I bounce back and forth between my iPhone and Nexus 7 and whenever I come across a new app that I’m interested in, I watch the video. You get a much better sense of what it does and how it works then just from the five screenshots you see in the app store. The Google Play Store allows you to add a YouTube video which is great for any business, they get additional view counts and it can give them a quick glimpse of how their app is doing. 

In the iOS store there are just a few screenshots that have often been doctored to look amazing or to show off some of the cool features of an app. Apple tends to do their own thing and doesn’t follow what others are doing but in this case I think they need to be a follower and add video to their apps screenshots / preview page. I guess I’m a little biased because I know if Apple did have a way to add videos I might see a few more projects come LooseKeys way.  

Google isn’t the only one offering video previews in their store. Yesterday I was interested in seeing what games were out there and so I installed Steam on my computer. I haven’t bought a game yet but I have noticed that just about every game has a preview or teaser with the game, sometimes both. Which is awesome for a game because screenshots just can’t do them justice. 

How great would it be to see a video review or a teaser for every book in the iBookStore or even on Amazon. More video gives us all a better idea of what we’re getting or purchasing and of course it also makes more work for designers and artists out there like me. 

I’ve been working on videos for startups and small businesses for awhile now and one of the constant points of tension is in trying to convince my clients that they don’t have to include every detail about their product in a video. I understand they built this amazing new thing and it’s going to change the world. They put their blood, sweat and tears into the product. However, when you’re marketing your service or product you need to keep it simple.

For potential customers who come across their video or webpage, they want to learn what it is that this service or product is going to do for them and why they need it. If they can’t relate to what they are seeing, they won’t stick around. You need to convince people there’s a good reason to choose your product over another equally good product. Think of it like the cherry on top of a sundae. That cherry isn’t going to make a bad sundae good, but if you have the option of the sundae with the cherry or with-out, the one with the cherry is going to win. The video adds little to the service but it makes that sundae look even better.

Skip all the marketing jargon, explain it in a simple easy to follow manner. Capture their attention and don’t bore them with details. Give your customer that cherry and you’ll win them over.

Beware of what you post and put online because someone is watching. Just because you’re small and think you’re flying under the radar, doesn’t mean someone isn’t going to find or see your work. And if that work you create is a rip-off of someone else’s or a copy of a tutorial you’re trying to pass off as your own work, someone is going to notice.  

These days it can feel like we need to be making and creating new content all the time whether it’s blog posts, videos, images or audio recordings. And it can get hard to come up with something new and different. It’s often a lot easier to just follow a tutorial or rip-off what someone else has done than think about it yourself. All throughout school we were taught not to copy or plagiarize when writing papers and essays. Today it’s incredibly easy to post a couple sentences into google and see if it was stolen. Where it’s easy with text, it’s not as simple with video and images. It’s often harder to get picked off or called out because someone would need to have seen both works. Depending on how high profile the work is you might be able to stay hidden but trust me you can’t work that way for too long. Someone is going to see the work and call you out.  

Working with so many different businesses and startups at LooseKeys, we want to make sure each one of our videos has a unique look and that can get hard. How many different ways can you show someone holding a smart phone or showing how you can import your friends from Facebook. I try to pull inspiration from all kinds of sources when I’m working and sometimes the work can look similar to the original and sometimes is can look like something totally different and unique. Which is what you want. If I have to stop and think twice about if this thing I made looks too much like what I was pulling inspiration from, that’s the moment I have to go back and make adjustments

My first goal when working is first to make something I’m proud of and if I were to copy something straight out, I can’t be proud of that. My second goal, which is the hardest and often is rarely achieved, is to make something amazing that will get recognized and stand the test of time. I don’t think that’s really happened yet but it might be something you have to look back at in 10 or 20 years to realize it. Simply imitating what someone else created won’t be lasting and won’t be recognized.

Alfred Tennyson said, “Great poets imitate and improve, whereas small ones steal and spoil.”

Meaning, bad artists or in this case poets deface what they steal. While the great ones take or steal an idea and turn it into something better or at least something different. Pull the best ideas from your sources and you’re going to make something outstanding. 

Everyone draws inspiration from others but there’s a difference between being inspired by someone’s work, learning new techniques and just ripping it off. Original work stands out and cuts through the noise. So next time your working think about what you’re doing, are you happy with this? Would you be proud for this to be the last thing you did? 

It seems like every startup has a video on their site demo-ing or explaining their service. But are they getting watched? At the rate I skip through commercials on TV, I often wonder if anyone is watching these product commercials or explainer videos online.

The best part about this type of online content is that you know that people are watching. The video I worked on for CamScanner was viewed over 30,000 times in a week on YouTube and when the folks at Resultly posted their video on YouTube it was played over 8,000 times in a single day. That’s just a couple examples but I’m not sure how well these two videos were promoted by the businesses. So someone is watching and that’s good for me since this is mainly the sort of content I’m creating and I’d be out of business if all of a sudden people stopped watching video online. 

An explainer or demo video for a service is different than a commercial. The goal of a commercial is typically brand awareness or to sell. Plus a commercial is getting in the way of what I really want to watch.  

An explainer video is there to educate and convert viewers. It’s a bit more passive than a commercial you were forced to watch. With an explainer video, you likely came across the site or video while searching for a way to do something or solve an issue. The viewer already knows they need this and now it’s time to convince them yours is the best.  

They are going to take the time to understand clearly what it is you do and that plays into the quality of the site, your videos and your team.

85% more likely to buy than people who don’t view videos. Even if that number was only 50%, wouldn’t you spend the money on a video? That’s 50% more users that are likely to sign up & buy. 

The more you can educate your consumer on who you are, what you do and why to choose you, the better off you’ll be. 

We won five 2013 Telly Awards for Online Video Content!

The first one was a Sliver for Viadeo for Videography / Cinematography in an Online Video. Next up is one I’m very proud of and that is Eugene Bear’s First Christmas. Eugene Bear took home a Silver Telly for a Production Company Online Promotional Piece. MyCabbage won a bronze for Branded Content and Use Of Animation. Finally, winning two Bronze Telly awards was “What Will Your Resultly Love Story Be?” One was for B2C Branded Content and the second was for Use Of Animation for a Promotional Piece.

This past week was a bit crazy… Monday afternoon I told Jake that we needed to finish two videos by the end of day Friday. Both these videos had live action elements that had been shot the week before, we just need to add graphics and do clean up to all the shots. The videos each were roughly 2 minutes in length and required a good amount of compositing. I think if someone told me I had a week to get all this done, I may have laughed in their face. But Jake said ok and asked where to start. With that deadline hanging over our heads, we got to work.

Most of the videos we work on don’t really have a hard deadline, we work on the video till it’s done. Sometimes there are launch days that we’re trying to hit but they usually aren’t too crazy of a turnaround.  I know our abilities and what we can take on and accomplish so we don’t usually find ourselves in a situation where we are freaking out about deadlines. The opened ended deadline or no deadline is great but sometimes if you really want the work to get done you have to set a deadline. That extra push is often just what you need. 

Basically we had two days to work on each video and then Friday for any final tweaks. Yeah, that’s a fast turn around. Just like in school when you have a paper due the next day and you haven’t started it, you let that stress fuel you and you get it done. You have to get it done otherwise you’re going to fail and in this case if we didn’t do well, we wouldn’t get paid but we’d also burn a bridge and disappoint a client. 

Because of that deadline, it forced us to work harder, smarter and well faster. We didn’t have time to screw around; no checking YouTube or getting lost on wikipedia. If After Effects or Cinema 4D wasn’t rendering then we better be animating. You might be surprised to hear there were no sleepless nights either. Typically we worked from 9 am - 1:00 AM which if you know me is my typical work schedule anyway. 

Right now we’re doing some final changes that the clients had but they loved the videos and I’m really happy with the result as well. 

I often fly by the seat of my pants and make decisions from my gut. This typically works out but there are those times when you have to stop, think about what’s about to happen and plan for it. This is especially true when I’m crafting a video. A video takes a lot of time and there is a good amount of planning that needs to happen so everything can run as smoothly as possible. When you just dive in without thinking things through; you’re just going to end up wasting time and money having to start over.

No matter how much you’re chomping at the bit to start making something, you must plan things out, in particularly when you’re on a tight deadline. At LooseKeys I know we’re working on videos that are a key piece of branding for a business and that’s important. You really can’t plan enough when you’re putting something like that together. So put together a great script, make storyboards, do some test animations, scout locations, and think about what you’re going to need to make your project a success.

I’m sure we’ve all sent a rough cut to a client before and the feedback we’ve received hasn’t been the best. “What is this?” or “This isn’t What We Expected,” are never words you want to hear. At LooseKeys  our clients are often people who run businesses or startups and not people necessarily familiar with all that goes into the creation of a video. 

 People who work in video or film, tend to toss around phrases that aren’t always widely known outside of our industry; terms like rough cut, styleframes, and codecs. People outside our circle might not be familiar with them. I know I’m not familiar with banker terms like M&A, LBO and below the bar. 

As creative people, we tend to get upset when others, especially clients don’t understand our vision or process. You have to take the time to educate and inform them on what they are seeing, otherwise you’re going to work yourself up and out of frustration end up freaking out on the client. 

So what’s a rough cut?

A rough cut is one of the first steps in putting together a video, this is the first phase where the project starts to resemble a real video and not just a bunch of random pieces. Typically rough cuts will still undergo many changes before the final. If you’re working with video, assembling a rough cut is a time consuming process; you have to go through all the footage trying to figure out what is the best and in what general sequence it should all go in. You typically go through many versions of rough cuts before you get to the fine cut and are near completing the video. A rough cut is really just the first step in the editorial process, there are many more changes that can and will be made.

Since most of the videos at LooseKeys are animated, our rough cuts are typically very advanced animatics. All the movements of the characters might not be in place but the pieces are there to make sure the scenes are working and flowing together. 

No matter what you show the client, make sure you’re happy with it and assume that they are looking at this video like it is the final. If there are changes that need to be made let your client know. Give them a list of things you’ll be fixing or doing. It helps to signal to them that this isn’t the final cut and you’re still working on it.  If you get bad feedback on a rough cut, remember to breathe and take a moment and try to understand that sometimes it will take a while before the client understands that this is a process.