The Vlogging Channels: These channels' content has an acquired taste. I feel you either love them or you hate them as they can either be very interesting or unbelievably boring. Let me give an example of each. Casey Neistat is a vlogger and one of my favourite YouTubers. All he does is takes a camera and records his daily routine. You would imagine that following someone's life is not a very interesting hobby however when you watch Casey Neistat you can realise how good it can be. Casey lives in New York, works in New York, has a wife and one kid, owns a motorized skateboard and has a friend called Marlyn that delivers his mail. Still sound boring? Fair enough. The way Neistat draws you in is with his incredible editing abilities, creative camera work and captivating tone of voice. He also created an app called Beme where users can broadcast short videos of their life to the world. He is one of the main people that inspired me to start a YouTube channel,.
Now there is also some very bad vloggers that see really good vloggers and think that all they need to do to be the same is to take out a camera, press record, hold it in front of their face, and chuck everything together in a terrible editing software. If this is you, please stop. The people that do this put up some of the most uninteresting content on YouTube and I just don't see the point of this.
There are plenty more YouTube channel types out there but the four I have chosen are the ones I tend to watch the most.
Friday 25 September 2015
Friday 18 September 2015
The Channels of YouTube (Part 2)
So what other channels can you find on YouTube?
The Gaming Channels: These are not channels I tend to visit often as I do not have a huge interest in gaming, and the content on the channels seems a bit boring to me. However as for the rest of the world these types of channels tend to be very popular. The content usually consists of someone who has recorded their computer or television screen using a downloadable software, and has layered a pre-recorded commentary over it. Some gamers such as PewDiePie or TobyGames will include a lot of humour to make the content more entertaining for the viewers however a lot of people will just describe what is happening in the game which can be very tedious to watch for some people with little patience (me).
The DIY/Tutorial Channels: These channels tend to be ones you stumble on by accident when looking for the best way to make rice pudding, or an origami Christmas card for the Grandparents. These types of channels will offer tutorials for such things as makeup, cooking and carpentry. They will provide you with tutorials on how to use a computer software or how to build a cot from scratch for your new-born baby. If you want to try something new, or find out more about doing something then YouTube can give you absolutely anything you need to accomplish that. Personally I only ever use tutorials for things like how to tie a good tie, or how to throw an American Football. You'd be surprised how easy it is to learn something when you have somebody showing you how to do it on a computer screen at home.
[More channels in Part 3....]
The Gaming Channels: These are not channels I tend to visit often as I do not have a huge interest in gaming, and the content on the channels seems a bit boring to me. However as for the rest of the world these types of channels tend to be very popular. The content usually consists of someone who has recorded their computer or television screen using a downloadable software, and has layered a pre-recorded commentary over it. Some gamers such as PewDiePie or TobyGames will include a lot of humour to make the content more entertaining for the viewers however a lot of people will just describe what is happening in the game which can be very tedious to watch for some people with little patience (me).
The DIY/Tutorial Channels: These channels tend to be ones you stumble on by accident when looking for the best way to make rice pudding, or an origami Christmas card for the Grandparents. These types of channels will offer tutorials for such things as makeup, cooking and carpentry. They will provide you with tutorials on how to use a computer software or how to build a cot from scratch for your new-born baby. If you want to try something new, or find out more about doing something then YouTube can give you absolutely anything you need to accomplish that. Personally I only ever use tutorials for things like how to tie a good tie, or how to throw an American Football. You'd be surprised how easy it is to learn something when you have somebody showing you how to do it on a computer screen at home.
[More channels in Part 3....]
Thursday 17 September 2015
The Channels of YouTube (Part 1)
Within YouTube there are many different channels that supply a certain type of content for their subscribers. Different content appeals to different people so once the YouTuber finds a specific category that they enjoy to film and that the subscribers enjoy to watch, they can focus on making the content as enjoyable as possible.
So what kind of channels can be found on the website?
The Music Channels: These channels can range from a professional musician's official YouTube channel (such as Katy Perry or Kanye West) to a regular teenager's music covers channel. Music is a massive part of YouTube and millions of people across the globe will browse the website for hours on end just to find that one song they heard at the end of some movie they watched the other week. I myself use YouTube almost every day to stream music and I usually find what I want in the form of a lyric video. This is a video someone has posted where they have edited the lyrics of a song onto a video with the song playing in the background. Avid YouTube music listeners will understand how frustrating it can be when you see the new Avicii song pop up in your subscriptions notifications, go to listen to it, then realise that the first 30 seconds of the video is just background noise to do with the music videos story. Very annoying, believe me. I remember a while ago reading a Tumblr post that said 'The people that post lyric videos to YouTube are the backbone of this nation' and I remember thinking to myself that I couldn't agree more.
[More channels in Part 2....]
So what kind of channels can be found on the website?
The Music Channels: These channels can range from a professional musician's official YouTube channel (such as Katy Perry or Kanye West) to a regular teenager's music covers channel. Music is a massive part of YouTube and millions of people across the globe will browse the website for hours on end just to find that one song they heard at the end of some movie they watched the other week. I myself use YouTube almost every day to stream music and I usually find what I want in the form of a lyric video. This is a video someone has posted where they have edited the lyrics of a song onto a video with the song playing in the background. Avid YouTube music listeners will understand how frustrating it can be when you see the new Avicii song pop up in your subscriptions notifications, go to listen to it, then realise that the first 30 seconds of the video is just background noise to do with the music videos story. Very annoying, believe me. I remember a while ago reading a Tumblr post that said 'The people that post lyric videos to YouTube are the backbone of this nation' and I remember thinking to myself that I couldn't agree more.
[More channels in Part 2....]
Friday 11 September 2015
My Interest in YouTube
So why do I use YouTube?
I use Youtube for two functions: to supply, and to be supplied. I supply the website with (hopefully) enjoyable content, and in return, I receive the enjoyable content uploaded by somebody else. Its a constant never-ending circle of entertainment from which I will never get bored.
So what sort of things do I do to make my content entertaining? I make short films for YouTube in my spare time. It is a fun and interesting hobby that satisfies my creativity and allows me to do whatever I want in terms of story telling. However when I am in the process of planning a short film, there are a number of factors which I need to consider in order to make it visually appealing for my audience.
For example, if I am filming outside, I need to choose a suitable location. I need to look at the scene I am shooting, think about the atmosphere I am hoping to create in order to help sell the story, and then assess a number of different possible locations. In order to do this I need a basic knowledge of geography. I need to think about if the ground is level enough for the equipment I use and I also need to consider the level of space I will have. If I am filming in a busy environment I need to find out when the busiest times will be and also get a filming permit from whoever manages the complex.
Weather is also a huge factor when choosing a day to film as if it is too rainy then the equipment may get damaged and if it is too windy then the sound will be fuzzy if I am not using a directional microphone.
So all these things greatly influence filming schedules and need to be considered if you are trying to get the best possible result for your YouTube viewers.
I use Youtube for two functions: to supply, and to be supplied. I supply the website with (hopefully) enjoyable content, and in return, I receive the enjoyable content uploaded by somebody else. Its a constant never-ending circle of entertainment from which I will never get bored.
So what sort of things do I do to make my content entertaining? I make short films for YouTube in my spare time. It is a fun and interesting hobby that satisfies my creativity and allows me to do whatever I want in terms of story telling. However when I am in the process of planning a short film, there are a number of factors which I need to consider in order to make it visually appealing for my audience.
For example, if I am filming outside, I need to choose a suitable location. I need to look at the scene I am shooting, think about the atmosphere I am hoping to create in order to help sell the story, and then assess a number of different possible locations. In order to do this I need a basic knowledge of geography. I need to think about if the ground is level enough for the equipment I use and I also need to consider the level of space I will have. If I am filming in a busy environment I need to find out when the busiest times will be and also get a filming permit from whoever manages the complex.
Weather is also a huge factor when choosing a day to film as if it is too rainy then the equipment may get damaged and if it is too windy then the sound will be fuzzy if I am not using a directional microphone.
So all these things greatly influence filming schedules and need to be considered if you are trying to get the best possible result for your YouTube viewers.
Friday 4 September 2015
The Beginning of YouTube
YouTube. Where did it begin?
In 2005, three early PayPal employees needed a way to share a video clip to prove the existence of a dinner party. The creators, Chad Hurley and Steve Chen, described YouTube as being a video version of an online dating service however it is now recognised as one of the largest platform for sharing media in the world.
The headquarters were set up above a pizzeria and Japanese restaurant in California and the very first video posted to the website entitled 'Me at the Zoo' was uploaded by Jawed Karim, a co-founder of YouTube.
The video now has over 26 million views worldwide despite the fact that it is only 19 seconds long, and contains Mr Karim explaining his visit to San Diego Zoo which you would imagine is not a very interesting topic. However this kick-started people's interest in watching and sharing videos on the site and soon hundreds and thousands of people were posting videos regularly. What began as a simple way of sharing interesting content among your friends has now become a way for some people to make money and even earn a living.
Every minute, 300 hours of content is uploaded to the website to be enjoyed by friends, family and other subscribers. As of today, YouTube is the third most visited website online, just falling behind Facebook and Google, but ahead of sites such as Wikipedia, Twitter and Yahoo!.
Thursday 3 September 2015
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