How to Post April Fool's Day Pranks on YouTube

Some of the best and most classic April Fool's Day pranks could be considered hearsay and urban legends because there's little to no evidence they ever actually happened. In Sweden the "Spaghetti Tree" incident is a classic because there's footage of the prank. If you want to ensure that your pranks live on, you'll need to film them and post them on a website like YouTube.

Instructions

Difficulty: Easy

Things You’ll Need:

• YouTube account
• Camera
• Film of the pranks

1. Record your pranks as they occur. For the best look, find places for your pranks that have great lighting. Outdoors always works well, or indoors where there is ample lighting is a good choice as well.
2. Upload the footage to your computer. Depending on how long the video is, this can take anywhere from a few minutes to a few hours. Just be patient and don't cancel the operation ahead of time or you'll need to restart.
3. Edit the pranks down to their essential bits. The shorter you make the film the easier it will be for people to watch it. Simple editing can be done using a host of different desktop film editing programs.
4. Head to the YouTube website (see Resources below). Log in to your account if you have one, or create one in order to upload your film to the site.
5. Click the "Upload" link from the main page.
6. Click the "Browse" button. This will open a directory through which you can search for the April Fool's Day film you wish to post.
7. Double-click on the film file once you find it or, alternately, you can click it once and then click the "OK" button in the directory box.
8. Wait for the file to upload. Depending on your connection speed this can take from several minutes to more than half an hour.
9. Check that the file plays correctly by accessing it from your "Account" link.

Tips & Warnings

• Encode your video at the highest possible resolution you can comfortably use when you upload it to YouTube. Video files that take up less memory or have lower resolutions will look bad when viewed online.
• Have separate cameramen film the pranks so that you can be an active participant in the pranks themselves.
• Never post April Fool's Day pranks on YouTube without the consent of the victim. Most people won't take issue to your sharing of a great prank if it was done in good fun, but some people may react poorly to being embarrassed on so public a forum as YouTube.