What to Consider When Comparing Video Companies, by Victor Van Rees

You've been tasked with creating a polished, complex marketing, tradeshow or recruiting video. Now’s the time to think about turning to a comprehensive, professional and multi-faceted production center for that  extra touch, that more sophisticated look that only a full service production company can offer. Oh, and you need a rapid response only a full-service vendor can provide. Here are just a few key capabilities you should make sure your video vendor can provide...

SPECIAL EFFECTS AND ANIMATION: When your presentation has to stand out from the crowd and leave an impression, you want that extra sizzle that only motion graphic effects or animation can bring. A blend of multi-layered scenes with special transitions can create a pace and emotion to carry your message.

American Petroleum Institue "Natural Gas: Powering Your Life"  https://portfolio.efxmedia.com/279882034

If you need to convey an intangible concept or bring a computer program to life, an animation might be the best, or only, way to illustrate it. Full service post-production facilities generally have motion graphic designers or animators on-staff that specialize in creating impressive, even realistic effects, and have the know-how to blend them seamlessly into an edited piece.

EXPERIENCED WORLD-CLASS EDITORS AND PRODUCERS: You know your company and its message, but are you having trouble crafting a bunch of interview sound bites into a real story appropriate for your audience? A professional who has spent a career in developing insight and presentation skills for every occasion will add that extra something. Storytelling is an art requiring talent enhanced by experience. Balancing all the elements, effortless pacing, eliciting a specific emotion... these are some of the advantages of working with an industry pro.

Fairfax Country Health: "Suicide Hotline" https://portfolio.efxmedia.com/214675117

DISTANT LOCATION PRODUCTION:You need scenes shot in Juno, Wichita, Duluth or Hong Kong. How do you find a local crew you can trust to shoot with the right equipment, in the best quality, with the right attitude, who will show up on time? A full service production center like EFX Media has a network of trusted crews in nearly every state and twelve other countries.

Orbital Facilities Overview Video with scenes shot in Arizona, Southern California and Northern Virginia https://portfolio.efxmedia.com/238115288

AES "Spark" with scenes shot in Panama, Puerto Rico, Indianapolis, Georgia and Southern California https://portfolio.efxmedia.com/214675117

An experienced full-service production facility can master to just about any format, develop interactive menu driven video applications, or provide expertise when it comes to translation, captioning, fulfillment, or digital asset management. At a full-service production center you can take advantage of robust technology to boost efficiency, particularly when ambitious projects require a rapid response. At EFX Media you can take advantage of a team of expert editors, technicians and producers armed with multiple edit suites to finish within the most stringent timeframes.    

“Efficiencies in Video Production – How to Maximize Your Video Budget”

PRESENTATION TO INTERNATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF BUSINESS COMMUNICATORS  3/19/2015 by Victor Van Rees
Not surprisingly, clients today are concerned about costs, even our multi-national corporate clients.

I represent EFX Media. We’ve been a leader in video production for over 30 years, producing both internal and external communication videos for major corporations such as CarFax, ExxonMobil, Orbital, Sodexo, SRA, BAE, Medstar Health, as well as dozens of associations and government agencies.

I’m not going to talk about our $50,000 or costlier projects, but rather concentrate on those with more challenging budgets. Although faced with ever lower-priced competition, we refuse to jeopardize quality by skimping on services. So, we’ve had to be smarter. And, over a few decades of production, we’ve learned a few tricks.

New hardware and software have allowed producers to create compelling motion graphics and animation at a fraction of the cost from even a decade ago. Not just eye-candy for getting viewers attention, motion graphics can deliver information is a succinct manner that’s easy to assimilate, and better tell as story. Graphics can often be a real cost saver.

  

 Arlington Economic Development wanted location production to show neighborhoods and buildings for their first “virtual tour”. 

We suggested that their money would be better spent by our utilizing motion graphics, adding motion to their wealth of still photos and renderings. 

Since buildings are static, and many of the key developments were yet to be built, sending a location crew didn’t make as much sense as motion graphics. The audience loved it and we’ve since been awarded a 5-year contract.

Example: AED http://portfolio.efxmedia.com/81050537

THE DREADED TALKING HEAD DOESN’T HAVE TO BE DREADFUL…OR EXPENSIVE

CarFax tasked us to create a video to share employees’ reaction to winning a “Best Places To Work” award. This meant spending a couple of days in Centreville HQ and in Columbia Missouri interviewing a wide variety of employees.  Since we knew that a recruiting video and a new employee orientation video were in the works, we suggested amortizing the location production resources by having employees respond to a variety of prompts, not just those about the award.  

Shooting green screen allowed for more efficiency in production, more employee reactions were captured, and it minimized the stress on the workplace during shooting. Each sound bite was short, to the point, often humorous and meaningful. The result is that CarFax ended up with a package of videos – recruiting, new employee orientation, and best place to work - on a very efficient budget.

   

T   This CarFax production package illustrates key factors for budget efficiency 

-    - grouping multiple videos into a package is more efficient,

·       - shorter is better, particularly when using non-professional talent.

·       - good use of technology, such as green-screen, can provide cost efficiency.

Example: CarFax Recruiting http://portfolio.efxmedia.com/102539034 

USE A TEMPLATE

We often suggest a “variation on a theme approach” to maximize a client’s budget. In our package approach, you spend a bit more on the initial video to allow for style, graphics, effects, and the creative back and forth.

By properly modularizing the approach, ensuing versions of that video can introduce new topics, products, messages, etc. by plugging in new footage into slots. You benefit from a consistent theme and framework and you enforce your branding.

Example: RSPA http://portfolio.efxmedia.com/104647916 

REDUCE, REUSE, RECYCLE

American Association of Veterinary Medical Colleges had only a modest amount of money left over after production of a 10-minute anniversary video, but they needed a PSA. Lifting key video shots from the longer video, adding clever pacing and a graphic approach quite pleased their execs and members.

Example: Association of American Veterinary Medical Colleges 50th Anniversary PSA http://portfolio.efxmedia.com/119155562

 

Victor Van Rees

Vice President Sales and Marketing

EFXMEDIA

vvanrees@efxmedia.com

2300 South Ninth Street

Arlington, VA 22204

Voice 703-486-2303 ext. 310

Cell:   703-447-8950

FAX   703-553-9813

View our demos at: www.efxmedia.com

 

Web Video by the Numbers – Not Just Window Dressing, by Victor Van Rees

A video on your website, or on YouTube, has proven to be integral marketing tool, not just a stylish branding element. A short, high-quality video, or better a series of short videos, can actually lead clients to your site via search engines (enhanced SEO). Web videos can help convert viewers into customers, and can influence viewer attitudes. Web videos are fast becoming a critical facet of successful marketing initiatives, and the numbers confirm it...

51.9% of marketing professionals worldwide cite video as the type of content with the best ROI.

eMarketer

 

 

A software marketing video for Price Waterhouse  http://efxmedia.com/work/portfolio/?v=pwc-tpim

75% of executives polled said that they watch work-related videos on business websites at least once a week. The results breakdown:

50% watch business-related videos on YouTube

65% visit the marketer’s website after viewing a video

59% of senior execs polled would rather watch a video than read text.

65% of those who view a video click through to visit the vendor website

50% look for more information and

45% report that they contacted a vendor after seeing an online video ad. 50% of those who viewed an online marketing video went on to make a purchase for their business.

Forbes Magazine and Brainshark

Orbital corporate marketing video  http://www.efxmedia.com/work/portfolio/?v=orbital-overview_2013

46% of people polled say they’d be more likely to seek out information about a product or service after seeing it in an online video. Eloqua

Hanley Wood marketing 3D animation http://efxmedia.com/work/portfolio/?v=hanley_wood_overview_2013

Video attracts two to three times as many monthly visitors, doubles their time spent on the site and has a 157% increase in organic traffic from search engines.  MarketingSherpa

LinkedIn Post: Followers like, share, and comment on video posts twice as often as they do on regular updates!

American Petroleum Institute  “Gas Station Spill Prevention” http://portfolio.efxmedia.com/85476080

Having video on the landing page of your site makes it 53% more likely to show up on page 1 of Google. Mist Media

A recent poll found that 93% of marketers had used video for online marketing, sales or communications purposes at some point during 2013, up from 81% in 2012. Another 3% said they had not used video in 2013 but were considering doing so. The growing importance of digital video marketing is also reflected in the number of dollars marketing professionals are allocating to the channel. The poll found that 70.5% of respondents expected their outlays for video to increase in 2013 over the previous year, while 14.6% indicated that budgets would remain static. Just 1.3% foresaw a drop in video marketing budgets for the year.

The following graphs illustrate findings about online marketing videos from a survey conducted during Q2 2013 and Q3 2013 by the Web Video Marketing Council, ReelSEO and Flimp Media

Is it any wonder that web video is now the sixth most popular content marketing tactic, as 70% of B2B marketers use some form of online video with their overall strategies.  Eloqua

Victor Van Rees
Vice President Federal Sales and Marketing
EFX MEDIA
vvanrees@efxmedia.com
2300 South Ninth Street
Arlington, VA 22204
Voice 703-486-2303 ext. 310
Cell:   703-447-8950
FAX   703-553-9813

View our demos at: www.efxmedia.com

Animation and Motion Graphics Considerations by Victor Van Rees

Using animated elements in your video, or totally animated videos, is often the best way to articulate complicated or multifaceted concepts. The cost for tools to create animation has lowered dramatically over the last few years, while efficiency has increased. You no longer have to fear that animation will blow up your budget or your production schedule. Here are a few examples showing how a variety of animation and motion graphics tools were used to best present compelling presentations…

 In this advocacy video for American Petroleum, After Effects 2D animation was used to “sell” a mathematical argument against increased taxes.

http://www.efxmedia.com/work/portfolio/?v=american_petroleum_institute-taxes_vs_access 

This technical tutorial for the Federal CIO used 2D animation to simplify the concept of cloud computing for government employees. http://efxmedia.com/work/portfolio/?v=cloud_computing_and_the_federal_government

The U. S. Census Bureau, needed an effective public education program about the Economic Census. An animated time-line, background illustrations and inventive maps were created in After Effects and combined with video to better illustrate the initiative.  
http://review.efxmedia.com/?v=review-census_anthem_

For CustomInk T-shirts, After Effects was used to assemble a three-dimensional box at the end of the video. After Effects was also put to great use in bringing still photos to life with motion graphics and some very interesting transitions http://demo.efxmedia.com/portfolio/?v=customink-concept_animation

 American Petroleum Institute needed to illustrate the safety-conscious techniques employed in hydraulic fracturing. 3D animation was required to demonstrate how the drilling was accomplished. Cinema 4D, a 3D animation software, along with After Effects, were used to best tell the story. http://efxmedia.com/work/portfolio/?v=hydraulic_fracturing 

It’s becoming popular for many budget-conscious clients to utilize what might be described as “motion-infographics”, as illustrated in this basic animated graph for Business Software Alliance http://demo.efxmedia.com/portfolio/?v=bsa_gsps

   

After Effects is also a very powerful compositing tool, offering the ability to combine multiple objects with motion, or to key people into an environment as illustrated from this scene from a Virtual Bus Tour http://www.efxmedia.com/work/portfolio/?v=arlington_economic_development-virtual_real_estate_tour   You can read more about keying and compositing in my previous my blog article – “Combining Motion Graphics with Live Video”  http://efxmediavictor.blogspot.com/2012/06/combining-motion-graphics-with-live.html)

In conclusion, make sure you consider the whole range of video graphics techniques when telling your next video story - motion graphics, 2D animation, 3D animation, compositing/keying, and most important, a creative and technically savvy designer and editor.

 

EFX Media is Washington, DC’s leading provider of Video and Interactive Solutions.  Our core business revolves around Video Production, Interactive Media, and Video Archiving.The EFX Media production team has vast experience writing, directing and producing effective, award-winning communications. Our extensive in-house capabilities include multiple high-definition editing and animation suites, a comprehensive digital file management and fulfillment center, and a multifaceted interactive programming & design department.  Since 1983, our commitment to quality and effective communications has earned the trust of countless corporate, association and government clients.

Victor Van Rees 
EFXMEDIA
Vice President Federal Marketing
vvanrees@efxmedia.com 
2300 South Ninth Street Arlington, VA 22204 
Voice 703-486-2303 Cell: 703-447-8950 
View our demos at: www.efxmedia.com