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If your Roku TV has been crashing while you’re trying to relax by watching the latest Netflix hit, you’re not alone. It seems to be an ongoing error many Roku users are experiencing with no word from Roku or Netflix on a permanent fix yet. When this happens, there are a few potential temporary solutions. We’ll walk you through the steps for a few fixes to hopefully get you back up and running so you can dive in and sit down.

How to Fix Netflix Crashing on Roku TV

When you have an issue with any app on your Roku TV, it’s a good idea to start with making sure the app is updated. To verify, you just need to highlight the app from the home menu and press the * button on the remote. This will pull up a popup of channel information with an option to Check for Updates.

If the app is updated and you’re still encountering problems, your next step should be clearing the cache. The cache on the Roku TV is where temporary app data is stored. If you have many apps, you might have a lot of space being taken up here slowing down the function.

Before you begin, you will want to remove the Netflix app from the TV by highlighting it on your home menu, pressing the * Button on your remote and selecting Remove app. Then clear the cache one of two ways.

• Go into the Settings menu, select System, and go to Power to get to the System Restart option.

  – OR –

• Using your remote on the Home menu on the left side, press the Home button on the remote five times, Up Arrow once, Rewind twice, Fast Forward twice and wait for your TV to restart.

Either way should restart your TV and clear out your cache. Next, you will go to Add Channels and reinstall Netflix. From here you should be able to resume watching Netflix as normal.

Report the Issue to Roku

In some cases, the above solution hasn’t fixed the issue. At the time of this article, Roku has a ticket tracking this problem open on Roku Community Discussions. As more people report the same situation, Roku asks users to comment on the discussion with some information. Here’s what you’ll need if you want to report your issue to Roku:

• Model, serial number, device ID and software OS/version of your Roku device – Go to Settings, then find System and all of these numbers will be found in About.
• Netflix version – Highlight Netflix from the Home menu and push the * button on your remote.
• Tracker ID – When Netflix crashes, push the Home button on your remote five times, then the Back Arrow (not the rewind) five times to get an ID.
• Steps you’ve already taken.

The US Federal Communications Commission on Thursday said it’ll approve T-Mobile’s deal to acquire Ka’ena Corporation, the parent company of prepaid wireless brands Mint Mobile and Ultra Mobile, according to Reuters. The deal could be worth up to $1.35 billion.

The move would allow T-Mobile to more directly operate the brands, which already run on its network. The FCC says the agreement will allow Mint Mobile and Ultra Mobile customers to more easily switch service providers, Reuters reports. After getting regulatory approval, T-Mobile reportedly anticipates closing the deal on May 1.

See also: Best Cellphone Plans of 2024: Our Top Picks for April

The FCC and T-Mobile didn’t immediately respond to CNET’s request for comment.

T-Mobile shared that it had reached an agreement to acquire Ka’ena Corporation last March, noting the deal would include a “combination of 39% cash and 61% stock,” it shared in a release at the time. The final sales price will be “based upon Ka’ena’s performance during certain periods before and after the closing.”

The wireless carrier noted that Ryan Reynolds, Mint’s part owner, would stay involved in a “creative role on behalf of Mint.” T-Mobile also shared its intention to “use its supplier relationships and distribution scale to help the brands to grow and offer competitive pricing and greater device inventory,” and specified that Mint and Ultra will be “complementary” to the carrier’s other prepaid options.

Electric-vehicle maker Polestar has a new product, and it isn’t another car. This time, it’s a smartphone. The Swedish automaker said Tuesday that it plans to release a phone in China that’s designed around the “FlyMe Auto” Android-based software from partner and corporate cousin Xingji Meizu Group, a phone-maker.

The smartphone, which offers up to 1TB of storage and a 50-megapixel camera, is designed to act as a companion to Polestar’s in-car infotainment system, including through a digital car key that’ll automatically “wake up” the car when a user is nearby. The company is taking orders now in China, charging roughly $1,019 for the device.

A Polestar spokesman said the company has “no plans to bring the phone to other markets at this stage.”

At first glance, it may seem odd that a carmaker is releasing a smartphone, but this is far from the first time a company has attempted to jump between the two industries.

Read more: Best phones to buy for 2024

Apple famously spent a decade developing an EV, in addition to its iPhones, iPads and Mac computers, before shutting down the project earlier this year. Alphabet, which owns Google, has also developed its own self-driving technology powering robotaxis in some US cities. Meanwhile, as Bloomberg noted in its article about the Polestar phone, Chinese tech giants Huawei and Xiaomi have begun to make their own cars that link with their devices.

“We also need our defensive measure as the auto industry incorporates more intelligent technologies and consumer electronics,” Xingji Meizu Chief Executive Officer Shen Ziyu told Bloomberg in an interview. Polestar is owned by Swedish carmaker Volvo and Chinese carmaker Geely.

In Chinese marketing materials, Polestar is promoting artificial intelligence technologies for the handset, powered in part by one of Qualcomm’s latest Snapdragon chips. Polestar said its AI will be able to answer questions; edit and curate photos; and help users more easily reply to chat conversations.

The $160 TCL 50 XL 5G is going on sale Thursday with a hefty feature list, especially for a phone that costs under $200. I spent a few hours with it, and so far the cheap phone seems quite capable at most tasks. While this TCL 50-series phone is not the NxtPaper model that includes a paperlike screen which is easier to see at night, it has a 120Hz refresh rate display and NFC contactless payments down to one of the lowest-priced phones that I’ve tested so far.

TCL ships the 50 XL with Android 14, 128GB of storage, a 5,010mAh battery and — in another rarity for phones in this budget price range — 1,080p resolution on its 6.78-inch display.

There are some early caveats to note. This phone is currently a T-Mobile exclusive, likely one of the reasons it has such a low price. It will also only receive one major software update to Android 15 and two years of security update support, which is on the lower side compared to the three years of security updates Motorola offers to its Moto G phones or the five years of security updates coming to Samsung’s $200 Galaxy A15.

But if you can deal with those caveats, this might otherwise be one of the most feature-rich phones you can find at this price.

The camera bump

The TCL 50 XL is big, just as its name implies. However what really sticks out is the large circular camera bump, which adds a bit of styling that we typically see on OnePlus phones. There’s three lenses within it: a wide, ultrawide and a depth sensor. The main camera has a 50-megapixel sensor, the ultrawide a 5-megapixel sensor and a 2-megapixel depth sensor. On the front is an 8-megapixel selfie camera.

I took a few quick office photos, and while I’ll have test the cameras more, initial images look OK with balanced colors. But I found these early photos to struggle when it came to details.

For instance in the photo of the grass wall in CNET’s office, there’s various shades of green but also notice that the individual blades of grass blur together.

Meanwhile the selfie photo I took in a well-lit podcast studio is noticeably blurry. However, I found that front-facing camera useful for a video call I took with my friend.

That big rear camera bump however made it quite easy for me to line up the rear camera to take a photo of myself with the better lens, which captured slightly more shades of color than those taken with the front-facing camera.

TCL 50 XL’s design, screen and specs

The rest of the TCL 50 XL’s back has a textured-plastic that’s reminiscent of the feel of leather, but I wouldn’t confuse it with the more pronounced texture that we’re seeing on this year’s Moto G line. On the 50 XL, you can feel some subtle bumps that’s more tactile to the touch, but the phone still has a more slippery feel closer to plastic.

The 6.78-inch display is the best feature. It looks sharp and clear thanks to the aforementioned 120Hz refresh rate and 1,080p resolution. TCL also includes its NxtVision HDR settings, which increases the color saturation for videos or games.

The phone has dual speakers — which sound tinny — but provide decent stereo separation and can get loud for the music and videos I’ve streamed. There’s also a headphone jack, which we often see in these cheaper phones.

The phone has a MediaTek Dimensity 6100 Plus processor and 6GB of memory which should help with multitasking. The 50 XL ships with its RAM expansion feature turned on, which uses storage to virtually simulate an additional 6GB of memory. And while the 128GB of internal space is a lot for this price (by comparison the $150 Moto G Play has 64GB), the 50 XL has a microSD memory card slot to expand storage up to 2TB.

I’ve been able to launch in and out of a mix of games and apps fairly easily, although games chugged along when I bumped the graphics from low to medium settings. It was easy to set up my various texting apps, scroll through news and stream YouTube, with the latter benefitting from the smoother 120Hz refresh rate.

I almost did a double take seeing the Google Pay setup screen since there are no other phones at or below the TCL 50 XL’s $160 price point that include the feature. Considering how prevalent contactless payment terminals are, it’s nice seeing NFC for Google Pay on more sub-$200 phones. It comes in handy for everything from transit systems to vending machines.

TCL 50 XL has a lot of potential value

While I have to run the TCL 50 XL through our variety of review tests, it’s striking to see so many high-end phone features make their way down to a $160 phone. The big 1080p display should provide plenty of space for most apps and media, while NFC for contactless payments will make the phone useful for making purchases.

Even if the phone’s cameras and software support fall short, ultimately the low price is still compelling for someone who just wants a functional phone.

No one likes to be in the middle of trying to relax with their favorite show only to be met with technological resistance and overly drawn-out waiting times. If you’re struggling to get your Roku TV to open your shows, it may seem like you need to delete apps or even get a new TV, but luckily there may be an even more simple solution than that.

When your computer, Android or iPhone starts to slow down and take a while to load programs or files, one of the first steps is clearing the cache. What you might not know is Roku TVs store cache as well and can also be slowed by holding too much. The cache is where apps on your TV store temporary data, but the more apps you have, the more storage space this takes up on the TV.

How to Clear Roku TV Cache

This process on a Roku TV isn’t as straightforward as it is on other devices. Improve the performance of your device and get it cleared by following these steps. Keep in mind your Roku will restart, clearing the cache, but it will not factory reset:

Reset Roku TV in Settings

1. From the main menu, go to the end of the list and select the Settings menu.
2. Within Settings, find System and open it.
3. Scroll down to Power and select it.
4. Select System Restart and click Restart to confirm.

This will turn off your TV and clear the cache, but will not factory reset. Your Roku TV should turn back on in about 30 seconds. If this doesn’t work, you can try using the hidden remote function to reset the TV instead.

Reset Roku TV with Remote

1. Go to the Home menu and make sure the highlight is over the Home option on the left.
2. On your remote push the Home button five times.
3. Push the Up arrow once.
4. Push the Rewind button twice.
5. Push the Fast Forward button twice.
6. Wait for your Roku to restart.

Uninstall the App

If resetting the Roku TV doesn’t solve the issues with slowing, you may have to uninstall and reinstall the app you believe is causing the issue. As a warning, all users and settings will be removed from the app and you will need to set this back up upon reinstall.

1. Highlight the app, but do not open it.
2. Push the * button on your remote.
3. Select Remove Channel from the popup.

Factory Reset Roku TV

For those still having issues at this point, you may be better off doing a factory reset of the whole Roku TV. This will remove all your users, sign-ins and apps. It will be the same as if you just brought it home from the store.

1. From the menu, select Settings.
2. Find System and select it.
3. At the bottom of the System menu, go to Advanced System Settings.
4. Select Factory Reset and enter the code underneath the number pad on the right to confirm reset.

In the streaming service universe, Disney Plus is one of the newer kids on the proverbial block. Still, the streamer has quickly reached powerhouse status, going toe-to-toe with heavy hitters like Netflix, Max and Prime Video, thanks to its epic slate of iconic content. Expanding the Marvel and Star Wars universes on the small screen has reaped enormous benefits for Disney Plus, attracting fans from all over. The platform’s original scripted programming library has grown exponentially since its inception, offering entertainment options for every family member. Whether you’re into comic book adventures, high school dramas, romantic comedies or educational docuseries, Disney Plus has got it.

So, you’re looking for TV show suggestions and need help figuring out where to start? You’re not the only one. The sheer amount of entertainment at your disposal can be pretty daunting. Don’t stress. Below, we’ve compiled a roundup of the 20 best Disney Plus original TV series to watch.

Read more: Disney Plus Review: More Than Just Child’s Play

My younger self won’t like that I’m saying this, but Megatron really is better than Optimus Prime — at least when it comes to the latest Flagship Transformers machine made by Robosen Robotics.

Robosen and Hasbro teamed up to release Robosen’s first Transformers robot from the villains side: Megatron, the leader of the Decepticons faction and sworn enemy to Optimus Prime. I got a chance to unbox and play with one of the first production models of this high-tech interactive collectible, and the upgrades in machinery and sensors make this baddie oh so good.

It can do everything a fan would hope for, including transform on its own from bipedal robot to a rolling tank via voice commands. It’s cannon fires plastic darts and it reacts to your pokes with touch-sensitive panels on the front and back. It comes to life and plays out scenes with its 22 lights and 36 servo motors animating the limbs, which are in sync with villainy banter voiced by Frank Welker, the voice of Megatron from the original 1984 cartoon series.

It’s available to preorder for $899 and is expected roll out later this year.

For people not familiar with Robosen’s product line, this isn’t a typical kids toy. With a few hours of play, I barely scratched the surface of all the things Megatron can do (you can see some of that in the video embedded above). More animations and phrases are unlocked when using the app, which I didn’t get a chance to test yet. I’ll update this post when I do.

As with Robosen’s other Transformers, the app allows users to control the robot remotely via Bluetooth and also teaches programing skills to create custom animations. Collectors who have Robosen’s Optimus Prime can use the Megatron app to have Megatron interact with his heroic archnemesis.

Not only is Megatron slightly larger than the original Flagship Optimus, which was released in 2021, but Megatron also has more-fluid animation, thanks to more-advanced motors and components. New to the lineup are touch sensors, placed in areas to surprise unsuspecting friends who get too close. Put a finger against the front plate and Megatron has a few ways of letting you know he doesn’t want to be touched. (“You fool!”) And the same goes if you pick him up and touch his backside.

Megatron’s accessories include an Energon sword and mace — but I had more fun with the simple plastic darts that shoot out via a spring release. In tank mode, you can shout, “Open fire!” and watch the shells fly.

In bipedal robot mode, Megatron’s voice command wake word is “Hey, Megatron” (“All Hail Megatron” also works), to which he crabbily replies “What’s wrong?” You’ll get a different animation and scene played out depending on what you say next — and the choices are numerous, anything from “attack” to “happy birthday” brings out a scene that got me cracking up.

Robosen has released a number of other complicated animated robots, including Grimlock, which converts from bipedal robot to chomping and walking Tyrannosaurus rex.

Although Megatron is quick to remind you that, “I belong to nobody!” — the preorders are open now on Robosen’s and Hasbro’s sites to commemorate the 40th anniversary of the Transformers franchise. Robosen says the price is expected to go up to $1,199 after the initial preorder window.

Beats headphones often make it on our list of favorite headphones thanks to the brand’s top-notch sound quality and durability. If you were on the lookout for a new pair of headphones or looking to upgrade your old ones, this deal is perfect for you. For a limited time, you can score the Beats Studio 3 headphones for $159 at either Amazon or Walmart. This is a savings of 55% but act quickly, this deal may not last long.

The Beats Studio 3 headphones are an over-the-ear model that offers noise canceling for a more immersive listening experience. The battery life is approximately 22 hours, so you can go all day without worrying about having to charge them. It also features the W1 chip from Apple, which makes pairing with Apple products incredibly easy for those already in the Apple ecosystem. These headphones can also be used as a phone headset when you need privacy.

If you are looking for different headphones options, check out our roundup of best deals on headphones that is happening right now. There should be something there that will work for just about everyone.

The Galaxy S24 series, Samsung’s latest flagship devices, comes equipped with exclusive AI features for photo editing, real-time translations, automatically generated summaries for webpages and more.

And thanks to the One UI 6.1 update in March, the Galaxy S23 series now has these same Galaxy AI features and settings.

Don’t miss: Welcome to AI Atlas, CNET’s Guide to Today’s Artificial Intelligence

However, not all of these features are on by default. If you own the Galaxy S24 or the Galaxy S23, and you’re still unsure about everything your phone can do, here are five AI settings that you need to enable right now.

For more, check out our review of the Galaxy S24 Ultra and why the Galaxy S24 Ultra could be doing so much more with AI.

Get real-time translations during phone calls

The first setting you’ll definitely want to enable is Live Translate, which features near-real-time voice translations between you and whoever you’re speaking with on the phone. Before we get into how the translation tool works, let’s turn it on first.

In Settings, go to Advanced features > Advanced intelligence > Phone and toggle on Live translate. Before you start using Live Translate, choose your language, the language of the person you’re speaking with and the translation voices. (There are 13 languages, including simplified Chinese and Mexico, Spain and US Spanish, with more on the way, the company said.) You also have the option to mute your voice and the other person’s voice so that you hear only the translation voice.

To use Live Translate, make your phone call, hit the Call assist button and then choose Live translate to start real-time translation. A screen showing your conversation, with both original and translated text, will appear in real time as you speak. After you speak, the translation tool will translate what you say into the other participant’s language. If you have your voices muted, participants will only hear the translation voices speak.

Use generative AI to edit your photos

One of the biggest AI tools on the Galaxy S24 is Generative Edit, which allows you to erase, recompose and remaster the photos you take on your phone, using generative AI. For example, if you want to resize an object or remove a person in a photo, Generative Edit can generate a new background to fill in any missing pieces.

Like the rest of the features and settings in this guide, Generative Edit is not on by default, so you’ll need to turn it on in your settings. Go to Settings > Advanced features > Advanced intelligence > Photo Editor and toggle on Generative edit.

In the Gallery app, hit Edit and then tap the AI button, with three stars, to use generative AI. You can then straighten the photo out, and generative AI will help generate more background, or you can draw on the image to move, remove or resize any object in the photo, with generative AI once again creating a background to fill the image in.

Automatically create a summary of your voice recording

The Voice Recorder on your Galaxy S24 doesn’t just record audio. It’s also capable of transcribing the audio into text and then using AI to summarize the text, which is useful if you’re recording a lecture at school or a presentation at work. However, before you can summarize your transcriptions, you have to enable the feature in your settings.

Go to Settings > Advanced features > Advanced intelligence > Voice Recorder > Summaries and toggle it on. Turning Summaries on will automatically create a summary of your audio recordings using artificial intelligence.

If you want to check out the transcription tool at work, tap on an audio recording in the Voice Recorder application, create a transcript and then go into the Summary tab. At the top of the summary you’ll see keywords you can tap to check out specific sections in the summary, and underneath that is where the summary lives, full of AI-generated headers and bullet points.

Get summaries of any site you visit in your web browser

Another AI tool that you need to enable before you can use it allows you to summarize pretty much any webpage you visit in your browser. For this to work, however, you’ll need to be in Samsung’s default web browser, which is simply called Internet. The AI summary tool doesn’t work in Chrome or any other third-party web browser.

In Settings > Advanced features > Advanced intelligence > Samsung Internet > Summarize, toggle the tool on. Now you can get summaries for webpages.

Go to the Samsung web browser, visit a site you want to summarize and press the AI icon (three stars) that appears in the navigation bar at the bottom of the screen. Hit Summarize and you’ll get an AI-generated summary of the webpage. Below you can see a summary of David Lumb’s CNET story on the Samsung Galaxy Ring.

Process data only on your device when using AI

The final AI setting you should consider enabling is for your own privacy. In Settings > Advanced features > Advanced intelligence, you can toggle on Process data only on device so that any data processed via artificial intelligence is done only on your device, instead of online.

Usually, your data is sent to a third party only to generate a response for whatever feature you’re using. It’s not used for machine learning or advertisements, and your data is immediately deleted from third-party servers as soon as your generation is complete. But if you feel safer with your data staying on your device, you should enable this setting.

Samsung does warn that toggling this feature on will provide worse results and certain AI features may not work.

While you’re here, check out the best phone to buy in 2024.

Editors’ note: CNET used an AI engine to help create several dozen stories, which are labeled accordingly. For more, see our AI policy.

With today’s best phones like the iPhone 15 Pro, Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra or Pixel 8 Pro capable of capturing pro-standard video footage, shooting great-looking movies yourself has never been easier. The fantastic multiple cameras, stabilization and even pro features like ProRes and Log recording on the iPhone 15 Pro mean you can essentially just point your phone toward your subject, start recording and still get excellent results. But there’s a lot you can do to take your home movies to the next level, and there’s never a bad time to get creative with your mobile video production.

Read more: Best Camera Phones to Buy Right Now

It takes more than a good camera to create videos you’ll want to watch again and again. You also need to know how to use the camera properly, how to capture the right moments, and what makes for a good-looking shot. A creative eye and some forward planning will help too, taking you from a simple home video into something more inspiring that you’ll want to share with your family and watch again in years to come.

Here, then, are my top tips that you should keep in mind when making your own family movies, whether you’re journeying off to exotic lands on vacation, having a barbecue at home with friends, or just heading out to your favorite street food market.

1. Consider what you want your video to be

Before you start, you should give a bit of thought to what you want your video to include. While it could just be a full film of everything that happens over the holidays, or your child’s upcoming birthday, consider making it a bit more specific. Perhaps a video all about the games you play together, or them opening their presents.

Having a more focused story to tell — even a basic one — will help you consider what shots you’ll need to get, and it’ll help you shoot and edit only what you need, rather than having endless hours of footage to sift through. A Christmas day movie can be more straightforward as you’ll likely want to simply tell the story from the morning through to the drinking and games at the end of the day. Even so, try and consider how you can be selective and tell an interesting story rather than just filming every minute of the day you have together.

For my own festive-themed video (embedded above), I decided to show how I make my own hot mulled cider. By keeping it to a specific topic I was able to determine exactly the shots I needed and in what order, and even sketched out a storyboard of shots ahead of time. You don’t have to go that far, but having a rough idea in mind will help a great deal.

2. Set up your phone properly

Almost all recent smartphones can take great video, but it’s worth checking out the settings to make sure you’re ready to go. Your resolution settings are up to you, but full HD (1080p) is probably a good starting point, as it’ll look good but won’t fill up your phone’s storage too quickly. You can ramp it up to 4K if your phone allows it, or even drop it to 720p if you’re on an older device that won’t handle editing as well.

Read more: Best Camera Accessories for Your Phone

If you have an iPhone 15 Pro or iPhone 14 Pro and plan on doing a lot of post-production on your footage in software like Adobe Premiere or DaVinci Resolve, you can consider shooting in Apple’s ProRes format. This gives you the best image quality, but the file sizes are immense, so if you want to keep things simple then it’s better to shoot in the standard video mode.

If you have the latest iPhone 15 Pro or Pro Max you could take things further and shoot in Log. Log is a color profile that looks very low-contrast out of camera, but gives much more flexibility for adjusting the contrast, colors and overall look of the footage in post. Applying these edits is a process called color grading and it’s often what separates professional, Hollywood movies from everyday home videos. If you want to create a truly cinematic, professional look to your video, then shoot in Log and color grade your footage in DaVinci Resolve on your desktop or iPad.

It’s worth keeping an eye on your storage though, especially if you’re away from home for a while; you don’t want to fill up your space on the first two days of your trip only to have no room to capture the rest of the vacation. Those of you shooting ProRes Log on your iPhone 15 Pro can now attach an SSD using USB-C for saving those huge files directly to external storage.

3. Keep your video clips short and sweet

While it’s easy to stand and film a five-minute clip of someone peeling potatoes for dinner, the reality is that when you watch that back, you’ll realize it’s way too long to remain interesting. Instead, consider keeping each clip to around 15-20 seconds in length. You might be surprised at how long 15 seconds of video actually seems like when you watch it back, and having lots of shorter clips cut together will give the video a more engaging, more professional feel.

If you’re walking up through a beautiful mountain trail, consider shooting 20 seconds of footage at 5- or 10-minute intervals — or only at particularly scenic viewpoints — rather than just filming the whole way up. But make sure you’re ready to capture interesting or funny moments as they happen as it’s these personal moments that you’ll enjoy looking back on down the line.

4. Stabilize your phone

There’s nothing that can ruin a video quite as easily as shaky hand-held footage. If your phone has a stabilized video mode, make sure it’s turned on. If not, consider using a small tripod to keep your phone steady. This of course also allows you, the filmmaker, to be involved in the action as well, which is great if you’re the one doing the cooking, or handing out presents.

You could even consider carrying a small mobile gimbal like the DJI OM 5. It allows you to get rock-steady footage even as you’re walking along, while the built-in selfie stick lets you film yourself more easily or capture more interesting angles for your footage than if you were just hand-holding your phone. If you’re interested in taking your mobile movie-making a bit more seriously then check out some of the best accessories you can pair with your phone to improve your footage.

5. Get creative with angles

A great way to improve the cinematic qualities in your film is to experiment with different angles. Say you’re capturing the moment your child takes a present from under the tree at Christmas — don’t just film them from your standing position nearby, but instead consider how you can capture that moment in a more exciting way. Perhaps even put the phone inside the tree, among the presents, so you see your child reaching toward the camera to retrieve their gift.

There’s no end to the ways you can play with your angles, so have a think about how you can shake things up. You can always try to reshoot certain things from multiple angles (or set up a spare phone or camera for another angle) and then cut them together in your video editor afterwards. In my video, for example, I wanted to show the cinnamon and ginger being thrown into the pot, so I used two angles: one from a first-person perspective looking into the pot, and another where I’d positioned my phone behind the pot to show me throwing the ingredients in. It’s little elements like this that can make a big difference overall.

6. Improve the audio and lighting

If your video will include people talking to the camera — perhaps your friends telling the camera where you are in the world or explaining how badly they’ll need a beer after the long hike — you’ll want to make sure your phone can capture that audio clearly. For the best results, consider buying a small external microphone like the Rode VideoMicro, which plugs into your phone’s power port, via an adapter, and will dramatically improve the sound quality.

Read more: Best Accessories for Better Video

If you don’t want to invest in extra gear there’s still a lot you can do to help. Turning off or at least lowering background music or closing the doors to drown out kitchen appliances will make a huge difference in how clear those voices can be captured. Outdoors, your biggest enemy for good audio will be the wind. There’s not always much you can do about it but at least trying to turn your back to the wind and providing a buffer between it and your phone will go some way to minimizing the problem.

Lighting is crucial too, and if you’re filming indoors in dimly lit spaces, then adding in your own light well help keep your footage looking good. I’ve outlined various LED light sources in my guide to video accessories, but one of my favorites for video production is the Zhiyun Fiveray FR100C light stick, which is easily hand-held and can produce any color you want, making it easy to get creative.

7. Experiment with slow motion and time lapses

Most recent phones have modes for taking slow motion video and for time lapses and both can be great tools for your video. Of course, it needs to make sense to use them — slow motion to slow down fast-paced action, and time lapse to speed up a long sequence.

In my mulled cider video, I used slow motion when lighting the stove to give a cinematic quality to the flames erupting, and I also slowed down the footage of me throwing ginger into the pot to get a great slow-mo effect on the cider splashing up. As it’s a short sequence it didn’t make a lot of sense to do a time lapse, but if you want to capture the whole process of making dinner, for example, a time lapse from high up in your kitchen, videoing you moving around over maybe a couple of hours would be a neat addition to a holiday film.

8. Edit your video

Once you have your video clips it’s time to piece them together. This can be the most challenging part, especially for those of you who are totally new to video production. Thankfully, there are easy ways of doing things.

Some phones, like the iPhones, as well as recent Samsung Galaxy phones, have built-in auto video makers that allow you to select some clips and automatically cut them together into a film, complete with background music and transitions between clips. They’re not always the most elegant of productions, but they’re worth keeping in mind if you’re a total beginner and just want a basic video put together to send to your family or friends.

Alternatively, look towards apps like BlackMagic’s DaVinci Resolve, which is free on the iPad (as well as on Mac or PC), with only some advanced features requiring a paid upgrade. It’s an incredibly well-rounded video editor that’s used by creative pros around the world and is renowned for its great tools for editing colors. For a more basic approach, look towards Quik by GoPro. It’s free and also lets you drop multiple video clips into a project for the app to automatically turn into a finished film. iPhone users will also be able to use Apple’s iMovie for free, which is an extremely easy-to-use video editor, with a variety of presets and styles available. Adobe Premiere Rush has a wide variety of editing tools and is built to be mobile friendly. It’s a great app, but it does cost $10 ( 9, AU$15) a month, so it’s only worth considering if you think you’ll want to do more video production.