9 Things you need for creating good content
A few words in the beginning. When you want to start posting or creating content, you can do that with almost nothing. You don’t need any expensive equipment, you don’t need an education in the topic, you don’t need to be a professional. The only thing you need is you, your ideas, and the passion for it. And even when you don’t see the thing as your passion yet, because you just wanted to try things out, then that is totally fine too. Passion and interest sometimes come after you spend some time with the things you are doing. We always tend to wait a long time before we even start doing things. (It’s not the right time, I’m not good enough, I don’t know what I’m doing... We all know those thoughts.) But let me tell you, that, it is better to jump into something without any knowledge, than waiting forever and never start at all. So please don’t worry too much about all these things. Just start and have fun!
🌙 A screen recording Program
I love using OBS for that. OBS (or open broadcast studio) is free and very good software you can use to capture and record your screen and voice at the same time. When you are working in a painting program or Zbrush or anything else which you want to show on your screen, then use this program. It is easy to learn and use and like everything else you can find free tutorials for that on YouTube. You also can use OBS for streaming and putting your own Layouts in the background. It’s an all-rounder and I definitely recommend that to everybody. You can use the normal OBS or the Streamlabs OBS.
🌙 A cutting Program for improving your videos
After recording your videos, it is nice to work a little more on that. Cutting programs are most of the time easy to learn for the simple basics (of course you can dive deeper into it to make even better content) but simple things like speeding up a video or cutting parts out or in, adding text and music to it are almost to learn. The same rule here, Free tutorials can be found everywhere for every software. I’m using Premiere Pro for that, but that is not a free program. Just google cutting programs in Google and you will find tons of good and free programs there like DaVinciResolve, Shotcut, VSDC, Lightworks, and so on.
🌙 A good Microphone + holder + pop support
Something that is very important and definitely something that is even more important than a camera, in the beginning, is a good microphone. When you do interviews, record a video with a voice-over, communicate and hang out online with other artists, do podcasts, or have interview meetings with clients and a company, then a good microphone is highly needed. There is nothing worse when nobody can understand you or when you have to listen to a cracking, dull sound while listening to your voice. Microphones are not too expensive. I would recommend buying a mic plus a mic holder to have more support working with it. It’s kinda handy when you can stick the holder to your table, and you can just move the mic around when you need to. Also, pop support in front of the mic is important too, to make your voice sound more clear and to avoid any weird background noises. Having a good voice recording program can help as well to get rid of things, but I highly recommend using a good mic for all the content you want to produce.
🌙 A Voice recording program
When you don’t record your voice on OBS, what you actually can, then you can also use other software for that. For example, Audacity is a pretty nice and free tool to do that. But like everything else, there are more than this out there like MixPad, Wavosaur, Adobe Audition, WavePad, Filmora Scrn, and so on. Just Google Audio recording software, and you get lists of different programs. Keep in mind, in this age, there is ALWAYS a free program out there for any kind of topic. Paid software is not always the best and for a beginner or to try things out, it’s not worth it to pay hundreds of dollars, but after a few times of using or doing something, you realize you don’t want to do it anymore. So keep it simple in the beginning.
🌙 A program to create some Graphics
It is always good to have a program where you can pimp your content a bit more. Making colors brighter, the contrast better, changing the size, adding things like text or other graphics to it, putting some screenshots together, or creating some thumbnails for your content. Doesn’t matter what it is, it’s not too hard to learn a few simple steps to take that. You will also get better the more, and more often you do these things. Online there is so much free content for learning some tricks. Photoshop is the most known when it comes to that, but since Adobe is a monthly payment system you can switch to other alternatives of course. Google alternatives to Photoshop and you will find immediately free or cheap one-buy versions like Paint, Canva, PicMonkey, Acorn, Pixlr, etc. I can’t give really tips on which software is good because I’m a Photoshop user, but on YouTube, you can always find some reviews and trailers about everything.
🌙 A Camera
As I said before, it depends on what you want to do. If you do digital recordings then you don’t need a camera. If you want to show your face or record something traditionally then you need a camera. No worries, you can use your phone camera as well. As long as the camera is not too old, you can use that. No need to buy an extra one in the beginning. If you have a bit of money, then you can get those streaming cameras that you can connect to your computer, or you can buy a more expensive one which can be used without computers. That depends on you and how much you want to pay for it.
🌙 A good Light setup
Depends on if you want to produce videos traditionally or digitally. For digital content, you don’t need any light setup because you are recording from your screen. Traditional content means, you are recording how you draw in your sketchbook, or you are doing a Vlog or giving tips and people can see you sitting there or doing things. Then it’s better to have a good light source to be prepared for filming everyday or nighttime. Natural light is the best and most beautiful one, but we don’t have always the chance to have a natural light source around, especially not when you film at night, on rainy days, or when your room is just a dark cave. Good light setups are not expensive anymore. You can use Softboxes or Ring lights for example. But there are many more out there you can use, depending on how professional you want to do something. On Amazon are tons of good products and also pretty affordable in price.
🌙 A service to share things with different devices
The Good thing is, that most platforms can be used from your computer. So there is no need to switch devices, however for example Instagram can be only used with your phone. (I think there are a few apps out there that can control it from the computer as well but overall Instagram is for the phone). Making sure to have something where you can exchange your content, would be a huge benefit. Sometimes, people work together or have team members who do different things (for example you are creating pictures of the product, but some other team member is preparing it for social media). That means you need something to share your content with one another. Good ways of doing that are for example Dropbox, Google Drive, or other services. There are definitely more out there, but these are the common ones. They are free, only need to pay for something when you need more space.
🌙 Social Media account
Well to share some of your content you need, of course, any kind of platform where you can share your content. This can be any kind of social media platform like Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube, TikTok, Vimeo, Behance.. Or you can post your content in forums like Polygroup, Zbrush central, CGSociety.. Or creating your own Website and load it up there like Artstation, Squarespace, Patreon.. Or you can upload it in online shops like Gumroad, Etsy, Redbubble, INPRNT.. There are many ways of sharing your content online and getting attention from there. No worry, there is no need to be on every platform but always keep in mind that not everybody is active on the same. I would say, choose maybe 3 platforms where you are more active, and the rest, if you decide to go with more, are just there to upload content, so people can see it.
