No Tech Skills? Over 40? Here's how to start creating videos

you're ready to create you want to be on YouTube and you want to be doing videos but you're you're terrified maybe you're scared or you're stopped of the tech in fact a lot a lot of times what I see is people say well I'm not a techie I get labeled a techie by the way if we haven't met my name is Kevin Colby and thank you for watching and being here I'm over 60 and I'm trying to help people over 40 just continue to do video and I think one of the things I see a

lot is like you know well I'm in my 40s or 50s or 60s or 70s or whatever and I'm just I'm not a techie you don't have to be a techie to create content uh I've said before I mean I've been in the video world for a long time there's still a lot I don't know either you know I can creatively show you how to use a camera but can I like get into the nitty-gritty and and tell you everything technically about it no in fact I don't even read the manual I just kind of

start playing so what I want to do is help you kind of get past that so you can create now I'm going to assume that you already have some ideas like you you you have an idea or ideas of what you want to create and if you haven't there's a video I've done on that I'll put a link to that down in the description that hopefully will help you just come up with ideas in fact there's even one down there to come up with your Niche and stuff too so what I want to go through

is several things to help you kind of get past that so you can create my goal with this video is to make it very simple to even spark some ideas so step number number one you ready simplify your gear I think that is one of the biggest things that can stop people is that you know they they feel like they've got to have the right gear I see this all the time you know I it's like I don't want to just use my phone why not now now granted for this video I have my Canon

camera mounted on my desk I'm using it as a webcam and things like that but you know a lot of times I use my web phone my my phone my iPhone on laptops every laptop I'm a I'm a Mac dude but on laptops I think even Windows they have a built-in camera use it is it the highest quality no but you know what don't we don't even worry about that right now use that use a webcam uh for a long time I used a Elgato face cam I think it's I think it's under a hundred

bucks there's nothing fancy about it there's some free software where you can do some different things but if you've got a phone I'm I'm going to say iPhone cuz I'm an iPhone user but if you've got a phone use your phone I mean that is the easiest thing my gut is I could be wrong but my gut is if you have a phone you've probably at some point taken a picture on it you've probably at some point shot a video on there of it so what I would do is just use your phone and start

recording I would turn it horizontal like this way you know rather than vertical unless you're doing shorts as far as a microphone you could just use the built-in mic on the phone now some webcams don't have a built-in mic some do it's only going to be okay if you're in a quiet location the microphones on the iPhones have gotten better and better and better other than that you can buy some very inexpensive mics that just plug right into the phone sometimes you can just clip them on your shirt I'll put a link to to a

couple that I have and use down there that I think are affordable and easy to use okay so the second thing to kind of get over the techy part is simplify the software here's what I mean by that this can be another thing that I think uh holds people up is like well I don't know how to do and I don't know what to do and there's a lot there's a lot of options out there I've had questions about which software I use like right now again I'm recording this on my computer using my Canon

camera I have a mic just out of uh the shot of the camera but the mic is like I think it's a $99 mic I'm using ecam to record this but other softwares I use have been streamyard and Riverside and OBS and all these other ones and I don't want to bog you down with that but what I'm what I'm getting at is is that if you're using your computer and you're on a Mac again I'm a Mac guy so that's what I can speak to use QuickTime quick time is free QuickTime comes with your

computer once you pay for it also you could use something like Loom now Loom has a free and a paid plan but you can do a lot with loom I think on the free plan it's limited to 5 minutes but it works on a PC or Mac because it's a browser program you just create an account totally free you can use it I've used it before just to to uh shoot something and maybe even do a squ a quick screen share and whatever camera you have connected to your laptop to your computer will pick that

up so you don't need anything fancy mine's not that fancy but fancy like mine or on your iPhone we're going to go back to the iPhone there 's a lot of different camera apps some of them are really cool some of them are very simple some of them take I think a scientist to figure out I would use the native app that comes with the phone the camera app you know it looks like the little camera icon and when you click on it it'll pop it up and over on the right hand side you'll have

the option of either photo or video just go to video and you've got lenses on the back and lenses on the front so the front is like the selfie one right I would use that yeah there's going to be people say well it's not the best you know what don't even think about that just use it because that way you can see yourself and you can hit record and go so that simplifies the software to get you to create and another step simplify the process here's what I mean by that it is easy um to

get caught up in the process of how you do it what I would recommend is hit record and go for it now you might have to come up with notes and things like I have notes for this video see there's my notes I don't script but I create some notes just to kind of keep me Keep Me in the area that I want to talk about but once you do that you could press record and go I think this would work for almost any topic you do now I realize there's certain things that that may

need more uh more finesse as you're going but if you just hit record and go for it and have your thoughts together that will simplify the process right there now maybe you have to do several takes and that's okay let's say you can't do it all in one take then just hit record say what you need to say stop hit record Say What You Need to Say and stop and maybe you have 12 of those it's not necessarily you're not striving for Perfection you're just striving to get it done you're going to have to put

all those clips together so it doesn't really simplify the process but if you if you just do that that is that is another way of doing it and finally just don't overproduce your video I can speak from experience on this I've been producing for a long time and trust me I it's well let me just say this it's easy for me to overproduce and so even in this kind of this this newer phase of me creating I'm trying to underproduce in fact these Graphics that I've been sharing were strictly done on my Apple notes using

there's a little pin button there and I used my finger to write it if you can't write it if you can't read it I'm I'm I'm very sorry but I didn't even do special graphics for that this but even like when I edit in Final Cut Pro there's so many built-in uh effects in there that you wouldn't even have to buy anything but I think if you just simplify the process keep it based on your message on the value on what you're teaching and don't worry about trying to we used to call this in television

junking it up you know adding graphics and Transitions and stuff like that that don't add to the video there is a time and place for that but that's a different video I wouldn't even add music I wouldn't add sound effects I would strip it down to the very basic to simplify it that helps you create so I hope these steps help you get past that fear of the gear and not being a techie and stuff like that I'm not going to promise that you'll ever be a Tech head but you don't need to now if

you're doing a tech Channel yeah you might have to be a techie don't worry about what you don't know concentrate on what you can do to create and share your gifts with the world because I guarantee you this there is somebody out there that needs you and what you have to say