I’ve noticed that all newcomers, especially new content creators, go through the process of getting comfortable with the camera. It usually takes some time. This video should help you speed up this process.

What do we want to achieve in the videos we create? Aside from sharing the content itself, we aim to show:

• Confidence
• Control
• Calmness
• Expressiveness
• Emotionality
• Positivity

To achieve this, we need to feel relaxed, engage with the viewer, and appear and sound confident. The problem is that you might be recording your content for the first time, so you can’t feel all these things. Instead, you might feel stiff, nervous, and even frightened. So what do you do?

Fake it until you make it.

What does that mean? It simply means you need to play a role; you need to perform.

Let me address a common concern before it arises: “But I want to be natural; there are a lot of fake personalities out there. It’s not me; I want to be myself.”

Yes. And the challenge is that without experience or special talent, you can’t be that “yourself” in front of the camera. So use the tips I will share in this video to get to the point where you can be yourself.

In this video, we will cover:

• Facial expression
• Body language
• Tone of your voice and intonation
• Breathing

Facial Expression

The visuals that you convey through the camera are a communication tool. Your face and your eyes play a major role in communication. That’s why we did all this setup with lights so that we can have our face visible, our emotions clear, our eyes visible. It all doesn’t make sense if you are frozen like a statue.

Sometimes, we tend to hide our emotions from unknown people or people who might judge us. So, we hide our thoughts behind a mask of stone.

To solve this, let’s start with our mind:

• Imagine a friendly viewer: When you are in front of someone who needs your advice and will take it gladly, someone who is friendly, we let our guard down and feel more relaxed and open. Imagining a friend like this, or a client who loves what you do, what you teach, who desperately needs your knowledge and guidance, will set your mind for good and productive work.
• Make faces: Not for shorts, of course, but as a stretch before the recording session. Open your mouth wide, say “Aaaaa”, make a tube with your lips say “Ouuu”, blink your eyes very fast, and do this for 10 seconds, changing faces and stretching your facial muscles. This technique, used by actors, will make your face more expressive and help release tension.
• Slap your face: Why not slap your face and say: “Focus!”? Just kidding. Gently pat your cheeks to get more blood circulation, which can make you look fresher and wake you up. I often do this when I am really tired and record late. I do it before calls so that I can pass on positive and general energy.
• Shake your face: Shaking can also be relaxing. It helps to release tension in the neck and facial muscles. But ensure the following conditions are met:
  • You don’t have a neck problem
  • You don’t have a problem with your blood vessels

You can actually combine this with shaking all of your body. Let’s talk about this in the next section.

Body Language

After our eyes and face, what people subconsciously analyze is our body language. It includes our posture, how we use our hands, and how much space we allow ourselves to take.

• Posture: The issue with many new content creators is that we often take a protective defense pose, for the same reason we have a stone or resting face. We are insecure in a new role. We are stressed and want to fight or hide. What does a protective posture look like?
  • Arched back
  • Shoulders forward
  • The neck is hidden
  • The head sinks down

Let’s see how we can fix it:

• Shake your body: We started talking about this before; we said shake your face. What helps even better both for the face and your body to release tension is shaking your whole body. My physician recommended it to get rid of stress and tension, and a professional actor recommended it in his acting training. I recommend it; try it, and you will thank me later. Recommended by actors and physicians.

Have you seen how children like to let their hands loose and do sporadic movements? They get pleasure from this experience. Well, you, as a grown-up, might be shy to do so even when you are alone in a closed room. Imagine the blocks people have. And all this blockage gets reflected on camera.

So be like a child, shake your body, allow those sounds that will get out of your mouth because of the shaking.

• Take a deep breath: Fill your lungs with air; take a deep breath! Inhale – Exhale at least three times. Relax shoulders, and drop them. Shoulders should not be at the level of your ears.

Here is one technique to relax your shoulders:

• Raise your shoulders as high as possible
• Tense your muscles
• Hold for 3 seconds
• Release

Muscles tend to relax after being stressed. This is how you relax your shoulders. Taking a deep breath also means you should not have a shallow breath. A shallow breath is when you breathe so shallowly that there is almost no sound of air in your airways. We do it when we hide, try to be invisible. But on camera, you have a totally different goal: On camera, you should be visible. Shallow breath will result in you talking at the top of your lungs all the time, unable to change intonation and add dynamics to your speech.

Here is a technique that will help you to have a deeper breath:

• Make 10 squats

This also helps to get rid of the Kardashians’ style of talking. “Resting voice,” they say. This also does not sound confident. Rather indifferent.

If you can’t do 10 full squats, do 5 chair squats. Sit and get up 5 times. We want your lungs to open up for air.

Generally, physical exercises help to open up your lungs. Vocal trainers recommend doing cardio training for the same reason.

20 minutes of the following exercise a day will help:

• Running
• Power walking
• Elliptical machine
• Bike
• Skipping rope

Now the topic that is connected to the breath is the tone of your voice and speech dynamics.

Tone of Your Voice and Speech Dynamics

Attractive speech is the one that has dynamics. It means if you imagine your voice as a wave, the dynamic speech would have a wave with high peaks and low deep amplitudes. Independently of your style of speaking, you should have amplitude.

For example, let me read the following sample in the same tone, loudness: “The big brown dog barked loudly at the blue sky, while the wind whistled through the tall trees.” This is monotone.

To add dynamics, you need to change the volume, emphasize words, make pauses, and more. We can get deeper into this in a different video. At this point, you need to try to avoid making it monotone and add a little bit of life.

Hand Gestures

Hands also help in communicating and help you have dynamic speech. You might have noticed that it is easier to record a selfie with you having to hold a camera in your hands and only articulating with one hand than sitting in front of the camera that is far, and you are totally exposed to it.

Unexperienced content creators often make one of the following mistakes:

• The hands hanging down because of not knowing how to use them. Sometimes there is an opposite hand
• The excessive articulation when your hands are moving up and down with such speed that you almost can’t see them because of the motion blur

Both cases need to be worked on. Let’s do the following experiment.

Try saying this sentence with the hands hanging down and the hands used to articulate while speaking: “The big brown dog barked loudly at the blue sky, while the wind whistled through the tall trees.”

Did you notice that the same sentence becomes more dynamic when you are using hands?

Articulation with your hands might not be your style of communication, but it definitely helps to add dynamics.

TV anchors are trained to change a few positions of the hands:

• Hands together (gentle lock)
• Right hand at the belly button level, left hand articulating
• Left hand at the belly button level, right hand articulating
• Both hands articulating

You don’t want to have excessive waving of your hands, and you don’t want them to be the same. So you can apply this set of hand positions, change them in whatever order you want.

Try this in front of the mirror and with a few training sessions, you will get a grip on it. With time, they will look more natural, and you will not think of the hands at all. You would rather use them as tools.

Space

Another topic related to hands but worth mentioning separately. People tend to try to be more compact in public, on the stage, and in front of the camera. The hands are usually glued to the torso and moving only from the elbow down.

You need to allow yourself to have more space. Open your hands and move them freely.

I would say another issue after understanding that you need to give yourself space is to try to stay in the open position as little time as possible and then return to the closed position for safety.

You need to train yourself to have open arms. Not to be afraid to do so.

I hope this helps you. I have moved improving your speech separately. So, see you in the next video.