We’ve been thinking a lot lately about creativity, specifically taking creative risks. As we get older, we become more fearful of taking creative risks while at the same time having more confidence in our creative ability. It’s a strange mindset, but one we’re willing to bet is faced daily by creative professionals.
Authenticity and intimacy are the qualities in our work we are most proud of. These qualities can come from real moments we film as well as interviews we capture during production of videos for non profit and corporate clients. For interviews in particular, we’ve honed a visual approach over the years that we think results in high-quality imagery that feels authentic and intimate. Here’s how we do it.
From teaching in Italy, to releasing The Guardians, to filming in West Africa, here’s some highlights of what we’ve been up to the last few months.
You’ve produced a video for your organization, and you’ve released it to the world. Now what? This may not be your first time at the rodeo, and it certainly won’t be your last. Each video project adds to your portfolio of communication tools and informs the production of the next. So take a moment to evaluate what was successful and what missed the mark. We explain how in part 3 of our 3-part series on working with a video production company.
The idea of assigning a “process” to creative work might seem limiting. But over the years we’ve honed a production process that liberates strong storytelling to the benefit of our clients. Below, we’ll share a little bit about our production process in part 2 of our 3-part series on working with a production company.
As time intensive as it can be, we love responding to inquiries for video production bids. We’re truly inspired by the work you do and want to help you advance your mission with our storytelling. But sometimes we receive bids that don’t include all the right information, making it difficult to gauge what the potential client wants to achieve. So we thought it might be helpful to outline what to include in a video production RFP or Inquiry.
It has been a while since our last update, but we are happy to share that we’ve finally reached the finish line with The Guardians. Picture lock in hand, composers Joey Burns and John Convertino of Calexico are currently working on the original score. And we will soon begin submitting to film festivals. We’re also waiting to hear where the film will land on PBS through our co-production agreement with public television funder ITVS. So stay tuned for updates. In the meantime, we thought we’d share a few takeaways from the production experience:
We were approached by Architectural Digest to produce a video as part of an integrated marketing campaign for Control4, a provider of home automation systems. They wanted to tell a real story of how technology and smart design could help a family with special needs. AJ and Devin’s story fit the bill perfectly.
For one of our clients, we were tasked with filming a series of interviews with a wide range of subjects all over the world. The goal was to keep the focus on the subject and their story. Guided by this goal, our visual approach was to film stripped down, simple close up interviews with as abstract a background as possible. We aimed for shooting locations that were simple and modern, sometimes even just a white wall or corner. This runs counter to the type of setting we usually request for interview shoots – something with character, natural light, architecture and a setting that provides visual context for the character or story.
We’ve flown on nearly every major US airline in the last year, close to 100,000 miles. Not all of it has been for filmmaking, but we have done enough trips with all of our gear to get a solid lay of the land when it comes to flying with film equipment. Oversize baggage fees, media rates, waived fees, damaged equipment, delays, cranky agents, nice agents– we’ve seen it all. In the process we’ve learned a few tips that can greatly help you on your next flight with your gear. Which airline is far and away the best for flying with film-making gear? Read to the end to find out!
Sometimes I feel like I have amnesia about how indie shoots have gone in the past. Through rose-colored glasses, I believe that every shoot was a successful endeavor and had gone exactly to plan, when that was not the case at all. This glorified hindsight leads me to crave perfection on my current shoots, causing me anxiety before and after. I wonder frantically: Does this content add to the story? Will it appear random? Does it connect to the characters? Was it shot creatively and was the approach thoughtful enough? Is this the best use of my time? Perhaps T.S. Eliot was really onto something when he said,” anxiety is the hand maven of creativity.”
Our recent travels through Southeast Asia were a sensory overload of colors, sounds, smells, people, and nature we’d never seen before. The compulsion was to immediately turn the camera to every single sight, an urge that slowed as the trip progressed. In fact, our best photos and video were taken towards the end of the trip because our eye for the unique became more discerning. Our growth as storytellers has taken a similar trajectory; we’ve developed better eyes and ears for what is interesting and worth telling and more importantly, which medium is best to tell it. There’s the written word, sound, video images and still images, all mediums we employ as storytellers. Some stories call for all while others may only call for one or two mediums. But how to decide whether a story is worth making into a film or if it’s better as an article or a photo? Below are a few questions I ask myself before I decide to start making a film.