I’ve carried a GoPro the last 5 years or so… I record anything interesting throughout the day I find, keep the clips short, it’s way easier to edit a bunch of short, good clips, than a single… long boring one. After everyday I download any of the better footage to a dedicated Ipad I have just for hunting videos/trail cam photos, I don’t even own a computer, I edit all my videos with the Splice APP. If the day was a complete bust I simply hit the reformat button and start over the next day, I carry 4 batteries and 2 sd cards at all times, all in a Dano fleece pouch in my pack. On a good day, a kill, film everything, what may seem insignificant at the time mite be gold later on during editing, packing it out, dragging, whatever. Keep the hero speech short at the end, if your making it only for family and friends then none of this applies, but for Youtube… nobody cares about that, keep it short and simple. If a channel is monetized what is allowed by Youtube gets more strict, I won’t get into that as I have a friend that does my final editing for that stuff, all I can say is any wounded animal scenes are out, some of my best footage got scrapped because of that. Adding music gets even more confusing with copyright laws, basically be prepared to pick from millions of different variations of elevator music when making your video, it sucks.. Be yourself on camera, pretend it’s not there, acting like someone else while it’s rolling doesn’t work and appears staged, just be you.. For me that was the hardest thing to get used to, but it’s a must, if your worried at all about your image, guess what… nobody cares but you, be yourself and don’t give a crap. Getting the kill on film is the best, guess what it doesn’t always happen for a variety of reasons, do the best you can do with what you have and it will be alright, tell the whole story, that’s what makes a video, and do it well. I made my videos for just family and friends for many years, I have years worth of footage hoarded, I wrestled with the thought of publicly sharing any of them for a long time, I’m not a fan of social media in general and keep to myself for the most part, you won’t find any hero pics of me on Facebook, nothing I have posted at least. After a lot of thinking on the matter, all day rut sits are good for that, I decided to share some of my videos to a channel I feel represents the values I believe in for the hunting community, and the industry as a whole…. If one person out there that maybe doesn’t have the time, or physical ability to hunt anymore.. gets any enjoyment at all from said video, then I feel as though the extra effort of carrying a camera, editing, was worth it, to me, and I’ll keep doing it. With all that said, at the end of the day, I‘m a hunter first, and if at any time it becomes a pita during the hunt, the camera goes on the back burner, I do my best, but I don’t let it ruin my moment, I escape to the woods each season to get away from that stuff, I try to keep it balanced the best I can, I have a system that works for me.
