ALTERNATE TITLE: A Blog About Vloggers By A Blogger Who Wants To Vlog His Blogs 🤣

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VLOG = video log, or video blog. We’re probably all familiar with that word by now. As I continue to work on my YouTube presence I’m still trying to find my sweet spot with regard to video style, energy level, etc. Currently I only have a couple handfuls of videos on my channel, but when I look back at some of my earlier videos I can DEFINITELY see an improvement in my delivery in my newer videos.

One of my first videos was of me making a variety of the Rockler cutting boards kits for Christmas gifts. At the time, I thought “cool, I’m on camera and I’m really doing it!” Now I cringe when I watch that video! The shooting and editing of the video is totally fine, thanks to my experience in video production back in the day. What I had very little experience doing however, was being IN FRONT of the camera. When I watch my cutting board video now all I can think is “Geez man! Did you just lose your best friend?” LOL!! Give it a look and see for yourself:

Fast forward a few videos and a couple thousand subscribers and what I’ve come to learn is the following. BE YOURSELF, but crank it up a notch….and then crank THAT up a notch….and just when you think you’re all cranked out go one MORE notch after that. Congrats, now you have a personality ready for the big screen, haha! It’s sort of like the saying “the camera adds 10 pounds“, but in this case it’s more like the camera REMOVES 10 pounds…of personality. For an introvert like me, this has been a difficult part of the process to get used to.

As an introvert, one solution to this problem is to just do narrator style YouTube videos. That way, all you’ve got to do is set your camera on a tripod, do the thing you want to do, and record voiceover later. This can save a lot of time but if it’s just a wide shot the whole time it’ll probably be a pretty boring video. Sometimes, YouTubers skip the voiceover altogether…they just put the video in fast motion (fast motion sound included), no music, and no narration. Jimmy DiResta has had tons of success with this format but I’ll be honest….I’m personally not a big fan of it. I AM however, a big fan of Jimmy DiResta as a maker and his creativity, just not necessarily all his videos, haha! Some people’s videos work well in this format, especially if the visuals are shot in a creative or interesting fashion, but I prefer to hear a little explanation of what’s taking place as well. That’s just me though.

So far on my YouTube channel I’ve got a little mix of styles. I’ve got some videos that are full of good footage but are edited to the beat of the music, like the baltic birch plywood bench I built a while back for the Rockler Plywood Challenge. You can see that video here:

I’ve also done it where I have all the pretty footage AND I incorporate voice over narration, all edited creatively to the beat of the music tracks. One of my favorites is my video where I’m making a whole bunch of serving boards for Flight Wine + Chocolate in Seattle and you can see that video here:

When I’m shooting video by myself, there’s always a couple different tripods around and maybe a DIY clamp accessory for mounting the camera in weird spots.

In some instances, if she’s available to help, I’ll have my wife shoot some handheld footage. We tried a short video not too long ago in this style, and I’ve gotta say….i really liked the way it came out. The footage had that “good” handheld look…not all shaky like a bad wedding videographer (and we didn’t even have a gimbal at the time!). I was natural on camera and I looked amazing with my new Stuff Seth Makes hat and my awesome apron from Calavera Toolworks. Check out that video and let me know what you think:

One thing you might not know about my wife and me, is that we have dreams of moving out of California someday and getting a larger piece of property. This dream includes a larger shop and a much larger plot of land to grow more of our own food and maybe add a couple other animals. I don’t think we’d go full blown homesteader life like Justin Rhodes or Doug & Stacy, but we do subscribe to several garden and homestead related channels on YouTube and they’ve got a different kind of style of video. I’d refer to these videos as VLOGS.

I’d describe vlogs as a “run and gun” approach. They usually have a lot of selfie footage and first-person point of view angles. A couple of our favorites are Garden Answer and Cog Hill Farm. I am so impressed by channels like theirs (and many others) that manage to put out new videos so frequently! Of course, putting out content so frequently means a no frills edit and the videos tend to run a bit long and can, at times, feel like you’re just watching camcorder home video footage (a LOT of unnecessary footage is left in that should be edited out). Something else I’ve noticed on some of the homestead channels is that they’ll show several minutes of the daily chores (feed the animals, fill the food bins, wash the whatever) at the beginning of almost every video. I understand that those things need to be done but I don’t think that footage is really necessary in every video. Sometimes I have to jump ahead 15+ minutes just to get to the main topic. Lumnah Acres would do the chore footage thing also but I haven’t seen their videos in a while so I don’t know what they’ve been up to lately. Maybe this is actually a genius move to get longer videos which means potentially longer viewer time which means more ads throughout the video which means more revenue? I dunno….I’m still new here, lol!

I certainly do NOT want this article to come off as a rant or diss to any of these YouTubers! They work extremely hard on their projects and they work hard to bring content to us on a regular basis and I have so much respect for them and their work ethic (I just wish they’d edit down the footage some more, haha!).

The vlogging “run and gun” style definitely has it’s place and I’ve incorporated it into my channel a couple times as well. In my most recent vlog on YouTube I wanted to give my audience an update about what I had been up to recently and what kinds of projects I’d been working on. I also tackled a couple quick small projects that I wanted to check off my to-do list. I found that the run & gun selfie style/point of view style helped me to shoot quicker because in this case I’m not AS concerned about perfect framing or dramatic bokeh in my shots. In fact, sometimes you’ll see me just grab the camera, going from mini tripod to handheld all in one shot. Some people might not like it but in my opinion, as long as the transition isn’t insanely shaky or jarring, you can get away with it. I also feel like that kind of shot brings the viewer in closer and maybe they’ll feel like they’re seeing what i’m talking about more clearly. Check out my video that I’m referring to and let me know what you think:

Something else I like about that vlog is that I incorporated my wife into the video, and that we interacted as we threw around some ideas on camera. My wife is my everything, and ever since we met back in 2002, she’s helped me, assisted me and supported me in every single thing. Whether it was back when I was a wedding videographer, or when we’re photographing weddings, building restaurant furniture, sanding tedious little items or yes, even in my friggin janitor job. The following pic was a couple years ago when I had to work on our wedding anniversary, so she came and helped so I could be done faster so we could grab dinner and hang out and NOT work, lol!

Dez will do anything she can to try to make my life easier and more enjoyable and I want to do EVERYTHING with her. Now as I dive deeper into my YouTube “career” any opportunity where I can bring her into the video with me I will. In fact, she actually has her own YouTube channel (What’s Up In The Garden) but as of right now doesn’t really have any content up there (just a couple short quick vids) but we’re working on a game plan! Eventually Dez and I will be a YouTube powerhouse but in the meantime, you can follow her on Instagram at What’s Up In The Garden.

So to answer the question in the title….is vlogging for me? I say YES, and I’m anxious to see how my format and delivery changes over time…hopefully it will be for the better. You guys will let me know when there’s a good one or a bad one, right??? 😉

Is vlogging for you? If you’re already outgoing and can blab on and on and on then yeah, sure, go for it. If you’re an introvert like me, I think it would be an interesting challenge for you to try! Even if my content isn’t blowing up and going viral and getting tons of views (yet), it’s still rewarding for me to see myself improving and maybe that will be the case for you too. You do need to look at it like a marathon though, and not a sprint. It takes practice!

To wrap this thing up, I just want to say thank you all for your support! Whether it’s reading through my blog, watching/liking/commenting and subscribing to my YouTube channel, subscribing to my newsletter and following me on Instagram (sorry I don’t post much on Facebook but these days the only thing Facebook is good for is Marketplace, haha!) I’m excited to keep improving and I’m looking forward to putting together more content with Dez. I hope you’ll keep following along and see how things progress.

If you’re interested in what gear I use for YouTube stuff, you can check out my Amazon list here: My YouTube / Video / Audio / Vlog Camera Gear.

Don’t forget you can also check out my entire Amazon Storefront to see a lot of the tools I use on various projects. If you use any of those links to purchase any of that stuff (or any other items you may jump over to) I earn a small commission from those sales. So click away and buy buy buy! 😂

Till next time friends!😎