What Makes a Video Great?

Since the dawn of cheap digital cameras and the popularity of the smartphone, everyone has become a videographer. But not everyone is making good videos. Our phones are capable of filming high-definition 4k footage, and close-up audio isn’t terrible. Heck, these phones have incredible stabilization, auto-focus and digital compression, all built in, right out of the box! So what is missing that makes our home videos lack excitement and intrigue? Three words: story, framing, and intentionality.

In most cases, we see something cool, grab our phones and hit record with little thought as to what is happening around us. There is no context to our video and no definitive beginning or end. As a result, this clip ends up buried in our photos app, wasting another 3MB of useful storage space. Let me share an easy 3- step strategy for improving your videos today!

Step 1 - Write Your Story

The first thing you need to do if you want to make a video that people will want to watch is to create a story. You don’t need to go so far as to script out dialogue–you don’t even need to write anything down at all. But you must create something with an obvious beginning, middle, and end. This tells the viewer what they’re going to see, gives them a reason to stick around until the end, then offers some satisfying resolution. 

For example, if you were to create a video of your child’s soccer game, the outline might look like this:

• Beginning - Opening b-roll shot of a soccer ball rolling onto the field, mixed with quick clips of practice, warm-up, and National Anthem.
• Middle - Handful of high-energy action shots, refs blowing whistles, and close calls. Camera pans to the scoreboard revealing a tie game and this section ends with one final team huddle while the coach shares some inspiring words.
• End - The ball is thrown in as the game reaches a cliffhanging moment. First pass. Second pass. Third pass gets to your daughter and you zoom in on her determination. She takes the ball downfield and you cut to a wide shot right as she sends the ball into the net scoring the game winning goal. Her team lifts her up in celebration as the camera fades out.

Don't make the same mistake so many are unintentionally making, and start planning out your storyline.

Step 2 - Frame Your Shots

Another common beginner mistake when filming videos is to place every subject in the center of the frame. While this works for some shots, others will feel unbalanced or draw our eyes to the wrong thing on screen. This may not matter when shooting your hundredth video of your cat with the zoomies (I know you do it), but would make a huge difference in our epic soccer example above. So how do we make our framing more interesting? Let’s talk about basic composition for a moment. Our goal is to help guide the viewer to our subject, and we can do this by using perspective and framing.

Let’s look at the Rule of Thirds as shown here:

The Rule of Thirds is a helpful tool designed to create balance while suggesting alternative compositions that are more interesting than centering everything on screen. In the graphic above, you’ll feel the weight of the dark mountains toward the bottom juxtaposed to the light sky above. Then we’ll find our subject almost unexpectedly standing to the left which provides a better perspective to what they are staring at. Rather than staring at the back of a person, we feel compelled to “see what they see” as the trees are revealed on the hillside.

Going back to our soccer example, a centered close-up of a rolling soccer ball makes perfect sense as an opening shot, but as you start to reveal more of the action, we need more context; the field position, the players, the proximity to the nearest goal… all of these and more help contribute to the larger picture and tell our brains what we’re looking at. Most importantly, mix it up! Contrary to its name, the Rule of Thirds is not actually a strict rule. Try new things and switch it up throughout your video to retain your viewer’s attention.

Step 3 - Start With the End in Mind

The opening of your video is the ‘hook.’ The first 5-10 seconds will tell the viewer whether they should keep watching your video or skip to something more interesting. That being said, we know that most of the action is toward the latter half which means we need to give the viewer a reason to stick around long enough to see what happens! Every clip should build on the last, pushing the story further and creating more and more tension or anticipation. Back to our soccer game, are there any carded offenses? Does someone get injured? Who wins the game!?

If you don’t have that final shot in mind before you start, you will miss the opportunity to capture relevant clips that complete the story, and instead compile a montage of random shots leaving you with a confusing video nobody will want to watch. Be intentional and start with the end in mind.

Parting Thoughts

Following these steps will immediately improve the viewability of your videos, but there’s one more recommendation I’ll make. As tempting as it will be to set your camera (or phone) on a tripod, hit record and enjoy the game, that is a sure-fire way to guarantee that nobody will watch your video. Instead, take some dynamic hand-held shots (tripod is okay for some shots, especially when tracking fast motion from a distance, just don’t use it for everything), and use a video editing software to cut it all together. You don’t need a subscription to Premiere Pro or buy the latest version of Final Cut. Just use the free version of iMovie (for iPhone users) or DaVinci Resolve if you prefer a more robust editing tool. If you’re not interested in editing, just download an app like CapCut or Riverside, upload your clips, and let the computer do all the work for you.

For your next video project just remember to write your story, frame your shots, and start with the end in mind. Do this and you’ll have people watching your videos again and again. Until next time, my friend, put this strategy into practice and go make something amazing.