Download your favorite virtual backgrounds and add them to your meetings! Follow the steps below to get started. Despite whatever well-intentioned reasons they may be chosen for, virtual backgrounds inevitably feel like a little bit of an evasion and a closure, rather than an invitation to engage with you and your world.Browse our curated list from around the Web.

If there’s a knickknack or two showing ( within reason), it will endear you to your viewer because they’ll feel like they get to know you better. My personal choice is a really nice painting.ĭon’t feel like you need to empty the space of personal quirks, either. Bookcases are really popular backgrounds because they’re colorful, and they make you look smart. Instead, choose a (real) background in your space that has a little something going on. They won’t be able to focus on your beautiful face during the interview.

If the background is obviously fake, that’s going to be a distraction.

Remember, our intention is to create a great experience for the viewer. The human eye can still detect the subtle differences in lighting between your living room and the great outdoors. But no matter how hard you try, a virtual background is going to look fake. You can change your background to anything you like - a video, a gif, a still image. Zoom has a lot of interesting options when it comes to backgrounds. So practice with loved ones until you can strike the right balance between looking at the camera (you don’t want to get into a dead stare looking into the camera) and watching the live image of your counterpart. If you’re always looking at the camera, you won’t have a good awareness of their body language and reactions. The final trick to this is that their live video image is not where the camera is. When you direct your eyes this way, the person you’re talking to knows that you aren’t distracted by web browsing or anything else. Then you can make eye contact with that (instead of a green light) and also feel like you’re looking at the person you’re talking to. If that also feels funny, put a smiley-face Post-it note or a small photo of someone you love right near the camera. So instead of looking at the image of yourself, I recommend that you look at the camera. This can be really unsettling and even unhealthy. BUT, now comes the inevitable Zoom predicament: Where should you look? The worst thing about this whole new video-chat world that we live in is that you’re constantly looking at video images of yourself. You’re well framed and your camera is well positioned.

Realistic zoom backgrounds