In moving to an online church model, it’s important to keep evaluating our efforts and constantly tweak to improve user engagement. Here are three things to remember:

#1. Think of the camera as your best friend

When we speak to a room full of people we naturally pan the room with our eyes. We look at people directly and from that, we get cues that we use to adjust on the fly in order to communicate well. With no one in the room that’s gone. But even though I’m not there physically, I’m still in the room with you so it’s essential to engage me.  If you don’t, I’m gonna change the channel and chances are you won’t even know I’m gone.

When we think of the camera as our best friend, you are going to start to use vocal choices and phrasings that you would use just as if your actual best friend was in the room with you. You will naturally smile and look at me are going to smile and ultimately this is going to make you look more comfortable on the camera and also with the person watching. This is engaging and makes me want to continue the conversation with you.

#2. Look at the Camera

I cannot stress how important it is for you to look at the camera. When you look at the camera, you are looking at and connecting with me. Inversely, looking away at notes or down to a confidence monitor breaks that connection. To help with this, position the camera so that it is at eye level is in front of you and if you do need reminders, position them so that when you glance at them, you are still looking at the camera.

#3. Remember the Frame

Staging the shot is critically important to viewer engagement and to do this well, you need to be aware of where the subject is within the frame.  If the subject has lots of empty space surrounding them in the shot especially above them, it becomes very visually distracting and there is a lot more to look at then just you – sometimes things you don’t want me to see. A good rule of thumb is to zoom in so the subject’s eyes are in the top third of the shot with a tiny little bit of breathing room above them so the head isn’t cut off. Also, unless you have someone moving the camera, the subject should stay planted in the same place so you don’t get an empty screen if the subject accidentally walks away.

As a side point, it’s preferable to shoot in the horizontal (landscape) perspective rather than vertical.  If Facebook live is your medium, this is a challenge for some android devices but here is a link to a tutorial that will potential help set up landscape mode.

Hope you find these tips helpful and I’d love to hear your feedback questions, or questions you have. Email me at tim@clifec.org.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Guest Blog by Tim Antoniuk. Tim is a creator, producer, designer, and director. He loves the church and all things tech. He is a church online specialist.