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Hand on a second. Wait for it.

Did you hear all those bangs and whooshes?

Did you see the colours?

These are some of the sounds we hear this time of the year when fireworks are fired up to celebrate days like:

• Bonfire Night
• Diwali
• Halloween
• Thanksgiving
• New year.

Family and friends get together to watch the fireworks.

Their eyes gaze upwards in anticipation of the next bang and burst of colour to light up the starry autumn night.

As each firework explodes, the crowd will cheer and clap with “ooohs! ahhs!

But why am I even talking about this? What can we learn from a firework display when it comes to creating amazing videos for your businesses?

Coming up are four tips to remember for video making to help  you give your audience their “oooh, ahh and wow” moments?

Hi, Pam Jones from Eight Interactive

Giving you video tips and ideas for creating impactful videos for your business.

If you’re new here please consider following or subscribing.

Back to today’s video and I’m talking about 4 Tips to Wow Your Audience With Video using fireworks as an analogy.

1. Ignite interest

At the start of your video, ignite some interest with your audience…marketers call this creating the hook.

Ask a question to get your audience thinking.

Tell them what’s coming up in the video.

Or talk about scenarios of your product or service as a way of telling a story.

2. Spark your audience’s imagination

Ensure your audience is engaged with your message from the second they click play. And then Keep those sparks firing throughout your video.

• Use a variety of visuals.
• Graphics.
• Video effects.
• Other footage.
• And music.

3. Add colour

Like fireworks that light up the sky, use a complementary colour pallet to light your audience’s screens.

Let colour enhance the look and feel of your video and draw attention to the content.

Do you want to use colours that represent your business brand?

Are there specific colours that your audience will connect with?

4. Create variety

A fireworks display is more than a series of rockets fired one after the other.

There’s a variety of fireworks.

Each one has a different explosive effect and different sounds.

Some “whoosh” in to the sky.

Others “bang!” so loud you have to cover your ears.

Now I’m not saying you should download a bunch of firework sound effects and add them to your video.

But think about creating a variety of videos.

• Animated.
• Short social videos.
• You or your team in front of the camera.
• Behind the scenes video.

So that’s it, 4 video making tips to remember this November and every month.

If you found this helpful, then please consider sharing it to help others too.

And if you have any questions about video making, then get in touch.

Until next time.

Happy video making.

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Need more video help? Check out the following video training courses to help you:

1. Video masterclass – How To Use Video To Promote Your Business
2. Video Implementation Programme – 3 online course helping you to plan, film and edit your videos confidently.

Getting in front of the camera is one way to make videos.

People can get to know you and hear what you have to say.

But what if you don’t want to get in front of the camera? Are afraid to.

How can you still make great videos for your business without getting in front of the camera?

In this video I’m going to give you 4 ways to make videos about your business which involves no-one getting in front of the camera.

1. Animated videos

Animated videos are made using video software. Graphics, images provide the visual aspect of the video. And video effects, and sound are then used enhance the message to make a video.

You can make animated videos with script which then record as a voiceover.

Or  without a script so there’s just a music track in the background which brings the video together.

The great thing about animated videos is there that the syle of choices is endless.

And that means you can create a video which is completely branded and suits your business message and style.

Animated videos work well for:

• Social media campaigns.
• Educational material.
• Or if you have something complex to explain which your audience find difficult to understand

2. Demo Videos

The second way to make videos without getting in front of the camera is to create a demo video.

You might want to make a demo video which is showing your audience something in your business.

It might be:

• Cooking lesson which is shot from above.
• A product demo which is a close up of the product being used. So in essence you’re just using your hands to show something closeup.
• A software demo which shows people how to use an app, platform or IT based system.

In all these examples, you can talk over the demo so people just hear your voice.

Or you can add text in key places to explain what the video is about. So in the cooking demo, it might be each step of the recipe without any narration. Instead a music track which brings it all together.

3. Use stock footage

The third way to make videos without getting in front of the camera is to use stock footage.

Stock footage are video clips which have been filmed by various people and then sold for use in image libraries and video software.

Like this, I didn’t actually get a drone or a plane and film this. This is stock footage which I’ve got within one of my video software.

You can find multiple clips which tell the story of your message and string the clips together to get a video.

I personally find it difficult to get free stock footage. So for client videos I use Image libraries such as Shutterstock and iStock. These libraries give you plenty of footage choice and with some creative editing you can then great something amazing.

Like this example – all these clips were sources from an image library and then the added into shapes with some motion behind it to tell a client’s story.

4. Film a different view point

And finally, the 4^th way to make videos without getting in front of the camera is point it the other way and film something from a different view point.

• Perhaps you want to make a video about how products are made. Point the camera the other way, film the manufacturing process – again with narration over it the recording or without.
• You could get other people in the video like your team. Your customers for testimonial videos.
• If you work or live somewhere unique how about giving your audience a tour around your work or home environment. These videos are also perfect if you have a lifestyle or travel business.
• Or perhaps you can use them to give your audience an insight into your world. You get a glimpse of your life outside of work and that helps them to get to know you.

So that’s it. 4 different ways to make videos without getting in front of the camera yourself.

• Animation
• Demo videos
• Stock footage
• And different view point videos

If you found this helpful, please consider sharing it with someone who may also find it useful.

Happy filming.

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We have experience of making all these videos, so if you want a video without getting in front of the camera, get in touch to find how we can help. See examples of animated videos and software demo videos we’ve made.

 

 

 

 

 

If you were about to film a video to camera how would you got about prepare what you want to say?

Do you script your message to the last word?

Or do you film without a script?

This video looks at the benefits of each approach and what types of videos you use a script versus no script.

Scripting Your Video

Scripting your video is when you write word for word what you want to say in front of the camera, and then record that message word for word.

There are lots of benefits to scripting your videos. It means you’ve got a planned message.  So you’ll  stick to your message. And you are less likely to umm and ahh..

When you don’t have a scripted message, you may lose your thought pattern and waffle more. And this can be a bit of a dangerous because you’ll end up extending that video more than you planned to. And before you know you may lose the purpose of your what you want to say in your video.

So if you’ve have a specific message that you want to cover in your video, and you want to be certain that you remember everything, then I would suggest scripting your videos. You may want to:

• Script every word.
• Create an outline of points that you can follow during filming.

Scripting your video works well for videos:

• Which are how-to videos.
• Where you are answering your customer’s questions.
• Doing product demos.
• Big announcements.
• And lots more.

These are just some ideas.

Scripting also helps certain kinds of people – like me. So for me I prefer to script my videos for all the reasons that I’ve just mentioned. But I also like to be organised and I like the structure a script gives me.

Unscripted videos

Unscripted videos work well if you have a story to tell.

Stories come out more naturally when you let the details flow. Stories are embedded in your brain, which means you can show the natural emotion coming out with a story.

Film unscripted if you’re sharing some deep reflections. Your audience will connect with you more if you let those reflections unravel as you talk.

Interview style videos are also unscripted in the sense that the person being interviewed will answer questions one at a time. There’s still some planning around the questions you’ll be asking in the interview.

So if I was going to be interviewing somebody about their story, I would plan the questions and get the person to perhaps think about them before the interview.

So there you go. Some reasons for making videos scripted versus unscripted videos.

If you found this helpful, please consider sharing it with someone who may also find it useful.

There are two ways to shoot your videos – in horizontal mode or vertical mode.

This video looks at which orientation you should film in. When and why.

Watch the video or read the script. To help you decide whether to film horizontally or vertically, ask yourself two questions.

1. Which platform will you be making the video for?
2. And what kind of video are you making?

So with those thoughts in mind, let’s first take a look at filming vertically.

Filming vertically works well if your video is for Instagram.

In Instagram you can post videos to Stories or Reels and because the whole of the vertical screen area is given to the video its best film your videos vertically.

Filming vertically is also OK if it’s just you in the video. But if you need to fit more in into the space, like more people, things or places, then you might want to film horizontally.

Filming horizontally is the recommended way to film video for YouTube, Facebook, LinkedIn.

So if these are the platforms where you’ll posting your videos, then film in horizontally in landscape mode.

Horizontal filming is also the most common mode to film your videos in because it gives you more options on what you film and how you edit your video.

We’re used to seeing video in this mode because it’s like watching TV. No-one ever watches TV vertically right?! So for some it’s a behaviour thing.

Having more space around you in a horizontally filmed video helps to create a feeling of space in your message, Even if it’s just you in the video.

You might want to use the extra space to add more elements in the editing process like images, or key points.

From horizontal footage you can also crop to a smaller size if you need to. So I can edit a horizontal video into a more square area for Instagram TV for example.

Or I might want to crop the video to fit it into another frame.

And here’s the other thing – if you are posting to multiple platforms, stick to horizontal. You can also use horizontal videos in your Instagram TV area called IGTV.

So that’s a few ideas to help you decide whether to film horizontally or vertically for your next video.

And if you found this helpful, please consider sharing it with someone who may also find it useful.