EEVBlog Video Length

[Pete F]

I'll probably be shot down for this, but just my personal opinion as feedback I'd like to suggest to Dave he tries to keep the videos as close as possible to 15 minutes, max 20. It's difficult to edit that hard, and I appreciate it makes that side of things a lot more work. A lot of the videos run up around 1 hours etc. I typically watch at 1.5 x and a 15-20 minute video is something that can be squeezed in while having a coffee break etc. Watching a few 40-60 minute videos really chews into the time.

I'm sure plenty with more time on their hands will feel differently. Most of what is discussed I've covered previously, but it was typically served to me in boring as batshit lectures I'd try to stay awake through (generally unsuccessfully). I think Dave engages people brilliantly with passion and energy that is the mark of a skilled communicator hence I've taken more away from mere hours of Dave's content than I did literally years of hearing somebody droning on at the front of the room. I'd love to watch a lot more, but there's only so much time available. I'd personally rather see a complicated topic broken down into 2-3 shorter videos that follow in logical sequence vs one long one.

I know you get what you pay for, but the videos I get the most from are those discussing the theory/fundamentals/tutorials. By all means hack in to a Photocopier etc, but personally that just reminded me of work. However it would be good to see the fundamentals etc arranged in a logical progression, as it seems to me they jump around all over the shop.

Anyway, that's just my 2 cents worth. Overall it's a brilliant channel and it's no wonder there's so many subscribers. I've tried to throw a teeny bit of support in by buying another multimeter off him I probably didn't need, but it seemed to be one of those win/win situations (it has been a pretty good multimeter in fairness), and if a similar opportunity comes up again I'll do the same.

[Bud]

I do not mind longer videos, in fact i prefer them, as long as the creator does not repeat himself as Louis Rossman does. Short videos leave impression of been made in rush.

[mcinque]

I watch both length, as long they are interesting there is no matter of time

[Pete F]

They're fair comments, obviously it's only a matter of opinion, so everyone is different.

To give an example, I'm currently watching Dave's FPGA implementation video, it's 1 hour long. Now that in itself isn't remarkable, FPGAs are a whole can of worms (pun intended) and a person could (and there probably is) do a whole Youtube channel just on this one subject. However at minute 20:00 (where I'm currently up to), only the datasheet has been discussed. What ddid I take away from that 20 minutes? The FPGA he's using is weeny, read the datasheet, the programming voltage can be different to the operating voltage, read the datasheet, a basic layout of the chip, read the datasheet, and finally, read the datasheet. Now given Dave has dedicated a whole video to (quite rightly) reading datasheets I think about 15 minutes of that 20 could comfortably be edited out, replaced with a one liner about how important it is to read the datasheet, with a programming voltage vs operating voltage as an example if required, then move on. To get to that point has taken two breaks in my day, and I was watching at 2x speed.

I know it sounds very critical, but it is at least supposed to be constructive feedback. The attention span of the average punter, ie me. isn't very long at all. This is all very well known by Youtube and Social Media, and Dave would either have done a Youtube provided course/mentoring/feedback/etc, or with his subscription base could if he wanted to, where all this is discussed.

More is not always better.

[jancumps]

I prefer the current "long" style. The EE channels that stick to social media strategies and advised formats/lenghts don't seem to get a bigger audience from their adherence.

[Pete F]

I prefer the current "long" style. The EE channels that stick to social media strategies and advised formats/lenghts don't seem to get a bigger audience from their adherence.

Maybe they're not as good

[timgiles]

I believe that a good video is the right length! Not a specific length. For me there are plenty of channels I subscribe to that make 20 minute videos - and I do watch them. But - for electronics, learning, reviews, how to's, actually just about every video, if there is content that is relevant, I want it included and not rushed through. I suppose Dave could split up his videos once edited in to Parts 1 to X. But this is very distinguish.

Pete. Part of your argument is about time. So are you saying Dave waffles too much? Youtube remembers where you were with any video you have watched. So if you can only get 20 mins in to a video, you do not have to remember where you were, the exact second, you can just reload it the next time you have time.


Prehaps it might help if Dave added a list of timestamps to some of his longer videos. Linus Techtips do this with their weekly Wan Show video. Several supporters actually help and provide additional timestamps. So perhaps if a few of us offered to do this it would mean Dave would only have to update the description of the video.

Thoughts?

[EEVblog]

I'll probably be shot down for this, but just my personal opinion as feedback I'd like to suggest to Dave he tries to keep the videos as close as possible to 15 minutes, max 20. It's difficult to edit that hard, and I appreciate it makes that side of things a lot more work. A lot of the videos run up around 1 hours etc. I typically watch at 1.5 x and a 15-20 minute video is something that can be squeezed in while having a coffee break etc. Watching a few 40-60 minute videos really chews into the time.

I rarely make 40-60 minute videos any more. Exceptions would be huge reviews or shootouts.
I've explained several times recently how if a video comes in at say 22 minutes editing, I try to aggressively edit it to get under 20 minutes, it's psychological factor when people look at the length before watching. 
Having said that, my latest video is 26 minutes, and the two previous were 27min and 30min. I didn't want them to be that long, as I now go into shooting a video with the intention of it being 20 minutes or less. But, you know, I think of stuff to say when I press record...

I'd personally rather see a complicated topic broken down into 2-3 shorter videos that follow in logical sequence vs one long one.

I'm of the same opinion these days.

[EEVblog]

Pete. Part of your argument is about time. So are you saying Dave waffles too much?

That used to be a common complaint, and I think rightly so. But I'm a lot better at it these days, and I often challenge people who comment that I repeat myself and waffle too much to take my video, edit it without losing any content, and re-upload it to prove they are right. No one has yet taken me up on that.
Like I said previous post, when I try and edit say a 22 minute video down to under 20 minutes it's almost impossible to do without cutting content.

My videos could be shorter if I did my usual editing and then went back to re-shoot the same content to make it more concise, but it would double my time to make each video and continuity would often suck. But even if I did that, a 30 minute video isn't going to half to 15 minutes, if you want that content must be cut.
Many people ask why I don't just write scripts and get it right before I shoot the video, well that's not how I work, I can't just do that.

Prehaps it might help if Dave added a list of timestamps to some of his longer videos. Linus Techtips do this with their weekly Wan Show video. Several supporters actually help and provide additional timestamps. So perhaps if a few of us offered to do this it would mean Dave would only have to update the description of the video.

I've done this with mailbags recently.

[EEVblog]

I prefer the current "long" style. The EE channels that stick to social media strategies and advised formats/lenghts don't seem to get a bigger audience from their adherence.

Actually, they do. Great Scott for example follows the Youtube formula also precisely and has a bigger audience than mine. But it's in fairly large part a different audience to mine however.
And it's essentially one type of audience, as the content rarely varies. My content on the other hand varies massively. When I did the last survey I think I counted over two dozen different types of video categories that I do, so it's a much broader audience that subscribes for many different reasons.

[tautech]

Dave has to cater for a wide range of experience and understanding of his viewers and to cover any technical topic with a considerably condensed video is sure to do someone a disservice.
To maintain and grow audiences as he has is testament to his ability to pitch to many skill levels.
Some I skim through and others are beyond full understanding at the time I might have first watched them but we all age and understanding grows or stems curiosity to learn enough so we can go back and those videos again and take away what Dave conveys.
Carry on Dave doing what works for your channel, the $ and you.

[plazma]

Long videos huh?
Watch some Joe Rogan interviews
https://youtu.be/vGc4mg5pul4

[EEVblog]

Dave has to cater for a wide range of experience and understanding of his viewers and to cover any technical topic with a considerably condensed video is sure to do someone a disservice.
To maintain and grow audiences as he has is testament to his ability to pitch to many skill levels.

And to a big extent, also limiting my audience and making it harder for me to maintain an audience as a result. But that's the downside of any "broad interest" channel with an eclectic mix of video subjects and styles.

Carry on Dave doing what works for your channel, the $ and you.

As for the $$$, it really doesn't matter much what type of content I make or how many views, as the view based ad-revenue isn't a big contributor to my income. So I do have the luxury to do pretty much what I please. But any Youtuber doesn't want to ultimately make videos that people won't watch, so I do at least try to be conscious of the video length these days as a starter.

[PA0PBZ]

I have no problem with longer videos but I do like to watch them fully, so depending on the time I have I sometimes skip longer videos to come back and watch them when I have more time.

Like I said previous post, when I try and edit say a 22 minute video down to under 20 minutes it's almost impossible to do without cutting content.

So why not cut some content if you want to get to the 20 minutes? You will probably be the only one that knows that some content disappeared, don't worry too much about it.

[EEVblog]

So why not cut some content if you want to get to the 20 minutes? You will probably be the only one that knows that some content disappeared, don't worry too much about it.

Yes, but I usually think it's all valuable. Although my next video has maybe 10 minutes worth of stuff cut out of it.

[Pete F]

It's a fine line when editing. It takes a huge amount of time to edit, especially when cutting hard. Many content providers argue that time could be better spent making more content, and that's a fair argument. The "story" still needs to make sense and have continuity, so often cutting whole sections out is more difficult than it sounds.

Dave strikes me as somebody who would be receptive to feedback and constructive opinion, and I wasn't surprised to see him come up on the thread. How well the channel may/may not do is entirely his business and none of mine, but I do think he has an enormous amount of wisdom and is willing to share it. He's a great story teller, so deserves feedback; that's the way social media works ... otherwise it would be called Fairfax I'm grateful to receive some of that wisdom and hope it can be shared with even more people.

[PA0PBZ]

So why not cut some content if you want to get to the 20 minutes? You will probably be the only one that knows that some content disappeared, don't worry too much about it.

Yes, but I usually think it's all valuable. Although my next video has maybe 10 minutes worth of stuff cut out of it.

Of course it is all valuable, otherwise it wouldn't be there in the first place, but you have to stop somewhere or you will be found dead like the gamers after a 3 day session…

[EEVblog]

It's a fine line when editing. It takes a huge amount of time to edit, especially when cutting hard.

Yes. Editing is actually quite easy, but going through and cutting out a few minutes from a 20 minute video actually takes just as long as editing the original video in the first place.
It's an extra step that I haven't ordinarily done until fairly recently.

Many content providers argue that time could be better spent making more content, and that's a fair argument. The "story" still needs to make sense and have continuity, so often cutting whole sections out is more difficult than it sounds.

Indeed.
If you watch carefully in my latest video you might pick up a thing or two I might casually mention but you didn't see in the video because it was cut.
Many things don't make sense if you cut content, unless you go back an re-shoot or do a voice-over.
All my videos are shot the same way, I press record and then something comes out of my mouth. Rinse and repeat 50 times (an average video would have have at least 50 individual clips), and I basically record me going through a teardown step by step, or a repair step by step, or a tutorial step by step as I think of stuff to say.
So each video is basically a little journey I shoot in sequence.
I then take the files and edit them, cutting the odd thing here or there, but most stuff makes it into a video in the same sequence I shot it in. And it's quite difficult to go back and re-shoot if I need to fix something, so I usually make do with what material I have, or add a voice over or annotation occasionally to correct something.
That off-the-cuff style is just the way I've always done videos, and it's not the most flexible in terms of creating concise content.

Contrast that with say Great Scott which is a good example of the opposite technique. Ignoring any likely story/build planning steps, he would just shoot stock footage as he builds something and then puts together the entire video as a voice-over in editing. Whereas almost all my video is shot in real time with me commentating behind the camera, so it's never going to be as polished.



Behind the scenes shooting a teardown video

[mariush]

I personally think 10-15 minutes is too short, I wouldn't like to see videos "chopped" and edited to hell just to get below 15 minutes.

I often watch 25-30 minutes, don't mind it. 

If it helps with revenue and all that, I wouldn't mind if you split longer videos in 20-30 minute parts and release them 12-24 hours apart (only because i think it would probably help with Youtube if you seem to upload more often and with more consistent, more frequency, so if the videos are uploaded with some time between them it would probably be better)

[Mr. Scram]

I personally dislike how YouTube is full of videos that have been artificially stretched to get to the supposedly ideal 10 to 20 minutes. YouTube used to be refreshing for not treating the viewer like an idiot like television has done for years, but times have changed. It's now full of clickbait, inflating a minute of content into huge videos, ridiculous thumbnails and all the obvious things content makers do to come out on top.

Of course that's the opposite of cutting videos down, but it serves as a warning to not let the content be dictated by things that don't have to do with the content too much. Sometimes it just is what it is.

[EEVblog]

I personally dislike how YouTube is full of videos that have been artificially stretched to get to the supposedly ideal 10 to 20 minutes.

The average attention span time on Youtube hasn't changed much, and it still the 8-10 minute mark. My channel gets and average watch time of 10-12 minutes across all my videos.
What has changed is that the Youtube algorithm now values watch time. That doesn't mean that people are watching for longer, it's just that it now matters more. So those science youtubers who spent a month creating one highly polished 5-10 minute are screwed.
I doubt any channel has an average watch time in the 20 minute range, mine is on the high side.

[Pete F]

I definitely don't want to get involved with the financial side of things, none of my business and all of Dave's. If someone of his experience can manage to make a decent living and raise a family from his own business, which just happens to partly be providing video content, then all the power to him. I tip my hat for sure, as it's not easy. In the meanwhile I wouldn't walk in to my local butcher and start telling him how to run his business, so I'm not going to start here either

Dave I think you should just keep shooting like you do. It's your style, it works for you, and it clearly works for others or you wouldn't have over 500K subscribers. However every successful enterprise always looks to see how things can be done better, that's just the name of the game.

To be more specific on my feedback, I think there are different "markets" here, and it's possible to vary how "scripted" and edited the content is depending on the audience. As I mentioned in the beginning, I'm not personally in to teardown videos. Not that they're not good, but I just don't have the time to watch a lot of them. I have more than enough of my own teardowns to do, I don't particularly want to see more Many people on the other hand really enjoy them, and why wouldn't they. But I'd suggest they are watching them as "entertainment". 30 minutes, 1 hr, it doesn't matter, it's all good. It's interesting, it's entertaining, everyone is learning from it. Happy Days!

People like me on the other hand watch videos with an emphasis on education. We want to get in, get the education we want, then get out. Drill down deeper if it's required, and that's the place for multi-video coverage in my opinion. FPGAs for example, first video might be an overview. What are they? How are they used? Why would I want to use them? Examples of them being used, etc. That may be all I want to know. 10-15 minute video. It's covered the basics, I don't need/want to use them, move on. Maybe I would like to use them. Great, well "do we have a deal for you". Here's a 10 minute video on FPGA datasheets. Here's a 10 minute video on FPGA datasheets and the different voltages needed for programming vs operation. Here's another 15 minute video just on PCB routing to FPGAs. A lot of material can be covered in 15 minutes and somebody with an interest in that would gain a lot of tips to help them. On the other hand, somebody who just wants to know the how, what, why? of FPGAs doesn't need/want to know what size vias are needed for an xyz FPGA.

Like I said, that's just my opinion. I don't watch much TV and am away a lot for work. I don't think I've turned my hotel room TV on in more than 10 years! But I do watch a lot of Youtube, and have seen what seems to work and what tends to come and go.

[EEVblog]

Like I said, that's just my opinion. I don't watch much TV and am away a lot for work. I don't think I've turned my hotel room TV on in more than 10 years! But I do watch a lot of Youtube, and have seen what seems to work and what tends to come and go.

The problem is as I said, I have literally a couple of dozen different types of videos, and people subscribe for different reasons and want different content. In short, everyone has their own opinion of what they would like to see from my content and I have to please everyone.
The numbers for example actually show that educational tutorial videos are some of my least viewed videos (with some exceptions), so if I was a numbers/business guy and wanted to grow my channel, more educational tutorial content would not be the way to do it. Even 30-40min Mailbag videos are more popular than 15 minute tutorials.

And as I said, I am perfectly conscious of video length, what works, and what doesn't. I am trying to make my videos shorter and more concise, and I'm always refining my content in some way, and that's the best I can do. I can't be all things to all people, it's impossible. For every person who complains my videos are too long at 30 minutes and wants 15 minutes, if I then do that there will be two more people who will ask why I didn't cover X in the video. Then I have to explain to them that I did shoot that material but cut it out to make the video shorter. But why not just throw it into another video they ask. Well, that sounds great until you realise you had to have planned that and shoot an intro and some matching content, and it needed to be shot as a series, and that I didn't have the time or inclination to finish that because something else interesting came along that I wanted to make a video on. etc etc.
It's easy to say create a 10 part series on FPGA's, it's another thing to actually have the time an enthusiasm to do that at the expense of the dozen other types of videos a creator wants to do.

And making shorter content is often easier said than done, especially using my style of video making which I have no intention of, and would be foolish to change.
One electronics youtuber spends 30+ hours on one 5-7 minute tutorial video. Shorter and more polished content takes time.
Don't even ask how long it's taken David2 to create those short tutorial videos he's done, it's crazy, the more concise and polished you intend to make it, the more paranoid you get about making it so and getting it right. I do not want my videos to become a chore to make, if that ever happens that's when I give up the game.

Remember that Microphone tutorial series with Doug Ford? I split that into 7 shorter parts to make it easier for people to watch. What did that get me? Countless complaints from viewers about me "flooding" my channel with stuff they didn't want 

If it's short tutorial videos you want there are other channels that do that, mine unfortunately isn't one of them, but thanks for your feedback.

[Wolfgang]

Let the take the same risk of being shot here. Nevertheless, the motto of all this here is: No Fear, No Script, All Opinion !!!

I like this forum and I think that it is a very valuable resource for EE interested people due to its broad scope.
I am not too big a fan of Daves videos, because:

- They are LENGTHY. What is said there could be said in half the time, to say the least
- A lot of homecoming cows, new uncles, hunkey-dories, ... In a computer language it would be COBOL.
- Repetitive rants about foreseeable things (Cheap electrolytics, scraped chips, font and button styles, ...) of debatable importance

Of course I know that Dave (is this a joke ?) has a background in dramatic arts so all the above is probably inevitable and cannot be changed.
Furthermore, the indended audience is not pure academia, but a lot broader.

So - rant completed - you may start shooting now 

[mickmake]

I'll probably be shot down for this, but just my personal opinion as feedback I'd like to suggest to Dave he tries to keep the videos as close as possible to 15 minutes, max 20. It's difficult to edit that hard, and I appreciate it makes that side of things a lot more work. A lot of the videos run up around 1 hours etc. I typically watch at 1.5 x and a 15-20 minute video is something that can be squeezed in while having a coffee break etc. Watching a few 40-60 minute videos really chews into the time.

I tend to watch almost all YouTube videos at somewhere between 1.25 and 1.5. The only exceptions are short films, (which I’m a fan of). But for technical content; I’m always just searching for that one or a couple of nuggets in the video. Usually when I find it, I stop.

The YouTube algorithm is a complex thing, but we know that it does favour those videos that have an audience retention rate of more than 50% for more than 90% of the video. There’s some magic thing that kicks in once you hit that mark.
So I’m gathering Dave has adjusted for that metric.
There’s plenty of other metrics at play, but if you want your video to be visible in the sea of content being put up on YouTube, you have to aim for that audience retention metric first. Doesn’t matter how many subs you have.