We are creators of videos of all kinds, but our focus has always been what we call ‘the image film’, or the corporate video people WANT to see. This can take various forms, but the kind of format we often work with is interview-driven. What does it mean to have a video that is interview driven? This is a video that is unscripted, that thrives on the stories of the real people that are on fire for the company they belong to. Digging up real stories from the people who live them, and then weaving them into a cohesive multi-layered story - that’s what we love to do!

There is an art to this. Finding the story that makes a business unique often takes an outside perspective to achieve. It’s more than just asking the questions to a random list of people and hoping for the best. There’s research, conversational interviewing, and editing with an emphasis on content - all of these things come into play when making successful videos featuring interviews.

Research: This is something we do with our clients and that we ask our clients to do for themselves as well. The answers to what makes a great story might not be in the obvious places. Discovering the right talking points for an interview translates into and effective interview dialogue. Research also includes finding the right people to be interviewed. Although the CEO might be the first choice for an interview, that person might also be terrified of the camera! A mid-level employee with great people skills and a passion for the business might be a better overall choice. A good interviewee might also be shy in real life but have an extremely intuitive camera personality. Finding these things out prior to the interview day is all part of the research.

Conversational Interviews: This is not an interrogation, but it is, in its own way, an investigation. We’re there to get to the heart of the story, and getting the interviewee to deliver the most natural and effective response they are capable of is our highest goal. How is that achieved? Again, this is an art, not a science. By having a conversation with the interviewee, and having that conversation flow into and become the interview, we find we can often get a great result. It also helps the person we’re talking to ease into the interview and reflect on what they’re saying. We’re also dogged about getting the response we need to get the result we’ll need in the edit of the piece. We may ask questions a few times, or re-phrasings of the same question, to elicit the type of answer that will work best. Other times, it’s just nice to have options!

Editing for Content: The editorial process is a multilayered one, and the workflows tend to be as varied from editor to editor as the artists who inhabit them. We have a workflow that we’ve used from the time we solidified our creative team, and that stability has helped us create consistently solid videos. Step one of this workflow is editing with an emphasis on content - period. Although we always edit with the finished video in mind, the content is really the backbone of a good video. Pouring through each interview to find the moments that really count, and thinking of how each person’s narrative will tie together, makes for a well thought out story.

An interview driven video that can show off your people telling the story of your own business - it doesn’t get much more genuine than that. Although it’s a format that doesn’t work for every business, it’s a format that we’re drawn to as storytellers. To take a look some examples of our interview-driven videos, see Lynchburg College or Prime Time International.

We’ve all seen them in video – beautiful landscapes, vibrant skies, perfect skin, and a gorgeous setting sun.  What you’re seeing is a perfectly orchestrated dance between a skilled Director of Photography and a Colorist.

The Director of Photography (DP for short) sets the shot, the scenery and the lights to give the footage an even, art-directed look.  The Colorist then takes the shot and ‘corrects’ any conditions that were not optimal at the time of the shooting: a hazy sky, a dark day, an uncooperative sun, or even bringing life back into those ‘rolling hills’.  When you look at footage before and after, it’s quite a stark contrast. 

The Colorist can also change the entire feeling or mood of a shot even AFTER it’s been shot.  Those same rolling hills and vibrant skies can be changed in color and tone to create a sense of pensiveness, urgency, hope, or even sadness.

In the past, a Colorist was limited in what could be done with an early generation digital video image.  Frame sizes where smaller and the color depth was inadequate compared to the color space that was available with traditional film.  Quite simply, if you have less “visual information” to work with, you have less options in which to change the image.

Since we started working with the RED ONE camera at Point7West, our frame size has quadrupled to 4K and we now have the color depth, luminance, and creative latitude that that even rivals that of film today.  Images are sharper, more vivid and now have an even greater shelf life because of the increase in resolution.  The options have become limitless in what we can do with the color correcting process.  So the next time you see those beautiful landscapes, vibrant skies and perfect skin, remember that those scenes were painstakingly refined and polished to be a perfect work of art.