Do you know Blender YouTube Creators, that don't talk in their videos?

Hey Guys,

Do you know any “bigger” Blender Creators creating Blender Content without Talking?
The Only one I know, which I’ve watched myself is “sketching in blender”.

Why I’m asking this? I have my own Youtube channel with 10k+ subscribers. In the past, I’ve mostly done bigger time lapses, where I do a Voice Over explaining stuff.

I also did some videos more like a tutorial, where I explain workflows in more detail.

I really love working with Blender, and figuring out how to do stuff for my projects. I also like uploading Videos to YouTube inspiring people. Also, this gives me an audience to sell my Addon and other products too, which helps me make a living.

The Problem is, that I really don’t like the Scripting and Voice over part. Englisch is not my naitive language, so just talking while I create stuff in Blender is something I’m not really good at. I’ve tried it a few times, and it just decreases the fun I have in Blender.

So I instead write scripts, which I then record and edit ontop of my videos.

I’ve noticed, that this isn’t something I like doing at all. Recording the Blender Stuff is super fun and easy for me, but as soon as I start with the Voice Over and scripting part, I keep procrastinating. Stuff that should take me 2 hours, take me 2-3 days.

I’ve now tried it for some months and noticed, that I probably could publish 3 times as many videos, when I would not have to do a Voice Over.

The Problem is, I fear that people will not enjoy my content as much, if I don’t explain what I’m doing. I have the feeling, that I have a lot of beginners watching my videos, and I would imagine it to be too complicated for them to follow without narration.

An alternative would be AI Text to Speech. But even then, I need to write the Script, and I don’t really like Text To Speech, especially If I’ve done my own voice overs before.

So I’m wondering, what other method there are of creating engaging Blender content, without talking. Do you have any examples?

2 Likes

Please go ahead.
While I’m probably not your audience at all anyway, I wholeheartedly despise this trend youtube forced upon us, this tendency of everybody showing us their (not nessecarily handsome) face on their webcam just because we’re trying to watch sth. which is supposedly a software-related video.
And don’t get me started about the dumb grimaces they’re making on their thumbnails these days, like they’re the most dumb f**k of a clown who get’s shot from a cannon on a daily basis.

greetings, Kologe

9 Likes

English is my only language; nonetheless, I also watch such videos in other languages. Here’s one I was watching this morning:

Enjoyed seeing the painting technique. Youtube provides subtitles; even though I don’t understand the words, other viewers will. And hearing the teacher speak along (to me) is better than just random music.

Maybe try silent movie style, with white on black text between important steps and crazy bar piano music in the background. I don’t know if this would work for longer videos though.

I wholeheartedly agree with @Kologe though. I wish youtube had this menu
image

4 Likes

I’m jealous. I have 2. And one of them’s my mother. :rofl:

But to seriously answer your question, I’ve seen a lot of videos from bigger channels that don’t talk at all in their timelapses. There’s usually some kind of background music, and occasionally they’ll pop a text box up on screen pointing out a specific thing on the model, or what tool they’re using, but not always.

The speechless videos seem popular enough, the one I just watched had over 100 thousand views in a month, and a very favorable like to dislike ratio.

So, there is a market for it, and if it’s something you’re interested in trying, I don’t see any reason not to give it a go for at least a couple videos and see how it works out.

2 Likes

Please don’t use Text to Speech, I always cringe when watching YT videos that use those techniques. I’m in the same boat with other replies; there is def a market for silent videos. Maybe just show some subtitles when you’re doing something important (shortcuts etc) but other than that there is really no need to talk. I don’t think you’ve got something to lose, other than maybe some followers who prefer the other style + in the end you want to find something that works for you as a creator in the long run, not be a “slave” to your audience.

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I like the format Open Class uses. They are from Sth Korea. Sometimes there is a robot voice.
https://www.youtube.com/@BlenderClass/featured

No face. No Woop woop noises or flashing colors.
Just a tutorial.

Never fear Kologe, I can assure you that you will never see my face on any Youtube video I make and frankly it’s really not needed, at least not for Blender stuff. I want to see and know what’s being done, a face in a circle, even in a corner just isn’t needed.
Mind you, having said that, I suspect it’s not helping. For real numbers it can be just as much about the personality/viewing experience, as it is actual useful information/facts. I mean I’ve done a couple of videos that I felt really provided a bunch of useful info, that largely isn’t found anywhere else and yet can barely get 1000 views.
Someone else pops up a half click-bait thumbnail and really just goes over much that has been covered so many times before or re-hashes a PR statement, etc and gets 30k views.

Same, tho I at least have a few more then 2, but I don’t ever see me hitting 10K, not sure I’m going to ever manage 1k.

For the OP, yeah, scripting/recording takes ages, I know, but then I actually script it first and as I’m doing so, I create most/all of the visuals to go along with it. Makes editing a bit quicker, as I’m not cutting out waffle and since its only audio you don’t get all those quick edit cuts on peoples faces as their head jumps or wobbles from side to side.

For what I do and mostly for what I watch, I’d want the audio so as to hopefully also hear what they are doing and more important why they are doing it. In a lot of cases just seeing it done is only half the story, but I guess that really depends on the purpose of the actual video, so it may work without any explanation.

Tutorials need some sort of narration to explain why you are doing what you are doing. The why is the most important part of teaching, otherwise it becomes a list of steps that need memorization which is not optimal. Blender Guru is a great example of excellent tutorials, yes they are lengthy, but the reasoning behind every step is what sticks. Most people prefer voice overs since they can focus more on the ui but if you make good subs and give people enough time to read, i see no problem. Ai has come a long way in text to speech, give it a try too. I recommend Tortoise TTS.

I use TTS for the dialog in my movies, and can usually find a voice that works for what I need.

Acapela Box
https://acapela-box.com/AcaBox/index.php

Oddcast

To the OP, I do not like tutorials with out explanations. Sometimes the text overlays are helpful - but not always.

Polygon runway does timelapses regularly which are great to watch.

There are individuals who create some videos with explanations and other videos without any explanation. An example is YanSculpts. He creates character sculpting videos. Sometimes he just uses background music when showing a sculpting timelapse. Other times he explains what he’s doing while sculpting.

Without voice, I find most technical tutorials hard to follow. If you’re reading subs, you cannot watch the screen.

Most Blendheads don’t mind a foreign accent. If you think quickly and have a todo list, you don’t need to write the full script.

For me, good AI voices (Wellsaid, Murf) are better than silence. I also don’t need to see a face.

Im personally doesnt care about voiceover until there’s something which really need to be explained. So if its a case when people start to open notebook on the video with text which you need to read, or too much text overlays - i just skip it and find better video with voice over (and always able to find one).

Im totally dont care about “Text to Speach”. All MACHINe video use it (he use google solution iirc). And all MACHINe videos are perfect in terms how well and how fast they explain the topic.

While I like time-lapses, I always struggle a bit with ‘no voice’ tutorials. Even if instructions are overlaid on the screen, it just makes following them harder. I’d experiment with the format to see how you can reduce ‘brain load’ when following your tutorials, perhaps by providing instructing in different ways?

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Well, technically, you’re probably right.
Then again, personality, viewing-experience?

If I was searching for entertainment, I’d know better places to find it than Youtube-tutorials.
Nor have I any intention to marry the instructors (I’m sorry guys, I know it hurts). I really couldn’t give any less of a damn about their personality.

After all, isn’t the truth that the largest factor in those 30k views isn’t anybody’s personality at all, not even any subconsious psychological effects whatsoever, but really Youtube’s algorithms?

greetings, Kologe

Well yes, but at the same time if it is tutorials you are after, even if you don’t really want to admit it, chances are you will sit and watch something that is more ‘engaging’ then another tutorial with the same information but using an AI voice-over.

It’s the personality, entertainment, engagement, etc (along with title and thumbnail) that not only get the initial click but keeps the person watching and maybe hitting like. That in turn feeds into the algorithm, pushing the video into more peoples faces, which then in turn helps the stats and makes Youtube push it more.

I know I’ve been guilty of pretty much watching a whole video as it was presented well, seemed liked they know what they where talking about, etc only to reach the end and think, ‘well that was a waste of time, the title promised a lot, but in the end the whole thing told me nothing I’ve not seen/read many times before’.

On the flip side I’ve checked some videos that lasted all of about 15-20s of my viewing, as the start held out little hope and on skipping/jumping to spots along the whole video it didn’t seem to get any better. Now for all I know there may have been a pearl of wisdom or 2 buried somewhere throughout the whole clip. Guess I’ll never know.

It’s not my intention to fight with you, but I fail to see how seeing the guy on his webcam is a factor to any of this.
And quite frankly, the thumbnails are nothing short of the worst acting I’ve seen and all types of dumb buffoonery.

greetings, Kologe

It doesn’t have to be webcam in the corner, it can be full screen at times and then full screen of just Blender. Either way it’s about creating engagement with the audience and those that do it well (along with good content/info) get the big numbers.

Yup and while you and me consider them cringe-worthy and click-bait, when millions of peoples Youtube screens are filled with thumbnails, it’s those that get the higher impressions. If that is then backed up with actual viewing/watch time, then Youtube will push them more, since its in their interest to have greater views/watching in order to sell the ads.

I must admit that doing+talking is very distracting for the person making the video. Also it might be annoying for the person watching the video, because words might not come out correctly, or perhaps the actions in the software might be confusing…

Some youtubers mentioned that it took them years of talking+recording to get to a pro level, literally is a very tough skill to acquire. Some even mentioned that it was an effort of many years. In some cases half of videos are recorded twice (first run is a test run – depending on the success rate – video might go for a reshoot).

One solution I find good is to record the voice at a later time. I like this technique in some videos of Bisqwit. It makes sentences to be well-thought and carefully constructed rather than being spontaneous and random.

At least you can record your voice as of doing things, to get practice, but then at post production use it for notes and probably to sum things up in clean takes.