CHAPTER 2
Why the Camera Changes Everything
Dateline: Summer 1991
Location: Altoona, Pennsylvania (specifically, Jaffa Shrine)
Event: Final night of competition at the Miss Pennsylvania Scholarship Pageant
I was the season shocker. How could I, Miss Butler County, a pageant neophyte who only entered on a lark, be in prime position to represent the Keystone State in the Miss America pageant?
Talent Competition: I nailed it thanks to a decade of voice training.
Judge's Panel Interview: I aced that, too.
The vast majority of my fellow contestants had been priming themselves for this moment for years, sharpening their skills on the lower-level pageant circuit. Me? I was a total newbie and on no one's radar as a potential threat. But after chalking up two preliminary competition wins earlier in the week, the dark horse had become the front-runner and likely winner . . . save for a slight miscalculation by my team.
You see, along with the tiara from the county win, I had acquired a cadre of pageant professionals who were in charge of coaching me for the state pageant. They taught me how to strut, wobble-free, across the stage in a bathing suit and four-inch heels made of Lucite. They explained the importance of displaying off-the-charts enthusiasm when I introduced myself at the top of the show. We even ran through my song from Phantom of the Opera ad nauseam just in case.
What we didn't work on was my on-stage interview question. Why would we? After all, I was a top student and had even skipped my senior year in high school just to get a head start on college. I was on track to receive my undergraduate degree magna cum laude with highest honors. Public speaking was my forte. I even won a scholarship for “Excellence in the Use of the English Language.” Why would I need to practice how to answer one question?
So there I was on the final night of the pageant, ready to tackle the last part of the competition: the on-stage interview question. The crowning achievement seemed like a fait accompli.
I made my way downstage toward the emcee, who held a stack of index cards laden with real stumpers—or so he thought. He selected my question.
“If money were no object, what would you do to make the world a better place?”
Could there be a bigger softball of a question than that? I'm sure you can think of dozens of answers that would have elicited a round of applause and perhaps even brought a tear to the eye of some touched by your empathy for the needy, the disenfranchised, the unfortunate souls you wanted to help.
My response: “Laughter . . . I'd give the world laughter.”
Say what?
There are no “take-backs” when answering a question live before thousands of people in a concert hall and countless others watching on television. I knew I had to find some way to make this substantive despite its laughable start.
I wracked my brain and free-associated laughter with monetary value. After a less than one second pause, I continued my response with this:
“So I'd buy everyone comedians.”
My entire entourage from the local pageant collectively slumped in their seats as if they'd been sucker punched.
I knew that I was in the process of completely tanking any chance I had to head to the Miss America Pageant in Atlantic City. Ironically, however, I thought it was hilarious. In fact, I remember trying to stifle a giggle as I fumbled through to the end of my clunker of an answer. There was some polite applause as I walked off stage.
I have to say I was heartened to hear some of the other contestants swing and miss on their questions, too. Here are some of my favorites (with italics added for emphasis by me):
- Question: “If you could meet any famous person, living or dead, who would you want to meet?”
- Answer: “Jesus Christ, because he did so much for our country.”
- Question: “If you could live in any era, which would you choose?”
- Answer: “I'd live in the South, because I really like the warm weather.”
So what on earth does this have to do with presenting on camera?
My pageant team assumed that I could handle any interview question thrown my way. Heck, I did, too. Your team may assume you can present on camera because you are a solid speaker. And herein lies the problem. Everyone wants to leverage video across all the many channels it now occupies, but very little thought is given to how to use this tool effectively. Too often, business executives are put in front of a camera and expected to perform well without any training. They're obviously intelligent folks who are in their positions of authority based on their achievements. But speaking in front of a camera requires a skill set that is never taught in business school, and very few of us possess the innate ability to do it well.
My “Aha!” Moment
Nowhere was the need for on-camera training more apparent than when I served as a regular webcast moderator for a corporate client. My role was to facilitate the discussion among global thought leaders on the panel. I was largely scripted, which helped me to come across as more knowledgeable than I truly was. What amazed me, though, was the panic many of those brilliant panelists felt just because they were going to be speaking on camera. I thought: I should be the one who is nervous. You know what the heck you're talking about. I don't. But I had spent more than two decades both in front of and behind a camera. Without that familiarity, those cameras represented a seismic shift in the environment.
In fact, I thought one of my first gigs as a webcast host was going to be my last. The topic of the show that day was incredibly technical, so my client had brought in an expert with strong credentials and deep domain knowledge. What she lacked, though, was experience communicating through a camera.
I noticed that she looked a little “moist” as we were getting mic'd up, but I had no idea how nervous she really was. In short order, though, it was revealed. I read the introduction of our guest and tossed it over to her for her 30-minute presentation. However, instead of taking the baton and running with it, she simply said, “I can't do this,” and attempted to take the mic off her lapel.
Thankfully, this was only the rehearsal. I somehow managed to find the right words to calm her down and convince her to try again. Her performance during the actual show wasn't stellar, but it was much better than no performance at all. (A big shout-out to our makeup artist on that day, who managed to keep the flop sweat mopped up during quick breaks.)
It all boils down to this: there's an assumption that if you can speak to a live audience, you can speak, convincingly and effectively, to a camera lens. And too often, that assumption is proven false, and at the worst possible time.
Unless you have experience performing on camera or are one of those rare people who just takes to it like Tiger Woods to golf, you will want and need some strategies, some guidance to perform at your best.
Perhaps if I had tested out some techniques for answering stock pageant questions (“Bring about world peace, feed the hungry . . .” yadda, yadda, yadda), my most embarrassing moment of all time might have been my biggest triumph. (Okay, maybe not biggest triumph, but certainly not a complete and utter failure to perform.)
A Camera Changes Everything
It may seem odd that the mere presence of a camera can cause such a disruption in the environment and recalibrate the way we act, think, and feel. Often, the change manifests physiologically. As soon as you are told “you're on,” your body may send a jolt of adrenaline through you, similar to the one you receive when you stop short in traffic. Your palms may sweat, your knees may knock, and a giant lump may temporarily block your throat.
Why? Allow me to offer four reasons why the camera changes everything.
No Immediate Feedback
When you're giving a presentation to a live audience, you're constantly surveying the room. Maybe you see someone nodding along. Maybe you see someone nodding off. You adjust your delivery based on what you see reflected back to you by your audience.
But when you're talking on camera, that lens isn't giving you any indication of whether your message is resonating or even being heard at all. You crave feedback, but the camera doesn't offer anything in return. Basically, it feels like your words are being sucked into a big black hole. That uncertainly can undercut your confidence and cause you to seek out reassurance from any source available.
Your Own Worst Critic
Do you remember when you first heard your voice on your voice mail or answering machine greeting? You probably thought, “I don't sound like that!”
Chances are, what you heard was exactly how your voice sounds—you just didn't like it.
The idea of having to listen to yourself or watch yourself on video can be a painful prospect for many. This is true even for those who do it for a living. When I meet the editors of any of my on-camera jobs, I always offer my sympathy because I know they've had to spend hours upon hours watching and listening to all of my many takes. That's enough to make me nauseous.
I always express my appreciation and admiration for those who take my on-camera performance workshops, because I consider it an act of courage. They are stepping outside of their comfort zones and subjecting themselves to criticism—the sharpest of which comes from within.
Analyzing baseline and post-training performances is an important part of any of my classes, yet it is always met with a cringe. The performers always notice things about themselves that no one else does.
For example, everyone in the class might be applauding your flawless delivery, but you may be totally fixated and irritated by the way your left eyebrow turns slightly downward. While the entire audience is mesmerized by your powerful presentation, you are thinking about how soon you can get in to see the brow lady. A camera lens can sometimes feel like a microscope, but in this case, it usually makes imperfections only we can see loom large.
Recorded for Posterity
Most on-camera performances will or at least can be recorded, and the shelf life of that video, good or bad, will likely be longer than you want it to be. And if your video is going to be hanging out on YouTube for who knows how long, you want it to be perfect.
That desire for perfection usually serves as the biggest barrier to performance success. We get incredibly self-conscious, which leads to a tremendous amount of pressure and stress.
For my classes, participants have the option of creating a video asset, which they can use beyond training. It's a valuable opportunity to make the training immediately applicable, but there is a downside.
Unfamiliar Territory
The presence of a camera, even if it's in your own office or home, can immediately transform the familiar into the unfamiliar. Suddenly, you become self-conscious about things you never gave a second thought. What do I do with my hands? Where do I look? What's that hum in the background? This hypersensitivity makes it nearly impossible to perform at your best.
If you are in a studio setting, the otherworldly effect is even more acute. You are surrounded by equipment you have probably never seen and likely find intimidating. There are physical obstructions like cords and wires, which create an obstacle course of a sort, leaving you wondering, “Can I get there from here?” The lights are always brighter than you imagined and cause even the most seasoned performers to initially squint as if it were high noon. Not to mention the whole slew of people who are there, all watching just you.
Why does the camera change everything? Perhaps the question should be “why wouldn't the camera change everything?”
The Archenemy of Performance Success: You
Before we move on, it's important to identify the archenemy of on-camera success. It's not the audience. It's also not the person asking you to go on camera.
It's actually someone who is with you all the time and likely one you are very familiar with: your inner critic. Every person has one. Some inner critics are more vocal than others, but that highly critical voice inside your head can derail your performance in big and small ways.
A friend of mine is a drama professor at a university in North Carolina. He told me how he would talk to his class about “the little asshole on your shoulder,” that Nagging Nelly who is often responsible for keeping a drama student from fully embodying a role. Call it what you will, that negative force can have a dramatic impact on any performance, whether it's on stage or on camera.
Remember how I talked about the expectation of perfection when you're being recorded? That can cause you to become hyperfocused on any element of your delivery that falls short of that. Say you didn't clearly articulate a sentence or you tripped up on a word. What happens? You start having two conversations: the one that's coming out of your mouth, and the one inside your head between you and your inner critic, who is saying, “Man, that sounded so stupid.”
When I anchored a newscast, I would wear what's called an IFB, an acronym for interruptible feedback. In layman's terms, it's the earpiece that news anchors wear, which allows the producer or director to talk to him or her throughout the show.
A newscast rarely moves in a linear fashion, especially when there is breaking news. It's the job of the person at the desk to be flexible and adaptable to respond to whatever situation arises without getting flustered. In that circumstance, I would often have three voices inside my head: the one coming out of my mouth, the one belonging to my producer or director via my earpiece, and the one trying to make sense of the directions the producer or director was giving me. (“Drop page six. Go to the reporter live from City Hall. Pitch to the commercial break.”)
As a professional, it was my job to always appear serene and in control no matter what chaos was breaking out in the control room. However, keeping my primary focus on the words coming out of my mouth (voice number one) while processing the other voices could be tough. There were times when a producer simply would not stop talking in my ear as I was trying to ad lib through a breaking news situation. If I had all of the information available, I would sometimes simply pull my IFB out of my ear, rendering that producer mute.
Translate that to the conversation you have with your inner critic. Sometimes that inner critic is like the producer who can simply talk too much and distract you from your primary conversation—the one you are having with your viewer.
What do you think happens when your inner critic starts barking at you about some perceived mistake? At worst, you get flustered and really start to mess up. At best, you start to go on autopilot. Instead of concentrating on delivering your message with passion and impact, half of your attention is devoted to what happened minutes ago. And your audience will know it. Even a subtle shift in focus can be seen all over your face.
So how do you keep your inner critic from hijacking your performance? Force yourself to stay in the moment and cut yourself some slack. The sooner you forget your perceived mistake, the sooner your audience will, too. It's often a much bigger deal to you than it is to them anyway.
The Key to On-Camera Success: Authenticity
Often, the most effective on-camera communicators are those who seem genuine, not those who seem like they're “performing” but those who seem to be just talking to you. The camera exaggerates a lack of authenticity, so the goal is for you to be yourself—albeit your best self.
Now this can run counter to advice given by other communication coaches and trainers. I found this out firsthand.
On-camera performance training is not nearly as common as traditional presentation training designed for presentations delivered to an audience in the same room. As a result, many of my students come into my class with a toolbox of techniques taught to them by other communication professionals. There may be overlap: some of my strategies align with what they've been taught, which serves to solidify the key learnings. However, there have been plenty of times where I've seen a one-size-fits-all approach backfire and strip all authenticity away from the presenter.
I believe the best presenters are steeped in authenticity, not prefab polish. Throughout this book, you will learn techniques, but know that while some of them may and hopefully will work for you, some may not. That's perfectly fine and to be expected. The goal is not to create on-camera automatons that all use the same gestures and same pattern of speech.
The goal is to help you find your own performance style, which maximizes your personal strengths and remains true to who you are, off camera. Try out the techniques discussed, but if they feel false, do not use them. Your gut is a powerful truth teller and will help you preserve that authentic self required to truly communicate through the camera.
Chapter Takeaways
A camera changes everything because
- It offers no feedback, so there is no way to judge how the message is being received.
- No one likes how he or she looks or sounds on camera, so there is an automatic aversion to the final product.
- Performers want perfection because it is being recorded and will have a long shelf life.
- It makes even the familiar seem unfamiliar and uncomfortable.
- The archenemy of on-camera success is your inner critic, whose harsh judgments can derail any performance.
- Authenticity is the key to on-camera success. The goal is to be yourself—your best self.