Make a birthday video message

Phones film very well; the usual problems are light and sound, not the camera.

• Face a window, not a lamp behind you. Daylight on your face does more than any filter.
• Get close to the phone. The microphone is at the bottom; arm’s length in a quiet room is ideal.
• Hold it upright for a Story or WhatsApp; turn it sideways only if the message will be played on a television.
• Start with their name and stop on a smile. Trim the fumbling at the beginning in your camera app before you add the clip.

A good message has three parts: the greeting with their name, one specific thing (a memory, a joke only they will get, something you admire), and a wish for the year ahead. Anything more and it starts to feel like a speech.

Three quick examples

• “Happy birthday, Sam. I still owe you for that lift home in the snow. Hope this year is as kind to you as you are to everyone else.”
• “Happy thirtieth, Lou. You said you’d never be thirty, and yet here we are. Have a brilliant night.”
• “Happy birthday, Grandad. Thank you for the Sunday walks. We’ll see you at lunch.”

For more, by relationship and tone, see what to say in a birthday video message.

A video message is usually from one person. If several friends want to join in, ask each to film their own message and send it to you, then add them all to a birthday montage, which shows each person’s name before their clip. There is no shared link for others to upload to: one person gathers the clips and makes the video.

Paid services that sell personalised messages from famous people are a different thing altogether. A message from someone who actually knows the birthday person usually means more, and this one is free.