Lessons

Lesson Info

Camera Performance with Michael Port - Part 1

In this section, we're gonna talk about performance and charisma two of my least favorite vietnam kitty because it's hard I mean, like who who here doesn't really like being on camera besides me show of hands, so yeah, I mean it's it's, not something we do every day, so when I first started doing video, I had a little webcam and there was something called ustream dot tv. It was before google hangouts who said all right, you know what? I'll test this out at the time, I had a lovely old pug named stella the pug who used to sleep next to me on the floor and snore really loud because she's a pug and I said, well, you know what? I'll make stella, my guinea pig, I'll do a live webcast with stella, so I put the webcam on the floor next to stella while she was sleeping in her bed and snoring real cute, so she's snoring away and I'm watching the webcast twelve you was eighteen, viewers, twenty six few issues. She had about thirty, viewers watching stella, the pug sleeping on the floor snowing s...

o I said, man, I'm gonna crush this. So I said, the next day I set up the web cam, I'm going to do my broadcast, I'm all good to go six viewers still ahead four times especially so it doesn't always work out the way you know eventually people started watching but still of the pug you know basically kicked my ass when it came to uh but a lot of this segment has to do with performing on camera and being on camera and I like to call the section sort of the don't fear the webcam section get clicker here because you do have to kind of embrace it at some point as much as we may not want to be on video and be front and center we really have to be on camera to make that connection to do the google hangout we connect with folks to engage people so a lot of times people say well, you know is there a way to do this without being on camera? There are certain videos where you're just gonna have to suck it up and be on camera the welcome video that we talked about that we're gonna work on more tomorrow is a good example if there's something on your website people are coming to your website for the first time they want to see who you are, what you're all about and they want to see you they don't want to you know necessarily see a bunch of fancy graphics or pictures they're coming to the website to see can you help them with a certain problem? Can you solve something for them? So that's one of the times that you're just gonna have to be on camera whether you want to be or not um and about me video is another example obviously if you do about me video you should probably be in that video so they're going to be times regardless we're gonna have to be on camera so there's a few ways to deal with that I mean, you know, I know some folks who just say you know what? Suck it up, buttercup just get out there and do it other folks say you know what if you rehearse if you practice if you get ready to be on camera not as difficult as you think about it a lot of folks I think they think all right I need to be on camera I need do this and I need to do it in half an hour and I could only do three takes well why? I mean, I've seen having worked in la la land in los angeles the best actors and actresses in the world do twenty thirty, forty takes so it may take a few takes for you to get that video right and it may take a little rehearsal, but with practice you get more comfortable with it and I know we talked a little bit earlier about, you know, talking to the webcam versus talking to an audience which has its own challenges and in a few minutes we'll have michael join us michael port join us to talk about performing on camera and one of the things that we learned from him I know we'll remember this and maybe tony too, because she works with michael as well is michael says to do big things in the world, you have to get comfortable being uncomfortable, so to be on camera it may just be one of those things it's not something that we're used to it's not something that we all want to necessarily do, but at some point they're going to be times when you do just have to be on camera so and as I mentioned, I don't particularly like being on camera, I just feel like, you know, I have a lot of really good information to share and a lot of stuff that's important for you guys to know, so I'm going to say, like, all right, I'm just going to get over myself and be on camera and share the information and it's really funny, you know, when you do when you're on, especially when you're doing something live like a google hangout on air or something like that uh, things will happen like you will miss speak you will forget someone's name who you very clearly know their name on dh things will happen and you just have to get over it and just accept that you are human that people know you're human that that can actually be a good thing if people see you like make mistakes and be a human because it connects you it creates that trust but just accepting that if you're doing something live there will be problems I think that you know right before we went on here I just vast was kind enough to tell me that I had broccoli in my teeth so I'm like yeah, I I should probably take care of that before we go in but you know, it happens nobody's perfect especially in the world of online video you know, the expectation is not that we're not walking down the red carpet with brad and angelina you know, it's basically we're trying to communicate a message we're trying to share our message we're trying to get the word out about what we do um I want us pause before we go to michael just to kind of get a sense of some of those on camera fear some of the things that you might want to kind of get when we talk to michael about performance and charisma and then in a few minutes we'll bring him on and go from there so anything stick out about you know, going on camera I think that's one of the biggest single fears of doing video is just the fact of, you know, putting yourself fun center anybody to I could just say I may have no fear whatsoever the only part it's scary the only part that I have trouble with this what this I'm saying give me a script, I'll cheer it with the world that I just don't know exactly how I want to say what I want to say that's my big great so you my christian kind of folks on from suze, huh? I've worked with quite a lot of different speaker trainers I did a workshop with michael with your excellent and er and others and this I don't know if the different schools of thought of it but there's some people say, look, you should write a script and memorize it practice fifty times and so that it's so automatic that you can relax and be natural and you've got all the words there in your head already and they're in some who's sort of take him over sort of safety more spontaneous have an idea of what you're going to say, but just let it come out naturally and I don't think there's a clear answer, you know thing one is better than the other, but do you have anything to say about it? Yeah, I think it's personal preference because and that's something that I struggle with myself my sense is that if you're doing an online video that's, you know two or three minutes you should probably just have, you know, points in your head or your bullet points again you know, this is pretty high tech but I taped an index card below the webcam three little bullet points so I know ok in this video I have to say this this and this and I try to be spontaneous and just kind of go with it if you're doing, uh, teaching video or longer video of something that's a half an hour or so six hours you know I have you know, kind of scripted in my head and in order but you know, it's tough to memorize six hours with material so I think it depends on the situation and what you're comfortable with if you're doing a three minute video and you want to have the exact script and a teleprompter and every single line and that's what's going to make you perform best great if you're doing a three minute video and you absolutely want to go off the cuff that's great too I mean like you know soo is not afraid to be on camera she just needs to know exactly what she's going to say and you will even have a script for that or you'll have bullet points well, you'll have, you know, something written on the back of some health I mean, I've got slide, so I honestly when I'm doing a longer video or a teaching video I kind of used my slides all not just for visual aid but also as a reference point so although oh yeah I'm supposed to be talking about this because that helps me not get off track as well good questions anything from the chat yeah we've got a couple of interesting ones we've got good day who says russ I hate having to do my hair which is funny says says seriously working from home means I don't have to get ready for the public but it is something where you actually mean to put or can need to put some effort into what you're looking like that something yeah uh we have ah kathy who says I'm on oxygen and have to oxygen hose when I videotaped my breathing when I'm on video is labored and it sounds like I'm out of breath I always feel the need to explain why I'm on oxygen and him self conscious because of it yeah that's tough I mean I think if you know people are going to be very understanding and sympathetic, you know, once they know what's going on and once they understand that and especially if she's doing video siri's she probably would have established up front that you know hey, this is why I may seem a little breathless at times so uh you know again people are very forgiving because they want information or answers that you probably have on dh they don't really care you know how they get it as long as they get it on and it is I will admit it definitely more difficult I believe as a woman to kind of be on camera because you know they have more here and like I just cut my hair off so I don't have to worry because I used to have pretty long here like in that moses video that was my actual here so and a lot of times honestly I'll put like a shirt on and have shorts and sandals below because I'm only shooting from this far up but there are things you didn't need to consider, so when you're going to be on camera it's like yeah, you might want to get, you know, gussy up or whatever the expression is and it's kind of a pain, which is why I also suggests batch ing your videos. So a lot of times when I do video, I say I you know, it's august, I got my tan going and I can you know where this should it's nice and quiet, I'm going to go up into five videos, so if I'm going to, you know, go to the, you know, extents effort of getting dressed, I'm gonna do a bunch of videos at once and you could do that and you, khun you know folks like oh my god do I have to change with every video to have to do a wardrobe change well you know you khun excessive eyes at a scarf or yeah I mean I have like two or three shirts and you know if I'm doing a whole bunch of videos I'll just you know, change a couple times so it sounds like our guest michel is ready and I learned something from michael recently who is also awesome at performance but he tells us that the performance actually begins when your bio is red not when you walk on stage so for that reason I'm gonna actually read michael's bio and this is another good point when you're being introduced don't just say oh just wing it we've known each other for years if you want them to say something specific give them something specific to say having said that I'm going to be michael's who has been called in uncommonly honest author by the boston globe and a marketing guru by the wall street journal and a sales gu by the financial times michael port is a best selling author off five books including book yourself solid and the think big manifesto he's probably the only new york times bestselling book author to have also been a professional successful professional actor guest starring on shows like sex in the city I saw that it was hilarious law and order and films like the pelican brief and down to earth and these days, michael convinced be seen regularly on msnbc, cnbc and pbs as an on air expert in communication and business development. In addition to his book yourself solid of coach training and large mentoring programs michael on his partner amy meet of the co founders of heroic public speaking. You may have seen that on creative live recently offense tastic, creative life, and I watched it many times to prepare for this. Michael is a great friend of creative live and he's given two of the most popular programmes, book yourself solid and as I mentioned, who work public speaking, you can find them in the course catalogue under money in business. And I also want to mention that michael and I go way back. He's been a huge friend and mentor and help to me. So thank you so much, michael, for doing this. So happy to have you there is michael port. Thanks. Wait, folks here, many, many of these folks know you already. All right? Well, hearts hear tony's here we've got lots of friends and followers, so thank you for doing this. I really appreciate it. So, michael, we've been talking about performing and performing on camera, and I know I've been watching the creative live that you did with amy about performing on stage and what we're interested in here primarily is how do you translate that performing on stage to performing on video when you don't it's really kind of apples and oranges, isn't it well I wouldn't call it apples and oranges I would say there's definitely some differences but the fundamentals are the same so the most obvious difference is the size so you know I can't be doing this all over the place where are causing problems and certainly when you are on a video stream, it'll actually start to break down the faster you move because often the band with I can't keep up with what you're doing so certainly the size of your performance makes a difference the connection that you made to annoyance on video is through the nyse and stillness is very, very powerful but here's, the thing is you don't have a contrast in the performance it gets born so if the entire time I'm just like this staring at you, my voice is very monotone it's very quiet after about five minutes, ten minutes you start to go to sleep and if I've got, you know got managing our with you well, you know it's going to be a terry more difficult to keep you away you going so you do need some movement you do any lots of all variation, pacing, variation and most importantly, the ability to control but when you feel physically because I was listening just for a few minutes before I came on so when asked a question about nerves and one of the things that the performer knows how to do is to control how they feel because we all get nervous I think that nerves anxiety before you speak is just the demonstration of your respect for the audience if you don't care about them in honors if you care about them, then you probably didn't notice because you want to do a great job we put all this pressure on ourselves as soon as the camera goes on as soon as we walked up on stage to somehow that was some respect that was supposed to behave differently that somehow we're all of a sudden supposed to be this magical a person that can tell jokes and can you know wow audiences and justo like them in some way that's outside of ourselves but actually the way we well lines is the way mito light audiences is by being more ourselves a fully self expressed version of ourselves the amplified version of the most compelling best parts of ourselves so the actor knows how to manage their breathing they know how to manage the way they feel from their fingertips all the way down on their toes and I know how to manage how they speak, so when you do get nervous you can control which is why in the course that aim united on creative life, her own public speaking, we focus a lot on voice work, breath, work, speech work because those are the things that when you having under control then you feel more comfortable and you can do when they're there to do so. Another of another thing that's very similar is motivation, so when you're on stage, you need to choose your motivation. You have a reason for doing what you're doing same thing's true on video now a lot of people will use the video for promotional purposes trade under too, but if if your goal in the video is to promote, then you don't make the same kind of connection to the viewer or with the viewer that you could if you had higher aspirations and your motivation now, if you have higher aspirations in your motivation, you will also set you don't have to worry about selling when you have very clear intentions, very clear objectives, very clear motivations. So what am I trying to get you to do to think to feel and the last to anything? You are ultimately the most important places to start what I want them to think, how do I want them to feel? And then of course what island them to do, but they won't do the thing I wanted to do unless they think the way that I want him to think and feel the way that I want them to feel and that's for the stage and fairview same exact thing no difference there and so I asked everybody in the host of giants and in the room in the room with you to think about what they want to do for me listen just one venue that would like to do something specific then you feel like what I created this five hundred to you with this two and a half minute video you'll be really good for my business now the first thing you think of this good good for my business great. Okay now the next is what I want to do I want that knocked into a newsletter I want them you know tio play this bible under whatever it is because that's the second thing you think great but let's go to the feeling and the thinking so when you write your script what is the motivation for everything you say and if you have that will start influenced the way you move the way you look the way you breathe the way you feel then ultimately the wave a view and that's that's the most important aspect of any kind of performance and video and and theater or stage performance is no different so the contrast is what's often most difficult when you're doing video because in the theater you have such diana movement that you can use you can go in the audience and go up on stage you could move them stage right or stage left from state to state right you go stand on a chair you go lie down for it so many different things if I could light flow right now yeah so just standing up and then the city down or be moving my desk down is not the kind of contrast that will work in a presentation of performance so we have to find other than tracked by different ways of connecting. So can we get audience interaction when we're in video? I think we can can we get him to talk to us in the comment section while we're getting the video? Can we get him to write things down to raise their hands to say things out lap to stand up to sit down to move around absolutely we can ask them to do all of these things and if there's a compelling reason for them to do these things then here will we do now I don't know what you're talking about cutting video together you've been teaching them how to do that but the best entertainers in the world are the ones who can create an extraordinary amount of contrast in the video in such a way that feel seamless creative minds so many courses on how to shoot video have any video etcetera so everything is there a creep like this is this is something that people who want to learn more about how to end it uh could do than go watching us, but just straight on camera just in one shot for a long period of time can get bored even if your conscience don't even what you're saying has residents it connect so can you start to learn how to cut your videos together can do with three cameras set up, take that footage dumping into ah you know final cut pro and it's those moving nice and smoothly throughout so you get some different angles I think that would be the next step but it's another way to create contracts and I do think with the technology we have I don't think you need to be a professional if you want her to do multi camera set up and then is that is not to know, but I want to do something with video for example I have ah training program in public, your olympic training program coming up and instead of doing a written sale stage we do a video to thirty three minutes. There was a long video that's along kind of be on all the promotion going up to the event is all video, so I go to a professional professions for this I flew out to st louis to our crew because we're good at that level for thirty thirty three minute video, it has got to be off the charts, but I mean you at home, I can still do a multi camera sound makes you simple cuts and create some contrast that way as well, absolutely, this is great stuff, so if you are, I mean this some folks who would consider those health public speakers and other folks who do video, but they're things that you could take kind of from the world of theater or public speaking and translate to video given that you know, you don't have the stage and you don't have the range that you have the kind of constrained to the screen, sure, so that those are some of the things that we've been talking about this far, but one of the things you gotta watch out for his hands because we leaves our hands to talk, which is great, but you notice when I was in my hands and trying to keep them at the bottom of the frame, I'm not doing the blue list here's the thing I saw a video of a woman who was teaching you how to use your hands on video to get people because nlp hypnosis thing like with that so she was teaching you how to use your hands when you spoke and I felt like there was this weird hands thinker and big man hands coming at me because they were in front of the front of her and between her and the camera so you can still move your body and still talk but you keep your hands in the lower part frame and then it doesn't it's not distract where you could be much more dynamic on the stage with your arms uh, it looks natural jack it's actually quite compelling, but you know it's right now that I was standing up one of the reasons I stand it because it gives me more energy I also stand up straight when I'm sitting in the chair, my shoulders start to hunch forward and my energy starts to go down so I have this desk is I should do that goes up and down, and so if I want to go in the middle of this broadcast that can sit down and I can't change my energy from matty, so I don't have a chair, but if I sat down and change my energy let's start talking like this and so so this is, um this is, um this is serious, but we need to talk about I want you to listen here, so think about this and now we have different energy and if you can play a role that has constantly changing energy based on what you're trying to achieve with that person on the other side of the screen, then you'll be much more connected to them. So what is your objective from everything you say, that's? What? I want them to do what they were looking, their scripts. What am I trying to achieve with his life? What am I trying to achieve with this story when I'm trying to achieve with this advice?