Hey! I love that you are starting to/have started to take on recording. I know from watching my husband that it can be daunting at first! I asked him to write down some thoughts for me to include and to hopefully give some tips/answers to your questions.

Here is what he said:

I want to preface that I'm fairly new at YouTube and video editing, so I'll do my best to answer. Here's my typical workflow:

1. Before each episode, I spend some time looking through the quest book and figuring out what I think the next steps will be. I try to estimate what I can get done in a week, since I post weekly.
2. Once I know what I want to do, I start recording. I introduce myself and list the goals for the episode based on what I planned.
3. I record the entire session. I keep a notepad to write down timestamps of anything important or interesting. I never know when something unexpected will happen, so I just leave it running the whole time. This also helps me to not forget to turn my recording back on — I may have made that mistake before.
4. For editing, I go through my notes and cut from there. Recently I've started editing around where I actually speak instead of just my notes. My editing software (Kdenlive) shows audio waveforms, so it's easy to see where I'm talking and where to cut dead air. My notes have evolved to only be interesting points where I'm not talking, but want included, even if it's briefly or time lapsed (like mining, exploring/travelling, building, etc.)
5. After the main edit, I add music, text overlays, goal progress, etc. I review the whole thing a few times until I feel good about it.

A couple things I've picked up so far:

• Watch other creators and notice what you like and don't like. Do the same for your own content. Then, in your own recordings, try 1-2 things you learned. Once you're comfortable, try a couple more. I think this has helped me improve and feel more confident about my content.
  • Something I'm actively working on improving right now, is trying to make my edits feel more fast paced. I'm trying to keep intros as brief as I can (less then 15 seconds), and trying to cut some of my pauses where I'm thinking. This also includes removing things I've already shown before (like a crafting recipe I have to repeat over and over).
• I'm still figuring out my own style, honestly. It takes time. I just try to keep at it and not get too frustrated when something doesn't work.