How much body, hands or backgrounds - online?

I have given one hour presentation, part my story and part pathways slides and discussions. At the beginning, I was sitting, then when the need arose I stood up. That is easy and normal on stage, in a room. Online, it is more a problem. 

We can still show "body language" depending how far we stay. 

Here I captured Derick speaking not only with his expression and voice but also his hands and fingers even. 

When you bring them so near, before your face, you have to be careful how it looks. Here is just great. A bit nearer to the screen, and the hands would seem giants relative to the head. 

And if you point - no, do not do it!

Here is another example, Samir arms and hand remain almost same place as his head so they do not seem bigger. 

Of course, it helped that his entire face was illuminated at the same time, as a spontaneous answer to a question I posed.

Taking screen shots as I did in this two case, at the "exact moment" to show the movement, is not easy. But possible. Usually, I take only faces from online meetings, and very seldom anything else. When we go farther, we can be seen from afar and from time to time even stand up.

From a video taken Saturday, here I am showing the little difference, between a printed manual and one that I printed and assembled home, with the screen waiting (should have been closed while I spoke.) In TV videos, there is sometime just a little screen in the left upper corner when you see images, the rest occupied by the speaker.

My 'usual' when I go online is blue on blue. And whatever someone said about is what not true. In this kind of setting, only what it is important shows : my face. And ok, also my white hair. It is near enough to see my smile and usually my eyes also.

When I want to use more my hands, I push my computer a bit farther. And nowadays, very rare put a special colourful background, as I realized that it may not add to what I am saying but distract from it. When I need to say, I am in London, instead of showing the beautiful red London Phone boxes, I change my name and put Julie - London, even if in some kind of recording the name is not shown. Those participating in the meeting do see, without taking their minds from my message, my story. I learned this in a photography class, that days was about Portraits.