It's About Production Values

This video was an incredibly informative, step-by-step breakdown of how this vlogger, Elizabeth, learns complex topics. From the start, I notice that there is a lot happening on the screen. She includes a lot of pop-up graphics and icons, sound effects, and sometimes signaled text. At first I was thinking that the graphics were actually helpful because I was able to form an association in my mind between what she was saying and what images appeared on the screen. However, after a while it almost started to become too much and a bit distracting. They did reduce in frequency toward the end of the video. The sound effects were not bothersome or out of place, as they were mostly just clicking sounds of a mouse or quiet pops for emphasis.

The audio and image quality was great throughout, as well as transitions. The transitions stayed simple, and thank goodness for that because there were a lot of them! The lighting was great as well, and the framing was appropriate. You see her face the entire video as she is talking, which I always find to be very helpful in learning. Something more prominent in this video than the other two is the blurred background. The focus is on Elizabeth, and the background is ever-so-slightly blurred. This helps me from paying too much attention to her background, so I thought it had a good impact on the quality of the video.

Overall:

I thought the video production as a whole was very effective at conveying competence within the vlogger, and was reflective of her qualifications and experience as a medical student. It was immensely evident that a lot of time and effort went into producing this video, and that in itself makes me trust the content more. The only thing that took away from the spoken message was the excessive amount of pop-up graphics in the first half of the video. Otherwise, the video appeared to me as one of excellent quality especially in terms of audio and video. She gets a bonus from me because I thought it was very entertaining. Despite the length of the video, I never found myself bored or losing sight of what she was talking about. 

This video was a detailed demonstration of how to make Paul Hollywood’s scone recipe, performed by the man himself. This video had very good image quality and the audio was great about 98% of the time. There were times where he mumbled and I didn’t catch what he said, but I could tell it wasn’t about pertinent information, rather a joke or something. The transitions in this video were smooth throughout, and very well timed to what he was doing on screen or to cut out downtime for baking time. I thought the framing in this video was excellent because Paul was slightly off center to the right of the screen to allow for written ingredients and/or steps to appear on the left. 

I thought the lighting of this video was a little lacking, but it still seemed fitting for the content. I thought the subtle lighting actually added to the mood of the video, making it feel like a really cozy atmosphere. Maybe that was the goal!

I thought all additional elements to the video like the transitions and on-screen text added to the overall quality of the video. It was fluid and effective, and there were no inclusion of unnecessary graphics.

Overall:

Had I not already been familiar with how prestigious a baker Paul Hollywood is, I believe I still would have been trusting of his recipe based off of this video alone. It served the goal well, and I did not notice any elements that I thought detracted from the quality of the video.