If you’re spending more and more time on video calls lately, try these simple tips that experienced digital nomads swear by:
#1 Always use the video
My cardinal rule of video calls - always use the video, unless someone’s connectivity is shaky and you need to free up bandwidth. When you’re new to working at home, there’s temptation to just use audio, but it just doesn’t build the human connection as well as video does.
#2 Treat this as an actual social occasion
Dress up as you would normally - i.e. with respect for the other people on the call. This doesn’t mean hair and makeup, necessarily - unless that is your normal habit. For me it isn’t, so the photos I’m showing you below are au naturel, just so we can get as real here as possible.
#3 Get the right angle
Raise the computer to the right angle. Not like this:
Your co-workers didn’t call a meeting with your nostrils.
Try not to use the phone camera for your meetings as this will almost always produce the wrong angle. Also - if you don’t have a good way to keep the phone steady, you’ll make your watchers seasick after a while.
#4 Keep clutter away
This is a hard one. If you’re used to working in an office, or don’t have enough space at home, it can be tough to carve out a clutter-less space in which to meet people over video. But clutter, unfortunately, will distract viewers from what you are saying. If you’re using Zoom to make your calls, there is a “virtual background” setting which can obscure your background with all sorts of scenes that do their best but don’t fully succeed at covering whatever you’re trying to hide. Use these at your own risk.
Who are we fooling here?
#5 Use sunlight or bright lighting
Now, I know that there are lots of really savvy people out there who have full-on professional studio photography lighting set up in their home office. This post is for the rest of us.
Whenever possible, position yourself facing a window during daylight hours to really flood yourself with soft, ambient light. If you are having the call at night, Make sure you have the room lit well, AND an additional lamp facing you. In a pinch, you can place or prop up a desk lamp behind your computer screen. I’m not a fan of the yellow glow - but it works ok.
Nighttime lighting done right - with no professional lighting setup.
#6 Use the touch up effect in zoom
Get in touch with your Zoom settings asap by pressing on “Video settings” in the bottom left corner of the video window. There’s lots of useful stuff in there that can help, including a “touch-up” setting that creates a smoothing filter effect for your face. (Access that by pressing on the video tab shown below.) You can also set Zoom to send an alert 5 minutes before each meeting, which brings me to my next tip.
#7 Be on time
Do I really need to explain why? But seriously, waiting for someone while they are late in person is somehow more tolerable than waiting in a Zoom call for people to show up one at a time, watching the minutes tick away.
See you over video!