While Hollywood can afford a high ratio of footage shot to used, you cannot. Don’t waste time editing your web videos; know what you’ll get before pressing record. Save time and reduce frustrating wasted takes with a Full HD monitor that shows clearly (in real time) every pixel your camera sees.

Image: Andrew Biss uses a Full HD monitor to more easily check what the camera sees. Verifying what you’ll get before hitting the record button saves a lot of time compared to trying to fix mistakes in the edit process. [If your RSS reader doesn’t show the YouTube video embedded above then please visit the original post in your browser.]

Monitor your recordings

Place a large Full HD 1920×1080 monitor near your camera to make it easy to check what your camera can really see when you are setting up to record a new video. It is also easier to review what you actually recorded at the end of each take.

Monitoring is especially valuable if you disassemble your set between recordings so office life can continue. Even though you mark exactly where everything was last time, things always seem to be a little different next time.

Without monitoring you risk unintended objects in view, or a background that is not quite wide enough. While you can fix these when editing, this wastes time and is frustrating. Better to check all is OK before pressing record.

With my external monitor I am sure what I see will exactly match the recording. I need no longer be concerned when I bring the content into Sony Vegas that a light is visible or my background is not quite wide enough.

HDMI mode and overscan

My ViewSonic VX2260WM panel has 2 HDMI settings: PC (monitor mode) and AV (TV mode), which differ in the overscan area. This goes back to TV which sends extra non-visible picture lines with teletext and other supporting information.

Connecting my Windows notebook in TV mode cuts off a lot of pixels. In PC mode the full 1920×1080 pixels are visible and fill the screen. Monitor mode tells the display there is no hidden information and to display all pixels.

My Canon LEGRIA HF S10 camcorder automatically forces TV mode when connected to the ViewSonic monitor. This cuts off the image’s edges, which is not at all helpful as a key job of the monitor is to check exactly what the camera sees!

I solved this by simply changing the HDMI connection type on the ViewSonic monitor from TV mode to monitor mode. All 1920×1080 pixels recorded by the camera are now visible (and pin sharp). It is a pleasure to work with this recording setup.

Next time

In the next video in this series I show you how I place my external monitor with respect to my camera when recording these web videos. With this monitor and camera setup I am sure what my camera really sees before I press the record button.