Having a go at my own build series

[ADFinlayson]

Nothing fancy, filming on a gopro and an iphone but will probably need to get myself a voice recorder. Episode one below.

 

[ADFinlayson]

Episode 2 done, getting the hand of editing 2 cameras, though I need to work on my mumbling.

 

[Andyjr1515]

Some useful information and well explained, @ADFinlayson .

In terms of observations to hopefully help you on this brave venture:

• Lighting, camera position, zoom and stability is what separates pro videos from home-made ones.  The second video was better, but in both, the camera movement is distracting and, at times, made me feel a little sea-sick (admittedly, VR does the same to me, but I know I am not alone on that one)
• Wide angle lenses distort straight lines.  On vid 1, I thought, at first, that the headstock was curved (which, actually, would have been quite cool! )
• A personal dislike...I always switch off Youtube videos when irrelevant loud music comes from nowhere.  I didn't with yours, but I'm I'm sure folks interested in the insights of our wonderful hobby aren't offended by the sound of a saw, even if its speeded up...

I suppose the only other thing to be always acutely aware of is ensuring that a viewer can never interpret what they see as 'an expert guide'. 

And, more specifically, even if they are clear that it is not, you have to ensure that your own H&S precautions and equipment are at a high standard and emphasise, as appropriate, the need for them to be aware of risks and to take all necessary advice and precautions relevant to their specific equipment and the laws & regulations applicable in their own country. 

Hope this helps.  I look forward to seeing future videos.

 

[Bizman62]

Whoa!

Your mumbling wasn't too bad, I could easily follow what you said. That said, you should seriously concentrate more on the sound/noise levels. Apparently your microphone has some pretty effective automatic recording level system since even the hiss of your pencil came out as loud as your speech. All those bangs, scratches, screeches, tingelings etc. not to mention the sudden music made listening with headphones miserable. The structure-borne sound felt like having an ear against your workbench!

Bolting the camera to the wall using thick rubber washers might help, a lapel mic or voice over even more.

Other than the sound issues it was pretty decent. I especially liked the lighting from the workbench camera.

 

[ADFinlayson]

thanks chaps, these are all valid points and I am acutely aware of them all as I was editing with headphones last night. 

It was recorded with iPhone 8 and a GoPro. I need to get myself a lapel mic recorder that will pick up my mumbling over the sound of pencil leds and twanging rulers. hopefully @Urumiko will chime in re mics as his videos have improved a lot recently. Learning to talk like a grown up will help me too. Also need to get myself a free standing tripod so the camera isn’t sat on the bench im working on. 

My only concern is I don’t want to do too much editing if I can, I’d rather keep it as “raw” as I can to keep the editing time down. Just cutting from one camera to another and is a fair bit of work - time I’d rather spend churning guitars out. 

I’m on the fence re music, granted it probably is a bit loud compared to the voice audio, but I remember several users kicking off at Ben Crowe on Patreon for there being nothing but the noise of power tools. I’m sure there is a sweet spot to be had.

Again, really appreciate the feedback, it’s a learning process and  opportunity for me to improve my presentation skill as much as anything. I don’t get much of that as a software engineer.

[Bizman62]

21 minutes ago, ADFinlayson said:

get myself a free standing tripod

A flexible tripod might be best for you since they allow for attaching to tubes and such as well as standing on flat surfaces.

[ZekeB]

  I do t know about the video stuff but I do really enjoy seeing your workflow and insight.  It really helps to see different perspective.  Thank you so much for sharing.  You've got one more subscriber!

[mistermikev]

my observations... it's hard to concentrate with your accent (hehe, I do realize I have the accent).  You are a very calm person on video!

just my two cents... but in general my fav build videos on youtube are all time lapse or otherwise edited to show fast progress.  I find it difficult to follow along in real time... just don't have patience (I don't know if I'm alone in this but these are MY thoughts).  I watch this guy a lot:

 

no idea what the kids these days like but this guy has 400k views.  If I were trying to do this... think I'd setup multiple cams as it's hard to have one that will 'follow along' with the action unless you pay someone to operate the cam.  just 2 cents

 

[Urumiko]

Hey bud. What editing software are you using?

Lighting looks fine to me, i agree sticking to tripod over freehand is better. 

Audio wasn't a problem for me but the noise difference when the music kicked in gave me a fright.. meant to ask what the music was.

I normally normalise all the sound to the same volume, adjust the volume manually then add in a leveling compressor on the master channel. Switching to premiere over the free stuff sped things up a lot.

[ADFinlayson]

43 minutes ago, Urumiko said:

Hey bud. What editing software are you using?

Lighting looks fine to me, i agree sticking to tripod over freehand is better. 

Audio wasn't a problem for me but the noise difference when the music kicked in gave me a fright.. meant to ask what the music was.

I normally normalise all the sound to the same volume, adjust the volume manually then add in a leveling compressor on the master channel. Switching to premiere over the free stuff sped things up a lot.

Only iMovie mate, I've got premier and avid from my design agency days but iMovie is just so much quicker for slapping some footage together, transitions and exporting. The music is my own, solely because I don't want to come up against any copyright issues or pay for it  

[ADFinlayson]

Episode 3 done, didn't bother with camera 2 but @Urumiko's tip on audio normalisation has helped a lot, thanks bud

 

 

[Andyjr1515]

Very informative once again and, for me, MUCH easier to watch and listen to.  Tonnes better

A small technical...when you described cutting across the heel end, I think you mixed your clockwises and anticlockwises an therefore the arrow went the wrong way?  Nevertheless you got away with it in real life.

What I think is a very important safety note that should be emphasised is to ensure the router is cutting no more than one or two mm at a time ( which you did but not sure was explained?).  A router of that power hitting a large lump of wood - and particularly on the back-cut runs - would be impossible to hold.  The serious consequences of that are known to us, but won't be to first time users who may well be a high proportion of the video's followers.

Hope this helps

[ADFinlayson]

 

38 minutes ago, Andyjr1515 said:

Very informative once again and, for me, MUCH easier to watch and listen to.  Tonnes better

A small technical...when you described cutting across the heel end, I think you mixed your clockwises and anticlockwises an therefore the arrow went the wrong way?  Nevertheless you got away with it in real life.

What I think is a very important safety note that should be emphasised is to ensure the router is cutting no more than one or two mm at a time ( which you did but not sure was explained?).  A router of that power hitting a large lump of wood - and particularly on the back-cut runs - would be impossible to hold.  The serious consequences of that are known to us, but won't be to first time users who may well be a high proportion of the video's followers.

Hope this helps

You might be right there Andy, It's difficult talking to a camera whilst trying to do something, I was also worrying about whether or not what I was filing was going to be mirrored, in fact the whole filming lark is a lot more difficult than I thought! Fortunately I did route in the correct direction. Maybe I need an auto queue I guess it will all get better with practice. I'll mention some more on safe routing when I cut the necks out. 

Again thanks for the feedback, glad it was easier to watch this time - learning a few little tricks like fading audio in, normalising levels etc is helping.

[Bizman62]

As Andy said, much easier to the ears. I still jumped when the music started. The way you normalise the sound doesn't quite work: Individual hisses, scrapes and your speech and even the pencil all peak as high as the music, with the difference that the former ones mostly consist of silence. Compare hammering the frets to routing, both having the same peak level. Which one hurts your ears more?

I suggest you familiarise yourself with the broadcasting standards which normalise the sound levels to averages rather than peak levels. If I'm right this video might have some useful information: https://youtu.be/AHzsluuN1jU

You might also benefit by using a limiter with a threshold to cut most of the pencil and tape noise to barely audible. Sorry, a fellow with a studio once told me about those things but I can't remember it more accurately.

[ZekeB]

what glue were you using ?

[mistermikev]

On 7/16/2019 at 5:48 PM, ADFinlayson said:

Episode 3 done, didn't bother with camera 2 but @Urumiko's tip on audio normalisation has helped a lot, thanks bud

 

 

you taught me something... a new word... muck?  love it!  like the idea of watered glue on the edges.  ideally... I'd have some laminate strips and lam glue... once you've got lam on the edges and put some mink oil on it... makes for a very nice template... but lacking that... wood glue is a great idea.

observations: 1) you should ad an intro theme song.  2) might have to try that bit... you should get linked up w amazon so you can get a comish if folks buy an item you advert 3) nice details on the end grain directions... I think it's simpler if you just think of it as going opposite directions from the apex of any curve... but your explanation is nice and concise. 4) so this is your music?  that singing is really very good - I'm not a fan of screaming metal... but the clean parts are outstanding.  well mixed, good themes.  rhythm guitar is a good tone (what are we using there assuming this is yours?)  ah 30 men on a dead mens on a dead mans chest... love it.

this video is a big improvement over the prev imo.  kept my interest pretty good.  good job.

[ADFinlayson]

7 hours ago, ZekeB said:

what glue were you using ?

Titebond 2 for the headstock cap then Titebond original for the fretboard and neck pocket. Titebond 3 would be better for the cap or glueing tops to bodies, but I have a bottle of 2 so using that until it's empty.

[Andyjr1515]

16 minutes ago, ADFinlayson said:

Titebond 2 for the headstock cap then Titebond original for the fretboard and neck pocket. Titebond 3 would be better for the cap or glueing tops to bodies, but I have a bottle of 2 so using that until it's empty.

What do you see as the advantage of Titebond 3 for those particular  jobs?

[ADFinlayson]

7 hours ago, mistermikev said:

you taught me something... a new word... muck?  love it!  like the idea of watered glue on the edges.  ideally... I'd have some laminate strips and lam glue... once you've got lam on the edges and put some mink oil on it... makes for a very nice template... but lacking that... wood glue is a great idea.

observations: 1) you should ad an intro theme song.  2) might have to try that bit... you should get linked up w amazon so you can get a comish if folks buy an item you advert 3) nice details on the end grain directions... I think it's simpler if you just think of it as going opposite directions from the apex of any curve... but your explanation is nice and concise. 4) so this is your music?  that singing is really very good - I'm not a fan of screaming metal... but the clean parts are outstanding.  well mixed, good themes.  rhythm guitar is a good tone (what are we using there assuming this is yours?)  ah 30 men on a dead mens on a dead mans chest... love it.

this video is a big improvement over the prev imo.  kept my interest pretty good.  good job.

I've used ply for templates before but not really got on with it, found it to splinter a fair bit, probably poor quality ply but the best my local timber yard or diy chain sells. It's the same with mdf, it's soft rubbish so without the glue layer, it will really only last a couple of builds. Interestingly, I got some MDF template from a chap called Bill Rae in the US (via luthiers club on facebook). The MDF he uses is hard, I've had a look on the internet but I've no idea what kind it is, certainly nothing that seems to be on sale in UK

I say my music, it's my bands music. Frontman is also the bass player so vocals are very much a secondary thing. Both Ollie (Who I made the V for) and myself play through Krank 100w heads straight into Marshall 4x12s, with the occasional wah for leads. I think he did most of his recording with his gibbo black beauty, I recorded all mine on my PRS Mira

Thanks for the feedback, I'll try and keep it as concise as poss in future, it's easy to waffle on and mumble. It's a strange experience essentially talking to yourself while working but having to do it in a way that the camera can hear you clearly. Anyway, I need to work on my presentation energy, maybe I need to do a line of orange Sherbet before pressing record.

[ADFinlayson]

2 minutes ago, Andyjr1515 said:

What do you see as the advantage of Titebond 3 for those particular  jobs?

Last year I had to unset the neck on one of my builds - the red one I recently finished (in it's earliest form). I had used the same glue to join the two body blanks together as I used for the fretboard and neck pocket, so the amount of water and heat required to unset the neck was also enough to cause failure in the body joint - I countered it with clamps, but the joint definitely suffered. So my rationale is that joint's that you don't want to fail, should have a higher resistance than joints you do want to fail.

Definitely not an expert opinion but something I have experienced.

[Bizman62]

11 minutes ago, ADFinlayson said:

Anyway, I need to work on my presentation energy, maybe I need to do a line of orange Sherbet before pressing record.

Hehe... Are you trying to find your inner YouTube character by Sherbets? Similar to Ben banging on his workbench? I can imagine you wiping the stickiness off your lips at the start of your vids! Well, anything that gets you in the mood is good. Also it might help if you don't think about your mumbling and waffling as talking to yourself. Imagine yourself being on stage in front of a live audience. If that's too big to fit in your workshop, consider the camera being a fellow to whom you're telling what you're doing.

You're an artistic person so using your imagination should be a second nature.

Edited July 19, 2019 by Bizman62

[ADFinlayson]

2 hours ago, Bizman62 said:

Hehe... Are you trying to find your inner YouTube character by Sherbets? Similar to Ben banging on his workbench? I can imagine you wiping the stickiness off your lips at the start of your vids! Well, anything that gets you in the mood is good. Also it might help if you don't think about your mumbling and waffling as talking to yourself. Imagine yourself being on stage in front of a live audience. If that's too big to fit in your workshop, consider the camera being a fellow to whom you're telling what you're doing.

You're an artistic person so using your imagination should be a second nature.

Ha well there is only so much I can do to improve my youtube face, I guess you could compare it to polishing a turd. 

[Bizman62]

1 hour ago, ADFinlayson said:

there is only so much I can do to improve my youtube face

I thought it was about getting your voice on top of other noise.

And hey, who would take some Richard Gere talking about building guitars seriously despite him being a musician and having collected hundreds of rare guitars? It's not about looks, it's about presentation.

[ADFinlayson]

1 minute ago, Bizman62 said:

I thought it was about getting your voice on top of other noise.

And hey, who would take some Richard Gere talking about building guitars seriously despite him being a musician and having collected hundreds of rare guitars? It's not about looks, it's about presentation.

well I have that covered now, I just got myself a voice recorder and @Urumiko sent me a spare lapel mic he had so next video should be better. 

Haha, if copyright wasn't an issue, I could have the theme to pretty women as an intro.

[mistermikev]

7 hours ago, ADFinlayson said:

I've used ply for templates before but not really got on with it, found it to splinter a fair bit, probably poor quality ply but the best my local timber yard or diy chain sells. It's the same with mdf, it's soft rubbish so without the glue layer, it will really only last a couple of builds. Interestingly, I got some MDF template from a chap called Bill Rae in the US (via luthiers club on facebook). The MDF he uses is hard, I've had a look on the internet but I've no idea what kind it is, certainly nothing that seems to be on sale in UK

I say my music, it's my bands music. Frontman is also the bass player so vocals are very much a secondary thing. Both Ollie (Who I made the V for) and myself play through Krank 100w heads straight into Marshall 4x12s, with the occasional wah for leads. I think he did most of his recording with his gibbo black beauty, I recorded all mine on my PRS Mira

Thanks for the feedback, I'll try and keep it as concise as poss in future, it's easy to waffle on and mumble. It's a strange experience essentially talking to yourself while working but having to do it in a way that the camera can hear you clearly. Anyway, I need to work on my presentation energy, maybe I need to do a line of orange Sherbet before pressing record.

btw... by lam... I meant like kitchen counter top lam.  you can buy strips they use for the edges of countertops at home depot or other hardware stores.  usually have heat activated glue.  if you apply this to the edge of your template... it not only makes it water tight and protects the edge... but it is a great surface for the router bearing.  On a tight curve tho... you'd have to heat it to apply.  I did some laminate cabinetry back in the day and this is what we did to all our templates.  Haven't done it to mine yet because I don't plan on much re-use, but it works very well.  Just thought I'd mention.