[pfreivald]

It's not uncommon for people fluent in ASL to communicate across a football field, or through glass, or whatnot. You just sign bigger (a bit like shouting or over-enunciating.)

That said, it's terribly, terribly common for people to teach themselves incorrectly, even when using a video to help, so if the plan is to use ASL, try to find someone who knows it so that they can correct you--and be advised that there are colloquialisms, accents (mine is mostly Western NY with a healthy mix of Californian), regional differences in word usage, and even a Black variety of ASL.

Alas, the best way to communicate would be a fluent use of classifier-based signing, but most ASL classes don't get into that much until ASL 3 or so. (Which, IMO, is silly--I've always introduced classifiers on day one and make extensive use of them throughout my classes, because they're an integral part of ASL fluency.)