https://www.listennotes.com/e/11698deda25441dc83759230a3db26f1

Don't look at the camera when you're being interviewed. That's some of the worst advice out there in media training. Oh, look at the camera. Ignore the report. No, there are exceptions. I'll go over them in a moment. But in general, you want to look at the reporter who's talking to you. You want to look at the host who's talking to you. Your entire life, you've been looking at human beings. when talking to them unless you're on the phone, there's nothing to look at. But if there's a video camera there and a reporter, you're far better off ignoring the camera and just talking to the reporter. There are a couple of exceptions. A local news crew could come out to you, just the camera person, and they might say, Just look at the camera, ignore me. In that case, do what the production crew tells you. If you're in a satellite interview situation, you could be interviewed by a host in another city. You'll have an earpiece on. In that case, you'll look right at the camera. Those of you who are watching me on YouTube now or other video file sharing services and not just listening on iTunes can tell I am looking right at the camera. That's appropriate in this case because there's nobody else around to look at. There are a couple of other exceptions. Let's say you are doing a Saturday morning, Sunday morning public affairs show and you want to invite people to come down to the walkathon to support your charity. At some point during, let's say a five or ten minute interview, you could turn to a camera and say, that's why we want all of you at home to come on down to support us. The tricky part is though, if there's three cameras in the studio, you might not know which one is on. and a light might be on to start with, but then it goes to another one. So it's a little tricky. You really can't go wrong by just looking at the reporter or the host. There's no one else around, by all means, whether it's a satellite interview, Skype video interview, look at the camera.