Setting up Your Unique Space for Video Conferences

The New Normal brings with it a slew of new practices and lifestyle changes. For work, more people have now moved from office to home, and work meetings are now held on digital space. Of course, you’d still want to make an impression at work. But with video calls, it takes a little more to impress than just dressing up. 

Shaping your very own station for work video calls? With these easy tips and suggestions from Island Premium Paints, yes you can!

Begin with Lighting

Lighting is everything. Especially when conversing with colleagues or pitching ideas to your boss, you want to appear reliable and confident. And design experts say that lighting, coupled with eye-level camera, helps nail that impression. Keep with these points:

• Select a spot with evenly distributed natural lighting

  Working with a laptop? Test your webcam on various spots in your home and look for a not-too-dark, not-too-bright area.

• Sit in front of a bright light source in

  Make sure to set up your station in a way that you’re seating in front of the light source. Lighting from behind you would give off a silhouette, while lighting from various angles could produce unpleasant shadows and highlights on your face and appearance.

• Not much natural light? Working with artificial lighting is fine

  If natural light is not available or insufficient, you can always use artificial light sources such as from a lamp or from ring lights.

Work Up the Aesthetics & Functionality

Reality check: most homes do not have a specifically designated area for office work. Most of the time, home office is a codename for a small section in bedrooms with a desk and work paraphernalia on it. But now that the New Normal is making working from home a part of everyday life, why not up that space’s aesthetics and functionality? Check out these pointers:

• Do a background check

  Literally. Check the background of your workstation. Turn on your webcam and check your frame if it looks neat, not too bright and not crowded. If it is, consider reorganizing or moving your workstation to the next best location in your home.

• Sit across from doorways and passageways

  While in a video call, the last thing you want to happen is for a housemate to make an appearance in inappropriate clothing.

• Study your current furniture and move things around if needed

  No need to spend on new furniture pieces! Consider what you’ll be working with and work on an easy redesign with these elements.

• Accessorize your background

  If you have space, plants, books and paintings are great ideas for accessorizing your background. Work a balance of what’s practical, what best suits your style and what helps set the mood for work time.

Re-Color of Your Background

If you have the luxury of time and if your background wall really calls for it, a DIY paint project with a color that projects your personality while also adding to your productivity would be an excellent idea. 

Pro tip: smooth painted walls of muted earth tones minimize the strain of a camera’s capabilities, allowing better recognition of the video call participant.
Choose from a wide variety of paint colors with Island Premium Paints’s Island Prima, a pure acrylic paint specifically formulated to exhibit superior adhesion, superior gloss retention and good alkaline resistance, ensuring long-lasting, vibrant and durable finishes for exterior and interior surfaces.

Like it or not, online video conferences are one of the many fixtures of the New Normal. Together, we can set up for the challenges and the uncertainties of this strange and unfamiliar time.

Island Premium Paints is the first and only locally produced paint with a Product Satisfaction Guarantee.