Sounds Right
Probably one of the easiest tasks for me is the recording stage. Once I have a few completed scripts I just sit down for an hour or two and record them directly to the PC using the free software package Audacity using a Microsoft LifeChat LX-3000 headset. While each script is timed to run for about six minutes, with gaffs, pauses and mistakes while I read it, each usually takes me about 20 minutes or so to record. That’s usually followed by another 40 to clean up and edit to remove duplicate audio, clean up breathing and generally tidy up before exporting a finished audio file. Ideally in a typical session I’ll create a couple of finished files unless I’m in a rush to release a specific review.
Audacity is probably the best tool available as it can handle everything I need. Not only does it give me full control of the recording itself including altering the input levels, but full editing control. I usually need to amplify the sound before I start editing, delete a lot of errors, but often my breathing is picked up during pauses so I have to insert “quiet gaps”and Audacity allows me to do all of this seamlessly.
Finishing Touches
For those of you who’ve watched our videos, you can’t have failed to notice that we’ve got custom intros, end sequences and music with them as well. We’ve created these in advance so we can drop them into all of videos quickly and easily making editing much easier. Once these were produced once we’ve been able to use them dozens of times, just making minor changes as needed. The intro sequence made use of a pre-rendered animation from the free image/video library Pexels while all our music has been licensed from either Shockwave-Sound our video games composer Chris Huelsbeck.
Licensing content not only makes things much easier for us sourcing what we need, but gives our content that extra special touch that we think makes them look that extra bit special. Well, we hope you think so!
Making The Cut
After I’ve got all of the individual elements together, it’s on to the editing. My package of choice here is Pinnacle Studio Ultimate 14. It’s a few years old now (they’re up to version 22 I believe) but it still does the job I need it to). The PC I use for editing is still running Windows 7 and is one I’ve had for about 8 years but it’s still up to the job (although I could do with something a bit faster now), but it still lets me put together everything we need.
Anyway, when it comes to the video creation itself, I start off with a standard review template we’ve assembled. This usually contains our generic intro and outro segments and any sponsor images. From there I insert the captured footage and then add the voiceover track. Locking that down in place, I can then go through the video, trimming out clips I want to use. Eventually, the length of the footage matches the length of the voiceover so I can then adjust the volume levels so everything is balanced out, add any title images or captions that I need and then render the finished video.
This is usually the part I look forward to the least. My PC is reasonably capable from the editing side of things but rendering is a fairly slow process. A typical review takes about an hour to render and some of our bigger videos on the channel (the convention footage) has taken several hours! I know a hardware upgrade is going to be needed sooner rather than later, both in terms of processor, RAM and graphics card (with the latter being the most important) but it’s all about money at the end of the day. At least the upload stage is relatively easy since our upgrade to fibre!
Vlogs etc
While I’ve talked primarily about game reviews, we’ve also done vlogs and unboxing videos. When it’s come to create a PS Vita YouTube video like this, it’s a slighly different process. With these videos all being based around on-camera work, then they alternate between myself and Marcos Codas in which of us takes charge of these. The key thing here is deciding what will make a good subject for the video more than anything else. Sometimes we may be talking about something that has happened within the PS Vita scene and feel that we want to discuss it further in an open forum. On other occasions we simply have new purchases we want to show off on screen,
One thing that is shared across all on-screen work is that pre-scripting doesn’t work. While we need to have a rough idea of what we want to say, for the most part we have to improvise. So it’s really a case of filming, ideally in full HD but at the same time finding accompanying photos or video clips to mix with it that could be mixed in real time. After that it’s generally the same as the editing process for reviews.
Uploading
Once we’ve got videos finished it’s just a case of uploading them to YouTube, adding and tweaking our standard description template. Again, we use these to make sure we keep important information there with music credits and links and don’t miss important details out. To make things easier for subscribers, we’ve got playlists for most content we post and then everything is promoted not only here and our own social media outlets, but to anywhere else we think people may enjoy it.
We may not have the biggest or best YouTube channel or content out there, but we’ve been having fun creating everything and that’s the most important part. Crucially, it hasn’t been expensive and not counting the everything has cost under £100 in total. So if you’ve ever wanted to try to create a PS Vita YouTube video yourselves, there’s never been a better time to give it a go!
Main photo by Bruno Massao from Pexels
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