Hello, dear reader, I hope you’re doing well. Last week I did an overview on the hardware I use to make YouTube videos. Today I wanted to focus on the software, and this article is in no way sponsored by any of the programs I’m talking about. I’ll explain what I use, what I’ve learned, and what items you may want to look into for yourself. I’m still focusing on recording video games and how I do it. I’ve been adjusting to using Apple product compatible software and, honestly, I encourage anyone who’s just starting out, to invest in PC compatible hardware and software.
In case you didn’t read the last article: I use an iMac, iPad Air 2, an Elgato HD 60 game capture device, a lightning adapter for the iPad to connect to the Elgato device, an Apogee Mic 96k microphone, a USB 2.0 hub, earbud headphones and a place to record. Some of the hardware comes with its own software which is helpful for recording videos. Once again, I would advise anyone trying purely to make YouTube videos to invest in a PC rather than a Mac, and to find a decent alternative microphone and software. The software I use includes the Elgato game capture software, Clip Studio Paint Pro, Affinity Photo, Affinity Design, GarageBand, iMovie, Handbrake, and YouTube itself.
Elgato’s hardware comes with software to help you edit videos, adjust game music, and record your commentary. It is a must for me. I set background music and sound effects at -36 dB. I’m soft-spoken and I don’t want to strain my voice if I’m recording for long periods of time. Note that there are a couple tricks to getting your microphone to work, and to turn off your own voice if you are streaming. Let me know if you’d like a more detailed guide of my steps for getting the mic to work properly. Otherwise I won’t waste your time, dear reader.
Clip Studio Paint Pro, Affinity Photo, and Affinity Design help me make images for videos. I drew the Let’s Play Knights of the Old Republic thumbnail with Clip Studio Paint Pro. Affinity Photo and Affinity Design help me make the Lunar Nebula LLC Gaming Intro and Outro pictures on the videos. Affinity design is cool because it can work with vector images. They’re pretty powerful Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator substitutes. Make sure you save any final images as JPEG’s if you are using iMovie. I learned that lesson the hard way.
GarageBand is a free Mac program which has a feature called Apple Loops. If you want to spend a lot of time in the program you can make very detailed pieces of music, use and record MIDI instruments, or use previously constructed unlicensed freely available musical loops called Apple Loops. If you don’t like what you find in the Apple Loops library there are other sites online which provide even more instrumental loops.
The free iMovie software Macs come with is powerful. However, the iMovie help section is limited, it’s hard to find good information about the most current version and updates, it’s not always intuitive to learn, and it won’t give you as many options as other software. The cool thing about iMovie is it will find the movie clips, images, and music on your computer and bookmark that information. This means creating a prototype for your movie will not take up extra space on your computer because it is not saved as a separate file. Once I have the movie clips, pictures, and sound where I want them I do have to save the file. It is usually larger than a gigabyte when completed. That’s where the program Handbrake comes in.
Handbrake is file compression software. It will compress a 1 GB video file down to approximately 96 MB with minute quality loss. This makes the file 0.096 times the size of the original. It dramatically decreases the upload time from uploading videos to YouTube. It’s like shrinking the 151 foot tall Statue of Liberty down to 1.5 feet in height. Never try to upload a 1 GB file to YouTube if you can help it. The compressed file takes about 30 minutes to upload on a good day.
YouTube has much to offer new creators. Its creator studio can give you access to free music. Make sure to check the license to see if you need to attribute the creator or not. It can save you a lot of time with GarageBand to find a good piece of ready-made music! It allows you to schedule videos for release, keep videos private so you can ensure the video is how you want it before release, and give you monetization options.
Once the video is uploaded, I make sure the news will reach my social media outlets when the videos are released to the public. Voilà! A YouTube video is born.
Overall, there are many resources available for finding out what software you may need. If you are recording gameplay on a computer you should check OBS and XSplit recording software at https://obsproject.com/ and https://www.xsplit.com/. Feel free to message me, comment below, or wait until I finally decide to write an article on the deeper mechanics of YouTube if you want more information. Have a good day, dear reader!
In case you didn’t read the last article: I use an iMac, iPad Air 2, an Elgato HD 60 game capture device, a lightning adapter for the iPad to connect to the Elgato device, an Apogee Mic 96k microphone, a USB 2.0 hub, earbud headphones and a place to record. Some of the hardware comes with its own software which is helpful for recording videos. Once again, I would advise anyone trying purely to make YouTube videos to invest in a PC rather than a Mac, and to find a decent alternative microphone and software. The software I use includes the Elgato game capture software, Clip Studio Paint Pro, Affinity Photo, Affinity Design, GarageBand, iMovie, Handbrake, and YouTube itself.
Elgato’s hardware comes with software to help you edit videos, adjust game music, and record your commentary. It is a must for me. I set background music and sound effects at -36 dB. I’m soft-spoken and I don’t want to strain my voice if I’m recording for long periods of time. Note that there are a couple tricks to getting your microphone to work, and to turn off your own voice if you are streaming. Let me know if you’d like a more detailed guide of my steps for getting the mic to work properly. Otherwise I won’t waste your time, dear reader.
Clip Studio Paint Pro, Affinity Photo, and Affinity Design help me make images for videos. I drew the Let’s Play Knights of the Old Republic thumbnail with Clip Studio Paint Pro. Affinity Photo and Affinity Design help me make the Lunar Nebula LLC Gaming Intro and Outro pictures on the videos. Affinity design is cool because it can work with vector images. They’re pretty powerful Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator substitutes. Make sure you save any final images as JPEG’s if you are using iMovie. I learned that lesson the hard way.
GarageBand is a free Mac program which has a feature called Apple Loops. If you want to spend a lot of time in the program you can make very detailed pieces of music, use and record MIDI instruments, or use previously constructed unlicensed freely available musical loops called Apple Loops. If you don’t like what you find in the Apple Loops library there are other sites online which provide even more instrumental loops.
The free iMovie software Macs come with is powerful. However, the iMovie help section is limited, it’s hard to find good information about the most current version and updates, it’s not always intuitive to learn, and it won’t give you as many options as other software. The cool thing about iMovie is it will find the movie clips, images, and music on your computer and bookmark that information. This means creating a prototype for your movie will not take up extra space on your computer because it is not saved as a separate file. Once I have the movie clips, pictures, and sound where I want them I do have to save the file. It is usually larger than a gigabyte when completed. That’s where the program Handbrake comes in.
Handbrake is file compression software. It will compress a 1 GB video file down to approximately 96 MB with minute quality loss. This makes the file 0.096 times the size of the original. It dramatically decreases the upload time from uploading videos to YouTube. It’s like shrinking the 151 foot tall Statue of Liberty down to 1.5 feet in height. Never try to upload a 1 GB file to YouTube if you can help it. The compressed file takes about 30 minutes to upload on a good day.
YouTube has much to offer new creators. Its creator studio can give you access to free music. Make sure to check the license to see if you need to attribute the creator or not. It can save you a lot of time with GarageBand to find a good piece of ready-made music! It allows you to schedule videos for release, keep videos private so you can ensure the video is how you want it before release, and give you monetization options.
Once the video is uploaded, I make sure the news will reach my social media outlets when the videos are released to the public. Voilà! A YouTube video is born.
Overall, there are many resources available for finding out what software you may need. If you are recording gameplay on a computer you should check OBS and XSplit recording software at https://obsproject.com/ and https://www.xsplit.com/. Feel free to message me, comment below, or wait until I finally decide to write an article on the deeper mechanics of YouTube if you want more information. Have a good day, dear reader!