Matthew Hughes - King of Video: What do you do if you've got a small budget, just a little budget, or maybe no budget, and you want to get started on YouTube? That is the question that I'm answering on today's podcast. This is YouTube Success. We have no jazzy intro, so it's me telling you it's YouTube Success. Please go and subscribe on the platforms that you're watching on, whether on YouTube, Spotify, all that kind of jazz.
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Usually have two of these lights and one of them is broken. So I won't be recommending that particular brand of lighting, but we're going to be talking about cheap stuff anyway. So before we get started, this episode has a gear guide associated with it. It's a free guide that my wife created. She's the graphics genius in our household. I created the content. She created the guide. It's beautifully designed and it has links to all of the stuff that I'm talking about.
I'm literally going from top to bottom in this guide, so you don't have to go and get it, but it's free. It'll get you on my email list and you'll get all the good stuff. We'll be talking about TubeFest, conferences, all the great stuff. You'll get notified when we do new episodes, all that kind of stuff. So head over to kingofvideo.co.uk, click the start here button, and then you'll see the link to the budget kit or the budget guide or the starter guide.
I call it all different things, but it effectively it is. Matt, I've got no budget or I've got a small budget. What do I do? How do I get started? How do I get the best quality video, audio, lighting with no money or with very little money? When we're talking about this stuff, I think we should call out the first thing, which is people always say, Matt, what's the best webcam to get? And if we think about cameras in general, when we start at cameras, know that all webcams are terrible.
That's the answer to that. I'm using a MacBook Pro. I think the most recent MacBook Pro. It's not so bad, the built in ones. And really if I had to choose a webcam, I'd go with one of the Logitechs. The Logitech C920 had a massive resurgence. I remember buying them just before lockdown. I bought them for like 40 pounds, 40, 45 pounds. When lockdown happened, they went up to about 85, 90 pounds.
I think even toppled, a hundred pounds at a time and because the demand was so high and I had three of them so I sold them all on ebay and made a bit of a profit on those second hand ones were making me more money than the new ones. But of course that's supply and demand for you. But so if I was going to choose something and I wanted something that was like a workhorse as a webcam, one of those would be it.
But my old phrase is that all webcams are terrible And that's because, most of the time, if you've got a phone that's, you know, a mobile phone, a cell phone as you Americans call it, in the last couple of years, you've probably got more than you need in your hand to start on YouTube. So you don't need to invest in any equipment.
If you've got a good, decent, mobile phone that films in HD, perhaps even 60 frames a second, most of them now film in 4K, you can get started and even if you're sitting here, if you are on the audio version of this, you won't be seeing my little studio that I've got here. But even if you're sitting in a little studio like this, I can connect my mobile phone to this and make it look like I've got a static camera. It's really, really simple.
And on Mac, it's even easier because actually it automatically connects to your Mac, your iPhone does, and it just becomes available as a webcam. Nowadays more than ever, it's so much easier to use your phone. And the quality of the camera inside your phone is largely better than what you get in webcams and there's a lot more flexibility you can do in it as well. So just know that that's the case. So the investment there is zero. You don't have to add any more investment.
Now you could say, well, I've got to go out to buy a phone So there is some investment in there. Well yeah, maybe that's true. But most people these days if they're running a business, they're gonna have a mobile phone anyway Yes, even you Samsung guys, if you're, if you're an Android user and you don't use fruit based devices like I do, then you Android guys are just in a good place as well.
The Samsung hardware, the cameras that you've got on the Samsung hardware has always been brilliant, always way ahead of the iPhones. So you're in good and safe hands if you've got one of those as well. So we talk about that in the guide. I've got a link there. This is how old the guide is. It's got a link to an iPhone 11 Pro Max. I'll definitely get these updated to add the latest phones in there. Then we talk about microphones. So what can we do with microphones?
Well, again, if you're in a quiet, safe, quiet environment like I am in my studio, an on board microphone is fine.
You could just literally use the microphone that's built into your phone and then you're good to go But what I would say is if you want deep sound you want good deep sound, better than the microphone that I'm using I'm actually using a Yeti Nano on my desk I'm going to talk about this in the next episodes, the next level up but if you want a good deep sound, then I would invest in something like a Rode SmartLav+. So if you're on an iPhone, Rode SmartLav+ is made for iPhones.
I've not seen a newer version of that, but the Rode hardware is generally good. I think there's some purists in the audio space that would probably say, Oh, don't use Rode, you want to use... Something else I don't even know what that something else would be but for me I think the Rode SmartLav+ is great.
And this means that when you've got a lavalier, something that attaches to you, a lavalier attaches to your top, sometimes called a lapel as well and phone microphone, then it means the microphone is close to your mouth. So Whatever's going on, it's got a little muff, It's got a little muff or it's a, uh, a DeadCat or, sort of soundproofing device on the top of it. I think it's called a DeadCat. My technical knowledge is obviously not there because I've not looked at gear.
I try to avoid gear now because I spend too much money on gear and I've got 10 versions of all of these things in my office. But if you've got something like some kind of sound, DeadCat or something on top of it, which is the fluffy thing. Then it stops the sound if you're outside as well, it stops the wind and all the background noise happening. It just gets the, audio from what's in front of it, which is usually your mouth.
So you sometimes see people that have like the DJI, Rode Wireless GO, which are like the little square devices and they'll hold them up to people when they interview them It's got the DeadCat on top of it the fluffy thing. All right, so look out that for that on TikTok. That's what they're using so the SmartLav+ comes with something like that and then you'll get deep nice sound and you can use those again as a microphone. You can even hold them and pass them around.
I've seen people doing that and it just means it sounds guaranteed to be better than it would be if it was just directional like an iPhone or Samsung where it's just looking at what's in front of you. Sometimes you can get a lot of background noise doing that. So again, small investment. I think the last time I looked the SmartLav's were about 40, 50 pounds that and SmartLav's, because their Rode, they're more expensive than some cheaper ones you can get.
We used to spend 20 pound on lapel microphones and then we're still good. And, and did as really well when we had the video company. And there's nothing wrong with getting cheaper versions of it if you're starting out and if you can't really afford to invest in that kind of thing. So that's some microphones, Boya BY-M1, I don't know if they still do it again, but that's what the Samsung guys use. So if you're on Android, that was always very well recommended.
And then let's think about lighting again. If you've downloaded this guide and you're going for it, you'll see in the lighting section, we've got ring lights. And if you're on YouTube, just behind me here, you can see a ring lights, not that same one that's in the guide there, because the one you can see in the guide, Hmm, is it the same? No, I'm sure it's not a newer one. The one in the guide is the newer one.
And what I tend to do, when you're looking for ring lights, and these are probably between 40 and 80 pounds, something like that. So sort of 50 and 100 dollars. When you're looking for these, go for the biggest one. You'll find that some of them are like 10-inch ring lights, 14-inch and 18-inch. If possible, get the biggest one. Ring lights are often called Beauty Dishes. That's what you'll find in photography world, a Beauty Dish. It spreads the light all around your face.
So, and the reason why it's called a Beauty Dish is it hides the shadows. When you get shadows, it can make you look like you've got extra chins, all that kind of stuff. Like I can tell you the ring lights gives you the best opportunity to look the best all the time. Now it does give you rings in your eyes. Some people don't like that weird effect that you get if you're looking directly in the middle of the ring light.
But I would say when you're getting started and you just want some good lighting, a ring light is a great place to start. And it doesn't have to be right in front of you. You can put it to the side if you want, and add a bit of mood lighting in there. But a ring light is a good investment. And the other great thing about the ring light is, and you'll see this in the picture on the guide, is you can put a phone holder on it, and then you're hands free.
And for me, I'm a very hands on kind of speaker, so when I'm doing stuff, when I'm talking to you now, my hands are moving a lot. Even though I'm sat down in a chair, my hands are moving lots because I like to, um, uh, what's, what's the word? There's a word when you're using your hands to talk, when you're talking about stuff, right? So. lighting wise, ring light, that's a good investment. So we're talking £50 for a microphone, £80 for lighting, so £130.
And then there's another suggestion there that perhaps if you don't want to just have the ring light to hold your phone steady, something like a GorillaPod, a little tripod to hold your phone is another good investment. If you've got good natural lighting outside, which is free, you don't have to pay for that natural lighting, then you don't need necessarily to have a ring light, but you could then invest in a gorilla pod, some kind of tripod to hold your phone. So your footage is steady.
Steady footage is really, really important, especially if you're trying to get an important message across. When it's shaky, what people subtly subconsciously think about is horror films. And you don't want people thinking about horror films when they're watching your courses or any of your material. You want them to focus on the important message you've got in a nice and steady way.
This is why I'm not holding my camera or holding my phone when I do a lot of these things, even if i'm doing a TikTok or something like that, I'm generally using a tripod to hold my phone so it's nice and steady. Okay, and that's it. There's a little summary in the guide there, so you can just look at an overview of what's going on and an invite to the website and that kind of thing. So that's the FREE Budget Guide, the Budget Gear Guide, £200 or less.
I think we were well under that £200 budget. Prices vary, different times, things like right now when I'm recording this, it's almost Black Friday, so there'll be some good deals that you can get out of there. But by investing in these things, a bit of lighting, a little microphone, a tripod, you can just level up the stuff that you've got already. By moving from a webcam to your mobile phone, you can level up the output that you're putting out there already.
And there's plenty of YouTubers out there that will be making good gains, they'll be growing their channel, they'll be making good money. And just using the mobile phone to film, edit and post their YouTube videos, all right? So I am looking for one of those to interview on this podcast so we can talk about, you know, their whole process and workflow and all that kind of stuff, but right now I just want you to know it's possible. You do not have to invest a massive amount of money.
When I'm talking about this, it's not just about what's possible. It's about what your excuses are. If you think if one of your excuses is about gear and it's about equipment, I don't have the right things to get going, but you've got a mobile phone. Trust me. That excuse can no longer exist. I've explained to you why in this thing, right? You can go and download that guide and it's free. So again, there's no real excuse to stop you from doing that.
Alright, so this is the YouTube Success Podcast. That is the Budget Gear Guide. Feel free to share that with anyone you think would find this useful. Anyone you think that struggles with getting started with video. Don't forget to join the YouTube Community on youtubecommunity.co.uk. Now take a look at the website and leave us a review. Thanks so much. My name's Matt Hughes, King of Video. I'll see you for the Pro Gear Guide in the next episode. Bye bye.