advice on 6 hour video project for our company

Our company is planning to do a video to expand our current business.
It needs to be around 6 hours, production quality.

We heard it will cost a fortune to do because it involves many
locations and a lot of travel from place to place. Estimates range
from $20,000 to over a hundred thousand from start to finish.

What are the hazards we should look for and if someone has done
something similar in the past, what happened to you?

Thank you,

Terry H
ITS

 

You should read this thread and the ones around it:

http://www.creativecow.net/index.php?forumid=12

Your biggest hazard, bluntly, is you're going into this process without a lot
of background,a nd you may be making some very basic erors in judgement. WE can
probably help if you give much more detail on what you're trying to do, what is
expected, etc. etc. We know nothing of your business so far, so you may have
to give us a little primer on what you do along with that. I'll start with an
obvious question:

Why do you think this video needs to be six hours? Even Coppola couldn't get
away with six hours, and Lord of the Rings is about the only other one that
might go that long;-)

You probably mean something like six one-hour modules or episodes? Again, Why
so long, what's the material to be covered? This sounds so big that
conventional video may not be the right tool for the job, it might be something
better done as hypertext or something else. We can't really say without more
data.

 

You would never come close to six hours of finished video involving
many locations for that kind of money. The $20K may get you one good
hour.

--
Larry Jandro - Remove spamtrap in ALLCAPS to e-mail

Are you a Sound/Video/Lighting/Staging Freelancer..?
If so, think about joining our mail list.
Send an e-mail to:
(Requests from Yahoo & Hotmail will be rejected.)

 

Six hours? That is unusually long. When you say "to expand our current
business", do you mean a marketing video for potential clients to view?
What do you mean by "production quality"?

Many locations and a lot of travel sure undermines my trust of the $20,000
estimate. Beware. Think in terms of $1K to $2K per day for a 2-person crew
with a camera and modest sound and lighting gear. Air fares. Van rentals
at each city/location. And, just as your company's employees expect a
paycheck on those days they travel but do no work, so do video people.
Video editing can run from $500 per day up depending on needs. Without
knowing more about the nature of your production, it is impossible to
estimate how many days will be required, but my guess is that it will be
more in the nature of weeks than days. And, how about the producer who must
create or have created a script... there will be a script, right? Six
hours. That's a bunch of script. Figuring about a minute a page you're
talking about 360 pages. Of course, the writer will have to become familiar
with your company, its products or services, and its culture if he or she is
to turn out something that will be satisfying to you. $20,000 would be a
bargain for that job alone. Next, how many days would it take you to
organize the transportation, hotels, rental cars, daily itineraries? Since
you'd like to keep costs at a minimum, you can't afford to depend on making
it up as you go along. That usually results in days totally wasted. So,
someone will have to create detailed shot lists based on the script and
organized by location. Everyone at each location who is to appear in the
video will have to be scheduled, briefed on expectations, and, perhaps, even
wardrobe discussed if that is part of the "look" the company wants to
present. That is going to take several days of an experienced producer's
time at say $500 or so a day. Graphic design? If there are charts or
drawings or illustrations or animation that could easily run several
thousand dollars. And, I've left out a ton of other details that all must
be paid for. Is that $100K starting to look more reasonable yet?

Have I ever done this? No, not shooting for a six hour finished time
production, but many locations in several cities, yes. What happened? The
production pleased the client. I got older and learned a few things that
helped make later shoots go smoother, which I try to do on every job.

Tell us more.

Steve King

 

Terry,

Sit down with the guy asking for the video and ask him this...

"What do you expect the video to do for this company that makes the
production worth undertaking in the first place?"

And ask for the information in DOLLARS.

Because if he or she is a sensible businessperson, they'll have an
ECONOMIC reason for making the video.

It must either make them - or save them - SIGNIFICANTLY more than it
costs to make or there's no good business reason for doing it.

Period..

So figure out how much the potential earnings, or savings are over a
reasonable period of time - say a life span for the video is 2-3 years.

Take THAT figure and tell your guy to budget about a TENTH of that amount
for producion. (I like a 10:1 ratio, it seems to work well)

If the budget figure is under about $50k (meaning that the video has the
potential to save/make the company less than half a million bucks - it's
probably not worth doing in the first place. Not with that much travel and
hassle.

If the budget figure is over $250,000 (meaning that the video can
reasonably be expected to have a quarter million dollar positive effect on
the bottom line) then the project makes eminent sense and it would clearly
pay someone to spend the better part of their year on a project of this
magnitude.

It truely doesn't matter WHAT a video costs. The only thing that matters
is what it MAKES or SAVES for the people paying for it.

If it ends up costing $2 million bucks to make, but returns to the
company's bottom line $200MILLION Then it's STILL a pretty good deal for
the company, isn't it?

The point is that no business video should cost any company a penny. The
act of making it MUST have a positive effect on the bottom line or it's
contarary to the interests of the business to make it in the first place.

Hope that helps.

Good luck.

 

Wish I'd said the above.

Steve King

 

I agree with a lot that has been said here. Very smart people who know
more than i do about video things have already given you some great
advice.

Äbout your questions concerning the video production your company is
planning.
A year ago or so, we looked at doing the same project, a lengthy
teaching video.

The only difference was that we were recording mostly indoor,
stationary product. There were also several oudoor shoots too and that
was another area of concern. We got several bids, ranging from $35,000
for a two week period of time - shooting only.

Up to $175,000 for shooting and editing - the entire package.

Not wanting to go cheap we chose a more middle-of-the-road approach,
for appx $75,000. And it turned out to be a mistake. We ended up not
really getting what we wanted due to communication problems between
our company and the video company we selected. You may not realize it
but a video truck runs about $2,500 a day regardless if you get
anything in the can or not. The clock rolls no matter what.

So in two weeks, you can really run up a bill, $30,000 and get
nothing.

After a couple of days, we put the video people on hiatus and
regrouped. In that time we decided to cut our losses, pay them off and
do it ourselves. It ended up costing about the same in cost and time
but we learned something and got what we wanted.

It was a full time effort and took a lot of time but the pressure was
off and we could do it over and over until we were satisfied.

Actually anyone can shoot a pretty good video because of the quality
of the equipment available. What was expensive a couple of years ago
is affordable now. You can get professional video cameras in digital
that can then be edited in personal computers with editing software
you can get in Circuit City.

My advice is to get some bids from professional companies then decide
what you want. If you think you can learn and do, then do it yourself.

If you rent then the cost will be smaller than purchasing but then you
are under the time pressure again. if you buy the initial cost will be
high, very high but if you get the right stuff, you can then sell it
again and get most, if not all of your money back.

Ebay or Amazon sells everything you will need. Look there and get
equipment that is almost but NOT new from sellers with good ratings
and from items that have a lot of bids. That way you know you can sell
them for about the same price again.

That is what we did. And I would do it all over again the same way if
we were to shoot again.

BUY, don't rent. Get the best cameras, film, editing equipment,
tripods, monitors, etc that you can afford. And get it in the boxes if
you can.

CAMERAS:

You will need to have good cameras, at least 2. One just will not do
it.
And don't look for different types, rent or buy 2 of the same. That
way you will be getting the same image quality and will learn the
features once. There are a lot of cameras out there, my advice is to
find small, flexible cameras.

Here are the most popular:

Sony PDX10
Canon GL1
Canon GL2
Canon XL2
SONY DCR-VX1000
SONY DCR-VX2000

We bought 2 SONY DCR-VX2000 's and loved them.

These cameras are 3 ccd cameras, don't get anything less than these.
DO NOT. You will be sorry because if you skimp here your whole shoot
will be wasted at the end. Then learn how to use them until you can
use them in your sleep. Go digital. Forget the tape stuff, it is slow,
dull and transferring it around from camera to storage sucks. Digital
is the only way to go, no loss of quality from dub to dub either.

Get the big batteries they offer too. You can record several hours
before they fail. We went with the ones in the box and they burned out
after a couple of hours right in the middle of shooting. A disaster.
Spend the money on the batteries. And get good cases, the regular
camera bags are terrible and will damage your stuff.

Also we got 2 tripods. Get solid ones, I can't recommend any in
particular.

MICROPHONES:

Get two exterior mics. Never rely on the built in mics. They will
sound terrible. If you can get wireless mics, get two and plug them
into the system you purchase.

LIGHTS:

Bottom line is the more light the better. 3 chip cameras love light.
Mix the light up too. Sunlight is the best.

SOUND:

Even more important than the picture is the sound. Yes, it is true.
Your sound must be perfect and you must record it as well as possible
because will will be doing voice overdubs and background sounds that
will sound horrible if you mess them up.

What we did was to purchase the best sound system we could, McIntosh
and then sold it after we finished. We actually made money by doing
this. Buy the best sound playback system that you can, especially
speakers. This might cost you $4,000 or $5,000 alone at first, as much
as your cameras, but you have the chance to recoup your investment
later. Get the best here too.

We got 2 JBL studio monitors to go with everything else and were very
happy. We also sold this back on ebay and broke even on them. I heard
Klipsch are good too.

EDITING:

We got the best Apple we could afford. It was a G-3 and did a great
job with the Apple video software. Now they have G-5's. You can also
use Windows. Get the biggest SCSI hard drive that you can. And get a
dual processor system, it saves a lot of time. There are a lot of
different editing software programs out there, I can not recommend
anyone in particular. And get one with a DVD burner. When we did ours,
they were very expensive but the prices have come way, way down. Apple
especially has a good one.

You will need two monitors to play the video you shoot back on so that
you can do the editing properly. Again, get good ones. Find them used
on ebay, use them some more and then sell them again.

VIEWING THE DAILY WORK:

This is so important and most people miss it. Get a video projector
system, hook it up to your sound system, set it up to a screen of some
kind and watch your work on the biggest screen you can get. You will
see and hear things you just cannot see or hear by doing it this way.
It was a fluke because one of our employees had a projector, brought
it in and blew us away. Editing on a small screen is OK but watching
it on one is not the best way to do it.

OK, that should be it. Cameras, ($5,000) Mics, ($500) Sound, ($5,000)
Editing, ($5,000) Lights, ($500) Viewing, ($1500) Extra Stuff,
($1,000) TOTAL: Around $20,000 to start but if you get the right
stuff, you can turn around and sell it again for nearly what you paid.

We ended up paying a little more but when it was all said and done, we
just about sold it back for what we paid for it.

Good luck.

You are in for a big experience no matter what you do. It will be more
work than you ever expected.

 

Wow,

Thanks for all the advice. Anyway, our company has a contract with and
works with the DMV and the various Municipal Courts. We are doing a
course video for violators and the courts require 6 hours of time and
a coverage of the violators handbook in detail.

We will have to go from location to location to demonstrate different
violations and rules as well as having in class teaching.

It is very involved and unfortunately we probably won't even break
even because people don't use it as much as they or the courts want.
Why watch a 6 hour video when you can just go and get it done in
person a lot quicker?

We had to provide them with a written Spanish course as a requirement
and we have not even brought in 5% of our total costs. This is one of
those politically correct decisions that sound good on paper but don't
often work out in the real world.

Anyway, that is a little more info on the project.

 

Bill.. he just asked about the aspects of doing a video. Not for a lesson
on the economics of corporate budgeting. You gave him zero information about
the process.

 

I have tried to post this about 10 times now, hopefully it won't get
sent all those times.

Äbout your questions concerning the video production your company is
planning.

A year ago or so, we looked at doing the same project, a lengthy
teaching video. The only difference was that we were recording mostly
indoor, stationary product. There were also several oudoor shoots too
and that was another area of concern. We got several bids, ranging
from $15,000 for a two week period of time - shooting only. Up to
$75,000 for shooting and editing - the entire package.

Not wanting to go cheap we chose a more middle-of-the-road approach,
for appx $55,000. And it turned out to be a mistake. We ended up not
really getting what we wanted due to communication problems between
our company and the video company we selected. You may not realize it
but a video truck runs about $2,500 a day regardless if you get
anything in the can or not. The clock rolls no matter what. So in two
weeks, you can really run up a bill, $30,000 and get nothing.

After a couple of days, we put the video people on hiatus and
regrouped. In that time we decided to cut our losses, pay them off and
do it ourselves. It ended up costing about the same in cost and time
but we learned something and got what we wanted. It was a full time
effort and took a lot of time but the pressure was off and we could do
it over and over until we were satisfied.
Actually anyone can shoot a pretty good video because of the quality
of the equipment available.

What was expensive a couple of years ago is affordable now. You can
get professional video cameras in digital that can then be edited in
personal computers with editing software you can get in Circuit City.

My advice is to get some bids from professional companies then decide
what you want. If you think you can learn and do, then do it yourself.
If you rent then the cost will be smaller than purchasing but then you
are under the time pressure again. if you buy the initial cost will be
high, very high but if you get the right stuff, you can then sell it
again and get most, if not all of your money back.

Ebay or Amazon sells everything you will need. Look there and get
equipment that is almost but NOT new from sellers with good ratings
and from items that have a lot of bids. That way you know you can sell
them for about the same price again.

That is what we did. And I would do it all over again the same way if
we were to shoot again.

BUY, don't rent. Get the best cameras, film, editing equipment,
tripods, monitors, etc that you can afford. And get it in the boxes if
you can.

CAMERAS:
You will need to have good cameras, at least 2. One just will not do
it.
And don't look for different types, rent or buy 2 of the same. That
way you will be getting the same image quality and will learn the
features once. There are a lot of cameras out there, my advice is to
find small, flexible cameras.

Here are the most popular:
Sony PDX10
Canon GL1
Canon GL2
Canon XL2
SONY DCR-VX1000
SONY DCR-VX2000

We bought 2 SONY DCR-VX2000 's and loved them.

These cameras are 3 ccd cameras, don't get anything less than these.
DO NOT. You will be sorry because if you skimp here your whole shoot
will be wasted at the end. Then learn how to use them until you can
use them in your sleep. Go digital. Forget the tape stuff, it is slow,
dull and transferring it around from camera to storage sucks. Digital
is the only way to go, no loss of quality from dub to dub either.

Get the big batteries they offer too. You can record several hours
before they fail. We went with the ones in the box and they burned out
after a couple of hours right in the middle of shooting. A disaster.
Spend the money on the batteries. And get good cases, the regular
camera bags are terrible and will damage your stuff.

Also we got 2 tripods. Get solid ones, I can't recommend any in
particular.

MICROPHONES:
Get two exterior mics. Never rely on the built in mics. They will
sound terrible. If you can get wireless mics, get two and plug them
into the system you purchase.

LIGHTS:
Bottom line is the more light the better. 3 chip cameras love light.
Mix the light up too. Sunlight is the best.

SOUND:
Even more important than the picture is the sound. Yes, it is true.
Your sound must be perfect and you must record it as well as possible
because will will be doing voice overdubs and background sounds that
will sound horrible if you mess them up. What we did was to purchase
the best sound system we could, McIntosh and then sold it after we
finished. We actually made money by doing this. Buy the best sound
playback system that you can, especially speakers. This might cost you
$4,000 or $5,000 alone at first, as much as your cameras, but you have
the chance to recoup your investment later. Get the best here too.

We got 2 JBL studio monitors to go with everything else and were very
happy. We also sold this back on ebay and broke even on them. I heard
Klipsch are good too.

EDITING:
We got the best Apple we could afford. It was a G-3 and did a great
job with the Apple video software. Now they have G-5's. You can also
use Windows. Get the biggest SCSI hard drive that you can. And get a
dual processor system, it saves a lot of time. There are a lot of
different editing software programs out there, I can not recommend
anyone in particular. And get one with a DVD burner. When we did ours,
they were very expensive but the prices have come way, way down. Apple
especially has a good one.

You will need two monitors to play the video you shoot back on so that
you can do the editing properly. Again, get good ones. Find them used
on ebay, use them some more and then sell them again.

VIEWING THE DAILY WORK:
This is so important and most people miss it. Get a video projector
system, hook it up to your sound system, set it up to a screen of some
kind and watch your work on the biggest screen you can get. You will
see and hear things you just cannot see or hear by doing it this way.
It was a fluke because one of our employees had a projector, brought
it in and blew us away. Editing on a small screen is OK but watching
it on one is not the best way to do it.

OK, that should be it. Cameras, ($4,000) Mics, ($500) Sound, ($4,000)
Editing, ($5,000) Lights, ($500) Viewing, ($1500) Extra Stuff,
($1,000) TOTAL: Around $16,000 to start but if you get the right
stuff, you can turn around and sell it again for nearly what you paid.

We ended up paying a little more but when it was all said and done, we
just about sold it back for what we paid for it.

Good luck. You are in for a big experience no matter what you do.

 

If you're doing this in California, it's already been done and is available
for rental at Blockbuster.

If you're doing this somewhere else, it's already been done in California -
check out what they did here and get some ideas.

 

Pete, I have to respectfully disagree with your thesis about them buying all
their own gear and learning as they go. First and foremost, you have to ask
yourself, "Am I a video company or am I a (insert your line of work here)
company?" Buying all the gear and learning as you go, when making videos is not
your actual prime line of work, is going to double your costs and time spent,
and take you away from your daily moneymaking business, with ZERO Guarantee of
success, much less profit. Stay within your organization's core competency,
leave the production to people who do it for a living, we'll both be happier
for it.

issue2:

Just because the courts say the class is to run six hours does NOT mean the
video has to run six hours.
Rather, you could play some video, work some exercises, play more video to
reinforce what you're training, etc. and you will have burned thru six hours
without having had to show six hours of tape.

You do NOT want to tape somebody reading the book out loud for 6 hours. In
over 16 years of making training tapes, I've seen it done "wrong" by many many
clients. It's a classic error. When people unfamiliar with a new medium (and TV
is new to this company) try to first use it, they typically try to use it as if
it was whatever was replaced by it... in the old early days of film and TV,
they locked down one camera on a wide shot and performed a play in front of it,
no stopping, no edits, no lens or angle changes, as if you were sitting in a
seat ten rows back in the theater. Now, if the play and actors are
exceptionally good, you "might" still have a pretty entertaining experience
doing it that way, but as we can see from the way cameras and editing are used
now, that old fashioned approach was not the most effective use of the medium.

Back to the present, and our friends of the DMV here.

If you want to use video, you want to use it for it's strengths, not try to
warp it to fit a task it is not good at. These, in no particular order, are
some of what I think are video's strengths and weaknesses:

S: it's a close-up medium, with a sense of immediacy. Smaller screens mean you
need to work in close to people's faces, let their facial body language
communicate most effectively. You can put yourself in a live-like situation and
experience it first-hand, it's visual, you mostly SEE and feel the message, you
don't necessarily HEAR it. Not meaning that audio is not important, it is, but
that TV is not a radio broadcast with pictures added, it is a synthesis of
image and sound, where one must reinforce the other. Bad training tapes have a
guy read the manual while unreadable blurry powerpoint slides of the manual's
identical pages flick by in synchronization. If you wanna punish the drunk
drivers, I guess this is a good technique, reading out loud for six hours....
but I'd guess most of them can read the book for themselves.

W: Bad for detail work, like complicated charts and graphs, tiny things (unless
you use special equipment). Graphics need to be big and simple.

S: Consistent- you get the exact same message every time you play it, anywhere
it's played.

W: It's very linear - you get the same message every time, in the same order,
if you need the introductory material or not. This is something to consider
when you have a non-monolithic audience, one made up of every stripe of race,
age, gender, educational background, culture, etc. You don't want to bore those
at the high end of the experiece curve with stuff they know already, and you
don't want to fly over the heads of the entry-level viewers who have no
grounding in the subject. There is no such animal as a truly generic audience,
"generic" is usually based on what the guy who signs the check things is
"average", i.e. HIM... and this is almost never what the true audience is
like... you need audience research to define it.

If you're stuck with tape, one way to help get around this knowledge level
thing is to break down your material into independant modules of various detail
levels... one for people with no clue, that gives the basics, another for the
intermediates who might need some review, another for the experts who want to
build upon previous knowledge without tedious review.

W: Once done, not fast or cheap to update or re-do. If in this case, you're
done making the video and they suddenly change some of the laws, you'll have to
recall and trash all the shipped dubs, re-edit the master tapes and make and
ship new editions, and all that takes time and money to do well. If you make
the tapes generic enough not to need constant updating, are they still relevant
enough to bother making in the first place? It's a tightrope.

Again, you were told to make a video, without first going thru a proper needs
analysis. Based on what little I've read here, I'm saying you don't need or
want a single monolithic video, you might want a series of short videos on DVD
with some interactivity to them, some quizzes, some audience participation, or
make something made in HTML or Director and runn off a computer, that can be
self-directed, with built-in testing and reinforcement/review. These new kind
of training tools, when net-based, can also be updated almost instantly when
new information comes out, and they can be customized to every user, so they
never get bored, because they are in charge of the pace and difficulty level of
the material, and can immediately get feedback on what they're learning.

Video is not a mass medium in the traditional sense: it is one-to- one
personal communication, one screen to one viewer, repeated many many times at
once. You have to know the person you're talking to and how to talk to them, if
you want successful training.

If you do ONE thing to make this expensive project a success, it should be
this: get to Amazon.com and find a used copy of John Morley's "Scriptwriting
for high-impact Videos" (Imaginative approaches to delivering factual
information) ISBN 0-534-15066-7

It's a corporate scriptwriting and producing primer that walks you thru all the
steps to making a video that works, from needs analysis and research thru
creative treatment and production feedback and on to analysis and changes after
it's done. Donna Metrazzo's book is also a good guide to this kind of thing.

That's a start. The more you talk about the details of this DMV project, the
more specific suggestions I could make. Or if this is not private enough, write
me direct and I'll try to help you a little more. Or burn your money, I don't
care either way, I just hate to see bad work done when there's a better way.

 

As someone who has spent 15 years producing for the local community college
followed by 15 years with the local police department, I have to say that
Msu's comments were right on target in all respects. Do yourself a favour
and take his advice (especially about trying to do it yourself). You won't
regret it.

Mike

 

"nappy" wrote...

Quite to the contrary. It looked like exactly what the original
question was about, even if the OP didn't state it explicitly.
Considering the tone of the question and the range of budgetary
numbers, this falls well within the "What are the hazards we
syoud look for..." part of the question.

 

I'd think that would be obvious for ANY rental. Rent a roto-tiller,

That kinda thing should all be figured out before shooting. The whole
recital sounds pretty unprofessional.

 

steve, just cut and paste and you can...

Bill, exactly. i did a short video for a company here several years ago.
the whined about the 12K budget. returned nearly 8 million in new sales
after the second year. they had over 400 copies made and translated into 4
languages before all was finished...so, i guess they got a pretty good deal,
wouldn't you say?

and terry, if you need any help on that video ;-) 6 hours does seem very
long tho!!

 

the hazards of producing the videos... not the impact of the decision on
their company.

 

Yea, we are fully aware of the Blockbuster video. It was done about 6
years ago for around a quarter of a million dollars. Blockbuster has a
big budget. ;'>

And it is kind of what we want but not really. It is pretty dull to be
honest.

BUT that is the general idea that we have.

And thank you so much for all the great, great advice you all have
given us. It has been so helpful, every one of you.

We printed it all out and discussed it today, on a holiday even.

Thanks again ...

 

Well, please let us all here know how you wound up proceeding, andhow it all
turned out, would you? And, if we can be of any further help, write direct.

 

Uh, Yep.

Exactly.

Because no matter WHAT I tell him about "the process" you know as well as
I do that nobody can learn "the process" of making a quality video from
reading newsgroup posts anymore than they can learn how to play the piano
by spending all their time in a bookstore reading sheet music.