Thứ Hai, Tháng Hai 10, 2025
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5 tips to improve image and sound in Zoom calls

If you're a content creator who regularly works with high-end video and audio equipment, you need to look presentable when participating in Zoom, Microsoft Teams, or even Discord calls. While quality hardware makes you look more professional, anyone can achieve it with just a few small changes.

1. A little light makes a big difference

When dissatisfied with the image on their webcam, many people will first choose to buy a better-looking webcam. This often makes a difference, but the key to improving the image quality of almost any webcam is lighting.

Whether you stand near a window, increase screen brightness, use a dedicated light, or use a combination of these methods, lighting often provides the greatest improvement to webcam images.

The image below shows a $129 4K webcam, the OBSBot Meet 2, without the lights to see what a typical person looks like on a video call.

Default settings, no front light, backlight, HDR off
Default settings, no front light, backlight, HDR off

Next, see the improvement when adding a moderate front light while slightly dimming the light in the room.

Default settings, backlight dim, elgato keylight 30%, HDR off
Default settings, backlight dim, elgato keylight 30%, HDR off

You don't need studio lights or anything too fancy, nor like using a DSLR camera as a webcam, but even a little extra light can greatly improve your images in your photos. call.

2. Good webcam placement

We've all been on a video call with someone using a laptop webcam at a low, unflattering angle with their face bobbing in and out of the frame – don't do that. In general, placing your webcam higher and straighter, as close to eye level as possible, will improve the framing to look more professional.

Tips: If you use your laptop's built-in webcam, consider purchasing a computer stand to raise the height and angle of the computer so it's closer to eye level.

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See the image below of the MacBook, laid flat on a table, with the screen as wide open as possible for the least flattering angle from the webcam.

Laptop webcam at low angle is not good
Laptop webcam at low angle is not good

Compare that to a laptop on a light stand with the screen almost perpendicular to the ground, creating a straighter camera angle.

The laptop webcam is slightly raised for a better angle
The laptop webcam is slightly raised for a better angle

Alternatively, you can choose a dedicated webcam for more space. Either way, try to position your webcam close to eye level and avoid too low, unflattering angles.

3. Use a better microphone or buy a specialized microphone

While video quality can make you look professional, audio quality is much more important for accuracy. A call will be useless if you do not clearly understand the content. Most MacBooks and some Windows laptops have good enough built-in microphones, but sound quality is almost always improved with a dedicated microphone.

There are many best practices for using a microphone properly, but in general, the closer the microphone is to the mouth, the clearer the sound. A dedicated microphone makes it much easier to arrange for sound quality than a built-in laptop microphone, but if you must use a laptop microphone, try not to place your mouth too far from the device.

4. Avoid using fake backgrounds

In almost every Zoom call, there's usually at least one person using a fake background, such as an AI-generated office space or a company logo. There's nothing inherently wrong with these things, but they often come across as cheesy. Think about how someone could partially or completely disappear from the frame if moved around with one of these fake backgrounds.

Unless your physical background is completely blank and contrasts sharply with you, like a green screen, you should only use a fake background if you want privacy. Even then, you can still use Zoom's built-in background blur feature to make things look more natural.

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5. Use your device's noise cancellation feature

Zoom and similar calling platforms are great tools with great features like background blur and noise cancellation, but chances are your device can perform these features at high quality. more.

On new Windows devices, you can get GPU-based background blurring like through Nvidia Broadcast, while on almost any macOS device with an Apple Silicon chip, you can use similar features through Nvidia Broadcast. via Portrait Mode.

These options produce a much better blur effect and can make your webcam look like a luxury camera with a strong bokeh blur effect. Zoom's background blur effect, while effective, is imprecise when moving and is a bit excessive in blur, as shown below.

Zoom calls with background blur enabled
Zoom calls with background blur enabled

Compare Zoom's background blur effect with the MacBook Pro M1 Max's portrait mode below, which still blurs out any meaningful information in the background while being of higher quality.

MacBook laptop webcam with background blur mode at about 33%
MacBook laptop webcam with background blur mode at about 33%

Nvidia Broadcast also has excellent AI-based background noise removal. Newer Macs have a similar utility, but in experience it works inconsistently.

Note: Regardless of the operating system you are using, you should check to see if your device has any utilities to better perform Zoom's background blur and noise removal features.

With a little lighting, better webcam placement, better mic use, and a cleaner background, almost anyone can easily make themselves look more professional on Zoom calls.

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