How To Get Your Home Video Conference Call Ready

Many of us are finding ourselves in a situation that we may never have imagined happening; our coworkers are in our homes. Not physically, but through video conferencing. Time to get the house ready for company, folks.

The Daily Beast has some advice for getting our homes camera ready:

• Set up your computer and check out what viewers will be seeing on the wall behind you. Bikini shots from vacation three years ago? Semi-nude art prints? Take them down and make sure you have a tasteful neutral backdrop.
• Check out the surfaces around you. Did you take your bra off while watching T.V. last night and leave it on the arm of the chair? Is the counter behind you filled with bottles of Fireball and Allen's Coffee Brandy? Clean up all of the surfaces around you and look at the area with a critical eye. Bosses and coworkers should not see the clothes hanging in your closet, or your bed for that matter.
• You don't have to deep clean your entire house, but first impressions are important so make it look like you've got it together, even if the rest of the house is feeling the impact of having the kids home from school.
• Do you have a pet that likes to walk across your keyboard while you are working or that might point their butt right at the camera? Nobody wants to see that. Put the pet in another room and close the door while you are video conferencing.
• Lighting is important. If you are backlit you will be a shadow, and people video conferencing instead of just listening on speaker phone are doing it to see you and have a more interactive conversation. Get as much natural light as possible and light from the sides if you can.
• A few more tips: pay attention to the camera angle so that viewers aren't looking up your nose, don't be too close or too far far from the camera and remember to turn your mic off when someone else is talking and to turn it back on when it's your turn.