Video Shoot Checklist: One Video, from Three Days Before to Right After

Preparing a video shoot comes down to four things — script, gear, location, and people — spread across four moments: three days before, the day before, right before, and right after. A shoot is expensive to redo. You have to book the place again and bring the person back, so one missing battery can cost you the day.

The list below assumes a YouTube, interview, or lesson video that you shoot alone or with one guest. If you shoot the same format every week, treat it as a list you fix after each episode.

One thing first: write a shot list

Even with a script, if you don’t have what you’re shooting and how many shots, you’ll miss something on location. Finding out in the edit that “that shot doesn’t exist” is too late.

Put it on one page — must-have shots, nice-to-have shots, and B-roll (hands, screen, product, the space). Cross them off as you shoot.

The checklist

Three days before

• Finish the script or the question sheet
• Write the shot list — must-have / nice-to-have / B-roll
• Choose the location and check its light and noise at the time of day you’ll shoot
• Send the guest the date, place, duration, direction of the questions, and what to wear
• Get consent to publish the video
• Reserve any gear you need to rent

The day before

• Charge every battery — camera, mic, lights, phone
• Clear the memory cards and check free space — first confirm the last shoot is backed up
• Pack the bag, checking off the list as you go (below)
• Set the camera — resolution, frame rate, white balance locked
• Print the script and shot list, or put them on a tablet
• Send the guest a confirmation
• Choose what to wear — avoid fine patterns and the same color as the background

Right before, on location

• Turn off the noise — fridge, air conditioner, phone notifications, windows
• Tidy the background — look only at what’s in frame
• Set the lights, and check whether a window is behind the face (backlight)
• Set framing and focus — stand where you’ll sit and check
• Record 30 seconds, listen on earphones, and zoom in on the picture
• Check mic placement and the sound of clothes rubbing
• Put water and the script within reach, out of frame

While shooting

• When you start, confirm the recording indicator with your eyes
• One clap per take — it syncs sound and picture, and is easy to find in the edit
• Cross each shot off the list as you finish it
• Every 20 to 30 minutes, check battery, free space, focus, and sound
• Before you wrap, record 30 seconds of the room’s silence
• Shoot the B-roll — the thing most often skipped

Right after

• Copy the footage to two places — don’t erase the card before that
• Open the files and confirm sound and picture run to the end
• Name the folder with the date and episode title
• Write down missing shots and any gear or settings that caused trouble
• Put the batteries on the charger and the gear back in its place
• Send the guest a thank-you and the planned release date

Gear bag list

Check this off while you pack the day before. Adjust it to your own kit.

Group	What to pack
Picture	Camera · lens · tripod · tripod plate · 2 memory cards
Sound	Mic · mic cable or receiver · windscreen · earphones for monitoring
Light	Light · light stand · reflector or a white cloth
Power	Spare batteries · charger · power strip · power bank
Other	Script and shot list · tape · lens cloth · water · blotting paper

Small things — the tripod plate, the monitoring earphones, the spare card — are what get left behind most.

Take care of sound first

People will watch a video that’s a little dark to the end. They close one where the sound echoes or cuts out. And sound is the hardest thing to fix in the edit.

• Keep the mic one to two hand spans from the mouth.
• Always listen to the test recording on earphones. You can’t hear the noise through the camera’s speaker.
• In an echoey room, close the curtains and put a blanket or rug on the floor.

Fix the list after every episode

If you shoot the same format every week, what you wrote right after the shoot is the preparation for the next episode.

• Turn each problem into a line on the list. “Lost a shot to backlight” → right before: “check whether a window is behind the face.”
• Move forward whatever felt rushed. If booking the guest three days out was tight, make it a one-week-before item from the next episode.
• Once a setup settles, photograph it. A photo of the light position and camera height gets the next setup done in five minutes.

We covered a frame for looking back in the KPT retrospective, the general way to build a materials list in How to Build a Preparation Checklist, and how to put the whole production on one page in How to Write an SOP. For a location you’ve never been to or gear you’ve never used, a premortem finds the gaps in advance.

Common mistakes

• Skipping the test recording. You find out after an hour of shooting that the mic was off.
• Shooting on auto. White balance and exposure change from shot to shot, and you spend the edit matching them.
• Erasing the card before backing up. It happens when you clear it in a hurry the night before the next shoot.
• Leaving B-roll for “later.” Later doesn’t come, and there’s nothing to cut to in the edit.
• Writing nothing down afterward. The same battery gets left behind next episode.

Keeping the list next to the gear bag

The fixes you make after each episode only get used if the list is right there where you prepare the next one.

In fecit, the app we’re building, “one video” lives as a template, and each episode is a task made from that template. The script, gear, location, and guest go into Preparation as materials, tools, venue, and personnel, checked off as you gather them. A venue item can hold a photo, so you can keep a settled setup as a picture. Plan → shoot → edit → publish go in as steps.

The items you added and the order you changed after the shoot go back into the template through template improvement, where you pick what to keep. The next episode’s task starts from the corrected list.

Wherever you write it, pack your bag from the list above the night before your next shoot, and right after you wrap, write down the missing shots and what went wrong.