Most professionals are on camera every week now — calls, recorded updates, the occasional interview — and most have never been shown the basics. So the basics, in one place:
Camera at eye level. A laptop on a desk points up your nose and reads as looming. Raise it — books work fine — so the lens meets your eyes.
Light in front of you, not behind. A window at your back turns you into a silhouette. Face the window instead. That single swap outperforms any gadget.
Look at the lens when it counts. You don’t have to stare at it. But when you’re making the point that matters, look at the lens — that’s eye contact on video. Looking at yourself reads as looking away.
Slow down and shorten. On camera, fast talk blurs and long sentences lose the room. Short sentences land.
Give your hands somewhere to be. Visible and still beats fidgeting under the desk. If you gesture naturally, let it happen in frame.
Record 30 seconds and watch it once. Everyone hates this. Do it anyway. You’ll find the fix faster by watching one clip than reading 10 lists like this one.
And the shift that matters more than any of it: you’re not addressing an audience. You’re talking to one person. Picture the actual human on the other end and talk to them. The camera is just where they’re sitting.
Questions
Do I need better equipment?
No. Eye-level camera, front light, decent audio. After that, the person matters more than the gear — a real answer beats a cinematic one.
Can you actually get better at this, or are some people just naturals?
It’s a skill. I coach it every month, and the on-camera part is exactly what my clients improve fastest. The naturals just started earlier.
One good read a week, free — get the newsletter. And if being credible on camera is becoming part of your job, that’s the thing I coach.