I am mostly a self-taught videographer, but I’ve learned enough to produce high-quality piano tutorial videos.

Along with a youtube video taking you behind the scenes, I thought I would include some more tips here.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HHWvUQpyf8I Main camera: Canon T3i with standard 18-55mm lens. Manual video settings, generally I’m shooting at 24fps, 200 ISO, highest (lowest?) possible aperature with the lens and zoom, usually ending up around a 4.0 f-stop.

Overhead camera tip: It’s tough to get the angle perfectly straight, so I get it close, then fix any imperfections in the editor (Final Cut Pro X). I use the Distort feature in the video inspector.

Lighting: I try to position one light somewhat off-center – not straight-on – and use a second light to fill the background. This gives more of a window-illuminated look. Happy accident discovery here.

Audio: The best solution I’ve found is to simply position a high-quality microphone as close as possible to my voice. For the best quality audio, don’t go through your camera. Even the best video mic will sound poor if your camera’s converters are the typically bad ones. Record your audio separately into a computer or high-quality portable recorder.

I record audio at a 48.1 kHz sample rate for better sync with video.

As I record my vocal into Logic Pro, I also play and record the piano with Logic, through MIDI. I hear the piano through earphones, keeping the piano sound out of the microphone, for a clean, direct sound.

Audio editing: I use Ozone (plug-in from Izotope) to increase level and tweak EQ. I also use its multiband compressor to limit the amount of room sound. Since my room resonates more in the low mids, I compress that range of my vocal more.

Video editing: So overall, I record just about everything – main camera, overhead camera, voice, piano – separately, and combine it all in Final Cut. To aid in lining up the files in the editor, I clap at the beginning of each take. This creates a sharp transient or spike in each of the audio waveforms. Just line up those transients, and all the files are aligned.

Hope that helps!