2013 has been a good year so far for us at LooseKeys and it just got even better, we won three Silver Communicator Awards. 

The first one was for “The Smarter Wallet from Lemon” for online video animation. Mike and I had a blast working with Lemon on these videos and it’s awesome to see one of them winning another award. Next up was the “Viadeo Company Pages” video in “Branded Content - Business to Business” category. That video was really LooseKeys first exploration into live action video, so it’s awesome that it won a Telly and now a Communicator Award. Finally, our Boxee TV video won in the “Branded Content - Business to Consumer” category. 

All three of these videos span multiple styles, which really shows off what this talented team can produce!

Whenever I have a spare moment I find myself trying to fill it with something. It could be waiting in line for coffee and pulling out my phone, driving in the car and listening to a podcast or sitting at the airport and trying to write a blog post. If I’m not doing something that is “productive” or helping me move forward then I feel like I need to fix that. There are very few times for me where I just stop, slow down and enjoy the moment. I know this is something about myself that drives Maeve nuts.The go go go can be exhausting. When you can’t just stop and relax for a second you have little time to reflect and make calculated decisions. Something that is extremely important when you’re running your own business. That was one of the reasons I started running last year, just to have those moments to let my mind wonder. Lately I’ve been listening to podcasts when I run… another way I found to fill that extra time. 

I don’t really have a solution for how I’m going to change this or if I really want to but I know I do need to take a moment at times just to slow down. 

Editing on set isn’t a new thing; it isn’t always possible for everyone’s shoots and it isn’t something I’ve been able to do till now. Boy, does it help and it even saved us some time this past week on our LooseKeys shoot in Sonoma. 

Sure, it’s nice working with digital cameras and being able to quickly review each and every take. But on those small screens you don’t always know if it’s perfect. You can always rent a larger monitor for playback but that would only help to make sure each shot looks right. When you’re able to edit a rough cut on the fly, it allows you to check for more than just that one shot. You’re also able to check if the edit is working, audio levels and give the clients a little tease of what it’s going to look like. 

This is the first time I’ve been able to work with the editor on set and wow, did it help. Having Maeve Price there to drop in footage from the camera was amazing and since we were using Premiere we didn’t need to convert anything. We were able to make sure that the shot looked great and we were also able to make sure that the video was cutting together like I had planned. A couple of times the video really wasn’t flowing right and because Maeve was there to help with the edit we were able to make adjustments on the fly and shoot some pickups. Being able to do the pickup shots and re-shoots that day was great. It saved me from having to deal with it after the shoot was wrapped and trying to come up with a creative solution. 

Not only did it help me and the rest of the team but it also gave the client something to see. They were able to basically see a rough cut a few minutes after we wrapped for the day. Which I think helped to put their minds at ease and made the LooseKeys team look good. At the end of the day I want them to be happy with the product.

Being able to edit on the fly isn’t something that works for every shoot but if the project is right and the budget is there, do it. It will save you later.