Just curious is there anyone who knows how to make a video? It’s something that I am cooking up for my guild. I’m technically challenged LOL. I have an idea of what I want to deo, general take on an intro/outro. It’ll definitely have that “Halloween Feel” to it.
Well…my account is inactive so I don’t know why I can suddenly reply here, and I can’t tell you how to contact me in game 'cause I quit ages ago, but ANYway. Making videos is fun! I don’t know what kind of info you’re looking for so I’mma just ramble.
Record game footage at the highest settings you can without the resulting video dropping frames. I use the built in game capture on my NVidia card for capturing game footage, and I think OBS streaming software does game capture (free open-source, OBSProject), and maybe XSplit does too? And I think the Microsoft Game Bar has video capture (Win+G? I don’t use it, but Google probably has instructions).
Be sure you know where your capture device is saving your video and whether it’s recording both in-game audio and your microphone (and in one audio stream or two) and whether it’s capturing your mouse cursor. If you have an option to not record the mouse, use it or you’ll have a little hand in all your videos. And when you record, try to be on an ethernet connection instead of WiFi. Record a few minutes with as much action going on as you want in the video – like, if you want a big PvP battle, record a big PvP battle – and then check the recorded video to see how it did. If it’s stuttery at all, try adjusting your settings to see if you can smooth it out. Or if necessary maybe you can get a friend to record for you?
Which, there are advantages to that, too. If you can get several guildies to record the footage you’re looking for, you’ll be able to get more angles into the finished project and you’ll get to be in it as well. I recommend being on a flying mount for all or nearly all capture, so you don’t get head-bob – a flying mount that can’t land is ideal.
Save your recorded video at the best quality you can, and if you have an ultra widescreen monitor, you might want to window the game and record it in a regular 16-9 aspect ratio or you’ll be dealing with black bars top and bottom on YouTube.
And speaking of YouTube, if you want music in the video check out the YouTube Studio Audio Library for copyright-free or attribution-only music. I used to use it a lot, until one of those tracks was later removed from the library and made copyrighted, but since I’m not monetizing, it hasn’t really had an effect on the video as far as I can tell. I haven’t found a better free source of audio.
If you’re going to record mic audio for voiceovers, check to be sure your mic records high quality audio without static and whatnot. If you use a headset mic, try not to position it directly in front of your mouth or you’ll get some pops and sibilance on Ps, Ts, and Ss. Try it a bit above your mouth or a bit below it or off to the side and see what works. If you have an external mic, the thing that I’ve found makes the most difference in audio quality is having the mic close enough – like, a handspan away maybe? again, test and see what works – and how you record. When I record audio in my video editing software for work (Camtasia, spendy, don’t do it unless you’re rich and don’t care), the audio is wretched, but if I open a Zoom call, start recording, and use that audio, it’s great – Zoom has settings for noise cancellation that work really well.
For video editing, I use Movavi Video Editor for finishing because it has pretty decent options for text, titles, annotations, and smoothing. You can buy a one year license for like ~$55 or a lifetime license for around $75. It is DEEPLY annoying in that it asks you to upgrade every time you launch the stupid thing, but I like it otherwise. I use NCH Videopad too, for actually cutting up the video and for audio editing because I need both mic and game sounds and Videopad handles that a lot better than Movavi. If you’re going to record game footage and just layer in audio or voiceover on top of that, Movavi should work fine.
Now, you can buy the NCH Videopad Master’s edition as a subscription service for around $8 a month billed quarterly, which may be the best bet if you just want to do the one video. I deeply dislike the text options with Videopad – Movavi has some decent title options built in and text is much easier to edit – but if you don’t need text or titles as part of the video, or if you can add them as graphics instead of using the video editor for them, $8 a month is pretty affordable, even quarterly. And I think both of them have free trial versions, too, which is how I picked an editor. I found them both pretty intuitive and encourage you to try the free trial versions of whatever software you’re considering, to see whether you do as well.
And don’t underestimate the importance of video cutting. Especially if you’re setting it to music, getting your action beats to fall on the music beats makes so much difference. Get your audio on one track and your video on another so you can cut them separately, zoom in so you can see the frame-by-frame view, expand the audio track so you can see where the beats are, and get your action on the beat. It can be a matter of a single frame that makes the difference. For a good example of beats and action cuts, search YouTube for Black Widow | Levitating by Sara Mikula.
Check how loud your audio is, too. It’s sometimes different for me when I’m working in the video editing software than it is once it’s exported, so be on the lookout for that. But it’s super easy to get the audio either too low or too loud. I’ll usually check it on two or three different headsets, plus speakers, and also pull up a YouTube video from a content creator who does good sound, and checking how my audio sounds compared to that.
Now, here’s hoping this actually posts even though I’m not currently subbed… 
Thank you, I’m going to sift through this. I think the idea for this video may be rather simplistic, but we’ll see. Everything always seems simpler until you put it down on paper lol.
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