music on video clips?

Hi All,

New to the site! Do video clips sell better when attached with music? I have some scuba diving videos but the sound is just me breathing through the regulator.

Thanks in advance!

In general, video clips should have no sound at all. They should never have the voices of people around you, as someone might be able to recognize your voice. However, if your scuba videos have just the sound of breathing through the regulator, that's probably okay, since it is appropriate to the situation and not otherwise recognizable. Whoever buys the video can decide whether to use your sound or not. I tend to think that it might help with sales slightly if you have appropriate sound, but it's only a very slight advantage. (If you shoot train clips and they have the sound of the train on them -- especially if the sound is well recorded.) Putting music on your videos is a bad idea -- Pond5 will almost certainly reject them.

Obviously, Pond5's reviewers (called "curators") have the last say, so it's usually best to have no sound at all. I mostly shoot without sound, because I never know when there might be a recognizable sound in the background.