Timeline:

• On average, 3-5 days of shooting during the nicest parts of the day (sunrise and sunset typically. The middle of the day is really only suitable for indoor or shade shooting as the light is so harsh during that time)
• After shooting around 15 hours of footage, that should take a day or two to upload
• Editing should take a few days after that, so this entire project is doable in only a little over a week
• Get started right away so that you have time to work through the process and reshoot anything that may need to be revisited; there’s nothing worse than working on a project and needing to do a reshoot and not longer having the opportunity to do so.
• We will be working with you throughout the process to provide feedback in order to make the highest quality video possible

Equipment:

• Pro-sumer/Professional Hi-Def video camera
• Tapes or recording media
• Editing equipment to go all the way from capture on to the final exporting of the project onto disc or tape. We will need the final project in an uncompressed format
• Professional tripod with fluid head
• Releases for models and occasionally for locations as well
• Storyboard shot list
• Notebook for recording time-codes on quality shots to assist in the editing process
• Digital still camera
• Polarizing filter for outdoor shots
• Recommended: Wide angle converter
• Optional: Steadycam (For moving shots, especially the fitness videos)

Shooting video formats:

• Shoot and edit in HD: 1080i/p
• 30fps (29.97) please for continuity between each video
• The finished product will be around 1.5-2 hours of high quality video. There will be two versions, a 16:9 standard def, and a 16:9 HD version. Final submissions should be uncompressed video on tapes, discs etc which will be sent to Great Moods
• Go for rich colors in a similar color palette within a video
• Using a polarizer and a wide angle lens will help increase the look and feel of outside shots
• Don’t take things like the sky for granted, a huge bright blue sky is part of the landscape, shoot it
• Make sure that you are shooting the nice parts of the landscape. Don’t shoot the parking lot with trash cans, compose your shots so you only get the nice aspects of a scene
• Get mainly wide shots starting out, progressing to tight shots as you work along the video and pull the viewer into the scene
• Tight shots can be of wildlife, plants, far-off nice looking people, lapping water etc. Use your judgment. Anything fitting with the theme and the mood and not too distracting would be good for any shots and especially close ups.
• Always shoot MORE than you need.

While shooting video, shoot digital stills:

• Once the camera is turned on, step away from the tripod and let it run for a little while.
• Step to the side and take some still shots of what you’re capturing on video.
• If you have a digital still camera with 5 megapixels or more we could potentially use your images for covers, and we’d love for you to submit some of your best shots for that purpose.
• After each day or when you’re capturing you can look through the still images and pick out the top few and send them to us. Do not send all of your pictures, edit through them and pick the best. If they are good and represent the video well, we’d love to use them as part of the cover or disc art.
• Also, if you send us an assortment of the images you shoot during the day we can give you feedback on the shots and accompanying video that you are shooting so as to work more efficiently.

Releases:

• You will need to get releases for any identifiable individuals in your video
• Be careful of shooting children, people are generally more sensitive about this so judge the situation and talk to people that you need to before shooting them and get a release
• If you’re shooting an indoor location like a club or bar for our NYC Big Band or clubbing products, talk to the management and, first of all, ask permission, it helps to offer them the footage as a sort of payment or trade for being allowed to shoot there. You will need to put up a general release at the door. If you shoot close shots of people once inside, you will need releases from those individuals.
• If you are shooting individuals from far away and they are not clearly identifiable then you do not need to get a release for those individuals.

Take viewers on vacation:

• Print out the storyboard for the project you are shooting and use this as a general guideline for the type of shots and compositions you should use. You do not need to follow this exactly, but this is the general type of shot we want.
• Generally don’t do pan shots or zooms. If you do choose to do camera movements, they should be incredibly well executed and should be barely noticeable.
• For still shots, make sure that the camera is not bumped or otherwise disturbed while recording. A tiny bump to the camera becomes an earthquake on a 50” plasma screen and is just not professional
• Imagine the steps that people take when coming up to a beach for instance or start going on a trail in a park as if you are taking the viewer along that trail
• First of all you’re going to see a wide view of the beach from far up
• Then you’re going to work your way a bit closer to the beach and then look up both ways at various views in those directions
• Then you’d find a place to camp out your beach chairs, so either find a place for that, or you could even shoot some beach chairs there that are picturesque.
• Then move on to closer shots, looking up and down, using standard angles and low angles
• Shoot things like the water lapping, people in the distance enjoying themselves (nothing too obtrusive) little crabs, some seagulls, coconuts swaying; you get the picture.
• Take these people on a vacation away from their homes so that on their plasma screens and LCD TVs they can escape to a picturesque paradise by drawing them in from wide to tight shots.

Editing:

• Edit in HD and then downcode to standard def afterwards so that you don’t have to make two separate projects.
• Shots should end up being between 15-40 seconds in length, with an average length of 30 seconds. That means that the final, edited clip is that long, so the raw footage would be much longer than that, and the 30 seconds or so are just the best segment of that shot
• The amount of shot footage will likely be around 15 hours of video, this will allow you to edit down to 1.5-2 hours of A-squad material
• Upload will probably take around one to two days
• Follow the format of the sample videos and keep within the feel of your specific video (don’t suddenly change editing style in the middle of the video)
• Download the uncompressed audio files HERE to include in the video