Initial Basic Planning for a Community online TV Station

Hi Guys. 
Thanks for your interest in this blog. I really appreciate you reading, and I hope that you are finding it interesting. Most of all I hope you are taking action. I'm going to try and answer Gina's question about how do you start to put together a community TV station? This is a difficult one to answer without more information but I'll give it a shot. 

Lets assume that you want to put together an online station that will be become self-funding because whatever you do there will be some costs and you may have a bagful of

volunteers but that isn't enough. 

So first of all you need to write down your objectives, assets and resources and the type of station you want. These are the 3 circles that you need to complete and have overlapping to see if the venture is credible.

 So list out your Assets and Resources. So this will include what equipment you have, what facilities and space, the people you can rely on, and any finances. Now this can be what you have or what you need. Be ambitious and write down what you need then you can look for it. Don't limit this to what you have. Include, for example, local college or university students studying acting or film making because you can gather a team here. I have worked with several successfully and am now partnering some projects with a friend whom I met through his studies and is now doing his masters in Film making and TV

What are your objectives? Do you want to provide a local information service, entertainment, news, local music? Do you want to provide training to local unemployed people, those retired, maybe disabled people. Do you want to provide a live station or pre-recorded that is available on demand? Do you want to get funding or will you look for local sponsors and advertisers? Will you want to have a large space station or just a desk and have most outside recording? Think about other questions and answer them here.

And finally, what type of station are you planning? Will it be in your home? I do a lot of filming in my bedroom, standing in front of the camera and away from the wall with a couple of daylight bulb lamps, one on an umbrella reflector and the other a light pointing on the back wall. I could put in a small desk and be a news reader. You might have a large lounge/living room that you could use. How about a double garage. You may be able to afford space. Maybe you have an office or can use an office evenings or weekends. I even had a large empty warehouse at one time. In the UK if an empty property is used by a charity or social enterprise then the owner doesn't pay business rates, or at least has an 80% reduction. So it helps you and the owner. The only problem is that you have no certainty and can have to move at any time, if the property is sold or rented out. A friend of mine who ran a charity and needed loads of space for his outdoor equipment had free space but moved about 4 times in 3 years. Keith Chegwin, a British actor and TV presenter ran an online show back in about 2003 for 2 months from his bed, two hours every day. He was a forerunner and it was successful. He had 5 cameras and ran it as webcams. I think I remember him having guests who went to his home and sat on or in his bed.

So you may have an intimate studio or something bigger. Here we are looking at what you have and also what you would like. But I seriously recommend you start with what you have and get going. Then when you get funding, sponsors or advertisers you just move up. At least you will have started and have a track record and viewers.

NEXT STEP
 Now you have this information see if it all overlaps as in the diagram below. If there is a big mix in the centre you are probably ready to go. If the central mix is small you need to see what you can do to increase it.

 Now you need to take all that information and write a business plan. You can make it elaborate if you wish but I'd keep it down to bullet points. The elaborate plan is when you want to involve funding or sponsors. The bullet point plan becomes a working model and should be looked at and updated daily. It will help and inspire you towards your goal.

Include a programme schedule section where you write out the programmes you want to include, details and length. This will help you focus.  If you can produce a very short video of yourself, or someone helping you, talking about your venture and expectations this can be put up on YouTube and Facebook etc to spread the word. It can be used to promote what you are doing. The main thing is to do it. No matter how good or bad it doesn't matter. All that matters is you take that first step. You can and will get better with experience. And your confidence will grow too. Be passionate because that is contagious.

This is just an outline but I hope you find it interesting and encouraging. I truly feel that the future for small independent local online TV channels is very bright. Take a look at the top YouTube channels and you will see that many are really individual TV channels, usually of one person. You will take this to the next level. So there are my thoughts for planning your online TV channel.

PLEASE NOTE. My new online course "How to set up and produce an online TV station" will be available soon. Click here to become an early bird   You can make a really exciting project out of online TV and I'm here to help you and answer any queries. Leave a comment below. Also please look at the right side of this blog and like my Facebook page. And SHARE

The Trailer Video on your YouTube Channel

 





Hi Guys
I've just launched a YouTube channel trailer. 

Setting up your own YouTube channel means you can have a specific page for your videos.I fact if you have a couple of interests you can have a separate page for each. This will mean you attract viewers interested in each interest and can encourage them to come back over again.

Having a trailer video means that anyone browsing can look at this and know exactly what to expect. It's a great idea. You can use an existing video from your library or have the latest and newest video as your trailer. But I believe that if you prepare a specific video you can explain exactly what you cover on your channel

So how do you do this? Well first of all you need to plan the type of video. Will it be a talking head, a Powerpoint presentation or a cartoon type video. There are others but these are the main ones used. If you are up to it I would highly recommend you do a talking head because it is the easiest and fastest to shoot and you will build up a fast relationship with the viewer. By relationship I mean its good to get viewers to know you and to like you. They will eventually trust you and the material you publish so that they come back and watch everything you make.

So how should you make the video. Firstly it needs to be precise. You need to introduce yourself in a sentence then talk about what you will be showing and finishing with a call to action where you ask viewers to either subscribe, go to a website or blog or take some other action.

It needs to be short, about 60-120 seconds. I's suggest an intro of about 10 seconds with a title. When you record look at the camera and be slightly off-centre on the screen. Be well lit: the best lighting is natural sunlight but when its actually cloudy because you'll not get harsh shadows. A good plane is to face a window. If not get some lights, with video these days you can use almost any type of light. I'm not going into lighting here but you can always do some test shoots. As a point of interest you could go to a park or other quiet place and do a selfie with your smartphone. This will probably be more than adequate.

When you have uploaded your video you need to make a custom thumbnail. Use Carva.com which is free. You can make all types of images with text to the correct size for any particular use such as a YouTube thumbnail or Facebook banner. Your thumbnail needs to be simple and with only one or two words max. Remember many people view on smartphones and other devices with small screens so text can't be read. There is a tight specification of recommendations that will give you the best thumbnail that will draw the most attention. There is not enough room here to cover that in detail. Take a look at successful YouTube channels and they will all have custom thumbnails. Copying their ideas is ok, but don't use the same images, use your own. 

So now you need to set up your trailer. Click on the "My Channel" button on the left. The you will see the wheel symbol on the right as in the following image. Click then you will see a drop down menu.

Where it says "Customize the layout of your channel" switch the botton across to change colour to blue as below

 Go to My Channel and as below click on "For New Visitors" and you will see the space below to load your Trailer. Complete as much on the text as you can as usual and tags.

 This is the finished result. This has been a very quick guide. I will produce a full video on this as it is very important

Good Luck. Give it a try.

I'm really happy to help you with your video problems. Leave a comment below and I'll reply or make a new post to cover your query. If you have any useful suggestions or ideas please leave hose too. We succeed by being a community

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