Have you ever wondered why your video of the vacation to Italy (or wherever you went) looks so "amateurish"? Do you want to know how to make it look just a little more like a big Hollywood production? Well then read on.

First let me warn you. These tips are really time consuming. It also takes a lot of experimentation before you know what your video needs and what not.

But if you are ready to spent hours in front of your pc (or mac) editing your video these tips will really help.

Let's get going.

If you only want to do one of these things do this. DOF (depth of field) is something very subtle but it makes a huge difference. DOF is the blurring of the background so your foreground gets more focus. You don't really notice this in movies before you know that it exists.

Now most video cameras don't come with this feature so there is a whole lot of post production to do here. To make the effect you work with layers. Duplicate your footage and blur the new layer. Then you cut out your foreground. Done. If you have the option of motion tracking that will make the whole thing a lot easier. If you can't motion track you will have to animate the whole blurring with keyframes. And that's where it gets time consuming.

Another big difference is "quality". It's not actually the quality but more the colors. It's called color correction. Most home videos have some very bleeched colors. Most times it helps to turn down the brightness a little and turn up the contrast. But don't overdo this as it can make the video seem unnatural. Saturation also can do wonderful thins for your video. Again don't overdo.

The last thing is that most people who make professional movies go to filmschool for a really long time. There they learn everything that it takes to make a good looking movie.