bits of green on people, what happens, light hits the green screen and then reflects onto the person, which is why you need to light them separately. That’s why I use a back light to separate the subject. It is a bit complicated, you need about five lights and it is something that you need to get some help with, look at a tutorial or talk to me.
Question: I’ve recently come up with a great concept using lycra, green lycra, because it stretches. You don’t get any creases or anything like that. Get it at Spotlight, it’s really cheap, I paid $40 and I think got ten meters.
I hope this will help improve the quality of your videos after using the best video background and video production equipment. Want to get help in doing this for your business? Contact us today.
