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Continuing Education
Media Services

Tips & Best Practices

"There's no 'i' in great vydeo!"
~A Poor Speller
(but great team player)

Production is a collaborative, team sport. We look forward to working with you!

Video Production
Animation
In the Studios
Photography

The sky's the creativity limit but sometimes the budget is, in reality, the limit, but that doesn't mean you have to water down your vision. Let's work together to create creative products but also be creative in how we produce them. When laying out the media for a course/project use this list as a guide to organize priorities. Sometimes there are ways to do, or at least get close to, your vision and still stay within budget.

  1. What is best and would be most impactful for the course/project?
  2. What is going to be best for the audience and their expected outcome?
  3. Is there a place to put a little budget to get a big bang and spread it out through the finished product?
  4. Are there other elements we could create to dress up and give some real pop to the project that might appear to be "expensive" but in reality, aren't?

Perhaps the most varied and wide-reaching box of tools in production is animation. From very simple 2D to photo-realistic 3D and everything in between we can come up with something that fits the need, the budget, and the context. Animations help to add variety to the content delivered. Sometimes it is the easiest way to add some pizzaza and pop.

If you are coming in to record at one of our studios there are a couple of things to know beforehand to have the extra experience be as smooth as possible and to get the best result.

  • Studios E & F
    • Avoid wearing colors that are too dark or too bright. The black background can sometimes make a black sweater disappear making you into a floating head. Typically if you are wearing white or other bright colored shirt it might be too much and overpower the light on your face.
    • Generally tight patterned clothes don't do well on camera.
  • General delivery tips.
    • Be ready to deliver as if live. In class, there are times when you might stumble to find a word or mispronunciate a word. It's natural and makes the final product seem less rehearsed.
  • Try to look straight at the camera. There is someone on the other end of the camera and it makes a big difference if you are talking and looking at them as much as possible or if you are looking at slides or notes.
  • If you do mess up, the magic of video is that we can do another take. We try to avoid having cuts in the middle of videos as much as possible but if it happens it's okay.

If custom photography feels like a daunting prospect for you, know that we are eager to work with you to help you feel in control of your artistic project! Here are a few tips to keep in mind as we get started:

  • It does help to know your desired outcomes. Do you want seats filled or an increase in something specific? Having a measurable goal (that we can analyze after the fact) helps communicate to our creative team how much attention to give certain aspects of the production process.
  • Examples of what you don't want are just as helpful (sometimes more) as showing us what you do want.
  • For advertising or commercial projects, helping us understand your brand and who you are is very helpful. Showing us your style guide or brand identity, even a simple mission statement, can help us quickly get a high-level point of reference that helps define the appropriate artistic approach.
  • Please know that the estimate phase of the production process is an exploratory one. We can scale up for large ideas, or we can greatly reduce and economically problem-solve. Here are a few guidelines that can help us get on the same page:
    • We view estimates as tools to continue our discussion about what you really want, not as a 'take it or leave it' number that is fixed. So, rather than looking at a budget discussion as a negotiation (where the first party that throws out a number loses), consider viewing this stage as an important dialog that will unify all of us and clarify the correct next steps.
    • Because estimate discussions help us discover the right creative trajectory for your project, we can best serve you by knowing right up front what you prefer to allocate towards a creative production. Even a ballpark figure, coupled with your desired outcomes for the project, will help us quickly assess potential project issues and help you mitigate risk.
    • We know budgets can be different for each client, and we can work with that! We don't want to show up on the production day with a much smaller scope than what you wanted, and vice versa, so estimates help us define and manage important expectations.