Do you often struggle to create the perfect lighting for YouTube videos? Lighting is a crucial element that can contribute to making a great YT video. Since cameras don’t capture light in the same way as the human eye, it is significant that you learn how to get the best lighting setup for recording YouTube videos.
An appropriate lighting setup adds professionalism to your videos, that helps in getting more views to your videos. Let’s walk through the tips to optimize your video lighting.
Tips To Get Good Lighting For YouTube Videos
Lighting is one of the most important elements of a high-quality video creation process. Here are a few tips you can implement to create better videos.
1. Focus Light On The Presenter
A well-lit subject helps draw the viewer’s attention to the video, generates enough visibility, and gives you the ability to shoot confidently. The priority is to make sure viewers are focused on you and your content. You can use natural light or create a lighting setup that puts enough light on the subject. You would have to make some adjustments to your camera settings to get the perfect lighting setup in your frame.
2. Stay Away From Overhead Lighting
Many rooms have ceiling lights, and creators often make the mistake of using these lights as their only source. It leads to the entire scene getting colored in the same tone or shadows appearing on the subject’s face, under the eyes. You can explore the idea of using adjustable lamps, LED lights, or ring lights that can be placed to get the ideal lighting for YouTube videos.
3. Set The Ideal Position Of Light And Camera
We recommend creating a lighting setup where the camera and light are placed on the opposite side of the subject at 45-degree angles. It gives a lot of depth to your video. This lighting setup is commonly used in filming techniques. You can place the camera at angles to capture both the light and dark side of the subject.
4. Avoid Mixing Different Color Temperatures
Using lights from different color temperature sources can prove to be quite tricky and may cause you to go beyond the ideal YT video length and size limit. If you are just starting out on the world’s largest video-sharing platform, it is better to avoid light sources with varying color temperatures. Camera lenses can often fail to adjust the changes observed in color temperature. An example could be using warm light from a tungsten lamp and cool light from a fluorescent lamp. Such mixed lighting can make it difficult for your camera sensors to adjust the white balance in your frame. We always recommend sticking to a single source of lighting for YouTube videos to get cinematic effects in them.
5. Prefer Using 3-Point Lighting Setup
To create a 3-point lighting setup, you need a key light, a fill light, and a backlight. The key light acts as the primary source of light and gives depth and dimension to the video frame. You can set up the key light in front of the subject at 45 degrees.
The fill light is helpful to balance out the shadows created by the key light. You can use a less bright light source or reflectors to bounce off light onto your subject.
The backlight is put behind the subject to make it stand out from the background colors. It is highly helpful for creators who use mobile phone cameras to shoot YouTube videos. The backlight increases the contrast between the subject and background and helps separate them.
Conclusion
This was all you need to know to create the perfect lighting for YouTube videos. Setting up this lighting frame is highly effective to increase the video quality and its impression on your target audience. However, setting up the perfect lighting environment is one part of the equation, the other part is editing your YT videos professionally. Also, know that a clear, distraction-free space is ideal for shooting YT videos. Ensure to declutter the space that will be visible in the camera while shooting your videos.
So go ahead and shoot some amazing cinematic videos and edit them using some of the best YT video editing tools.
Frequently Asked Questions
Q1. Can I Avoid Glare In Video Lighting?
Yes. You can avoid the glare in your videos by repositioning your lighting setup. Either raise the lights or try adjusting your key light and fill light.
Q2. Is It Possible To Have More Than 3 Point Lighting Setup?
Yes, you can have more than a 3-point light setup if there is a desperate requirement. However, having too much light in the wrong places can cause undesirable shadows to appear and can ruin the quality of your videos.
Q3. How Do I Get The Best Lighting For YouTube Videos?
You can adjust your key light, fill light, and backlight at different angles to get the best lighting setup to shoot YT videos.
Q4. Can I Just Use Natural Light To Shoot Good-Quality YT Videos?
If you are in a streaming location that has sufficient natural lighting setup, you can rely on it. However, we do not recommend relying entirely on natural lighting since it produces different results each time.