Virtual Lesson Video Tips for Horse Training-Techie Nerds Like Us

FOCUS ON WHAT YOU LIKE AND WHAT YOU WANT TO SEE MORE OF IN YOUR HORSE AND YOURSELF. Remember to be gentle on yourself! Compassion and understanding include self-talk and self-analysis. Be as kind, forgiving and gentle with the person in the videos as you are with your horse. 

The process of videoing and reviewing videos may sound daunting at first, but it is SOOOOOO WORTH IT and like any new skill becomes super easy with repetition. The best way to do it easily is to just do it often. Here are a few tips.

1. All you need is a smartphone and a minute or less.
• Prop up the phone against the stall wall 
• Or sit it on a bucket against a fence post
• Or get a friend to video a few short clips, or just one (short clips load easiest)
• Avg. total length of video submitted per lesson is 5-10 min. Send as much as you want though. We’ll get through as much as we can during your lesson time.
• Or get an inexpensive phone tripod from Amazon or at Best Buy. You can go as simple or fancy as you like.  A few are listed on the Products page of my website https://www.victorylanddressage.com/products/.  They tend to come in 2 parts, a holder for the phone and the legs, which can be sold separately or together.
2. Mark off your area: 
   • Do whatever you find easiest because if it is too difficult, you won’t be positively reinforced for your efforts!
   • Use cones or poles or some recognizable marker (milk jugs with sand in them and bricks etc. work great. Noting a tree or fence on all 4 sides of the area that is visible in the screen so that when you are riding or walking around with your horse can work but it will take extra effort to be sure to stay within the area that can be captured by your camera.
   • You can also use chalk to do this, but I prefer something that doesn’t wash away when it rains and usually choose something more permanent. 
3. Get the hang of it BEFORE you need a video to submit for a lesson or other reason to prevent possible stress.
4. Don't let perfect be the enemy of done! Who cares if the camera is crooked or your hair is a mess? Not us. 
5. Try to capture as much sound as you can. One of my students just uses a Bluetooth with her phone. She even does live lessons with me this way. Another does live lessons by just talking to me when she rides or walks by. Another is doing things with her horse that are mostly stationary or in a small area so we can hear each other through her phone without any fancy equipment. A little creativity can yield great results when it comes to audio.
6. Google is my favorite way for clients to share their videos with me due to the ease of organizing your videos so I can find and review them easily as needed. YouTube can be used, but is more difficult to upload and less reliable for lessons. Often people who try to use YouTube the night before show up at their lesson and the video is still uploading. If you choose this method, you’ll want to start in plenty of time.
7. We prefer to not use Facebook or Facebook messenger as it is all too easy to miss a message due to the overwhelming number of messages received daily. 
8. Reach out if you have any questions and remember, it’s a training exercise for the human!

For CHC Online Lesson Clients

We prefer to use Google Drive to share:  https://tinyurl.com/ycksmhbu this video breaks it down step-by-step for sharing success!! 

• Account: [email protected]
• If you can, *please* try to name your video with your name and date of scheduled lesson when you upload it to Drive. Thank you!

If you share via YouTube:

• Upload your video(s) to your YouTube account. 
• Mark video(s) as "Unlisted."
• Copy the video link(s) and email to [email protected].