This video was two years in the making. You may be thinking, “This doesn’t look like it took two years’ worth of work. It looks like something my 16-year old nephew could make over the weekend.” You’re probably right, but also no one likes your nephew.

This episode, although I’ve released a bunch before this, was actually the third I filmed. First was Kentucky, then Sri Lanka, followed by Beijing, and finally Central America (you can watch a Nicaragua film I made here). I was still unsure of how to structure a story, plan my shoots in depth, and had difficulty adapting to anything that wasn’t part of my limited plan. The result was a mad spray of everything I saw in Beijing, relevancy be damned.

The final product – “Beijing – 7 Days in China’s Capital”

I left a lot of footage, ranging from restaurants to major tourist attractions, on the cutting room floor. At best, some of this footage was used as b-roll for scene transitions and some will be used as Instagram stories. Yet a majority will never see the light of day. I have hundreds of gigs of 4k footage and no way to use it. I got too much coverage (as it’s called in filmmaking circles), but it wasn’t relevant coverage as I didn’t have a plan.

What went wrong? There were many lessons learned and I’ll share six of them to save you the trouble if you’re planning on launching your own YouTube travel show or want to improve what you’ve already got.

Look To Your Old Work

First, I lacked experience and had only a vague notion of how valuable it could be. Yes, that seems obvious, but I was focused on mistakes I made in the field while in Sri Lanka. How to approach strangers, keeping my gear light for all-day shoots, and others. I knew from these mistakes some things I wanted to change the next time I was filming on location. I thought the only teacher for better field work was analyzing my previous field work. I needed to take this one step further. You can learn even more from the editing process.

On location in Sri Lanka. Photo by Ryan Nell.

I went to Beijing exactly one month following the Sri Lanka trip. I didn’t even look at the Sri Lanka footage before I departed for China. This was a big mistake for beginners like myself. I recommend editing your previous project before you begin a new project, or at least watch the footage to gain some key takeaways.

Viewing your previous footage or taking a first crack at editing the video can provide valuable insights into your shortcomings. You may learn that your wide angle shots suck or that your hands shake too much when you pan down when shooting handheld. You might even learn that a lens you rarely used takes the most beautiful imagery. You learn these only by watching your previous work and then carrying these lessons forward with you into the field on your next project.

Where the Hell Are You?

Establishing shots. Go ahead and Google it if you don’t know what that means. I knew about these shots, but either forgot about the rule in the rush of the moment, or chose to ignore it, and lied to myself saying I would shoot it again later. You’ll never shoot it later.

Fast forward to 6:54 in the video, right before Bay and I sit down to eat Chinese dumplings. Is anything missing? How about the name of the restaurant and a shot of its exterior? What does the rest of the restaurant look like? Surely I could have taken at least one wide angle pan shot before we sat down to eat. Did you notice the repetitive shots of the food? I realized halfway through the meal I didn’t have any food shots. I took one 10-second video of the food and then turned the camera back to us for the rest of the interview. I chopped up that one 10-second clip into several in order to mask the cuts in the interview.

I ate a lot of lotus on this trip. This is Bay Zhang in the restaurant on Ghost Street.

The audience needs to know where you are, to have a spatial awareness in order to understand your position in the overall location. Don’t think that chatting about what you’re doing or where you’re at is enough to set the scene. It’s not. Learn from my mistakes and we can both make better videos in the future.

Shoot with Purpose

Always shoot with purpose. There are two examples in the video—the Summer Palace (6:44 – 6:48 and again at 13:37 – 13:43 and the Temple of Heaven from 9:22 – 9:25). These are two of Beijing’s most popular tourist attractions, yet they are reduced to nothing more than scene transitions (and blog posts coming soon). I got so much footage and a lot of it is really nice, yet my audience will never see it. It’s a real bummer. How did I let that happen?

A young boy celebrates his climb to the top of the stairs at the Temple of Heaven.

First, I’m not in any of it. I never filmed myself and never spoke into the camera to record any kind of audio. A-roll is essential as it is the glue that holds your scene together. B-roll acts as a patch, but it’s difficult to make it the glue. Second, I shot with no purpose. There was no story, there was no meat on the bone. It was a completely random set of shots that when put together are at best a brief montage (the passengers on the boat at 13:37). That’s not good enough for me, so I shortened that montages and used them as scene transitions in the final video.

Abandon Chronological Editing

You don’t owe the audience total honesty when it comes to presenting activities in the order they occurred. In fact, sticking to a rigid timeline hinders your creativity and could prevent you from building a compelling narrative. Story matters, and that can be difficult to accomplish in a purely chronological fashion. Structure scenes in a way that allows you to create rising action, a climax (the flag lowering ceremony), and a resolution (my closing thoughts accompanied by additional footage).

In my Beijing video, the Great Wall was presented as my first activity and Tiananmen Square as the last. This is accurate, but everything else is out of order. A chronological film would have lacked balance as it would be front-loaded with a long lull in the middle before the flag ceremony at the end. I tried it this way originally, but found it unwatchable. Abandoning a commitment to the correct flow of time saved my film. Don’t be afraid to do the same to yours.

The view of the Forbidden City from Tiananmen Square.

Audio in Crowded Spaces

This is a short and sweet lesson, but an important one. Always have a lavalier microphone for crowded indoor scenes like restaurants, such as the restaurant scene referenced above. Yes, professional crews may use a shotgun mic on a boom pole. I don’t have a professional crew with a sound guy hovering the boom pole just out of frame. I’ve got one camera and whatever I can attach to it. The on-camera Rode shotgun mic was useless in such a loud and large space and this resulted in me having to subtitle the conversation with Bay. Luckily, I learned my lesson and brought lavalier mics for all interviews in the upcoming Central America videos.

I Suck, You Suck, but We Don’t Have to Suck Forever

It’s okay to get discouraged in your filmmaking journey, particularly if you’re almost entirely self-taught like myself and you have no mentor or teacher to guide your development. Your feelings are valid and I get where you’re coming from.

There were days when I wanted to throw in the towel and skip this video entirely as I was struggling to piece together a story. I started and restarted this video about 20 times. That’s not a joke. I originally had this as a 4-part series! Essentially a 4-part class on “How to Bore Your Audience and Force Your Mother to Lie About Enjoying Your Videos.”

These hard lessons learned will drive you crazy and strike you right through the heart. I have been upset with myself during the editing of every video I’ve produced. I felt I missed several opportunities for making videos that matched my creative vision. This will happen to you. Guaranteed. Be mad at yourself. You fucked up and it’s your fault. And now move past it. It’s in the rearview mirror and there’s nothing you can do about it, except learn from the mistake and never do it again. Let that red hot shame you felt by messing up and making a shitty video be a constant reminder to never let it happen again.

Think of mistakes as first destroying your confidence, humbling you, and teaching you that you have much to learn. After tearing yourself down, your confidence comes back stronger than ever because you learned and you’ll be damned if you let that happen again. Get excited about how much better your next video will be.

They say getting good at something takes ten years and I’m currently at 3.5 years, so my journey is only beginning.

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