6 Mistakes to Avoid If you want to Speak Better on Camera
There’s a moment many people remember: the first time in front of a camera. Everything seems easy from the outside… until you’re the one standing there. And then the same thing happens again and again: your body stiffens, your voice changes, your mind speeds up more than it should… and you get that strange feeling of not sounding like yourself, even when you’re only saying “hello.”
The good news is that this has nothing to do with talent or innate charisma. In fact, it’s about mechanics: how your nerves, posture, and communication fall out of alignment in that moment. And that’s precisely what matters most, because if it’s a mechanical issue, it’s something you can train, correct, and improve with practice and awareness.
That’s why today we’re going to talk about how to speak on camera, the most common mistakes people make, and—most importantly—how to fix them in a practical, quick, and immediately applicable way.
To better understand this, we also draw on the perspective of one of the country’s most respected communicators: journalist and TV presenter Laila Jiménez.
What does a leading professional advise you?
Laila Jiménez
A journalist specialized in news broadcasting, Laila Jiménez is currently part of Telecinco’s news team, where she presents the morning edition and provides additional reporting from the newsroom. For the same channel, she has worked as a news reporter in Barcelona since 2006. Before that, she worked as an editor at CNN+ and in the news department at Antena 3.
With this trajectory, Laila knows exactly what it means to speak on camera in a real newsroom context: rhythm, clarity, and presence. That’s why she shares three essential ideas that help improve any video intervention and are especially useful when doing a live news broadcast.
How to speak on camera: avoid these mistakes and gain presence from the very first minute
1. Letting your nerves take over
The first mistake is thinking that nerves must be eliminated. Big mistake. In reality, nerves aren’t the problem; the problem is trying to fight them.
When you try to “not be nervous,” your body goes into contradiction: you’re activated, but you want to be relaxed. That creates stiffness, an unstable voice, and mental blocks. In truth, nerves are energy. What’s missing is direction.
Before recording or speaking on camera:
Inhale for 4 seconds
Hold for 2
Exhale for 6
2. Speaking too fast
One of the most common on‑camera mistakes is speeding up. When you’re nervous, your brain wants to finish quickly. Deep down, it’s an instinctive response: “if I do it fast, it’ll be over sooner.” But in communication, this is fatal. The message gets lost, ideas overlap, and the audience has no space to process.
The pause is your best tool.
After every important idea, take a real one‑second pause. It’s not empty silence — it’s space for understanding. Think of it this way: you’re not filling time, you’re building meaning.
3. Blocking your body language
Even when you’re not saying anything, your body is already speaking. And in fact, on camera, it speaks louder than your voice.
Closed shoulders, lowered neck, hidden arms… all of that communicates insecurity, even if what you’re saying is good.
Adopt an active posture:
Firm feet
Shoulders open but relaxed
Hands visible and moving naturally
Neck elongated
An open body doesn’t just look better — it also helps you breathe better and speak better.
4. Wanting to sound perfect
One of the most subtle mistakes when speaking on camera is trying to control your voice, your words, and your gestures so much that you lose your naturalness. Perfection in audiovisual communication is a trap. In fact, the more you try to control everything, the more artificial you sound.
Embrace small imperfections.
If you make a mistake, keep going. If you blank out, pick up the idea again without dramatizing it. The audience isn’t looking for perfection — they’re looking for truth. Naturalness isn’t the absence of mistakes; it’s the ability to keep going without losing your thread.
5. Not listening to your own voice
Many people speak without being aware of how they sound. But your voice is your main instrument. If you don’t listen to it, you can’t adjust it.
Record yourself every day for 30–60 seconds. Not to criticize yourself, but to become familiar with your own voice.
At first it feels uncomfortable. Then it becomes normal. And once it’s normal, a large part of the nerves disappears.
6. Moving your hands too much… or not moving them at all
There are two common extremes:
Exaggerated hand movements that distract
Frozen hands that convey stiffness
Your hands should reinforce the message, not replace it or hide it. Think in simple movements:
Highlight ideas
Support key phrases
Avoid nervous, repetitive gestures
The idea that changes everything
The camera doesn’t reveal whether you’re good or bad; it reveals whether you’re connected or disconnected in that moment. That’s why what we often interpret as on‑camera “mistakes” aren’t personal failures, but natural reactions to a new situation.
When you stop demanding perfection from yourself, something much more interesting starts to appear: presence. A way of communicating that’s clearer, steadier, and closer to what you actually want to say.
From there, everything fits better. You stop obsessing over the “how” and return to the “what” and the “for whom.” And it’s precisely at that point that communication gains strength.
In the end, it’s not about doing it flawlessly — it’s about doing it for real. And when that happens, the camera stops being intimidating: it simply accompanies what you’re already communicating.
When we talk about presence when speaking on camera, it’s not just theory. Professionals who work with it every day agree on the same thing: communicating well isn’t a matter of perfection, but of practice and naturalness.
The key to how to speak on camera
Training in real environments like the Radiofònics courses accelerates this process, because you don’t just learn theory — you train exactly what will happen later in front of the camera. At Radiofònics you will find all the courses designed to improve your on‑camera presence and your communication skills.