Using video to tell the story...

People are visual, and crave instant gratification and that means I want it all, I want it now, and I don't want to pay for it.

Sometimes I wonder just why I put video skills on my resume, because it often has me beating my head against a desk in frustration. I'm no Ron Howard, but I do understand how it works and can do some pretty basic stuff - and if I was forced could possibly do something that had to air on television. I just don't want to do television type work because I'm not at that level, and I know that.


What most don't know is that it takes quite a bit of time to put video together. It's not the actual video that takes time, it's wading through hours and hours of c-rate video looking for that perfect sound bite as you try and figure out how you'll be able to tell the story that is phenomenal in print, or how you're going to promote a product that isn't really a tangible product. Sometimes it's going through hundreds of photos looking for ones that can tell the story for you - with the help of voice and audio.

Finding that voice that fits the writing is sometimes a challenge. We don't have a giant talent pool, so we often times look within the company. For instance, this time I kidnapped an artist and asked him to perform like a dancing chicken. Lucky for me making chickens tap dance isn't addressed in the employee handbook, and it looks like I'll keep my job for at least another week.

Video just takes patience, and sometimes a little creativity. I call it making chicken salad, out of chicken sh*t.