Watch Hannah's first dance vlog! Hannah is a dance teacher and dance school owner of Stardust Dance Academy in Cambridge. In her vlog she discusses how the dance school has adapted during the global pandemic and proceeds to cover the topic of how she films online dance classes for the Stardust Dance Academy YouTube channel for toddlers, kids and beginners. This is a real talk vlog (video blog) with Hannah, not on-camera "Miss Hannah" the Ballet teacher. Let Hannah show you how she records my dance videos, prepare dances, practice dancing, film dances & her life in between!

Ballet Teacher Vlog Transcript

Welcome to my very first vlog everybody if you are brand new to my channel welcome i'm Hannah and if you are already a subscriber welcome back for those of you that don't know me i run a dance school in cambridge and for the last year i've started teaching online and i've started this youtube channel i was really hesitant to record videos of me or teaching but when the pandemic hit back in march 2020 i was definitely forced out of my comfort zone and had to try different ways and do different things to keep my dance school going and to stay connected with all of my lovely students firstly i started some zoom classes which i was doing from my um studio which did not go well to start with the internet could not cope so what i decided to do was to pre-record everything so i recorded all of my lessons and uploaded them to youtube and sent private links out to lots of my students which was just a really nice way to stay connected so i knew they were still dancing still getting their weekly class every week and i had some really really lovely feedback which was wonderful in a pretty rubbish time a few parents got in touch and told me how much they were enjoying the lessons how nice it was to see their little dancer still dancing still getting to see their teacher at home and to have a friendly familiar face on screen i then decided to try something a little bit new and to do a facebook live class i was just desperate to help to give more to kind of my community and other children out there that wanted to keep dancing or adults or anybody that wanted to keep moving at home so i did my first facebook live class which was very nerve-wracking i had no idea if anybody was gonna watch or join in um i did a test one before to check on you what i was doing and i did ask some of my students to make sure if they could come and join in so at least i knew i would have one or two people watching and it was a big success i had some of my own students joining in and i had children from all over the country joining in just taking a free ballet class with me here in my kitchen which was really lovely and i was just pleased that i could help and just provide a bit of normality maybe give the parents a bit of peace have a cup of tea have a bit of a break while their children can do something fun educational and yeah keep moving and dancing at home jump to a year ahead and i am now doing a weekly ballet class every saturday for people to enjoy anywhere i've got children and grown-ups from all over the world that are joining in which is wonderful and i am loving making classes for you the last year has definitely been a very big learning curve in so many different ways and just learning to be more confident on camera knowing what comes across well to people looking back at my first videos is just cringe worthy to be honest looking how i wasn't comfortable behind camera at all knowing what to do what to say and also the video editing behind it all as well learning completely new software what to do with videos how to cut how to change scenes all that kind of stuff has been a big learning curve so i am very happy where i am now and what i am doing but still learning and changing the way i do things all the time if there's anything in particular you are interested in feel free to drop me a comment and i will do my best to help or to answer any questions that you have about particular things about what i do or the videos that i make so why am i doing this vlog i've had lots of comments and messages from people all over asking to know more about me how i make my videos what other classes i teach so i just wanted to connect with you all really and let you know a little bit more about me hannah not miss hannah the ballet teacher you might see every week if you watch my videos so i'm just going to take you through how i plan one of my saturday classes what goes into it the planning the finding the music picking a costume and then show you what i do when i actually go and film and the setup that i have for filming we've recently got a ginormous green screen i used to dance on a very teeny tiny one so it was very restricted in what i could do but recently i've got a much bigger one which i'll show you later in the video so you can have a look actually where i am dancing each week and yeah a bit kind of behind the scenes what makes a saturday class i hope you enjoy this new kind of video if you do or if you've got any thoughts or feedback or questions for me please drop me a comment below and i will do my best to answer for you let me begin to show you how i would plan one of my saturday ballet classes this is where it all begins the first thing i need to do is to pick a theme for our saturday classes now i've already got a big spreadsheet set up on my computer with loads of theme ideas that i think could work for classes and this week i have chosen to go with springtime flowers it's nearly easter the weather's getting a bit nicer so i thought that would be a nice theme to go with seeing as it is nearly spring so i use spotify for my main music i've also got an itunes account with millions of songs in i've created a playlist so springtime flowers youtube class i've put a couple of songs already in here that i know that i want to use or i've used in classes before that i think will work for this particular class so what i'm going to do now is just have a listen see if i can find some new music and finish putting my playlist together i think i've got an idea now of the songs that i'm gonna use so the next thing that i need to do is test out some dances to them and start making up some choreography to go with the dances i've chosen probably a lot more songs than i'm actually going to need but occasionally facebook or youtube blocks music which is a bit of a challenge so i always prepare more than i think i'm gonna need also sometimes i'll start making up a dance and it just kind of won't feel right or stuff doesn't come to me for that particular song so i might end up scrapping that one and taking it off the playlist so i make up most of my dances in the kitchen so let's head there and i'll get started this is the kitchen area where i do most of my choreographing we used to have a little sofa and a table here this was a clock none of the bunting or anything was here we used to have a dining room table and chairs as well sadly that's had to go so i've got space to dance lightings had to change because i kept hitting the light above me so that's now just a very boring bowl i've also got the roll-up banner up mainly to hide the mess behind so i kind of angle my camera when i'm on zoom so you can't see any of my kitchen mess i've also just done a bit of decorating the sparkly stars this little section with tiaras butterflies flowers the bunting lights and things just so it looks a bit prettier for when i'm doing my zoom classes and just to make sure i've got lots of space to dance as well so what i'm going to do now is just put my music on have a run through see if i can come up with some general dances and choreography to the dances that i have chosen for the springtime ballet class time for a quick cup of tea and so far i have done kind of worked out the first two songs that i'm going to do so i know which song i'm going to use for my warm-up english country garden just traveling around some little traveling steps pretending we're walking in and out of the flowers and then another little dance as well so just gonna have a quick cup of tea as i continue working a lot of the time i will record my own choreography just on my phone on my ipad i find it much easier to relearn my own dances from a video rather than my own notes sometimes i've just finished my basic plan for my saturday springtime flowers ballet class so i've gone through lots of different ideas i've kind of whittled down some of the songs i've not used all of the ones that i picked i've chosen about five that i'm going to include in this week's class you'll have probably seen me tap in and my watch loads i've got all my music on here which is amazing and it just means i've not got to keep running off it's been awesome for online lessons i can just tap play pause turn it down and so that's been really useful and i've also written down everything i am not great at remembering my own choreography so i always record everything and i like to just scribble down some notes as well of the different dances that i'm doing little moves that go with it what i'm doing on the chorus and on the verses so just when i come to my filming day i have remembered what i spent time making up so that is all the practicing and preparation done i've already chosen what i'm gonna wear i try my best to mix up with lots of different outfits i think that makes it a little bit funner for the viewers that are watching my classes so i try and choose a ballet dress that kind of fits the theme so springtime flowers i've gone for a pink dress that's got some flowers on which arrived last week which is very exciting so that's what i'm gonna wear so that's most of the preparation done i will have another practice when i get to the venue before i start filming just to check i've remembered it all but yeah that is what the preparation looks like just got myself ready to leave to film my saturday class got my makeup phone for my music change your clothes ballet shoes ballet tights i've got my little ballerina teddy bear she is going to be joining in our ballet class this week um bottle for water some shaker eggs and there are also some snacks in there which is very important and the most important thing is my little pup edie so she comes with me every week she looks incredibly excited about coming with me today but she will enjoy it when we get there come on um before we set off i always put whatever playlist i have organized to teach the class just kind of so i can go over the choreography and the dances in my head as i'm driving so here we go we're listening to english country garden because this week's class is what's the flowers springtime themed so angel that's evie's boyfriend bruno who she just saw on her walk he always waits for her i live in a little town just outside cambridge and we have about a 20-minute drive to get to the studios right we have finally arrived and evie is excited to get out of the car you can probably hear her school weekend away in the back she loves coming here so she gets very excited uh listen to my playlist on the drive here and let me show you where we film and first this is the little garden studio you can see my lovely pile of books where i balance my laptop while i am teaching so that is where i do a lot of my filming and then coming inside that's where we used to do the green screen filming but it in the end just wasn't big enough i wanted even more space so we had to move it inside and here is evie she gets excited she thinks there's going to be somebody here to see but sadly nobody's here evie at the moment so this is where i do my filming um but i need to sort the green screen out first and position the lights we have a lot of lights so i'll get them sorted now before i have a practice and get myself ready over the past few months of recording and editing videos i've found that lighting is super important we've also got an external microphone now so that we get the best sound quality for the videos so i'm just having a little break a quick cup of tea and a biscuit before i start having a practice so i've got the green screen all set up i always like to have a run through of my dances before i start filming just so i know kind of what space that i've got and the floor is a bit different to dance on as well so i always just like to have a bit of a warm-up and a practice before i get ready and start filming so now i'm going to get myself ready sort out my hair and makeup and then i'll get myself changed before we start filming so makeup is something that i really enjoy doing i arrived with a little bit of base or foundation on a little bit of mascara which i took off so i could put extra on ready for the filming i love having liquid eyeliner on i just feel it mix it accentuates my eyes a little bit more especially on camera and here you'll see me putting on about 10 coats of mascara i normally use a kind of double ended mascara which is white and black but i didn't have it with me today so instead of that i've got about 10 coats of this mascara on okay so that is face makeup done and now i've got to do my hair which i do not enjoy doing i like doing makeup but not hair so i will give it my best shot i'm going to take my jumper off first otherwise my ballet bun is not going to be able to get over the top of my jumper all right i really should be better at doing ballet buns since i have to wear one every day of my life and throughout my training have to wear one every day at college yep i still hate doing that i always like to put my hair up in a ballet bun when i'm teaching or doing ballet videos it's kind of the classical hairstyle and i like to like to look the part as best i can it also keeps your hair out of your face it's nice and neat and tidy so if you were doing turns it wouldn't get in the way i'm also putting a bun net in it just stops all those crazy flyaway hairs makes it look a little bit neater and lots and lots of hair clips then secured with lots of hairspray and a last coat of mascara okay so that is me done with hair and makeup so what i'm going to do now is get myself changed into my dress for this week's eye class okay so i am finally ready and i'm just about to start recording my class so we're going to start by dancing to the song english country garden so we're going to pretend we're walking around a beautiful garden up on our tiptoes good eight little steps on demi point and then you're gonna run on your toes so roll around finishing in first position good job ready rise up and the green screen has been really fun to record on because i can put myself in any background it works perfectly for all of my preschool ballet classes and if it's a themed class i can easily change the background to suit the theme which is really fun and i think adds a nice kind of visual effect for everybody to watch is a bit of a challenge because i'm restricted with space the width of the green screen and also the flooring has been a major issue you can probably see i'm on a piece of vinyl green now which is held down by a nice kettlebell it does tend to still move around when i'm dancing on it and also has a really annoying squeaking sound which still drives me mad so i'm always kind of working on different ways trying to find different things to make the flooring better and that is still something i am working on and i hope to improve after hours of editing and adding some fun green screen effects this is what the final product looks like so i have just finished filming my springtime ballet class which was a very long day just to do a 20-minute class takes hours i always tend to make a few mistakes dancing on this floor because it is carpeted is really difficult so balancing any turns are a bit of a challenge so i wasn't happy with some of the stuff i did which meant i had to redo it so i've played in a couple of hours of filming and by the time it's been edited it's probably about 15 to 20 minutes i like to redo things and make sure they are as good as they can possibly be so i am definitely ready to pack up put all these lights away put the green screen away get myself changed back into my comfies and get home so we are finally back in the car ready to head home evie is crying again because she doesn't want to go home she loves being here when i'm filming um it has been a really long day it's been lots of fun but i am definitely ready to head home after a very long day of filming it is just after half eight we got here at about half past two so that is that is my day of filming so far packed up in the car cannot wait to get home lie on the sofa and take all my makeup off on the drive back i normally put a good podcast on or an audio book something just to listen to and unwind on the drive home we are finally home after a long day and we are just chilling out on the sofa gonna watch some tv got my cup of tea ready so i hope you have enjoyed a little bit of a insight into what goes into filming one of my saturday ballet classes and if there's anything else that you want to know about me or what i've been up to feel free to drop me a comment down below see you soon you.