Understanding Video Production

It is becoming essential for businesses to start creating video content. When people come to a company’s website, it’s almost an automatic reflex to look for videos. The reason for that is simple: video is everywhere nowadays, from vlogs to short content documentaries, educational 90 second Facebook videos, your friend’s Instagram, TV and online ads. Video is just easy to consume. You can put so much into a 1-minute video. And it doesn’t have to contain all of the information you are trying to communicate, it can be a gateway to longer form content, like an article or an “About Us” page.

?In this post we are going to go through some of the key things to help understand what is video production and what work goes into it.

Video Types 

This is not a conclusive list, as video production is a very wide concept and different videos can be called different names in various environments.

Corporate Videos

The term Corporate Videos, hold many different types under its belt. Crowdfunding Videos, Company Videos, Case Study Videos, Testimonials, Interviews, Events, Animation can all be classified as corporate videos. We have an extended post dedicated to just Corporate Videos, which you can see here: https://speedingfilms.com/corporate-video-types/

Promotional Videos

Promotional videos can be trailers, shorter versions of your longer form corporate or other videos, online adverts, pre roll adverts, TV adverts.

Animation

While animated videos could be considered as corporate videos, it’s sort of on a category of its own because of the obvious different look (animated) and the different production process.

Animations are perfect for making complicated tech products or services quick and easy to understand.

From infographics and text animations to full-on characters and scenes.

Using an animation, you can quickly visualise a concept to convey what you are doing or how your product/service/company works.

Video production process and stages

Pre-Production

This is where it all begins. Pre-Production stage is everything from coming up with an idea and developing a concept to writing a script, creating storyboards, planning, auditions, location scouting. It is all the preparation work needed before the filming day.

Production

This is where the filming happens. For production to go smoothly, it is essential that all of the preparations were carefully done. Production is when all of the hard work put before comes together and the creation of the moving visuals begin. For most promotional, corporate or crowdfunding videos this can be anywhere from a couple of hours to a few days.

Post Production

When all of the filming is done and the footage is captured, it is time to start putting the story together. From backing up and assembling the footage to making the first edit, modifying the edit, adding graphics and logos, choosing the right video format, colour correction and grading.

Biggest misconceptions of video production

Here are a few common ones:

Video production is very expensive

Depending on the project you are trying to complete and the complexity of it, the video production cost may vary. There were some incredible technological advancements done in the last 10 years, allowing video production cost to decrease significantly. Now, you can be more mobile, get professional quality equipment for the fraction of the cost and you have a choice from a pool of incredible amount of talent (at least in the big cities). You can create your own aerial shots for under ￡1,000 by buying a decent quality drone! The main thing that you are paying for, especially when hiring a video production company, is their expertise. Understand that video production experts have gathered their experience over time, through trial and error, learning to navigate difficult conditions and often uncontrollable circumstances. If you want a sure thing, hire the best, but be prepared to pay the price, or offer something of value in exchange. There are many ways to approach your video production needs, but the cost is definitely not as crazy as some people imagine, unless you want exploding helicopters and cars jumping off bridges.

Video production is easy

Probably any filmmaker or videographer heard this or something similar in the past: “Why does it cost so much, you just point the camera and press the red button” or “What am I paying for, you’re just sitting at your computer putting some clips together”. If you strip it down to the very basics, yes, that’s true, the red button is pressed and the camera is pointed. Hopefully, after reading this post up until here you have a deeper understanding of what goes into video production. All the experience is gathered over time and practise and if you feel it is easy, please give it a go and see how it goes putting together a professional, even basic, corporate video.

What approach to choose?

There are a few different ways that you can approach video production.

• DYI (Do It Yourself)

That’s right, you CAN do video production yourself. If you don’t have any previous knowledge in filming, videography or photography and do not understand the technical side of video production like camera settings, lights and sound – the footage you capture may be underwhelming. And that is only one half of the job! Once you capture everything you need, you will have to throw it all into an editing software and create your final masterpiece. This requires additional technical knowledge which can of course be learned, but it will be time consuming for sure. A lot of the filmmakers start early in their life when there is all the time in the world, no deadlines or pressure, so over time they naturally became more savvy. Now, don’t be discouraged if you are still planning to do video production yourself, just weigh in the time you will need to learn and produce a good quality video. Your chances of making anything to look relatively professional on your first attempt are very low. If you do nail it though, maybe consider a career change and become a filmmaker!

• Freelancers

Freelancers can be a good option for video production. If you’re planning your video production in London or other big hub of talent - it won’t be hard to find good talent. Freelancers can produce quality similar to production companies as they pretty much are the same thing, just instead of working for a company they work for themselves. Now, same as in the first option, DYI, choosing to make your videos with freelancers can be a time consuming task. That is because you will most likely have to take care of all the tedious production tasks. For example, if you are hiring a camera man or a videographer, they will come and film anything you need on the day, then they will leave and depending if they will edit your video, you may never hear from them again. The problem comes in because you most likely need a script, you need storyboards, schedule, perhaps additional help on the shoot? Good videographers will help you get the best footage on the day, but it will all lie on your shoulders. They are there to do their job, but the project is yours, and all of the responsibility is yours, from beginning to the end. Freelancers are usually picked over production companies in an attempt to save on cost and work on smaller budgets. Be cautious though! While it may seem like a cheaper option, be aware of all the time you will need to make this happen. Make sure you understand what exactly are you paying and if additional fees can occur. For example, filming overtime or if editing takes longer than planned.

• Video Production Companies

With a video production company, you usually get a team. Even if the team is small, most of the times you will get a Producer. His/her job is to make sure the project succeeds, from beginning to the end. Production company will offer you full services from initial concept to all of the planning, scripting, storyboarding, filming, editing and final video delivery. Some companies will even offer distribution and strategies of where to use the video. When hiring a video production company, you are paying for the overall knowledge and experience the team has acquired over time. You can usually see and understand the level of the company by looking at their homepage. Check their showreel and check any previous similar work examples to what you are looking for. Any good video production company will have nothing to hide, if they have great work, it will be put forward on their homepage. You can closely work together with the production company or you can just check in and see how they are doing with your project. Either way, you can be calm about it and concentrate on running your business.

Why make videos? 

Increase Sales and ROI

Our clients, have in the past, achieved great results using online ads. Crowdfunding campaigns that we’ve created videos for have raised over ￡4,000,000 in the last 12 months.

Put a face on your company

Nowadays, people want to see who you are and what you are all about. Show off your team and headquarters, talk first-hand about what you do and create a deeper connection with your customers.

Improve SEO

Somebody coming to your website and watching your video increases the time they spent on your website. Google likes that! Not to mention that Google owns Youtube and gives good rankings for websites with videos.

Easy to watch on any device

Whether you’re browsing on your laptop, tablet, phone or anything else, video is compatible with all of them. Videos are easy to watch at your table or on the go, just think how many videos you watch or at least see pop up online everyday.

Easy to consume

Since our brain works better with visual content…

Build a community

If you are continuously releasing good quality video content, you can build a follower list and create a community in an area of interest, which you can later start converting into sales.

In Conclusion 

There will be more and more videos and visual content coming out in the days to come. The customers are expecting that and businesses are reacting.

Create high quality video content and present your company in the best of light, engage your audience and achieve results.

For more information on video production, please contact [email protected]

We offer free consultation!