Comment by __mharrison__ | Hacker News Reader

Comment by __mharrison__ | Hacker News Reader

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I "invested" in early 2020 when all of my training moved to Zoom. I've gone through a lot of equipment and frequently am complimented on my sound, camera, and background.

My rank order for investment:

1. Mic - See my mic comment in another thread

2. Lighting - It is hard for good cameras to compensate for poor lighting. Good lighting on the other hand, does compensate and helps laptop webcams perform much better. I currently run a Godox ULC60bi with a huge parabolic diffuser. Probably overkill for many. You can get cheap fluorescent or LED lights with a diffuser. Would avoid a ring light especially if you wear glasses.

3. Camera - I have used Canon M50 and Sony A6500 as webcams. These days, I use an Insta360 Link. It's not quite as good as the cameras (you can add more "background blur" with their software), but it's more convenient. I still get compliments on this.

4. Background - Blur, doors, and bedrooms are what you see 90% of the time. A good background helps you stand out. I have a bookcase with the books ordered in color. Folks always comment about it. There are lots of other common looks, look on Youtube or X (Kevin Shen) for office makeovers.

5. Teleprompter - Not for scripts but for "looking in the eyes" of my students or the person on the other end of the call.

My setup is not as professional as yours, but I bought the "diva light" ring light and put my camera in the middle of it. I swear it makes me look 10 years younger and people say I look like a supermodel on calls which is really funny. The key is to put the camera and screen up high so you're looking upwards, which makes it a flattering angle for jawline.

That's awesome that the ring light works for you.

I wear glasses, and having a ring in the middle of them would drive me crazy when editing videos. Also, staring at a computer screen with lights off to the side is bad enough for me, I don't know how you can look directly into the light. Finally, it isn't compatible with my camera being behind the teleprompter.

Most lighting folks recommend putting one light to the side (say 45 degrees) so that one side of your face is lit and the other has a shadow. Fancier folks have additional fill light to highlight the shaded side and the back of the head (so there is a glow around it).

>Background - Blur, doors, and bedrooms are what you see 90% of the time. A good background helps you stand out. I have a bookcase with the books ordered in color.

True on the first part, but bookshelves as backgrounds are so cliche. Every two bit hack who gives an opinion on TV has a bookshelf as the background. It's a negative signal for me.

It always shouts "curated inauthentic bookshelf" to me.

Every book and item has been carefully selected to produce a specific image about the person.

I just use a Severance themed overlay :)

I had my real bookshelves behind me for most of my remote career. Mostly because my old sociology professor called attention to what backgrounds people get in media reports tells you a lot about them.

Sadly, we had a second child and we put a cot into the room, so I can't have my books behind me anymore :(

Me, too. You can't really see what's on them due to the bokeh from the DSLR I use as my webcam, but you can tell they're books, at least! What's actually there is my RPG collection, and some other hobby references.

Cliche is typically what you want to go for in a professional setting, it is not a negative signal in general.

I think it depends on what you are trying to accomplish. Are you trying to fit in or stand out?

4b. Collapsible green screen[0]. Can't recommend this enough if you don't want/have the ability to stage or curate your background (my "office" doubles as a guest room). It's also excellent for presenting and handy for any number of one-off things. When I don't need it I just slide it under the bed, easy.

What teleprompter do you use? How do you use it?

0. https://www.amazon.com/FUDESY-Collapsible-Auto-locking-Green...

A green screen might be another option. I don't know anyone who is using them, so I can't really comment on them.

Here's my setup.

https://x.com/__mharrison__/status/1901829114417602569/photo...

Teleprompter is a GlideGear.

Thanks!

I put together a similar setup in 2020/2021, but had to tear it all down. I got too many jokes about being a Twitch streamer, and the teleprompter made me look like one of those dudes who stares directly into your eyeballs at all times as a power move.

Maybe I should have stuck with it and iterated! Sounds like you've dialed it in.

Whatever floats your boat ;)

I'm the creepy instructor who looks at his students rather than talking to you by looking down and to the right...

More seriously, I have dialed it in because I think it gives my clients a better final product. I also just want to have things work rather than spending an inordinate amount of time setting up equipment each time I need to record.

I'm up to level 4 on this scale, with a hacked d5100 as my camera. How much incremental ROI do you feel you got from adding the teleprompter? I'd never considered one.

I use it for looking in the camera. If I don't have the zoom window on my teleprompter, I find myself looking at the zoom window. Probably not a huge deal for folks using just laptops and occasional zoom.

I find it even more useful when recording courses. I use OBS to overlay my face when talking about code. I immediately notice when folks try to do this without a teleprompter. They keep gazing off to the side.

There are yt tutorials about making cheap teleprompters. You could try it out and see if you care for it. I made two, however the value in a real teleprompter is the sturdiness and the mount. It was easier for me to buy one than hack one up that I would be using everyday.

What teleprompter solution do you use?

I linked to a photo elsewhere in this thread.

It is a Glide Gear teleprompter with an Insta360 Link for a camera, custom foam draping, and a Lilliput 8-inch monitor. It is attached to my monitor mount with a swing arm, and some adapted camera gear (inspired by some YT video) that allows me to adjust its vertical and level position of it relatively easily.

Wow, this is being downvoted. (Please help me understand why as this comment is a summary of interactions that I have when folks ask me about my equipment.)

My guess is because for the median HN reader (an ordinary techie who doesn't talk much on video, and when he/she does, it's mostly to other ordinary techies), your setup appears to be expensive overkill.

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