How To Be A Home Gym Content Creator in 2024

Last updated on April 5th, 2024 at 10:34 am

This topic has come up multiple times over on r/HomeGym, I’ve been asked questions about the tools and software I use, I’ve even asked my buddies for help along the way. So in this guide of sorts, I want to provide YOU with a behind the scenes look at being a home gym content creator. I’ll share my own experiences, share software, equipment, and more.

Whether you want to start a Podcast, Website, Instagram or YouTube Chanel, hopefully what I share here will help you decide if that is the right fit for you and what you might want to snag to do so. My plan is to organize this article in “beginner” and “advanced” categories. I don’t consider myself an Expert in anything content creation related, so maybe some day I’ll come back and update this there. But for now, this will be how to start and then level up your game.

Links throughout may include Affiliate Links. These help fund the site at no expense to you.

Expectations Of A Home Gym Content Creator

We are going to start with the expectations first, because I’d hate for you to buy a bunch of cool stuff or get super excited before understanding what this might look like. The below is meant to hand you a small dose of reality. Not because I don’t want you to join those of us doing this, but because I don’t want to see another person hop in, spend $10k on video equipment and production materials, and then quit in 3 weeks. The line “It takes 10 years to be an overnight success” fits the content creator lifestyle perfectly.

How Much Time Will I Spend To Be A Home Gym Content Creator?

As a beginner, you’ll likely be working a full time job. You might have a family, school, and other obligations. That means you will have a minimal amount of time to carve out for content creation. If you have to decide between spending time with your family or finishing that article that 17 people will read, the choice is pretty easy. So your first step is going to be asking yourself how much time you really truly have for this.

If you are doing this part time, I would say you need a few hours a week, to bang out quality content once a month. Once a month gives you a timeline, doesn’t rush forced content creation, and lets you breathe and tackle the rest of your life.

Keep in mind that the social media experts will tell you that you need DAILY content. The more, the better! In my experience, that didn’t work well. Not only was I not able to maintain that schedule while trying to do everything else. I found that content needs to be REAL and not forced. It needs to fit, it needs to have purpose. The algorithm, or your audience, will likely filter out bullshit and fluff. So while more might be better… better, is better. If you wouldn’t watch it, why would anyone else?

Advanced Time Commitment

If you are doing this closer to full time, something every week should be your goal. My personal schedule looks like this:

• Monday – Garage Gym Competition Newsletter and Articles
• Tuesday – Off for Groceries and Food Prep
• Wednesday – Gray Matter Newsletter and Articles/Videos
• Thursday & Friday – Content creation and planning for the following week
• Weekends – Ideally nothing, but typically bits and pieces here and there

My goal is to put out one BIG piece of content for my Gray Matter Lifting side every week. An article, a video, a review, you name it. And then multiple bite sized pieces for social media. For the Garage Gym Competition my goal is to publish one new article, either my own, a contributor article, a sponsor highlight, or an athlete spotlight. And then multiple bite sized pieces for social media. I also have all of the background items like website maintenance, video editing, actually coordinating the competition itself, working with sponsors, scheduling AMAs, and all of the tidbits in the Newsletter.

Hybrid Business

I’ll toss in here as well, that for most of us who drop the full time job to do the at home business route, we end up being more like a Stay At Home Parent with a side business. I take my daughter to school every day. I am responsible for breakfasts and lunches for everyone in the house and prep and plan every single dinner.

On Tuesday I do all the grocery shopping and food prep. I coach multiple sports teams. I do that on top of my content creation duties. This isn’t a complaint by the way. I absolutely LOVE what I am doing. It just requires a LOT of flexibility with my time. I don’t exactly have a 9 to 5 Monday – Friday where I am cranking out content like a machine.

The Other Stuff

An average article, alongside pictures, research, and more, is going to eat up an entire work week for me, possibly more. If you are on multiple platforms, you will need to handle DMs, emails, comments, and everything else that comes with being OUT THERE, on top of getting your work done. Put up a really engaging post? Get 100 comments? You need to reply to most of those. There went your entire day.

Some things get easier and quicker as you go, as you learn your tools, learn your website plugins and widgets, learn your newsletter platform, you name it. Other things get more complicated as you focus on thumbnails, featured images, SEO, alt tags, Google Console Results, and more.

Time is required to produce anything, and that is going to be the number one most difficult piece for MOST Home Gym Content Creators. Finding the time to make consistent, quality, content.

How Much Money Can I Make As A Home Gym Content Creator

Most affiliate programs pay a 5% referral. If you buy a $300 bar, you’d get $15 for each referral. This means you need 20 people to buy with your link just to get your money back on a single bar! A pretty decent home gym might cost someone $5,000 to set up. If they used your affiliate link to buy that entire $5,000 gym, you would get a whopping $250! You would need to refer nearly 200 people to use your affiliate link to create their $5000 gym from scratch, to make the US Average Annual Salary of $50,000. That same $300 bar would require you to refer 3,333 bars to make that same $50,000.

Small Cookie Jar

When you have a dozen or more people feasting over the same equipment, affiliate links, and discount codes, you really need to stand out to even get a chance at your link being clicked. And then there are all the problems with affiliate links in the first place. If someone watches your video but goes to the site directly to buy the product, or used someone else’s link first, or they watched the video on their phone and then bought the piece on their computer. All of these would mean ZERO affiliate dollars for you.

Advanced Money Making Opportunities

My dude Adrian at Gluck’s Gym has this great video explaining how they make money from their channel. I personally make the LARGEST majority of my income from running the Garage Gym Competition. Some dudes make money through product collaborations/creations like KaizenDIY. Others make their money off video production, product photography, and other niche areas. What do we all have in common? We have a unique niche/idea and we spent TIME growing our network and connections and influence.

Is it possible to find a niche for yourself? Of course! But unique ideas don’t come around every day. And I worked for 4 years on the GGC with the help of MANY other content creators, to get it to the point where I could make a single dime. I was negative multiple thousands of dollars out the gate. And to this day with expenses, growth needs, and more, I’m BARELY in the positive.

The Future

I have a lot of opportunities ahead that I am excited about, and as my base expenses steady off with my equipment purchases and upgrades, I can start netting a bigger profit. But again, I wrote my first piece of content in 2016. That time frame to go from part time beginner to full time money maker is a LARGE ramp up.

I would make 4x as much money working in an office 40-60 hours a week. But then of course, I wouldn’t be able to do everything I do. And I am only able to do it because we made some solid financial moves early on, bought our house at a very ideal time, and my wife has a great steady income and insurance.

Ok, you made it past the expectations piece and still want some more info. Good for you! Here we will cover some recommendations around the “stuff” that you might want to consider to be a Home Gym Content Creator.

Home Gym Content Creator Content Decisions & Planning

What Platforms Will You Be On

I made this mistake early on, and others have done the same thing. We feel like we need to be EVERYWHERE. Every single platform, with content, all the time. This is a recipe for disaster. You end up like me who would go MONTHS between YouTube videos, and upload repeat effort training footage to Instagram, because I was spread too thin. Choose a platform or two to start, and go from there as you get the hang of it. This will also keep your expenses down. There are a lot of people who ONLY write a website. No need for video, social media, etc. So keep that in mind.

One note on this, your decision around platforms COULD be based on content TYPE. YouTube for instance is a long form, widescreen video format. A website is a long form, written format. But Instagram, TikTok, YouTube Shorts, are all short form vertical video formats. You could conceivably leverage the same content for all three platforms with only the need to reupload each time. Each platform has SLIGHTLY different restrictions, and you’ll learn that some content plays better than others on different platforms, but none the less, much easier to leverage all three.

Shout out to Flex Marks The Spot for the above tip.

What Makes You Different?

This is probably the most important aspect to figure out. You might not need it right out the gate, and it might change over time. But you need to figure out what separates YOU from everyone else. There are a dozen guys doing product reviews for gym equipment. If you want to do the same thing, what is going to make companies want to work with you? What is going to make people want to read/watch your reviews? Why would they take your review as the right piece to the puzzle over Coop, Gluck, Adam, Jake, myself? Why would they click YOUR link? Use YOUR discount code?

Figure out what you bring to the table that is different. And make sure your content reflects that.

You’ve got to be original, because if you’re like someone else, what do they need you for?

Bernadette Peters

Planning

We talked about time commitments already, so I’ll keep this one brief. You likely need to have a plan of attack for your content. Big picture in terms of what your content actually is, and isn’t. A timeline around when you plan to produce, publish, and promote your content. And then templates of some kind that help you prepare for the content. I have an excel spreadsheet where I track my To-Do list, content pipeline, parking lot, and metrics. And I have a YouTube video template for planning my script, B-Roll, thumbnail images, social images, post descriptions, and more. These things reduce the back and forth wasted effort, keep me on track, and keep me producing consistently.

Office Equipment For A Home Gym Content Creator

I spend enough time at my desk throughout the week that when I decided to do this for real, we bought an adjustable desk. UPLIFT makes the BEST desks on the market from what I’ve seen, and I absolutely love mine. Clean, easy to adjust. We have a preset for my standing, sitting, wife standing, and my daughter to sit. So it works for the entire family. Regardless of what you go with, this will be one of the most used pieces of equipment you own. A lot of hours spent at the desk knocking out content.

If you can, spend some extra time making your desk special. I painted my desk container to match my desk, picked out some quality speakers, and spent multiple hours organizing wires. I wanted to enjoy being here, so I’d keep coming back. Eddie Baumgartner put me on Mechanical Keyboards. Boy was I wasting my time before with Logitech and others. I don’t have a specific recommendation, just that a Mechanical Keyboard is DOPE! Mine was $40 on marketplace. I also keep my second Sanddune Stepper under my desk for walks. If your space is enjoyable, it will get used.

Computer

You are going to need a computer. The needs of this computer are highly dependent on your content. 4k video is going to need WAY more in terms of the processor, ram, and video card than writing articles will. If you don’t have a computer, used might be a solid approach. There are $500 computers in my area for sale with 3 monitors, new gen processors, and all the fixings. If you want to buy new, I HIGHLY recommend checking out the resources on Reddit under r/BuildMeAPc.

Up until my desktop died recently, I was doing EVERYTHING on a computer I had built back in ~2015. You don’t need some monster $4,000 computer to do this. But you absolutely need a computer for editing, storage, and more.

Audio Equipment For a Home Gym Content Creator

If you have no plans to do video or podcasts, skip this step.

A common concept is that audio is 50% of good video. How many YouTube videos have you “watched” without actually watching it, but simply letting it run in the background? It is why podcasts are so commonly consumed without the video aspect. Speaking of which, focusing on audio opens up your ability to hop on podcasts like Garage Gym Radio.

Sound is 50% of the movie-going experience…

George Lucas

If you plan to do video of any kind, the order of importance goes Audio > Lighting > Video. You can do a lot with decent audio and lighting on a cell phone, but the best camera in the world sucks with crappy audio and lighting. The good news is, the video piece is often the most expensive, so saving it for last is great for our budget.

Primary Options

There are a couple main options for audio for the typical content creator. One is a lav mic, and the other is a boom mic. This is a rare setting where what I recommend for a beginner, is also what I recommend for an advanced Home Gym Content Creator. The reason is because of how important audio is, and how these items will go with you from beginner to advanced to likely expert level content creation without breaking the bank.

Lav Mic

Basement Brandon, Gluck’s Gym, and myself (possibly more) all use the RODE Wireless GO II. I opt for the additional add on Lapel Mic as my garage gets some decent road noise. They work wirelessly and will pick up pretty much only noise right next to you. And you can even have two of them if you often have two people. They have a bunch of other awesome options like recording to your device AND the main unit for back-ups, adjusting settings in the App, and more. This is very likely what you’d use for the vast majority of your polished videos. Instagram Reels, YouTube Reviews, whatever.

I recently upgraded to the RODE Wireless PRO for the sake of having all of my charging and accessories in two cases, having two mics, and coming with everything I needed in one package.

MPB might have some on sale, so check their listings too.

Boom Mic

For a boom mic, you’ll want something like the RODE VideoMic. This is good if you plan to record audio from near-bye your camera but in an open environment. Say you have a bunch of friends over to lift for a Local GGC Meet, and you want to capture some of the fun, this is the right mic for that.

This is what a lot of walk and talk vloggers use as you can get JUST enough of the environment while focusing mostly on you. This is something I have in my gear that I don’t use often, but when I do it is the right solution. Start with the wireless pieces, add the Video Mic as needed (Check MPB for the VideoMic as well).

Again, audio is going to make a HUGE difference. And these microphone options are not only a great first start, but likely a great one and done purchase FOREVER.

Advanced Audio

You can use the above for video work, live streaming, audio recording, literally everything. But if you want to bring a little spice to your podcasts, then you likely want a dedicated microphone, set of headphones, and a couple of accessories.

I recently spent a lot of time researching podcast headphones and mics and decided on a few key criteria. First, I could tell the difference between a bad mic and a good mic, but not a good mic and a great mic (same with headphones). So I was sitting in the $100 to $200 budget range. Second, I knew I wanted some items that looked aesthetically pleasing as I’d be on camera.

Third, I found out I wanted a Dynamic broadcast microphone, as they do better at picking up your voice and NOT everything else. Fourth, I wanted something that was USB and XLR capable. USB meant easy to use forever, and XLR meant I had the option of going a little deeper in the future if I found the need. And last, I wanted the mic to have some built in features around shock absorption and pop filtering.

Podcast Essentials

There were three microphones I landed on. The first was the RODE PodMic. I liked the look, the abilities, and especially that I already owned RODE equipment. Second was the Shure MV7, the little brother to the legendary Shure SM7B. And last was the Samson Q9U, which is what I ultimately purchased. The price was the best for this, the reviews were great, and it had everything I wanted. You can’t go wrong with either three.

I grabbed the Senheiser Pro HD 280 Headphones, based on the fact that they are used by Joe Rogan. I’m not a Joe Rogan fan, but he knows podcasts, and if they work for him and have over 11 THOUSAND positive reviews, they are good for me. These things KICK ASS. Comfortable, they fit both me and my daughter, they are robust, and the sound is simply incredible.

Then the last piece, I grabbed this Boom Arm. This makes sure that the mic gets into the right place, keeps the desk bumping noise out of the equation, and looks good too. It is about HALF the price of the very similar RODE PSA1+ which it was obviously modeled after. The above is what I used on the recent GORX Podcast I was on. The sound was pretty much perfect in my opinion, at least from a non-sound engineer.

Just A Little More

If you REALLY plan to take your audio content up a notch, you are going to want to look into sound treatments for your recording room. Things as simple as a large movers blanket against a window or mirror or rugs for hardwood floors can eat up a lot of echo. Putting in a solid core door, adding a door sweep, and then Acoustic Foam in strategic places can finish off your needs. You can get creative and add acoustic foam to the back of a print to add some flair to your room while also killing the echo.

Lighting Equipment For A Home Gym Content Creator

Lighting is an area I am still learning a lot about. There are a TON of options, different techniques, and approaches depending on what you are shooting, where you are shooting, and what you are trying to convey. The key thing to understand with light, is that your goal is to have control. If you are outside, vlogging, doing your thing, you have limited control because of the sun, clouds, trees, and more. In your own garage? With the doors open you have SOME control, with the doors closed you have COMPLETE control. The more control, the more you can change the look and feel of your content to match your goals.

Make sure whatever lighting you get mentions some kind of “soft light”. Soft means it won’t look like you shined a lamp onto your face. The other thing you need is a high CRI value. The closer to 100, the more it looks like natural sunlight, which is a good thing. For video work, you want 95+ ideally. There are other things to consider like watts, lumens, and more. But we are getting a little intense out the gate for a Home Gym Content Creator.

Where To Start

To begin, if you have a lot of great natural light, or a solid assortment of overhead lighting, you might be able to skip this one for awhile. But I’ve always found that my lighting was enough to see, but far from ideal for photos and videos. My garage door fully open would often give me some gnarly reflections off my face. Filming in my office the light was always on screen. And the inconsistency of natural light from day to day is troublesome. Cloudy one day, no sun at all, to full sunglasses territory makes for difficult content creation.

Luckily with a cell phone, it does a pretty damn good job of handling this. Not great, your stuff won’t have that POP! But it’ll get the job done. Your first light should likely be something like a simple RGB Magnetic Light. It will give you a TON of options for creative uses and to be able to brighten up some poor shots.

This thing will clip to your camera rig, attach to your rack, or simply be easy enough to hold by hand while snapping a slightly less than ideal lighted photo. Plus you get the opportunity to add some color to your shots. This will help you fill in the gaps of where your lighting is dull, and can help with both video and photos.

Advanced Lighting

For video work, you will either need to cover your ceiling in lights like Brandon Campbell and Gluck, or go with the cinematic look and turn off everything except for some studio lights. I ended up buying this kit from Lumecube to be able to control a large amount of light in many ways. They plug in, run off batteries, have barn doors, are soft light, you can control the temp and intensity, and more.

If I Was Starting Over With Lighting

I have found that the LumeCube lights get the job done BUT I get a much cleaner and better production with a more traditional “studio lighting” set up. Plus the LumeCube panels didn’t light up my space enough for product demonstrations and things where I need MORE light to fill a BIGGER space.

My upgraded set up includes two 220 Watt lights from SmallRig, a 21.5in Softbox, a 35.4 in Lantern Softbox, a 47.5in Softbox, and they sit on a pair of 9.2ft expandable light stands. I use these two lights as my Key and Fill lights, and use the LumeCube lights as my hair light. The small softbox and the lantern get used for my talking head clips, and the large softbox and the lantern get used for my “fill the room with light” type shots.

I then grabbed two of these RGB Tube Lights for ambient lighting.

Examples Of My Lighting Scenes

I wanted to add a section that shows what I use, and how it turns out, so you can decide what you want to invest in.

For my more “dark and cinematic” stuff, I use a 220 Watt lights from SmallRig, a 21.5in Softbox and the various small LED lights for the product stuff, and then I use my LumeCube lights to fill in the gaps for my talking head shots.

For my BRIGHTER shots, where I’m demoing products, or just want an easier set-up, I’m using my new overhead lighting. I bought two packs of these Barrina lights and ran them around the ceiling. I’m not an electrician, so I also used these Wireless Remote Switches. Examples include the following:

I use the other lights and accessories as I mentioned above, to fill in the gaps. Small RGB lights help add accents and fill shadows. Bigger soft boxes help with equipment demos and shadows UNDER equipment. And there is an endless list of possible situations. But honestly, the above two are my go to.

Too Much!

Lighting can get VERY complicated, very quickly. The big guys will all recommend something more intense, with lighting setups reaching well into the multiple thousand dollar range. They are, probably, correct. But one thing to remember is that most people are watching your videos on a phone, tablet, or MAYBE a computer monitor. The high end super professional lighting set-ups are meant for commercial video productions to be watched on a large 4k TV or even a big screen movie theater.

You also will see that a LOT of YouTube creators work out of their office. The problem with their lighting recommendations, is that their office is about HALF the size of my garage. So keep that in mind when thinking about your goals, location, you name it.

The final takeaway with lighting, is that there is no one right answer. You might like dark and dramatic, or bright and welcoming. You might want color, or not. Your space might have five options to shoot from, or just one. So as always, start small, start simple, and grow as you feel you are not progressing due to your light limitations.

Video & Photo Equipment For A Home Gym Content Creator

On August 31st, 2023, I bought my first professional camera. Yes, I’ve made countless review videos, articles, Instagram clips, and more, with my phone. Most recently, my Pixel 7. As long as your cell phone is from the last several years, you should be good.

Learn how to use it, watch some YouTube videos on how to get the most out of your phone and the videos and pictures. I was able to improve my production value considerably with just understanding what the three lenses were on my phone. How to use the manual focus and auto focus options. I’ve taken pictures with my phone that most people think included filters or were professionally done. Nature, portraits, product shots. Seriously, phones do some amazing stuff. And you likely wanted/needed a new phone anyway, and you can get them on amazing deals.

Plus, the audio items I recommended will work with your phone. AND if you snag the lights, you have a pretty damn solid start to high quality production value.

Tripod

A tripod is another area where I think spending just a LITTLE more is the right choice as the right tripod will be with you forever. I recently bought this Tripod from SmallRig and it comes with a Phone base and ready to use ARCA plate for your camera. It adjusts up to 78″ tall and can handle a ton of options, and folds up easily.

There are a lot of “mobile” tripods. I’ve owned a couple trying to save some money. I don’t recommend it. Those tripods are just a LITTLE cheaper, much flimsier, and they ONLY work with a phone. I’ve broken a couple of them over the years, and when I upgraded I had to get a new tripod anyway. Go the route of a good tripod, it comes in at maybe $50 more expensive and will be everything you need for the long haul.

If you need to go super cheap, check your local Goodwill. Mine regularly have 4 or 5 tripods for about $8 a piece. They are OLD, but they work.

If you are EXCLUSIVELY doing Video work, you might want to consider a Video Tripod that has what is called a Fluid Head.

Advanced Video

If you want to grab a camera, the best advice I read online was this. Just about any camera made in the last 3 to 5 years is pretty fantastic. Don’t worry about getting “the best” because it doesn’t exist. Pay attention to what you do and plan to do with your camera, and buy a suitable option. Get into an ecosystem you want to be in for lenses, accessories, etc. and go for it. If you buy good lenses for a good system, you could use them for 10+ years. You can upgrade your camera as your current one no longer produces the results you need.

Date the camera, marry the lens.

Unknown

My Camera

I chose the Sony e-Mount system with a Sony a6500. It records 4k, takes great pictures, and does exceptional 1080p in super slow-mo. It is what is called an APS-C sensor camera, which means the lenses are a bit cheaper and it has a “crop factor” of 1.5x (I’ll explain that in a bit). In future years I’ll likely jump to the Sony ZV lineup of cameras as they do cool stuff like native vertical video, product shots, and more. The a6500 could be sold, become my B camera, or handed off to my daughter so she can learn about cameras. Regardless, this camera is more than enough for me to get rolling.

My Lenses

Quick run down on lenses. You have prime lenses and zoom lenses. Prime lenses have a static focal length, like my 16mm Sigma. Zoom lenses can adjust their focal length, like my soon to purchase Tamron 17 to 70mm.

Now you might ask, why not just buy zoom lenses? First, a prime lens is typically cheaper than a zoom lens. Second, prime lenses are typically better in multiple categories than a zoom lens. Most movies are shot with a  couple of different focal length prime lenses. So better for cheaper is a nice option. The downside is having to change lenses to get different focus ranges and abilities. 

My stance currently, is to get a quality prime lens that you will use for a lot of your shots like when you are speaking to the camera. And then get a zoom lens for versatility. The third option is a macro lens, which can help if you plan to do some cool product photos. Keep in mind you have other lens types, but you likely don’t need them for what we do here.

Me Lens Choices

The Sigma 16mm is what I use for my “talking head” shots in my office and in the gym. It is a sharp lens at a great price. Because the Sony system is an APS-C lineup, it has a 1.5x crop. This means that the 16mm is actually closer to a 25mm. Which is a PERFECT wide angle shot for YouTube. The lens gives me plenty of BOKEH (the background blur), takes nice wide product shots, and is a really good lens for all basic content.

Grab the Sigma 16mm at MPB on a discount.

I also recently bought the Sigma 30mm, as it will be my go to for product photography, and if I go for a B-Cam it will be my second lens.

The Sigma 18-50mm will fill the gaps between all the focal lengths I plan to shoot in. That is again a roughly 25mm to 75mm focal length range due to the crop. Great for video B-Roll where I can zoom in on features, I’ll take it to shoot shots of my daughters sports, even use it for family portraits and other good stuff. It will be great for slightly more close up shots of talking, or maybe interviews, you name it. The Sigma 16mm will be my go-to for my YouTube talking head because it is easy, consistent, and fantastic. The 18-50mm will get tossed on when I’m not talking to the camera, or if I snag a B-Cam.

And the Sigma 70mm Macro, again comes out to a 110mm. This is considered the favorite focal length for product macro photography. Macro lenses help get those SUPER sharp close up shots where you can read the fine print on a label. This will let me get great knurling shots, close ups of padding, stitching, powder coat, and finishing details.

Grab the Sigma 70mm Macro at MPB on a discount.

Full Coverage

These four lenses SHOULD bring me everything I need for my Home Gym Content Creator needs and much more.

I bought my lenses from MPB based on recommendations from Brandon Campbell and others and a ton of reading and YouTube videos. You can go about this a few ways and there isn’t a one size fits all approach to lenses. But my goal was to nail everything, in minimal fashion.

My Accessories

A camera is expensive, and then you need lenses, AND accessories. I grabbed a bag, SD Cards, cleaners, and a remote. I snagged a few other accessories here and there, but my goal was to buy things that would last for a long time. If I decide to upgrade in the future, my lenses will still work. Bag will still work. Most of my stuff, will still work. I just need to upgrade the camera and maybe batteries.

There is an endless list of items you might want to consider. Most recently I set up a DIY shelf for my rack. This lets me demo products for videos as well as set up back drops for product images for my website articles. There are excellent videos from companies like Think Media who are helping creators learn how to upgrade their game and build out their spaces.

Webcam Video

I bought a 4k webcam to be able to hop on video calls quickly and look decent. But even the BEST webcams, are just OK. If you plan to do this for real real, do live streaming, you name it. You are going to want to leverage your newly upgraded camera and lenses to look SHARP!

You will need an Elgato 4k Capture Card, a micro HDMI to USB cable, a dummy battery for your camera, and a USB to power charging brick. This will let you use your camera with your awesome lenses as a webcam to get a MUCH better result. You’ll need to leverage your lighting, probably your microphone, and put it all together for a premium professional result.

Software For A Home Gym Content Creator

Image Editing

The gold standard is PhotoShop. PhotoShop is also expensive. I’ve been using a free online alternative called Photopea for a couple years now. Assuming you aren’t working with ENORMOUS image files, you are good to go. It does not do vector stuff like Adobe Illustrator. You still need to know how to use Photoshop, including layers and other pieces to the puzzle.

If you run Windows, I also recommend you install Power Tools. I use this for ONE thing, to resize a lot of pictures at once. Your website doesn’t want to manage a 25mb picture of a barbell. Trust me.

A free web tool I use often for my articles, is EZ Gif. It allows me to convert short video clips to an animated GIF, and include them in my articles opposed to loading a big video file.

For the Garage Gym Competition, I am regularly making “flyers”. Flyers to announce the competition dates, announce sponsors, all kinds of stuff. My go to over the past several years has been Elegant Flyer. A quick google search of Free PSD Templates will work too, but pay close attention to copyright requirements.

If you are looking for some free graphics, places like clipartmax are fantastic. High res PNGs with no copyright issues… YES PLEASE!

A program I have recently installed but not used yet, which is a Lightroom alternative, is Dark Table. This should help organize your photos, allow you to edit them, adjust coloring with LUTs, and much more.

Video Recording & Editing

For screen recording, I use OBS Studio. This is a pretty common recommendation for streamers. I use it for clips of my browser and other stuff I want to include in a video.

For video editing, I use Cap Cut. Even the free version does way more than any other editor I’ve ever used, while also being super simple to use. You can easily cut your videos for YouTube, TikTok, Instagram, add captions, intros, effects, and more. I will soon be upgrading to the Pro features, but this is a fantastic program.

My man JGIII likes Davinci Resolve, as mentioned in this interview.

I’m including Audacity here in video, even though it is an Audio editor, simply because I only record audio for the sake of video. Free, does its job, can export to a number of formats.

Eventually, you’ll need to fill some air space with some background music. There are a number of free options including Ben Sound, Free Stock Music, & PixaBay. Pay attention to the copywright requirements.

Other Resources For A Home Gym Content Creator

Looking to buy a Microsoft Office key on a good deal? You can find them at Kinguin. Pay attention to the comments on the sellers to make sure you get a legit key. I got the entire MS Office Suite, which I find better for what I do than the Google Suite, for $30.

I was asked for years to make merch and never wanted to handle the entire behind the scenes craziness of holding onto sizes, shipping, etc. TeeSpring makes it easy to set up a store, at no cost, upload your designs, and have them printed on demand. The quality isn’t 100% every time, but the good news is that you can complain right back to them and get a refund. They handle orders, shipping, communications, and customer service. You get your merch out, make some money, no issues.

Have something you need done, but don’t have the skills or time to do it? Outsource it through Fiverr. Find video editors, graphic designers, and more. One thing to note, you may struggle to find someone who “speaks your language”. No, not English. The Home Gym language. People who aren’t lifters and don’t lift at home, can sometimes misunderstand the assignment.

Website Resources For A Home Gym Content Creator

You don’t have to, but you might want to, set up a website. If you do this, the free option is OK. I ran a free blog for years. The problem is that you can’t control anything, can’t do anything you are “supposed to do”, and you are limited on space and aesthetics and much more. Find a platform you like, many like myself use WordPress.

Others use Shopify, or Wix, or a bunch of others. If you go the “real deal route”, you’ll need to begin selecting themes, plugins, security, legal pages, backup processes, and a bunch more.

WordPress Plug Ins

There are a ton of great WordPress Plugins available. But here is some info I shared with Flex Marks The Spot recently on some tips:

I’d start by installing and running the initial set up of the Rank Math Plug In. This is a FANTASTIC SEO plug-in that has helped me a ton.

Then install Pretty Links. This is a link tracking plug-in that does wonders for keeping track of everything in one place.

Then go through all of your posts and pages and update two things:

• update them all to condone to Rank Math SEO’s guidelines as best you can without destroying the post/page
• add in any pretty links for affiliate links, links you’d like to track clicks, etc.

After that I’d set up Google Search Console… It’s gonna take awhile for Google to do its initial scan and update your account. It goes through and scans your entire website and updates over the course of a few weeks. So by doing the Rank Math and Pretty Links stuff first, it’ll pull your updated article and page info.

I found it was helpful when doing pretty links, to have two monitors and windows. One had your article you were working on. The other has your Pretty Links plugin tab open. That way when you find a new link, you simply add it in the Plugin, copy the new Pretty Link, and paste it back into your article.

Final Thoughts

If you are still with me, I want to finish with a few big pieces of the puzzle.

You can create content with your phone, and nothing else

I used my phone for the first 6+ years. I only upgraded my lighting and audio in 2022 and early 2023. You can do a lot and get involved in a lot of community stuff with the basics and begin your steps towards being a Home Gym Content Creator. After all, being involved in the community is likely your NUMBER ONE piece to the puzzle. It is called “social media” right?

Fancy Equipment Is Not Content Creation

I can not stress this enough. Having fancy and expensive equipment, does not make you a content creator. Creating high quality content that people want to consume, read, watch, listen to, engage with! That is what makes a content creator. Plus, the more you dig into equipment, the more it becomes ESSENTIAL that you know how to use it. Focal lengths, aperture settings, kelvin temps, Rembrandt lighting, amps, watts, megapixels, resolution, aspect ratio. There are a million things to gather as you get further into the weeds. With every new toy, it means more time spent LEARNING how to use it, instead of time spent creating content. Sticking to the basics can help you avoid MOST of that.

Start Simple and Grow

If you want to bump it up a notch, we are talking under $500 for a mic, tripod, and lights, and you’ve stepped up your game TREMENDOUSLY. Then when you have some cash flow coming in, buy yourself a camera, lenses, and all the fixings. Take your game up a notch and get comments like me “Wow, Your production value is GREAT! How’d you improve it so fast?”

I remember Jake at Garage Gym Experiment being asked if there was room for more content creators in the home gym space. His answer was, Yes, there is room for more HIGH QUALITY content creators. So make sure if you take the leap, you focus on the quality of your content.

Wrap Up

Each of the above sections warrants a video or five, and multiple articles. And trust me, I’ve read and watched that amount AT LEAST. In the past few weeks I’ve watched and read over two dozen pieces on lighting alone. But I figured this could be enough (alongside the included videos) to get you going and making some decisions. When you really start focusing on production value, the list keeps going and going and going. But that wasn’t entirely the point. My goal was to help you in your journey to being a Home Gym Content Creator. Not make you a professional photographer or videographer.

As I learn more, change my thoughts, upgrade my gear, I’ll make note of that here.

If you are reading this and have something to add… a video, a snippet on content, cameras, whatever. Fire away! I’d love to make this a living and breathing resource.

If you think you want to hop into this world with me, and have some questions, let me know. I’m here to help! And if you’d like to see MORE in any particular area, fire away.

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