We all know how effective visual communications are in business advertising and sales, but how confident are you in understanding the best ways to create your content and know the legalities of it?

Here is a quick rundown of the top 5 things to remember when working with images and video.

1. Creating content on your smartphone

If you have a degree in photography, media or experience operating DSLR cameras, creating content is very simple, but if you don’t, let’s cover the basics:

There is no need to overcomplicate your content; your average Smartphone is capable of producing excellent images and video footage if you know the basics. When using phones, ensure that you have selected at least the FHD option in your settings, this means shots are captured at 1080 x 1920 giving a decent size for editing later on. 

When filming video content, remember: always use a tripod!

2. Resolution; the good, the bad, and the ugly.

Remember, that if an image looks slightly blurry, it may be that the image resolution is smaller than you need, if you stretch an image it will look a little blurry and of poor quality. Here are the basic options.

4K – 3840 x 2160.

 4K is beautiful quality, because of the number of pixels in the footage. This also means files are much larger and can slow down your editing process. Large images and videos will require more memory for storage, and you may struggle to edit these pieces if you are working on a basic laptop and using non-professional editing software. More isn’t always best, use it where appropriate.

Full High Definition – 1080 X 1920.

This resolution gives the size you would need on a big screen and can always be made smaller if need be.

High Definition – HD – 1280 x 720.

“720” is still great for HD but is a little smaller which means the file size is smaller. Smaller images allow your web pages to load quicker than a page full of FHD images.

3. To print or not to print.

When you create your edited images be sure as to whether these will be used for print or to be viewed on the monitor. If you plan to print these make sure your image is CMYK which matches printer specifications if it is going to be purely viewed online RGB is fine. If these aren’t checked your printed colours may be slightly different to how they look on your screen.

4. What is copyright?

When you create content, you are automatically the owner of that content, whether this is a photo, video, artwork, a script, software, a song or anything else requiring design and making. There is no register for this; it is granted upon creation, this means that to use someone else’s images or videos you must have permission. Bear in mind taking pictures off the internet and sharing these means it is likely that you are breaching copyright and a content creator would be well within their right to take you to court if they wish. 

Use places like Shutterstock for good quality images, music and video which can be purchased for a fee. It’s better to be on the safe side until you gain more experience.

5. Do you have permission?

When photographing or filming people be sure to get permission for the location in which you are shooting, permission to capture the person, to edit them and to broadcast them. Get this in writing and keep them in case employees leave later down the line.

This is just the tip of the visual iceberg, to learn more about images and videos be sure to jump on one of our workshops and feel free to bring with you any devices or software you would like to practice with. Contact us for more details.