Talking Head Video Production

As we already know, videos are the content with the most engagement currently available to marketers, and utilising them as part of a successful strategy is a necessity. Talking head video production is one of the most popular and cost effective ways to get your message out, our expert production process ensures maximum viewer attention.

Talking head video productions are a simple, straightforward and effective way to share your message with your target audience. Whether using them to explain the benefits of your new product, in a corporate video production, assist in gaining new funders, or to train your staff in a cost effective manner, the possibilities are limitless, and a well made talking head can be both engaging and compelling, whilst showing off your professionalism, approachability, or quirky nature.

Although on the surface it appears to be one of the easiest forms of video content to create, getting all the fundamentals right can be harder than it seems, and overlooking any part of the production process can prove costly and leave you with either an unprofessional look or sound, or a slow and un-engaging video that people will skip past.

As a professional video production company we will take away these worries for you, take a look through our detailed production process to understand what equipment we use, what’s involved and how we work on this style of videos.

Choosing the right person for your talking head video is important, they need to be comfortable in front of camera, to represent your values, and to appeal to your demographic. Whether you choose someone internally or bring in an actor will depend a lot on the feel you are trying to achieve, you may want a natural in front of camera who seems friendly and approachable, or someone with years of experience in your industry that appears capable and knowledgeable. What you choose will depend on the aim of the video, and on your ethos as a company.

Either way, once this decision has been made they will need to prepare. If you want them to deliver a script then it is important they are comfortable with it, understand what they are saying, and ideally have some freedom to make it sound natural to them.

A teleprompter can be invaluable here if you are looking for a simple single camera setup and quick edit turnaround.If you have someone knowledgeable in their area then an interview can work well to coax the answers out in their own words, and if this is your plan make sure they are comfortable and reassure them that you are not there to catch them out with anything tricky, work with them to formulate a question structure if there are technical areas to cover that you do not understand.

Some other important considerations are what your subject is wearing, and the location of the video. Naturally you want the look of your subject to reflect your company ethos, and a casual look may be more suited depending on your industry.

What you have in the background of your talking head video can offer both interest to the shot and information to the viewer, you may even want to include something in the foreground. You can use the composition and colour palette to help tell the story, and to add depth to the shot, giving it a more professional look and directing the viewers attention to the speaker. Also consider things that may interfere with the filming, especially noise.

Extractors, fans, air conditioning, computers, and even fridges can cause a distracting buzzing, office noise can seem unprofessional or confusing if coming from out of shot, outside noise is more difficult to control so try to choose places that will be quieter, for example away from busy roads.

There is a lot to consider when choosing the right equipment for a talking head video, lens choice is important, Prime lenses generally provide better quality and faster (lower aperture/ more DOF), offering both a better picture sharpness and a desirable shallow look to your shot. We also use cameras capable of 4k shooting, as even though often we won’t be releasing these videos in 4k resolution it allows us to capture a wide shot that can be punched in digitally to a close up without losing picture quality. In an ideal scenario we will have a two camera setup giving a slight variation in shots (either punched in on the second camera or at around a 30-40 degree angle, or both) adding both visual interest to the viewer along with helping to hide edits when we are working solely with the interview footage.

Now we have the basics it’s time to get the professional look for your talking head, so we’ll need some lights. A basic setup for interviews is 3 point lighting, with a key light at around 45 degrees to the speaker, a fill light to soften their features on the other side at 45 degrees and a backlight behind the subject to help pick them out of the background. LED panels are a good option, and the more expensive ones allow for temperature adjustments so that we can get a consistency with any practical lighting we have in your shot already (or to offer a difference for emphasis of a particular object or feeling). This is a starting point naturally, and once we are comfortable with this basic setup it is worth playing around with it as we can achieve a great deal with a lighting change, completely changing the mood and feel of a talking head video, and the way the speaker is perceived.

In terms of audio capture we generally use a lavalier microphone with a wireless transmitter. These packs can be discreetly concealed, and if you don’t want to have any trace of the mic either you can get stickers that will go on either clothes or skin, and offer protection from any rubbing or interference that the mic might otherwise pick up. There are a number of different mic styles out there and they offer a variety of pickup patterns, for our needs though an omni-directional mic will likely give us the best results.

Balanced cables are important too to get the best quality audio with the lowest gain, decent receivers come equipped with an XLR cable (although the gain picked up will be much more noticeable on longer cables, so may not be much of a concern for wireless transmission). If you want to know the ins and outs of why balanced audio is much better than the unbalanced (jack connections) then check this out.

We’ve already discussed some of the basic technique in order to produce a good looking piece with clean audio within the equipment portion, so let’s think about some ways we can improve our production to give a more entertaining, informative, and therefore engaging product. Firstly, be prepared to do multiple takes. Even if your speaker is comfortable and gets it all first time (pretty unlikely in our experience), it is worth running over it again as you may get something different or better from them. You can then cut together the different takes, giving you more options later on.

The most obvious way is to give the viewer something more visually appealing to look at than a person talking to camera, shots of something pertinent layered over the top of the speaker is known as B-roll, and is an ideal option. Shooting the B-roll obviously takes a bit of time, and often involves staging some activity with the speaker, generally repetitively in order to capture footage from different angles that can then be cut together to compliment the story they are telling. It is worth organising this shooting to take place after the interview portion in order to maximise the use of your allotted time with the subject, and because you will now already have a decent idea of which bits of the interview you will want to use. If, of course, you have scripted and storyboarded the production previously, then you can do this in any order as you are already clear on what will be the finished product and know what you need to capture.

Along a similar line is adding animation. It isn’t always possible for us to capture live action footage of what the speaker is discussing, and it may be necessary to create something in order to help explain, or simply to give a more dynamic look to the video. Simple animations done with text, known as kinetic text, can really help emphasise important points and will really help increase your engagement especially on social media where the audio is not going to be on by default, and can make the difference between someone scrolling past or clicking to view. In a similar vein, using simple animated titles for your speaker, known as lower thirds, can add a really polished and professional finish to your talking head video. We like to keep them clean and modern unless you have a reason to do something different.

Another way we can add value to your production is to have some camera movement. If we are shooting with two cameras, why not have the first one a static wide in front of the subject and then use the second more creatively. Panning and tilting is simple, or we can add shots of something they are holding if it is relevant, or go the extra mile and get a slider to add a really dynamic edge to your video. We can also try experimenting with your lighting setup, try taking out the fill light to create harsher shadows giving the face more contrast adding a dramatic feel to your shot, or perhaps even move it behind our subject to backlight both shoulders and really pick them out of the background.

Once we have completed your production phase and we have loads of great footage, including multiple takes of the interview with camera options, and some relevant B-roll, it’s time to put it all together in an engaging talking head video. We use the Adobe Suite as a post-production software of choice, because of it’s dynamic linking allowing use of multiple programs to get the best results depending on the action we want to perform. We also use DaVinci Resolve when it comes to colour grading as it is one of the most powerful and specific programmes available for that function.

So how do we keep a talking head video production engaging? Naturally, it will depend on your audience as to what you can do here, but for most occasions when you are trying to reach a non captive audience, for example, to reach potential new customers, then there are some pretty standard things that you can consider. Firstly, peoples attention span is short and getting shorter, so we need to keep the video length to a minimum. It’s going to depend a lot on what your message is to how short you can make it, but ideally you want to break it down in under 2 minutes, perhaps consider a talking head video series if you have way too much to say in that time.

Keep the core message really clear and cut anything superfluous, this is where your B-roll can have multiple uses, you can use it to hide your ruthless cutting of the interview, and also to advance or reinforce the message.

Fast cuts can also help here, and give the video a dynamic fast paced feel, using long clips can be useful to get a message across or to keep shooting time down but it is less visually appealing and risks losing the viewers attention. Something to consider again when thinking about your objectives and demographic, but for a short talking head video fast editing is generally going to give you better results. Music can also help, and a song in a style which suits can be really beneficial to not only give the video some atmosphere and mood, but an added interest. Composers can craft the perfect song for you, or there are many libraries online (such as Audio Jungle) where you can find a suitable track and then simply buy the licence for its use.

Our experienced team has produced hundreds, maybe even thousands of talking head videos, so this process always ensures we are able to  in deliver great results.

If you believe like we do that a specialist is worth their weight in gold then you could always take a look at our video production costs price guide or get in touch about your next project and see what we can do for you.