If you turn on half an hour in advance you have time to check your face, your neckline, your angle, your background.
Also check your sound level.
1 Background & Colour
A white wall works well.
It does not distract from your face. A projected background shows clearly.
What if you have no white wall? Just filing cabinets. Or other distractions.
Alternatively hang a sheet without paterns. (Not creased. The creases show up as shadows.)
You can see the lime green sheet on the far right. I could have cropped the photo to eminat the edge but I left it too show to you.
The background on which you project the image should not match your skin tone, eyes, spectacles or clothes or any foreground object.
If your spectacles are catching the light, you may have to remove them. Alternatively, remove them during your speaking slot or during the group photo.
2 Face
Do not light only from behind your face and body becauser you become a dark face or almost a silhouette.
Light from both sides, eg with two table lamps. If you have only one table lamp, perhaps in daytime a window one side and a lamp the other side of your face.
Do not tilt the frame so you are below.
Do not look down so the top of your head appears on screen.
Do not look up or sideways to a larger screen.
3 Movement
Cover your lens if you ae moving around or leaving the room so as not to distract the speaker.
Do not look away from the caerma and forward, nor side to side.
4 Lens And Camera
When you reach forward to adjust your mobile phone,your hand may appear across it. As you see on the left of this photo.
You could buy a separate camera.
5 Head and Hair
If you are looking sideways at a larger screen, move your laptop.
Place a piece of paper with an eye drawn on it either side of your lens.
Buy an independent camera.
Hair messy?
Keep a comb beside your laptop.
Wear a hat.
Pull your hair back in a hairband.
Bald or Roots showing?
Don't look down.
Write your notes on a piece of paper with a hole in the middle for the lens and attach it above or over the camera or laptop lens.
Wear a hat or headband.
Pull your hair back into a ponytail.
6 Neck
Double chin or sagging chin?
Wear a polo neck.
Cover with a scarf.
7 Language
Learn a few words of welcome in other languages.
About the Author
Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, author and speaker.I and my family have lived in the UK, Spain, the USA and Singapore. I am a travel writer and photographer and teacher of English A level and English as a foreign language.
Please come to a Toastmasters International Club where the English clubs have a language evaluator or grammarian. We also have French, German, Mandarin Chinese, Tamil and other language clubs based in Singapore and many more online around the world which because of Covid-19 are now meeting online. I am President of Braddell Heights Advanced, which was meeting every Wednesday, on zoom the first Wednesday of the month but the other Wednesdays were workshops on app learncool.
From July 1st the new President will be Faith. I shall be vice president PR.
Or quicker to type and easier to remember:
Useful Websites Lansbury, Languages, toastmasters
https://travelwithangelalansbury.blogs
https://travelwithangelalansbury.blogspot.com/2020/01/second-set-of-portuguese-words.html Please share links to your favourite posts
translate.google.com
duolingo.com
