I am a writer, with blogging being my preferred platform. I love writing, always have, and the written word is where I naturally find myself most comfortable. Reading, writing letters, blogging. Give me a subject that interests me and I’ll happily disappear down a research rabbit hole, emerge several hours later with far more information than I actually needed, and then start putting it all together in words. That’s my happy place.
I’ve been thinking about blogging versus vlogging lately. Partly because everything seems to be video these days, and partly because, when you enjoy creating things for other people to consume, it seems sensible to occasionally look up from what you’re doing and ask yourself whether everyone else has discovered something you haven’t.
Is Vlogging the Future?
I’m not oblivious to what is happening around me. Vlogging is a thing. A very big thing. Video has become an increasingly popular way for people to consume information, me included, and there is a very good reason for that. Moving pictures catch the eye in a way that a page of text simply doesn’t. You can show someone a beautiful garden, a renovation, a journey, a meal or a particularly entertaining duck in seconds, whereas with a blog you have to persuade them to stop and read about it.
So, from both a practical and a business point of view, I have occasionally wondered whether I should be doing more with video. If vlogging is where people’s attention is going, perhaps it makes sense to go where the attention is. And because I am not entirely immune to the occasional sensible business thought, I have, a few times over the years, picked up a camera with the intention of giving vlogging a proper go.
I had visions of filming my renovation home and garden, capturing the changes as they happened and putting together those wonderfully relaxed videos where very little appears to happen, yet somehow you find yourself quite happily watching them. A bit of gentle music, the sounds of nature in the background, perhaps the ducks wandering through the garden looking as though they have been employed specifically for the production. It all sounded rather lovely. And then I actually tried it.
But.
It turns out that there is a rather enormous difference between watching a beautifully relaxed video and making one.
Blogging and Vlogging: Similar Idea, Very Different Process
In the simplest terms, blogging is communicating through the written word, while vlogging is communicating through video. Both can tell stories, share experiences, teach, entertain, explain, persuade or simply allow somebody to have a good old ramble about whatever has caught their attention that day. The difference is in the way the audience receives it, and that difference affects the way the creator has to think.
A blogger starts with words. You can sit down with an idea and let it develop as you write. Change your mind halfway through a paragraph, go back and alter something, add a thought, remove it again and then decide that actually the first version was better. You can convey a mood, make a joke, wax philosophical, engender anger. The written word has an enormous amount of scope. It can be precise or vague, funny or serious, direct or wonderfully indirect. It allows for nuance and deeper thought, and it gives the reader the opportunity to create their own pictures from what you’ve written.
Vlogging, by contrast, puts the visual experience right in front of the viewer. A beautiful landscape doesn’t have to be described because you can show it. The sound of rain doesn’t have to be explained because you can record it. A person’s expression, the movement of a river, a dog chasing a stick or the ridiculous way somebody walks when they’ve just discovered a particularly large puddle can all be communicated instantly through moving images.
Moving Pictures are Sexier
Human brains are hardwired to process visual motion instantly, whereas reading is a late cultural invention that requires significant cognitive effort. Hence the fascination, appeal and even addiction of movies, TV, YouTube, TikTok and Instagram. They play into a brain prioritisation. Visual processing takes up a massive portion of the human brain, meaning we are biologically optimised to interpret moving images before text.
So I completely understand the attraction. Moving pictures catch our attention in a way that words often don’t. We’ve been trained by television and film to follow movement, and now our phones are full of videos competing for the few seconds of attention we might have available. A moving image can communicate an enormous amount very quickly. The trouble is that making that moving image can require rather more concentration than watching it.
The School of Film
None of this should have surprised me, because I went to university for film and TV production. I know that what we see on screen and what actually happened to get those few seconds of footage are often two very different things. The finished product is supposed to look effortless. The making of it very often is anything but.
One of the things you learn very quickly about filming, videoing in today’s parlance, is that the tiniest moments on screen can require a ridiculous amount of preparation.
The Two-Second Shot
Imagine a shot in which someone walks, rides or drives past the camera. On screen, it might last for two seconds and look completely spontaneous, as though the person just happened to wander through the scene at precisely the right moment. You probably don’t even really notice it.
What you don’t see is the person setting up the camera, deciding exactly where it needs to be, working out the composition and making sure the view is right. Then the person being filmed has to walk away from the camera, get into position, walk back and do whatever it is they’re supposed to be doing for the shot. Once they’ve done it, they have to walk back to the camera to check whether it actually worked. If the framing was wrong, the focus was off, the person walked too quickly, something unexpected wandered into shot or somebody simply decides they don’t like it, then you have to do it again. And again, if necessary.
Eventually you get your two seconds. Those two seconds then go into the edit, along with all the footage of walking away from the camera, walking back towards it, checking it, repositioning and repeating the whole performance. That has to be given the time to edit it out. All of that work disappears, leaving us with somebody apparently strolling past as casually as you or I might walk to the fridge. That is the cleverness of film-making. The audience isn’t supposed to notice the work. Unfortunately, when you’re the person behind the camera, you notice every bit of it.
My Attempt at Peaceful Vlogging
Perhaps my mistake was trying to think of vlogging in conventional terms. I didn’t want to make fast, heavily edited videos with lots of cuts and different camera angles. I had no desire to film myself talking at the camera for ten minutes and then discover that I had somehow managed to look like a hostage reading a ransom note.
Instead, I thought I’d go for something much calmer. Long shots, a static camera, beautiful scenery and subtle music in the background, while still allowing the natural sounds of the environment to come through. Birds, wind, water, ducks, birds and all those little sounds that make a place feel like itself rather than a film set.
Discovering ASMR is a Thing
Turns out this style actually has a name – ASMR. It stands for Autonomous Sensory Meridian Response and describes a pleasant, calming or sometimes tingling sensation that some people experience in response to particular sounds, movements or quiet activities. Things such as rain tapping on glass, pages turning, gentle voices, waves, footsteps or somebody quietly going about an ordinary task can produce that soothing effect for some people.
I liked the idea enormously. What could be nicer than simply sitting somewhere lovely, allowing the camera to capture the scene and letting nature provide most of the soundtrack? It turns out the answer is almost anything, if you are me and have a camera sitting nearby.
The Camera Got Between Me and the Moment
The moment I started filming, my brain stopped being in the moment and became a tiny, irritating production company.
I would be happily gardening, with my pet ducks help of course. Always worth a smile. But instead of simply enjoying it I would start thinking about the shot. Was this the best angle? Would it look better from over there? Should I move the camera slightly lower? Perhaps I should get a close-up of that particular patch. Is the light changing? Did I record that sound properly? Maybe I should film the same thing from another position just in case I need it later. It became impossible to simply do the thing I had gone there to do.
I wasn’t working in a beautiful place anymore. I was thinking about how walking through the beautiful place would look on camera. Forget listening to the birds, rather I was wondering whether the microphone was picking them up. I wasn’t watching the ducks at play instead I was thinking about whether I had enough memory on my camera for all I wished to record. And that rather took the shine off it.
There is a difference between experiencing something and experiencing something while simultaneously thinking about how you are going to present that experience to other people. For some people, I’m sure that process is part of the enjoyment. They see the shot, capture it, edit it and create something beautiful, and I genuinely admire that ability. For me, however, it turned something I loved doing into something I had to think about doing correctly. That wasn’t what I wanted.
The Written Word Gives Me Room
This is probably why I keep coming back to blogging. I love writing. Much more than videography. Much, much more. One is a delight, the other a chore. Even on a non-creative day, I never want for a topic idea for a blog post. Whilst when I think about videoing, my mind is certainly not as creative, often blanking.
I think I lean this way because the research can be as much a part of the process as the writing. I do love to learn new things, and sometimes my brain gets curious about some pretty strange topics. Not only do I get to enjoy the writing process, I enjoy the lead up to, too. It’s kind of a reverse of vlogging, where you have the idea, you film the various clips and then you have to spend the time editing. Editing is a truly underestimated part of making videos. And I really don’t enjoy editing, but I do love researching.
But, Is Blogging Dead?
Well, no. At least I hope not, because that would be a slightly awkward conclusion to an article written by a blogger.
I know that video is enormously popular. I know that moving images catch attention faster and that vlogging can attract audiences and make money in ways that written blogs generally struggle to do. I’m not pretending the internet hasn’t changed. It has, enormously, and the written word is arguably less sexy than it once was when it comes to grabbing attention. Unless in book form – currently. And that is something to contemplate.
But perhaps we shouldn’t measure everything we enjoy by how well it performs. There is always going to be something newer, faster, shinier and more commercially successful. If you spend your life chasing whatever happens to be getting the most attention, you could spend an awful lot of time doing things you don’t actually enjoy very much. And I’ve reached the point and strength where I’m quite happy to not do what I don’t like.
So I’m Sticking With Blogging
I’ve tried vlogging, and I’ve discovered that it isn’t for me. I have enormous respect for anyone who can produce a good vlog because I understand rather more about the work that goes into those apparently effortless videos. I know what happens behind the scenes.
I’ll stick to the written word. It may not be quite as glamorous. Forget catching the eye as quickly. It may make less money. Certainly, it may not be what the latest algorithm has decided it wants from us this week. But I love it, and sometimes in life you have to follow your heart rather than the crowd. You have to take your joys where they naturally occur, rather than constantly trying to turn yourself into whatever happens to be fashionable, profitable or popular.
So while somebody else is setting up their camera, checking the angle, filming the sunset, walking back to check the footage and then spending three hours editing 1 minute of sunset into something beautifully effortless, I’ll be here happily whiling away some time musing on future topics.
More Musings
As you can read, I like to muse. A lot. And so I write a lot, as mentioned, on a variety of weird and wonderful topics. From Life in France, to my Restoration Works, and quite simply Finding a Simple Living. At least to me. I hope you will read more.
Of if reading is not your thing, even though you got this far, I have shops. It helps tick the box on the visual side of things (for me too, which is why I enjoy it as well). Pumpjack & Piddlewick to satisfy my desire to buy weird and wonderful one of a kind older stuff, and my French Silk Scarf Shop, which sells, well, um … French silk scarves. A side passion.
And of course, because I like writing, I do search out various vintage writing implements for my shop. Nothing beats writing with an ink pen. Your poor handwriting suddenly looks beautiful. And all the acroutements that go with it. Here’s a taste. Simply click on an image to see more:
