There was a great conversation a while ago, on a Guild Ball content channel on the GBCP Discord.
Many people (including me who runs The Bench obviously) have a feeling of wanting to create Guild Ball stuff now with the resurgence of this great game. To be an active part of the community and such.
But the impostor syndrome can be strong, and that is prefectly understandable!
If you want to create Guild Ball stuff, how should you go about it? If you want to reccord videos and create youtube GB content, what kind of content should you create?
While there are probaly infinite amount of tips and ideas, the main point that I’ve come across is “make the stuff you yourself would want to see” and just go with that. 🙂
As long as you enjoy making it, that’s a huge value in itself, and after that the viewers/readers/users will follow.
Some pointers for youtube making, by discord user zgray and others.
- Make sure you’ve got adequate storage for the video. Finding out halfway in that your phone or other reccording device is full is a feelbad.
- Same with battery. Using a battery pack or keeping your device plugged in is recommended, as recording video for 2+ hours can thoroughly burn through a battery.
- Do some testing to find a good camera angle that shows the game well, and works with your editing style. (If you don’t have/know your preferred editing style, trial and error is your friend)
- Decide on a format you want, who the target audience is, etc. Consider how much time you can put into editing for example. Many people prefer accelerated gameplay with voiceover commentary, since most will not want to watch a full 2 hour game in real time. But that requires a lot more editing and so on.
- Also bear in mind that a lot of youtube is watched on phone screens today. What draws people to a battle report is stuff like its length and how it is narrated etc, not if it’s 4k quality or not.
For podcast recording it’s pretty much the same, as far as I can tell. If you who read this have thoughts to add here, don’t hesitate to send them my way!
While you don’t have video to edit for podcasts, you might want to edit the audio, and also make sure that the sound quality is good. Badly timed annoying sounds or many silent periods or the like will not be positive to the listening experience, but at the same time this probably shouldn’t be about getting the perfect sound either. 🙂
Thoughts from Singled Out who makes both podcast and youtube content.
I use OBS to record both podcasts and videos. It’s a super versatile bit of kit and free.
I use daVinci Resolve to edit videos, and Audacity to edit podcasts. Both are also free.
I have a microphone (I forget which brand but was around 60 quid) I’ve been using it since episode 2 of the podcast. I use it whenever I can. The sound quality is far better than a headset. Alas it is sensitive enough that it will pick up disturbing sounds too much, so it massively depends on when I’m able to record as well.
Thoughts on content making from one of the creators of youtube channel Glory Goals.
I also say do whatever style of content you would enjoy to watch. I personally prefer the longer form ones, mainly because I like having a battle report on in the background while I’m painting or hobbying. I also enjoy watching the players options and thought processes, and think what I would do in that situation. I am probably in the minority though, cause people generally prefer the shorter form content. But as been said, it takes a lot longer to edit the shortform videos.
I think the GG videos we do usually take around 2-3 ish hours to edit all together, so that works for us.
TL:DR make whatever content you would like to watch and just go for it. Your content will evolve over time and your own style and niche will develop. There’s plenty of room for new GB content.
Me, Daniel who is running The Bench, this is my first time creating a website (not counting class in middle school haha) so when I decided I wanted to make this that became The Bench, I had to learn WordPress and hosting and so on from scratch. But it’s very doable, so if you want to make a Guild Ball website, just go for it!
Send me a pm or look me up on discord if you want to throw ideas around!
The Bench is for example really not at all focused on my own experience of the game, just gathering great stuff made by others, and keeping an eye out for interesting news.
Maybe a brand new battlereports/gameplay/tactics blog format is what you want to make? 😉
If you want to go the same way I have, I thought this WordPress tutorial was really good:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kYY88h5J86A
I also looked at one or two others I think, there’s tons of info around.
Header image credit – Nightcafe Studio
