Channel Milestone Hurdle – Cross the 10K View Threshold Fast

How to Become A YouTube Partner

Richard Bennett

Oct 26, 2023• Proven solutions

0

Navin explains this issue really clearly.

YouTube announced changes to its Partnership Program for some time. For a long time, anybody who had an account in good standing could monetize their videos and start earning ad revenue, but now you need to have 10,000 views to qualify.

My first thought was that this isn’t fair. Small channels shouldn’t be barred from trying to earn money.

I was prepared to go to war over this. Or do an angry blog post. One of those.

However, when you consider YouTube’s reasons for imposing this milestone, it actually starts to make a lot of sense. Here are 4 reasons why this will be a good thing for creators.

1. 10,000 isn’t a crazy number

This is actually a very do-able number for a smaller channel if the creator works hard at growing their audience. Remember that this is cumulative – you don’t need to get 10,000 views on a single video.

Say you receive about 100 views per video and post once a week. It would take you about 2 years to reach 10,000 at that rate, except that it wouldn’t because if you’re putting out good content on that reliable a schedule your channel will be growing (even if it’s slow).

If you get 500 views per video and post every week, you’ll reach 10,000 in about 5 months.

2. 10,000 views aren’t worth much money

Earning money from ad revenue has always been tough. This is just a little extra weight.

How much money could you earn off of 10,000 views, anyways? Not much.

You need to earn $50 in ad revenue to be paid out, and 10,000 views wouldn’t have gotten you there. You would have had to have passed this milestone anyways to actually see any money.

It’s too hard to put an exact number on the money you could have earned from your first 10,000 views – there are too many variables – but considering that smaller channels get lower-paying ads we’re probably talking about pocket change.

3. Inappropriate content won’t be monetized

YouTube has been having issues with advertisers lately. A lot of brands have been justifiably miffed that their products are appearing next to some violent, threatening, objectively offensive content. Anyone could monetize, and some pretty bad eggs took advantage of that.

Now that channels will be applying for YouTube’s Partnership Program instead of simply activating the feature, there can be a real screening process. Channels with content that violates YouTube’s Community Guidelines can be barred from monetization.

4. Thieves won’t profit

There are people out there who want views, subscribers, and nice comments but who do not want to put any real work into getting them. It isn’t uncommon for someone like this to download a video they like and post it to their own channel.

This reposted video will steal views and ad revenue away from the real post on the creator’s channel.

Having a review process for the Partnership Program will help ensure that these content thieves are caught before they can make any money.

YouTube also recently made it easier to report users for impersonation, regardless of how many views they have.

TheGamingGuy looked into people who had stolen his logo and found out they had also stolen whole videos from other YouTubers.

There are clear benefits to this new milestone, but there are also some questions remaining.

How does this change stop content thieves from taking views and ad revenue from creators?

It will help stop them from making money themselves, but not from siphoning away views from other channels. The impersonation rules only apply if somebody is pretending to be another creator. You can steal and repost someone’s content without pretending to be them.

This new rule does take away money as an incentive for stealing content, but a lot of people doing this probably aren’t in it for the money. They might just be misguided fans who want to repost videos they enjoy.

Could this affect your CPM?

Competition plays a huge role in how much YouTubers earn from ad revenue. Some genres are bigger on YouTube than others and, the more popular your genre is, the more options advertisers have. The more competition there is for higher-paying ads, the larger your channel has to be to get them.

Could this new milestone decrease competition in some genres?

Leave a comment to let me know what you think. Jayaprakash, one of our members here, also started an active forum thread on this issue so make sure to join that discussion too!

Touch Up YouTube Videos with Effects in Filmora

You can check our tips and tricks about how to get more views, and here is one thing that need to remember that content is the king. To polish your video content, you can use some YouTube video editing software to remove unwanted clips, add texts and titles, apply filters, create attractive channel arts such as banner and thumbnail. Here, I recommend Wondershare Filmora .

Richard Bennett

Richard Bennett is a writer and a lover of all things video.

Follow @Richard Bennett

Richard Bennett

Oct 26, 2023• Proven solutions

0

Navin explains this issue really clearly.

YouTube announced changes to its Partnership Program for some time. For a long time, anybody who had an account in good standing could monetize their videos and start earning ad revenue, but now you need to have 10,000 views to qualify.

My first thought was that this isn’t fair. Small channels shouldn’t be barred from trying to earn money.

I was prepared to go to war over this. Or do an angry blog post. One of those.

However, when you consider YouTube’s reasons for imposing this milestone, it actually starts to make a lot of sense. Here are 4 reasons why this will be a good thing for creators.

1. 10,000 isn’t a crazy number

This is actually a very do-able number for a smaller channel if the creator works hard at growing their audience. Remember that this is cumulative – you don’t need to get 10,000 views on a single video.

Say you receive about 100 views per video and post once a week. It would take you about 2 years to reach 10,000 at that rate, except that it wouldn’t because if you’re putting out good content on that reliable a schedule your channel will be growing (even if it’s slow).

If you get 500 views per video and post every week, you’ll reach 10,000 in about 5 months.

2. 10,000 views aren’t worth much money

Earning money from ad revenue has always been tough. This is just a little extra weight.

How much money could you earn off of 10,000 views, anyways? Not much.

You need to earn $50 in ad revenue to be paid out, and 10,000 views wouldn’t have gotten you there. You would have had to have passed this milestone anyways to actually see any money.

It’s too hard to put an exact number on the money you could have earned from your first 10,000 views – there are too many variables – but considering that smaller channels get lower-paying ads we’re probably talking about pocket change.

3. Inappropriate content won’t be monetized

YouTube has been having issues with advertisers lately. A lot of brands have been justifiably miffed that their products are appearing next to some violent, threatening, objectively offensive content. Anyone could monetize, and some pretty bad eggs took advantage of that.

Now that channels will be applying for YouTube’s Partnership Program instead of simply activating the feature, there can be a real screening process. Channels with content that violates YouTube’s Community Guidelines can be barred from monetization.

4. Thieves won’t profit

There are people out there who want views, subscribers, and nice comments but who do not want to put any real work into getting them. It isn’t uncommon for someone like this to download a video they like and post it to their own channel.

This reposted video will steal views and ad revenue away from the real post on the creator’s channel.

Having a review process for the Partnership Program will help ensure that these content thieves are caught before they can make any money.

YouTube also recently made it easier to report users for impersonation, regardless of how many views they have.

TheGamingGuy looked into people who had stolen his logo and found out they had also stolen whole videos from other YouTubers.

There are clear benefits to this new milestone, but there are also some questions remaining.

How does this change stop content thieves from taking views and ad revenue from creators?

It will help stop them from making money themselves, but not from siphoning away views from other channels. The impersonation rules only apply if somebody is pretending to be another creator. You can steal and repost someone’s content without pretending to be them.

This new rule does take away money as an incentive for stealing content, but a lot of people doing this probably aren’t in it for the money. They might just be misguided fans who want to repost videos they enjoy.

Could this affect your CPM?

Competition plays a huge role in how much YouTubers earn from ad revenue. Some genres are bigger on YouTube than others and, the more popular your genre is, the more options advertisers have. The more competition there is for higher-paying ads, the larger your channel has to be to get them.

Could this new milestone decrease competition in some genres?

Leave a comment to let me know what you think. Jayaprakash, one of our members here, also started an active forum thread on this issue so make sure to join that discussion too!

Touch Up YouTube Videos with Effects in Filmora

You can check our tips and tricks about how to get more views, and here is one thing that need to remember that content is the king. To polish your video content, you can use some YouTube video editing software to remove unwanted clips, add texts and titles, apply filters, create attractive channel arts such as banner and thumbnail. Here, I recommend Wondershare Filmora .

Richard Bennett

Richard Bennett is a writer and a lover of all things video.

Follow @Richard Bennett

Richard Bennett

Oct 26, 2023• Proven solutions

0

Navin explains this issue really clearly.

YouTube announced changes to its Partnership Program for some time. For a long time, anybody who had an account in good standing could monetize their videos and start earning ad revenue, but now you need to have 10,000 views to qualify.

My first thought was that this isn’t fair. Small channels shouldn’t be barred from trying to earn money.

I was prepared to go to war over this. Or do an angry blog post. One of those.

However, when you consider YouTube’s reasons for imposing this milestone, it actually starts to make a lot of sense. Here are 4 reasons why this will be a good thing for creators.

1. 10,000 isn’t a crazy number

This is actually a very do-able number for a smaller channel if the creator works hard at growing their audience. Remember that this is cumulative – you don’t need to get 10,000 views on a single video.

Say you receive about 100 views per video and post once a week. It would take you about 2 years to reach 10,000 at that rate, except that it wouldn’t because if you’re putting out good content on that reliable a schedule your channel will be growing (even if it’s slow).

If you get 500 views per video and post every week, you’ll reach 10,000 in about 5 months.

2. 10,000 views aren’t worth much money

Earning money from ad revenue has always been tough. This is just a little extra weight.

How much money could you earn off of 10,000 views, anyways? Not much.

You need to earn $50 in ad revenue to be paid out, and 10,000 views wouldn’t have gotten you there. You would have had to have passed this milestone anyways to actually see any money.

It’s too hard to put an exact number on the money you could have earned from your first 10,000 views – there are too many variables – but considering that smaller channels get lower-paying ads we’re probably talking about pocket change.

3. Inappropriate content won’t be monetized

YouTube has been having issues with advertisers lately. A lot of brands have been justifiably miffed that their products are appearing next to some violent, threatening, objectively offensive content. Anyone could monetize, and some pretty bad eggs took advantage of that.

Now that channels will be applying for YouTube’s Partnership Program instead of simply activating the feature, there can be a real screening process. Channels with content that violates YouTube’s Community Guidelines can be barred from monetization.

4. Thieves won’t profit

There are people out there who want views, subscribers, and nice comments but who do not want to put any real work into getting them. It isn’t uncommon for someone like this to download a video they like and post it to their own channel.

This reposted video will steal views and ad revenue away from the real post on the creator’s channel.

Having a review process for the Partnership Program will help ensure that these content thieves are caught before they can make any money.

YouTube also recently made it easier to report users for impersonation, regardless of how many views they have.

TheGamingGuy looked into people who had stolen his logo and found out they had also stolen whole videos from other YouTubers.

There are clear benefits to this new milestone, but there are also some questions remaining.

How does this change stop content thieves from taking views and ad revenue from creators?

It will help stop them from making money themselves, but not from siphoning away views from other channels. The impersonation rules only apply if somebody is pretending to be another creator. You can steal and repost someone’s content without pretending to be them.

This new rule does take away money as an incentive for stealing content, but a lot of people doing this probably aren’t in it for the money. They might just be misguided fans who want to repost videos they enjoy.

Could this affect your CPM?

Competition plays a huge role in how much YouTubers earn from ad revenue. Some genres are bigger on YouTube than others and, the more popular your genre is, the more options advertisers have. The more competition there is for higher-paying ads, the larger your channel has to be to get them.

Could this new milestone decrease competition in some genres?

Leave a comment to let me know what you think. Jayaprakash, one of our members here, also started an active forum thread on this issue so make sure to join that discussion too!

Touch Up YouTube Videos with Effects in Filmora

You can check our tips and tricks about how to get more views, and here is one thing that need to remember that content is the king. To polish your video content, you can use some YouTube video editing software to remove unwanted clips, add texts and titles, apply filters, create attractive channel arts such as banner and thumbnail. Here, I recommend Wondershare Filmora .

Richard Bennett

Richard Bennett is a writer and a lover of all things video.

Follow @Richard Bennett

Richard Bennett

Oct 26, 2023• Proven solutions

0

Navin explains this issue really clearly.

YouTube announced changes to its Partnership Program for some time. For a long time, anybody who had an account in good standing could monetize their videos and start earning ad revenue, but now you need to have 10,000 views to qualify.

My first thought was that this isn’t fair. Small channels shouldn’t be barred from trying to earn money.

I was prepared to go to war over this. Or do an angry blog post. One of those.

However, when you consider YouTube’s reasons for imposing this milestone, it actually starts to make a lot of sense. Here are 4 reasons why this will be a good thing for creators.

1. 10,000 isn’t a crazy number

This is actually a very do-able number for a smaller channel if the creator works hard at growing their audience. Remember that this is cumulative – you don’t need to get 10,000 views on a single video.

Say you receive about 100 views per video and post once a week. It would take you about 2 years to reach 10,000 at that rate, except that it wouldn’t because if you’re putting out good content on that reliable a schedule your channel will be growing (even if it’s slow).

If you get 500 views per video and post every week, you’ll reach 10,000 in about 5 months.

2. 10,000 views aren’t worth much money

Earning money from ad revenue has always been tough. This is just a little extra weight.

How much money could you earn off of 10,000 views, anyways? Not much.

You need to earn $50 in ad revenue to be paid out, and 10,000 views wouldn’t have gotten you there. You would have had to have passed this milestone anyways to actually see any money.

It’s too hard to put an exact number on the money you could have earned from your first 10,000 views – there are too many variables – but considering that smaller channels get lower-paying ads we’re probably talking about pocket change.

3. Inappropriate content won’t be monetized

YouTube has been having issues with advertisers lately. A lot of brands have been justifiably miffed that their products are appearing next to some violent, threatening, objectively offensive content. Anyone could monetize, and some pretty bad eggs took advantage of that.

Now that channels will be applying for YouTube’s Partnership Program instead of simply activating the feature, there can be a real screening process. Channels with content that violates YouTube’s Community Guidelines can be barred from monetization.

4. Thieves won’t profit

There are people out there who want views, subscribers, and nice comments but who do not want to put any real work into getting them. It isn’t uncommon for someone like this to download a video they like and post it to their own channel.

This reposted video will steal views and ad revenue away from the real post on the creator’s channel.

Having a review process for the Partnership Program will help ensure that these content thieves are caught before they can make any money.

YouTube also recently made it easier to report users for impersonation, regardless of how many views they have.

TheGamingGuy looked into people who had stolen his logo and found out they had also stolen whole videos from other YouTubers.

There are clear benefits to this new milestone, but there are also some questions remaining.

How does this change stop content thieves from taking views and ad revenue from creators?

It will help stop them from making money themselves, but not from siphoning away views from other channels. The impersonation rules only apply if somebody is pretending to be another creator. You can steal and repost someone’s content without pretending to be them.

This new rule does take away money as an incentive for stealing content, but a lot of people doing this probably aren’t in it for the money. They might just be misguided fans who want to repost videos they enjoy.

Could this affect your CPM?

Competition plays a huge role in how much YouTubers earn from ad revenue. Some genres are bigger on YouTube than others and, the more popular your genre is, the more options advertisers have. The more competition there is for higher-paying ads, the larger your channel has to be to get them.

Could this new milestone decrease competition in some genres?

Leave a comment to let me know what you think. Jayaprakash, one of our members here, also started an active forum thread on this issue so make sure to join that discussion too!

Touch Up YouTube Videos with Effects in Filmora

You can check our tips and tricks about how to get more views, and here is one thing that need to remember that content is the king. To polish your video content, you can use some YouTube video editing software to remove unwanted clips, add texts and titles, apply filters, create attractive channel arts such as banner and thumbnail. Here, I recommend Wondershare Filmora .

Richard Bennett

Richard Bennett is a writer and a lover of all things video.

Follow @Richard Bennett

Elevate Your Shots: Vlogger’s Guide to the 9 Finest Camera Gadgets

Smartphone Camera Accessories Vloggers Should Try to Improve Recording

Richard Bennett

Oct 26, 2023• Proven solutions

0

As smartphone camera technology is rapidly advancing, more and more people are using smartphones as their primary vlogging device. They’re convenient and they draw the least amount of attention. But since most smartphones weren’t made specifically for vlogging, there’s a lot of room to make them more suitable for that purpose. Here is a list of the nine best smartphone camera accessories for vloggers.

Table of Contents 1. PORTABLE CHARGER2. TRIPOD MOUNT3. ANTI-GRAVITY CASE4. SELFIE RING LIGHT5. DIRECTIONAL MICROPHONE6. LENS SET7. FILMMAKING RIG8. FILMMAKING RIG9. GIMBAL

1. RAVPower Portable Charger

Vlogging uses a lot more power. If you’re planning to vlog all throughout your day with your phone, you need a portable way to charge it back up. RAVPower has a great line up of portable chargers with multiple USB inputs that hold a total charge of more than 20,000 mAh. With that amount, you can fully charge your smartphone more than 6 times! I own one myself and it’s been great for me during my travels. A 22,000 mAh charger goes for about $42 USD.

2. Arkon Tripod Mount

The Arkon tripod mount is a great portable tripod option that you can get at the fair price of around $20 USD. Not only does it have bendable legs, like the more expensive Joby GorillaPod tripod, that you can wrap around all kinds of structures, but it also comes with the smartphone mount, which Joby sells separately. Another great thing about the Arkon tripod is that its smartphone mount can be rotated so that you can position your phone to film in either widescreen or portrait mode.

3. Mega Tiny Anti-Gravity Case

For all the flat surfaces that the bendable legs of the Arkon tripod mount can’t wrap around, Mega Tiny’s anti-gravity cases will do the job of holding your iPhone or Android phone in one fixed position. These cases can stick to glass, mirrors, metal, and more. They range from $20 to $30 USD.

4. FLII Selfie Ring Light

As much as smartphone camera technology has advanced, phone cameras still underperform when it comes to filming video in low-light. In low-light, your footage is very grainy because your phone is equipped with a small camera sensor, an engineering choice by the manufacturers to keep the size of the phone small. A handy accessory that you can use to get more light is the FLII selfie ring light. This ring light clamps onto your phone and emits a neutral white light. You can clamp this light to either side of your phone, depending on whether you want to use your rear-facing camera or your front-facing camera. This selfie ring light sells for around $16 USD.

5. RODE VideoMic Me

The mic that is already built into your phone is equally sensitive to the sounds that come from behind the phone as it is to the sounds that are in front of the phone. This can be problematic when you’re trying to vlog in selfie mode while there’s a loud concert on the other side. One smartphone accessory that can improve the sound that you record from your phone in these situations is the RODE VideoMic Me. This mini directional shotgun mic plugs right into your phone’s headphone jack and sells for around $60 USD. In windy conditions, the dead cat windshield that it comes with does a great job of minimizing noise from the wind. In quiet, indoor conditions where you are the only person speaking, this device performs no better than your phone’s internal microphone. Your phone will also have to be in airplane mode to prevent the Rode VideoMic Me from recording unwanted clicking noise caused by background processes performed by your phone. So you wouldn’t want to use this for livestreaming.

6. Aukey Optic 3-in-1 Smartphone Lens Set

Aukey makes a 3-in-1 lens set that you can clamp onto your smartphone so that you can vlog at different focal lengths. The 3-in-1 set comes with a wide-angle lens, a fisheye lens, and a macro lens. The clamp it comes with is long enough for these lenses to reach any camera on a smartphone, not just those of iPhones which are positioned close to the phone’s outer edge. To get the most out of these lenses, you’ll have to use them without your phone’s protective case on. Although you are free to use this lens set on either your phone’s rear-facing camera or front-facing camera, the metal housing of these lenses is likely to show up in your footage when you use them with your front-facing camera. So, instead of having your recorded image stretch to the ends of a 16:9 ratio rectangular frame, your recorded image will look as if it is contained inside a circle. This lens set sells for around $30 USD.

7. iOgrapher Go for Android and iPhone

There’s many more accessories that you can take advantage of if you don’t limit yourself to just smartphone camera accessories. Sound and lighting equipment made for stand-alone cameras perform much better too. Many of these accessories are meant to connect to the camera “shoe” (a bracket on top of the camera that accessories can be attached to). Smartphones don’t come with these kinds of shoes. So, to take advantage of these higher quality accessories, you’ll need some kind of camera rig for your smartphone that also comes with shoes. The iOgrapher Go offers this at around $60 USD. This accessory comes with three shoes.

8. Manfrotto TwistGrip System

Manfrotto’s TwistGrip System does a similar job to the above iOgrapher Go. This system also comes with three shoes. An advantage the TwistGrip System has over the iOgrapher Go is that it is much more portable. Its three connected parts can be detached to take up less space in your bag. This system sells for around $50 USD.

9. Zhiyun Smooth-Q 3-Axis Handheld Gimbal Stabilizer for Smartphones

My favorite smartphone camera accessory that I own is the Zhiyun Smooth-Q gimbal stabilizer. This gimbal is very effective in helping you record smooth video. Using the app that it comes with, you can even preset this gimbal to smoothly pan and rotate from a starting position to an ending position, giving you the opportunity to film beautiful time lapses. You can get this device at around $100 USD.

Polish Your YouTube Videos with Filmora

As one of the most widely used video editing software in YouTube video editing, Filmora provides lots of templates and effects with an intuitive interface, which saves much time. Download the free trial version and get started now.

Richard Bennett

Richard Bennett is a writer and a lover of all things video.

Follow @Richard Bennett

Richard Bennett

Oct 26, 2023• Proven solutions

0

As smartphone camera technology is rapidly advancing, more and more people are using smartphones as their primary vlogging device. They’re convenient and they draw the least amount of attention. But since most smartphones weren’t made specifically for vlogging, there’s a lot of room to make them more suitable for that purpose. Here is a list of the nine best smartphone camera accessories for vloggers.

Table of Contents 1. PORTABLE CHARGER2. TRIPOD MOUNT3. ANTI-GRAVITY CASE4. SELFIE RING LIGHT5. DIRECTIONAL MICROPHONE6. LENS SET7. FILMMAKING RIG8. FILMMAKING RIG9. GIMBAL

1. RAVPower Portable Charger

Vlogging uses a lot more power. If you’re planning to vlog all throughout your day with your phone, you need a portable way to charge it back up. RAVPower has a great line up of portable chargers with multiple USB inputs that hold a total charge of more than 20,000 mAh. With that amount, you can fully charge your smartphone more than 6 times! I own one myself and it’s been great for me during my travels. A 22,000 mAh charger goes for about $42 USD.

Click here

2. Arkon Tripod Mount

The Arkon tripod mount is a great portable tripod option that you can get at the fair price of around $20 USD. Not only does it have bendable legs, like the more expensive Joby GorillaPod tripod, that you can wrap around all kinds of structures, but it also comes with the smartphone mount, which Joby sells separately. Another great thing about the Arkon tripod is that its smartphone mount can be rotated so that you can position your phone to film in either widescreen or portrait mode.

3. Mega Tiny Anti-Gravity Case

For all the flat surfaces that the bendable legs of the Arkon tripod mount can’t wrap around, Mega Tiny’s anti-gravity cases will do the job of holding your iPhone or Android phone in one fixed position. These cases can stick to glass, mirrors, metal, and more. They range from $20 to $30 USD.

4. FLII Selfie Ring Light

As much as smartphone camera technology has advanced, phone cameras still underperform when it comes to filming video in low-light. In low-light, your footage is very grainy because your phone is equipped with a small camera sensor, an engineering choice by the manufacturers to keep the size of the phone small. A handy accessory that you can use to get more light is the FLII selfie ring light. This ring light clamps onto your phone and emits a neutral white light. You can clamp this light to either side of your phone, depending on whether you want to use your rear-facing camera or your front-facing camera. This selfie ring light sells for around $16 USD.

5. RODE VideoMic Me

The mic that is already built into your phone is equally sensitive to the sounds that come from behind the phone as it is to the sounds that are in front of the phone. This can be problematic when you’re trying to vlog in selfie mode while there’s a loud concert on the other side. One smartphone accessory that can improve the sound that you record from your phone in these situations is the RODE VideoMic Me. This mini directional shotgun mic plugs right into your phone’s headphone jack and sells for around $60 USD. In windy conditions, the dead cat windshield that it comes with does a great job of minimizing noise from the wind. In quiet, indoor conditions where you are the only person speaking, this device performs no better than your phone’s internal microphone. Your phone will also have to be in airplane mode to prevent the Rode VideoMic Me from recording unwanted clicking noise caused by background processes performed by your phone. So you wouldn’t want to use this for livestreaming.

6. Aukey Optic 3-in-1 Smartphone Lens Set

Aukey makes a 3-in-1 lens set that you can clamp onto your smartphone so that you can vlog at different focal lengths. The 3-in-1 set comes with a wide-angle lens, a fisheye lens, and a macro lens. The clamp it comes with is long enough for these lenses to reach any camera on a smartphone, not just those of iPhones which are positioned close to the phone’s outer edge. To get the most out of these lenses, you’ll have to use them without your phone’s protective case on. Although you are free to use this lens set on either your phone’s rear-facing camera or front-facing camera, the metal housing of these lenses is likely to show up in your footage when you use them with your front-facing camera. So, instead of having your recorded image stretch to the ends of a 16:9 ratio rectangular frame, your recorded image will look as if it is contained inside a circle. This lens set sells for around $30 USD.

7. iOgrapher Go for Android and iPhone

There’s many more accessories that you can take advantage of if you don’t limit yourself to just smartphone camera accessories. Sound and lighting equipment made for stand-alone cameras perform much better too. Many of these accessories are meant to connect to the camera “shoe” (a bracket on top of the camera that accessories can be attached to). Smartphones don’t come with these kinds of shoes. So, to take advantage of these higher quality accessories, you’ll need some kind of camera rig for your smartphone that also comes with shoes. The iOgrapher Go offers this at around $60 USD. This accessory comes with three shoes.

8. Manfrotto TwistGrip System

Manfrotto’s TwistGrip System does a similar job to the above iOgrapher Go. This system also comes with three shoes. An advantage the TwistGrip System has over the iOgrapher Go is that it is much more portable. Its three connected parts can be detached to take up less space in your bag. This system sells for around $50 USD.

9. Zhiyun Smooth-Q 3-Axis Handheld Gimbal Stabilizer for Smartphones

My favorite smartphone camera accessory that I own is the Zhiyun Smooth-Q gimbal stabilizer. This gimbal is very effective in helping you record smooth video. Using the app that it comes with, you can even preset this gimbal to smoothly pan and rotate from a starting position to an ending position, giving you the opportunity to film beautiful time lapses. You can get this device at around $100 USD.

Polish Your YouTube Videos with Filmora

As one of the most widely used video editing software in YouTube video editing, Filmora provides lots of templates and effects with an intuitive interface, which saves much time. Download the free trial version and get started now.

Richard Bennett

Richard Bennett is a writer and a lover of all things video.

Follow @Richard Bennett

Richard Bennett

Oct 26, 2023• Proven solutions

0

As smartphone camera technology is rapidly advancing, more and more people are using smartphones as their primary vlogging device. They’re convenient and they draw the least amount of attention. But since most smartphones weren’t made specifically for vlogging, there’s a lot of room to make them more suitable for that purpose. Here is a list of the nine best smartphone camera accessories for vloggers.

Table of Contents 1. PORTABLE CHARGER2. TRIPOD MOUNT3. ANTI-GRAVITY CASE4. SELFIE RING LIGHT5. DIRECTIONAL MICROPHONE6. LENS SET7. FILMMAKING RIG8. FILMMAKING RIG9. GIMBAL

1. RAVPower Portable Charger

Vlogging uses a lot more power. If you’re planning to vlog all throughout your day with your phone, you need a portable way to charge it back up. RAVPower has a great line up of portable chargers with multiple USB inputs that hold a total charge of more than 20,000 mAh. With that amount, you can fully charge your smartphone more than 6 times! I own one myself and it’s been great for me during my travels. A 22,000 mAh charger goes for about $42 USD.

2. Arkon Tripod Mount

The Arkon tripod mount is a great portable tripod option that you can get at the fair price of around $20 USD. Not only does it have bendable legs, like the more expensive Joby GorillaPod tripod, that you can wrap around all kinds of structures, but it also comes with the smartphone mount, which Joby sells separately. Another great thing about the Arkon tripod is that its smartphone mount can be rotated so that you can position your phone to film in either widescreen or portrait mode.

3. Mega Tiny Anti-Gravity Case

For all the flat surfaces that the bendable legs of the Arkon tripod mount can’t wrap around, Mega Tiny’s anti-gravity cases will do the job of holding your iPhone or Android phone in one fixed position. These cases can stick to glass, mirrors, metal, and more. They range from $20 to $30 USD.

4. FLII Selfie Ring Light

As much as smartphone camera technology has advanced, phone cameras still underperform when it comes to filming video in low-light. In low-light, your footage is very grainy because your phone is equipped with a small camera sensor, an engineering choice by the manufacturers to keep the size of the phone small. A handy accessory that you can use to get more light is the FLII selfie ring light. This ring light clamps onto your phone and emits a neutral white light. You can clamp this light to either side of your phone, depending on whether you want to use your rear-facing camera or your front-facing camera. This selfie ring light sells for around $16 USD.

5. RODE VideoMic Me

The mic that is already built into your phone is equally sensitive to the sounds that come from behind the phone as it is to the sounds that are in front of the phone. This can be problematic when you’re trying to vlog in selfie mode while there’s a loud concert on the other side. One smartphone accessory that can improve the sound that you record from your phone in these situations is the RODE VideoMic Me. This mini directional shotgun mic plugs right into your phone’s headphone jack and sells for around $60 USD. In windy conditions, the dead cat windshield that it comes with does a great job of minimizing noise from the wind. In quiet, indoor conditions where you are the only person speaking, this device performs no better than your phone’s internal microphone. Your phone will also have to be in airplane mode to prevent the Rode VideoMic Me from recording unwanted clicking noise caused by background processes performed by your phone. So you wouldn’t want to use this for livestreaming.

6. Aukey Optic 3-in-1 Smartphone Lens Set

Aukey makes a 3-in-1 lens set that you can clamp onto your smartphone so that you can vlog at different focal lengths. The 3-in-1 set comes with a wide-angle lens, a fisheye lens, and a macro lens. The clamp it comes with is long enough for these lenses to reach any camera on a smartphone, not just those of iPhones which are positioned close to the phone’s outer edge. To get the most out of these lenses, you’ll have to use them without your phone’s protective case on. Although you are free to use this lens set on either your phone’s rear-facing camera or front-facing camera, the metal housing of these lenses is likely to show up in your footage when you use them with your front-facing camera. So, instead of having your recorded image stretch to the ends of a 16:9 ratio rectangular frame, your recorded image will look as if it is contained inside a circle. This lens set sells for around $30 USD.

7. iOgrapher Go for Android and iPhone

There’s many more accessories that you can take advantage of if you don’t limit yourself to just smartphone camera accessories. Sound and lighting equipment made for stand-alone cameras perform much better too. Many of these accessories are meant to connect to the camera “shoe” (a bracket on top of the camera that accessories can be attached to). Smartphones don’t come with these kinds of shoes. So, to take advantage of these higher quality accessories, you’ll need some kind of camera rig for your smartphone that also comes with shoes. The iOgrapher Go offers this at around $60 USD. This accessory comes with three shoes.

8. Manfrotto TwistGrip System

Manfrotto’s TwistGrip System does a similar job to the above iOgrapher Go. This system also comes with three shoes. An advantage the TwistGrip System has over the iOgrapher Go is that it is much more portable. Its three connected parts can be detached to take up less space in your bag. This system sells for around $50 USD.

9. Zhiyun Smooth-Q 3-Axis Handheld Gimbal Stabilizer for Smartphones

My favorite smartphone camera accessory that I own is the Zhiyun Smooth-Q gimbal stabilizer. This gimbal is very effective in helping you record smooth video. Using the app that it comes with, you can even preset this gimbal to smoothly pan and rotate from a starting position to an ending position, giving you the opportunity to film beautiful time lapses. You can get this device at around $100 USD.

Polish Your YouTube Videos with Filmora

As one of the most widely used video editing software in YouTube video editing, Filmora provides lots of templates and effects with an intuitive interface, which saves much time. Download the free trial version and get started now.

Richard Bennett

Richard Bennett is a writer and a lover of all things video.

Follow @Richard Bennett

Richard Bennett

Oct 26, 2023• Proven solutions

0

As smartphone camera technology is rapidly advancing, more and more people are using smartphones as their primary vlogging device. They’re convenient and they draw the least amount of attention. But since most smartphones weren’t made specifically for vlogging, there’s a lot of room to make them more suitable for that purpose. Here is a list of the nine best smartphone camera accessories for vloggers.

Table of Contents 1. PORTABLE CHARGER2. TRIPOD MOUNT3. ANTI-GRAVITY CASE4. SELFIE RING LIGHT5. DIRECTIONAL MICROPHONE6. LENS SET7. FILMMAKING RIG8. FILMMAKING RIG9. GIMBAL

1. RAVPower Portable Charger

Vlogging uses a lot more power. If you’re planning to vlog all throughout your day with your phone, you need a portable way to charge it back up. RAVPower has a great line up of portable chargers with multiple USB inputs that hold a total charge of more than 20,000 mAh. With that amount, you can fully charge your smartphone more than 6 times! I own one myself and it’s been great for me during my travels. A 22,000 mAh charger goes for about $42 USD.

2. Arkon Tripod Mount

The Arkon tripod mount is a great portable tripod option that you can get at the fair price of around $20 USD. Not only does it have bendable legs, like the more expensive Joby GorillaPod tripod, that you can wrap around all kinds of structures, but it also comes with the smartphone mount, which Joby sells separately. Another great thing about the Arkon tripod is that its smartphone mount can be rotated so that you can position your phone to film in either widescreen or portrait mode.

3. Mega Tiny Anti-Gravity Case

For all the flat surfaces that the bendable legs of the Arkon tripod mount can’t wrap around, Mega Tiny’s anti-gravity cases will do the job of holding your iPhone or Android phone in one fixed position. These cases can stick to glass, mirrors, metal, and more. They range from $20 to $30 USD.

4. FLII Selfie Ring Light

As much as smartphone camera technology has advanced, phone cameras still underperform when it comes to filming video in low-light. In low-light, your footage is very grainy because your phone is equipped with a small camera sensor, an engineering choice by the manufacturers to keep the size of the phone small. A handy accessory that you can use to get more light is the FLII selfie ring light. This ring light clamps onto your phone and emits a neutral white light. You can clamp this light to either side of your phone, depending on whether you want to use your rear-facing camera or your front-facing camera. This selfie ring light sells for around $16 USD.

5. RODE VideoMic Me

The mic that is already built into your phone is equally sensitive to the sounds that come from behind the phone as it is to the sounds that are in front of the phone. This can be problematic when you’re trying to vlog in selfie mode while there’s a loud concert on the other side. One smartphone accessory that can improve the sound that you record from your phone in these situations is the RODE VideoMic Me. This mini directional shotgun mic plugs right into your phone’s headphone jack and sells for around $60 USD. In windy conditions, the dead cat windshield that it comes with does a great job of minimizing noise from the wind. In quiet, indoor conditions where you are the only person speaking, this device performs no better than your phone’s internal microphone. Your phone will also have to be in airplane mode to prevent the Rode VideoMic Me from recording unwanted clicking noise caused by background processes performed by your phone. So you wouldn’t want to use this for livestreaming.

6. Aukey Optic 3-in-1 Smartphone Lens Set

Aukey makes a 3-in-1 lens set that you can clamp onto your smartphone so that you can vlog at different focal lengths. The 3-in-1 set comes with a wide-angle lens, a fisheye lens, and a macro lens. The clamp it comes with is long enough for these lenses to reach any camera on a smartphone, not just those of iPhones which are positioned close to the phone’s outer edge. To get the most out of these lenses, you’ll have to use them without your phone’s protective case on. Although you are free to use this lens set on either your phone’s rear-facing camera or front-facing camera, the metal housing of these lenses is likely to show up in your footage when you use them with your front-facing camera. So, instead of having your recorded image stretch to the ends of a 16:9 ratio rectangular frame, your recorded image will look as if it is contained inside a circle. This lens set sells for around $30 USD.

7. iOgrapher Go for Android and iPhone

There’s many more accessories that you can take advantage of if you don’t limit yourself to just smartphone camera accessories. Sound and lighting equipment made for stand-alone cameras perform much better too. Many of these accessories are meant to connect to the camera “shoe” (a bracket on top of the camera that accessories can be attached to). Smartphones don’t come with these kinds of shoes. So, to take advantage of these higher quality accessories, you’ll need some kind of camera rig for your smartphone that also comes with shoes. The iOgrapher Go offers this at around $60 USD. This accessory comes with three shoes.

8. Manfrotto TwistGrip System

Manfrotto’s TwistGrip System does a similar job to the above iOgrapher Go. This system also comes with three shoes. An advantage the TwistGrip System has over the iOgrapher Go is that it is much more portable. Its three connected parts can be detached to take up less space in your bag. This system sells for around $50 USD.

9. Zhiyun Smooth-Q 3-Axis Handheld Gimbal Stabilizer for Smartphones

My favorite smartphone camera accessory that I own is the Zhiyun Smooth-Q gimbal stabilizer. This gimbal is very effective in helping you record smooth video. Using the app that it comes with, you can even preset this gimbal to smoothly pan and rotate from a starting position to an ending position, giving you the opportunity to film beautiful time lapses. You can get this device at around $100 USD.

Polish Your YouTube Videos with Filmora

As one of the most widely used video editing software in YouTube video editing, Filmora provides lots of templates and effects with an intuitive interface, which saves much time. Download the free trial version and get started now.

Richard Bennett

Richard Bennett is a writer and a lover of all things video.

Follow @Richard Bennett