Smooth Record ' People Crossing The Street '

Nothing brings out the camcorders like the holidays, which is why this is the perfect time to admit an ugly truth: You suck at making home movies.

No, really. I'm sure you're a nice person and all, but there's more to videography than just taking the camcorder out of the box and pressing Record.

As with photography, good videography requires a bit of know-how. Luckily, I know how, so here's my list of ways you can improve your home movies. You won't come out Soderbergh on the other side, nor even Singer, but your Uncle-Henry-dropped-the-turkey-on-Aunt-Edna's-head submission to America's Funniest Home Videos will look a lot better.

It's a lot harder than it looks to pull off that cool shaky-camera look. Most home video just ends up looking shaky, which is absolutely no fun to watch. By mounting your camcorder on a $20 tripod, you'll get rock-steady footage. At the same time, you'll free yourself to perform pans and zooms, or even to get in front of the lens. If you're planning to rely on your camera's digital image-stabilization feature, don't. All that does is lower the video resolution by cropping to the center of the frame. Optical image stabilization is better, but it still can't beat a tripod.

No tripod? Lean against a wall. That'll help keep the shakiness to a minimum. No wall? Put your butt on the ground, bend your knees, and prop your elbows on them. Presto: instant tripod.