Alex Williams, the founder of Louper, sat down with our Senior Director of Innovation, Michael Kammes, at NAB to discuss our latest integration with the cloud-based real-time collaboration platform. They talk about why people choose Louper over the competition, and the features that make it so popular, even in the most unexpected workflows.

Michael: Hi, Michael Kammes here from Shift Media on the show floor. Today we’re with Alex Williams from Louper. How are you doing, Alex?

Alex: I’m well, Michael. Thank you for having me.

Michael: Excellent. We are so thrilled to have Alex here because one of our announcements here is that we’re integrating with Louper. Louper has been one of my favorite technologies in the past couple years because they enables review and approve in a live way, plus some awesome other features. So I don’t wanna steal your thunder. Perhaps you could just share with everyone – what is Louper?

Alex: Yeah. Right. So it’s live review and approve. You can play out of your NLE so you can review edit sessions, VFX reviews in real time in a web browser. And on top of that, you can also review assets. So existing media files, you can have synchronized playback of that inside the room. And everything works in the web browser with built-in video chat and text chat. And so it’s sort of a synchronous live review and approve tool to complement the asynchronous tools out there.

Michael: What I love, you brought up at the very beginning, was interfaces with NLE. So video editors, there are a lot of screen-sharing tools out there that say, we’ll just do a screen scrape, right? We’ll just do a screen share, and the quality is degraded. The color management is out the window. Sync AV is often not there. So being able to integrate directly within the NLEs, gives you that high-quality, correct frame rate. And I think a lot of people just glaze kind of over that. Can you talk a little about the tech specs as they are right now? Like, are we doing SD, is it HD, what kind of frame rates, what kind of data rates?

Alex: Yeah. So at the moment, it’s uh, 4, 2, 8 bit SDR, up to 4K resolution frame rates 23.976, 24, 25, 30. And we don’t process or compress that stream in any way. That’s a pass-through thing. So, whatever you stream at resolution frame rate is what the end user sees in the browser. And then, in terms of data rates, it’s anything from 2 to 20 megabits per second for offline editorial. And people use color reviews as well for SDR contents. And then, on top of that, you can also get a direct signal out of NLEs like Final Cut, Avid Media Composer, and Premiere Pro. Flame as well for online assets. That’s quite a popular one as well now. So you get the actual video frame out of that as opposed to a full interface scrape or anything like that. It’s a true signal.

Michael: So one of the things that we’re showing here is taking that technology and enabling Louper to plug into MediaSilo. So can you explain a little bit about how that integration works and what folks who already use MediaSilo can then use Louper to do with their assets?

Alex: Yeah, sure. So if you look at Louper as kind of the shell where you have your video chat, your text chat, everything’s live, and you know, at the moment, the content in there is a live stream on top of that. And with the MediaSilo integration, you can now connect your MediaSilo assets, video files that exist on MediaSilo, to Louper, and you can then have synchronized playback of those video files within the Louper room so everyone sees the same frame at the same time. There’s collaborative shared playback, controls, pause, play, sync, as well as onscreen drawing and annotations. So that sort of adds a real-time live review to existing assets, which is exciting.

Michael: So MediaSilo clients who are already used to the more traditional on-demand review and approve now can do joint screening sessions, for lack of a better term, for assets that are already sitting inside a MediaSilo project.

Alex: Yeah, exactly that. Yeah.

Michael: Excellent. So, I’m sure you’ve had some excellent growth since Louper started just a couple years ago. Have there been any unexpected use cases, like use cases you didn’t really imagine when you first developed the product?

Alex: Yeah, I mean, we’ve been so focused on our vertical and media entertainment and film industry that in terms of the types of use cases and the types of workflows, that said, there are some ways that people are using the product, which I didn’t envision. We spoke to a customer last week who works in visual effects, and they have VFX editors that use Louper for internal reviews. And from that point, they go, well, we’ve actually got multiple projects, multiple VFX editors, and we like to have an internal review every morning and have all the VFX editors streaming into the same Louper room and just switch between the live signals and do a 30-minute review with everyone on the team looking at that, and then switch over to the other VFX editors live signal without having to go to a separate room. We’ll start a new session, all remaining right there. And I think that kind of stuff is cool and stuff I didn’t expect, of having it really be this hub where everything can happen live and in real-time, and you can send signals into and out of it really, really quickly and easily.

Michael: So over the past few years, especially during the pandemic, a lot of solutions popped up that enabled live review and approve. And obviously, folks will try out each one. And when folks end up trying all the others and end up coming to Louper, what’s the main reason you hear is why folks said, yeah, that’s really the reason why I’m sticking with Louper.

Alex: The biggest thing is ease of use, setup and, especially on the client side, just having the ability to join via links in the browser. So on the client side, for people who are producers, directors, clients who need to join the session, they don’t need to register, they don’t need to sign up. There’s no real setup. It’s a one-click drawing in the web browser and that, people love that. That’s been the biggest, the biggest kind of, “Yeah, this is cool.”

Michael: Now, this is where you’re on camera, so I’m gonna try and put you on the spot. Just to see what I can get out of you. But can you talk about maybe what directions you may be looking at Louper going or what features you’re really looking into? Can you discuss any of that?

Alex: Yeah, I can. So the big one is support for 10-bit 4:2:2, 4:4:4 HDR streaming. We are getting a lot of interest from colorists and yeah, we support SDR and 8-bit 4:2:0. But really there’s a need there for 4:2:2, 10-bit, including HDR. So that’s something we’re working on actively. And that is one of multiple things, but that’s probably the biggest one that, you know, that we’re responding to. In terms of customer stories.

Michael: Where could folks find out more about Louper?

Alex: So on the website, Louper.io, l-o-u-p-e-r dot i-o. I’m also on Twitter @alex_willo_. And that’s pretty much it. Our website’s pretty extensive in terms of use cases and customer stories, and setup guides. It’s also free signup. So it’s super easy to get started and try it out and take it for a spin.

Michael: And for any MediaSilo clients, we’re now in beta with utilizing Louper to playback content to folks in real-time from MediaSilo. And we can also get you connected with Alex to talk about playing out directly from your NLE. Alex, thanks so much for coming. Thank you for tuning in. This is Michael Kammes from Shift Media at the NAB show floor.

For tips on post-production, check out MediaSilo’s guide to Post Production Workflows.

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MediaSilo allows for easy management of your media files, seamless collaboration for critical feedback and out of the box synchronization with your timeline for efficient changes. See how MediaSilo is powering modern post production workflows with a 14-day free trial.

A tradition stuck in the Past.

Let’s face it: the traditional agency pitch is a drawn-out, sprawling, cumbersome process that has now spread throughout the creative industry.

From pitching on a client’s entire creative business to bidding on a specific project or campaign, creative agencies in advertising, marketing, experiential, PR and digital all dutifully invest time, creative energy and resources into frustratingly rigid dog-and-pony shows.

And talk about rigid: according to pitch consultancy ID Comms, today’s agency pitch process has been in place since the early 1990s. In other words, most consultants’ pitch templates are older than the internet.

Even during the COVID-19 pandemic, when accelerated changes swept through so many other industries, these archaic processes remained in place, keeping agencies tied to stagnant and unproductive methods of developing new business – while the rest of the world raced ahead.

Basically, we’re stuck with the traditional pitch.

The Creative Cost

Yes, the process is formulaic and time-consuming. Yes, the average agency surveyed in the industry report The OUCH! FactorTM spent 22.2 days’ worth of staff time last year on each pitch they entered (equal to one employee working one full month per pitch – 11 times a year). And sure, the odds of winning the pitch after all that work are around half at best, according to the same research. It couldn’t get any worse, right?

Wrong.

New studies have shown that the traditional pitch process actually feels like it undermines the core strength of an agency: creativity. With all the focus on jumping through hoops to present strictly formatted materials for every client who requests them, it has become very difficult for agencies to show what they actually do well themselves.

“We’re meant to be in the business of creativity, but the focus has shifted,” says MullenLowe Group UK’s Lucy Taylor in a Campaign Live article from March 2022 (Resetting the pitch process and bringing the soul back to adland.) “The average agency now spends around 2,000 hours a year working on pitches, time that’s often tacked on to the end of the working day.” With that kind of time required to address restrictive pitch requirements, it’s almost impossible to demonstrate real creativity.

Pitches can also be very stressful and lead to burnout, posing a serious problem for existing clients, who “need a healthy landscape with dynamic agencies and great creative work. That’s the lifeblood of our industry,” says Andrew Lowdon from the Incorporated Society of British Advertisers (ISBA), the trade body representing advertisers in the UK, in Marketing Week. After all, says Jemima Monies of adam&eveDDB in the Creative Salon, “New business should be a means of nurturing talent, rather than draining it.”

So how can you shift the odds in your favor when it comes to preparing for the dreaded pitch?

The Agency Reel: The Win Before The Pitch

Consider the basic criteria clients use to determine the fit of any agency— essentially, the admission price for you to compete:

• You understand the client’s business, their vision and their immediate needs.
• You have experience in their industry.
• You have a recognizable roster of previous clients.
• You have the right mix and level of capabilities.
• You can personalize your solution to them.

It seems like an overwhelming list of things to demonstrate clearly. But with one creative pitch reel done right, you can prove to your prospects that you possess all of these characteristics before you invest valuable hours into a pitch. They can see right away that you’re a great fit for their needs and that you have creativity to boot. If a client loves your pitch reel, then you’re in the enviable position of only needing to confirm their impressions rather than having to prove that you’re right for the job.

A good reel will help pave the way into a prospect conversation before you’ve even spoken with them while leading with proof points they care about— giving them confidence to trust you with the brief. And reels are the most visually arresting way to show all of your work, from print to outdoor to experiential. Nothing jazzes up a static medium more than a video presentation with music. And nothing showcases your successes better than a video that tells the story behind the work. It’s a tool that can speak for you without you having to be there.

Better yet, a great reel will allow you to learn earlier in the process (even before the competition begins) whether the client feels you’re a good fit, so you don’t waste time pitching on work that you never had a chance to win anyway. Then you can determine whether to continue to invest or weed out the clients that aren’t a good match and instead focus on the next important project.

What’s important to note is this: the best reels reflect the specific client who’s watching it and demonstrate what you can do for their exact needs. That airtight resonance of your work with the client’s needs is what gives a reel the best chance at hitting every one of their initial criteria.

Bespoke Reels: Sizzle On Demand

Of course, every client is different. That means the best reel you can use is one that’s customized for the particular client. And creating custom sizzle reels professionally can get very expensive—up to $10,000 per minute of finished video, or more in many cases.

And that’s the conundrum: on one hand, a reel made just for the client you want to pitch will be far more effective and ultimately win more of the right clients for your agency or firm. On the other, it’s risky, involved and expensive to professionally create a bespoke agency reel each time when you have no idea whether you’ll land the project. And the more work samples and other elements you have to choose from, the more complex creating the perfect reel can become

If you’re going to engage with multiple prospects while trying to beat The OUCH! FactorTM odds, it makes sense to scale up your reel-building capabilities internally. Doing this will allow you to conduct business development proactively, respond more swiftly to requests, reduce the expense of customizing your reels and, most importantly, increase the “at bats” your agency gets by pitching as many clients as possible. Best of all, with the right tools, it’s possible to build reels quickly with the staff and resources you already have in place, using the content you’ve already created.

Check out the full guide to pain-free-pitch reels here.

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The reel is everything. Whether you’re an independent rep hoping to get your future star on an agency’s radar or an executive producer with a director or editor ready to tear up the awards circuit, the first step is getting agency producers or creatives to take notice. And that means you need a showreel. But how do you make your showreels work harder and cut through the clutter amidst so much competition? We’ll help you make the most of your work by making the most of your reels.

A Digital Foot in the Door

When you first approach an agency or client, you often don’t even get the chance to talk to anyone. It’s only after you’ve sent a reel and they like it that you get to have an actual conversation about the talent you represent. So your reels have to do the talking for you. Think of them as a digital foot in the door.

Use Advertising Tactics To Cut Through the Clutter

Since a showreel is essentially an ad for one of your creators, it can be helpful to think of showreels in terms of both reach and frequency. On a basic level, reach refers to how many different people see your ad, and frequency is the average number of times each of them sees it. Most people just think about getting their reels in front of prospective clients, but that’s only part of the equation. Unless someone watches it two or three times (and preferably more), there’s a pretty good chance that they’re not going to remember it well enough to reach out to you and take the next step. So you’ve got to think about ways to get them to watch the reel more than once if you want it to bear fruit. That may be a matter of following up and asking questions about what they thought of particular spots so they watch them again while engaging actively. Or it may even mean sending the reel more than once and tracking whether or not it’s been viewed. This requires a bit of extra effort, but it’s critical to getting creatives to remember the reel you sent and who did the work.

There is a limit: you want to avoid inundating them with the same stuff over and over. But you’d be surprised how quickly the details disappear after just one viewing. So if you sometimes feel like you’re just sending reel after reel into thin air, keep in mind that finding ways to increase your viewing frequency could help crack the code.

Timing Is Everything

Sometimes getting people to react to your reel isn’t just a matter of having them watch it enough times. They also have to watch it at the right time. Say your reel showcases a lot of motion graphics; unless the viewer has an immediate need for motion graphics work, they may not respond to it, even if they like it. The fact that they viewed it is great, but you’ll still want to make sure that it’s fresh in their minds when they have a project that the work is a good fit for.

If you’ve done your homework correctly and have seen to it that people are viewing your reels, the next step is to do what you can to increase the likelihood that they’re seeing them at a time when they have a need and can take action. Otherwise, you’ll want to keep in touch and maintain an ongoing relationship until they do. Even if they don’t have a need now, they may talk to someone who does, and if you’re top of mind, that can turn into a new project.

Talent Alone Isn’t Enough

It’s a familiar refrain: “We need to see it on the reel.” No matter how talented, experienced or smart your director, editor, colorist or VFX artist may be, no one is ever going to just take your word for it. Prospective clients almost always want to “see it on the reel.” And by that, they mean that they want to see not just the flashiest or funniest work on your showreel but also things that are very similar to what they’re hoping to produce. This helps reassure them that your person can do the job. If you have a very similar project available to show, then by all means, include it. But sometimes, that kind of thinking is really a trap. Making a great reel requires more than just showing stuff that’s really similar to what the client is hoping to produce, even if that’s what they asked for.

It’s a Trap! (And How To Beat It)

While there are obvious reasons why agencies and clients often seek out reels featuring work that’s as similar as possible to their proposed ideas, there are also a number of drawbacks to this approach that they are usually unaware of.

Generally speaking, creative professionals take on jobs for one or more of the following three reasons:

1. The reel: They love the creative idea and think that the end result is likely to end up on their reels, where it can bring in new work.
2. The relationship: They want to start a working relationship with an agency or client in the hopes of establishing an ongoing flow of projects.
3. The money: The job is lucrative enough that it’s worth doing just for the paycheck.

In the best-case scenarios, all three reasons will be at play. But in the real world, that’s rare. More often, only one or two of these conditions are met. Generally speaking, agencies and clients hope that the creative merits of their idea are strong enough that a talented creator will want it on their reel. But creative professionals are a restless lot, motivated by variety, excitement and creative innovation. So if a client seeks out someone who has work just like their project already on the reel, chances are that person is only going to take it on for the money or to get in with the client for future projects. After all, if they already have something just like it on their reel, they don’t need it for that. And if they don’t need it for their reel, that means they’re doing it for one of the other two reasons. The risk in such cases is that they may just “phone it in,” creatively speaking. That’s why the practice of looking for reels that are just like the proposed project is a trap.

But all is not lost. The best creative agencies and clients are savvy enough to be aware of this and are frequently open to finding talent who can demonstrate the general skill set to do a great job, even if they don’t yet have an exact clone of the project on their reel. Those clients know that the added bonus of having someone really excited and creatively stimulated by their project is well worth any perceived risk in trusting it to someone who hasn’t done one just like it before. And that’s where building just the right showreel can help crack the code.

Picking Your Spots

So how do you decide what to put on the reel? The first thing to consider is what skills the client will be looking for rather than just what the finished product will be like. Will they be concerned with actor performance, how good their food looks or heartwarming storytelling? Does comedy or tone matter to the project’s success, or does gorgeous composition matter more? While you may not be able to show them their exact piece on your reel, you can show them things that required the same skills in their creation. Whether it’s for an insurance company or a delivery service, funny dialogue is funny dialogue. If the project requires that, try to include something demonstrating the ability to achieve that result.

In addition to demonstrating specific skills, you may want to consider budget and scope. Having worked on large-scale projects with lots of moving parts may be reassuring to a client with a complicated project. Meanwhile, flashy-looking locations and sophisticated visual effects may scare a client who knows they are playing with a limited budget. You may want to show work that managed to achieve a lot of impact without huge production investments. In the end, what you choose to put on the reel is about reassuring a prospective client that you have the knowledge and skills to make their project great, even if you haven’t done that exact thing before. You can also use a showreel to balance out or address any concerns you know the client has going into the project. Having your work do the talking is always better than just verbal reassurance.

Aim High

While you don’t want to scare clients with scope or make them think you are only good with huge budgets, it can be very powerful to show them what their work could be like. Especially with agencies and clients who are new to the game, you want to show off work that might be aspirational to potential clients. Make them see that you can take their work to the next level. So if you’ve got a spot that’s next level for them, use it to show them how good their work could be if they hire you.

Leave Out the Kitchen Sink

Building a great showreel can be a bit like building a great meal. You want enough courses to make everyone satisfied, but you don’t want to overwhelm with volume. And if every piece you choose to include is great, you’ll leave a fantastic overall impression. But if one piece is notably weaker than the others, that is what the viewer will remember. Better to have fewer and know they’re all good than to include a “weak link.” Leave them wanting to see more. Especially with new and developing talent, having a short reel is fine and far preferable to a reel of mixed quality with some flawed pieces that aren’t up to standard. As a guideline, people will assume you’re as good as the worst work they’ve seen from you.

Put Yourself In a Box (or Boxes)

While most creative talents crave variety and new challenges, this sometimes works against making the best showreel for agencies and clients. When seeking creative professionals for a project, ad agencies and clients usually have a specific vision in mind and want to find someone who’s a perfect fit for that particular job rather than a talented generalist. They’ll be looking for very specific skills, as well as genres and sub-genres of work. So having a really broad reel, while seemingly impressive, can be confusing or make them concerned about whether you really understand what they’re after. If you’re strong in multiple genres or styles, creating separate reels for each is fine, but it’s often a good idea to refrain from putting it all on one showreel (unless specifically requested). It may take more thought and resources, but if you’re truly multi-talented, try making distinct reels that demonstrate each of those disciplines and marketing them separately.

Make It Bespoke

Of course, every client and project is different. That means the best showreels reflect not only the general category they’re in but are customized for the particular client or even specific aspects of the project. The reel should demonstrate what you can do for their exact needs at the time. That connection between your work and the client’s needs is what gives a reel the best chance of getting you in the door. So the more customized you can make the reel, the better your chances of winning the job. The top people in the business make custom reels for each job they pitch on, despite the time and cost this may incur. And creating custom showreels professionally can get very expensive quickly: as much as $10,000 per minute of finished video once you’ve factored everything in.

Look the Part

Because your reels are the first impression you will make on many clients, it’s a bit like your resume or a first job interview. You want it to have a professional look and feel. You wouldn’t show up to an interview in your gym outfit or hand them a hand-scribbled resume. So make sure your reel is polished and professional-looking. Include company graphics or animation at the head and tail, and make the hosting page or presentation look good. If possible, you may even want to include their logo or customize the reel with a mention of the project. This is all part of making it feel like it’s the perfect fit for them.

Managing Your Stable

Most companies in the creative world manage work for a number of people. Whether you’re a production company, editing company, independent rep, post house, music house, color grading or VFX facility, or involved with other parts of the creative pipeline, chances are you’ve got a lot of work to pick from and a lot of assets to manage. Add to that the need to demonstrate a variety of skills and customize your reels for specific jobs, which means you’ll need to handle a lot of materials and keep track of them all. Having a reliable system for managing all of that is essential, or things can get messy pretty fast. It can also be a big time suck, so organization is critical when setting up a reel-building process.

Mitigating Costs and Time

While it’s clear that creating custom showreels is the best strategy for winning jobs, not everyone can afford the time and money it takes to do so. On one hand, a reel made just for the project you want to pitch will be far more effective and ultimately win more jobs for your talent. On the other, it’s a big ask to professionally create a bespoke showreel each time when you have no idea whether it will even get viewed. And the more projects and samples you have to choose from when building reels, the greater the challenge to managing the process efficiently.

If you’re going to be pitching on a lot of projects with a variety of different parameters or styles, it often makes sense to scale up your reel-building capabilities internally rather than relying on outside vendors. Doing this will allow you to be more proactive, respond more swiftly to reel requests, reduce the expense of customization, and, most importantly, increase the “at bats” your company gets by pitching as many projects as possible. Fortunately, there are now tools and options available that let you build reels quickly with the existing staff and resources you already have, using the content you’ve already created rather than going to outside vendors.

Read about how to optimize your reel-building system in our next installment.

The reel is everything. Whether you’re an independent rep hoping to get your future star on an agency’s radar or an executive producer with a director or editor ready to tear up the awards circuit, the first step is getting agency producers or creatives to take notice. And that means you need a showreel. But how do you make your showreels work harder and cut through the clutter amidst so much competition? We’ll help you make the most of your work by making the most of your reels.

Read about how to optimize your reel-building system in our next installment.‍

On our first episode, we hang out with Sven Pape, host of This Guy Edits, to check out his new editing bungalow and bay, the gear he uses to edit and chat about workflow and collaboration. Next on “What’s In Your Bay.”

Michael
On this episode of “What’s in your Bay” we’re talking to this guy, Sven Pape, indie doc and feature editor and nearly a million subscribers on YouTube. Oh, no… it’s half a million.

Sven
Half a million…

Michael
Half million.

Sven
But I won’t stop until it’s a million.

Michael
Today, we’ll sit down with Sven Pape. We’ll check out his new editing bungalow and bay, the gear he uses to edit and have a chat about workflow and collaboration. Next on, “What’s In Your Bay.”

Sven
Well, come on in. This is the actual office right here.

Michael
This is a brand new building, right?

Sven
Brand new. This is going to be where the assistant editor station is right here. And then I’ll be over there. Well, I actually am. I’m going with a laptop. This is a decision I made about, I don’t know, six years ago. I had a Hackintosh, actually, before that.

Sven
It’s actually pretty straightforward. It’s just a MacBook Pro. At some point, I decided I don’t need a desktop anymore because I need to be able to edit on the fly when I’m, like, traveling, when I’m on location. I also have the iPad connected to it in the teleprompter, and I do Zoom streams sometimes while I’m showing stuff to edit to students, and I run all the drives.

Sven
I have about five or six LaCie drives, and it’s about 16 to 20 terabytes per box. And I basically, I mean, I run a feature on one of those, and then I have a backup or I have my entire YouTube library of like 100 plus episodes that I’ve created on there and backed up. I only really recently started to do a full backup of everything, and a week later, one of these died.

Sven
So I got lucky because that would have been thousands and thousands of dollars worth of video. Instead of that, I would have lost. So if they do the system of three, right, so two locally and then one off-site just in case the building burns down, you still have the ability to be up and running.

Michael
So I see a ton of monitors on your desk. And these aren’t just regular 16:9 monitors. These are ultrawide.

Sven
And I have them just because the timeline is long, and I want to be able to see as much of the timeline as I can. I love this. That’s the Monogram Creative Console, which really helps me with editing to just stay more in the flow state and be able to like, cut as fast as I want to without having to worry about, like, where do I put tracks and manage media, that kind of stuff.

Sven
I have two Rodes. This is the N-11. I love this mic. This is my favorite video mic. And it’s actually not that expensive. It’s, like, 150, 200 bucks, and it just has a super clean, fat sound. And then this is also a Rode. But that’s just for Zoom because I do a lot of Zoom calls with students or I have live stream office hours.

Sven
And to be able to sound good and look at it’s really important to just sort of up the production value, then it feels more professional.

Michael
I’m glad you mentioned Zoom because I can imagine that having a good camera to be on Zoom with your students is important. So what kind of optics do we have there?

Sven
There’s the Sony ZV-1, which is really a specialized camera for vloggers. So it’s like auto everything. And I love that. It gives me a good look, and I don’t have to worry about sound or anything. If for any reason I lose connection here, it immediately switches over to that camera, and it’ll be fine. And then behind that, I have a GH-2, too, which is a very old camera.

Sven
It’s about ten years old. It’s actually the one that Martin Scorsese tested first when he was like, Should I shoot film or should I shoot digital? And so he tested all kinds of cameras, and this was the one he picked as being the has the most character. So I’m going to stick with that for quite a while.

Michael
I think I understand this desk is also a transformer, right?

Sven
So it has this retrofit here where it can be a standing desk. And I actually like to, I got to make sure that I don’t break anything here, but I can theoretically, I’m not going to bring it up all the way just about here. And I love to do all my work while I’m standing because then I can sort of move to the sound, to almost dance to the editing when I do the sound.

Michael
Was that a little bit of Walter Murch?

Sven
It’s a little bit of a Walter Murch thing when I’m cutting and want to do a lot of the heavy lifting, which is like selecting shots and really thinking hard about how I’m going to, like, structurally build something. I’d rather sit down for that. And they also do this, which is great, like when I’m standing and then I want to have my laptop right here.

Michael
Is that some of your swag? “Just Edit.”

Sven
Just that is. Yes.

Michael
Some of your merch.

Sven
Merch. Get a little bit in trouble with Nike with that. I’m still selling it.

Sven
So what’s really nice about having this new office is I actually have a bathroom here as well, so they don’t have to come into the main house. We can have a coffee; we can sit down here. And there’s also an option where the director can sleep here overnight if we have a long session because this can be pulled out to become a bedroom.

Sven
And this is something that I really noticed when I was working in my other bay. It’s like, okay, how do I make sure that the director can be comfortable? Because it’s going to take a couple of days to get through and edit. And so any amenity that I can throw at them is another option for them to entice them to hire me.

Michael
I see you have an assistant editing station. Is this to do just to string out, or what do you typically task an assistant editor to do here?

Sven
Well, I try to get them as involved as possible, so whenever there’s time, I want them to cut. Being able to work together closely in this environment is really, really important. And then they can also stand if they want to.

Michael
Yeah. I see you have a standing desk here.

Sven
At any point, decide I want to be cutting on this system right here, and I can be standing. This TV can come out and swivel. So if it’s like if I have a director right over here, I can just pull it more like this. I’ll be watching it over here. The director will be watching it over there, and we can be communicating.

Sven
I am starting to write a screenplay, and I actually, I know this is like a trend right now to be writing on typewriters, but I actually find it quite enjoyable. And it also makes me be very focused when I put it on the page because I can’t delete. So I have to commit. I have to commit to the scene.

Sven
So we’re actually using a typewriter, like in the morning for an hour, which is actually really helpful to get things done. This is one of the old YouTube plaques that you get for 100,000 subscribers, and I got one of the last ones before they changed to like, it’s more of a mirror-looking thing. And so I’m really glad to get this one.

Sven
And I hope with my other YouTube channel eventually, I will get the new one. This is the phone, and it actually works. I can call the company Film Supply whenever I need a shot. Just call us direct.

Michael
It’s like the “Bat Phone.” You can pick it up and hit the button.

Sven
And supposedly, it’s 24×7. I haven’t tried it, but supposedly I can get somebody at night.

Michael
After the tour, it’s time to sit down with Sven and talk about editing and collaboration. So the first thing I want to point out is that normally when you walk into a higher-end editing bay, you’re seeing Avid Media Composer or Adobe Premiere Pro. But I noticed a familiar icon here. What? What’s that?

Sven
Yeah, I’m still loving Final Cut X. It’s my go-to system. It’s so intuitive. I love the magnetic timeline. I love the fact that I don’t have to think about media management at all or track management. And I can stay more focused in the storytelling, less clicking per cut. That’s what I love about it.

Michael
So when you are working with directors for a lot of the indie projects you’re working on or documentaries do, do they normally request and say, we want you to edit in this software application? And then is there a discussion, or is it this is what I’m working in or nothing at all?

Sven
It really, it depends on the project. So I cut a documentary, and it was already set up in Premiere, and I hadn’t cut in Premiere at all. I told him, that’s fine. Like, I didn’t argue the fact. I’m like, It’s going to take me two weeks to figure it out, but you’re hiring me for the storytelling.

Michael
A core tenet of Shift Media is collaboration. We make tools that enable folks to collaborate. So to that end, what kind of tools are you using to collaborate with people, whether they’re, you know, in the same office or in the same facility or on the other side of the world?

Sven
Well, first of all, I have a pool of about five editors that I work with on various projects at the same time. And what I usually do is I get the media organized here, and I send it over Dropbox to them.

Michael
Are you creating proxies of everything, or are you cutting with the camera originals?

Sven
I’ll try to do the high-res if I can. Sometimes we’ve done proxies, too, and it has worked, but it always creates a little bit more friction. I give the footage to them, I give them direction, and they start cutting. They are then going to start sending me cuts where I can give timecode-based feedback on them online. At some point, we’re going to start sharing examples where I tried to bring the project back alive.

Sven
We constantly update each other’s additional media that we created, and eventually, I will do the final pass on everything before it goes out. And it’s always pushing my editors just a little bit more than what their ability is. I try to get them as close as possible to the finished project, but it doesn’t quite work out because, in YouTube, you have a lot of, like, beginning aspiring editors that are, like, excited to build content.

Sven
So there’s a lot of training, coaching and directing involved online as well. And that happens usually through Discord, Zoom. But those sessions in the room are what really make a difference in terms of just fine-tuning polishing. So usually I have these milestone events where I have a director, and I have a director that’s in Germany, and he shoots, he sends the stuff over here, I’ll send cuts back.

Sven
Eventually, he will fly over for like a milestone or we’re getting ready to do a screener for festival or the producer or whatever. And then we’ll spend a couple of days on the cut together just walking through all the minutia of just massaging it.

Michael
As we’ve spoken about, collaboration involves working with people in the same room or all across the world and in different departments. I’m going to bring up a few job titles, folks who work on the same projects you do. And I want to hear your one piece of advice for those people. So let’s start at the beginning. Let’s start with aspiring editors.

Sven
Actually, edit every day, like there are a lot of aspiring editors who want a cut, and it’s so easy to find something to cut. And if you really want to learn to become good at it, you need to be cutting practically every day because you got to get those 10,000 hours.

Michael
What one tidbit of wisdom would you give assistant editors?

Sven
So many things. But I would tell them to never make excuses when it comes to their misgivings or things that they didn’t deliver. Instead, be very cautious about what you promise. Always under-promise and overdeliver, that makes the relationships so much better.

Michael
And what about directors?

Sven
Other than “get out?” I would say, “hold off.” There’s a lot of work in progress, and it’s very important for the directors to be part of that process. And I tend to really want to show them a cut at various levels, but I don’t necessarily want to be already thinking about the details until we figure out the big picture.

Sven
That’s an end goal that you’re trying to reach with a feature, and it’s going to take a long time to get there. So having patience on both sides to let things suck for a while so that you can get all the other things lined up so you can make the right decisions about how you’re going to change the details. It’s really important. And that patience for a new director is often very hard.

Michael
So, in addition to production, post-production, teaching, and YouTube, what are you doing to keep yourself sane?

Sven
Well, I have a balanced life. I have other passions that maybe combine my interests in filmmaking with something that I’m really, really obsessed about right now. Well, keeps me sane as well as to really not stress about popping out content constantly and just let it happen. Like, if a good idea for a piece of content comes, I’ll make a video.

Sven
I don’t feel obligated to make a video just to make a video.

Michael
Is there anything else you would like folks to know?

Sven
I’m a little bit in the transition phase in the sense that I’m a traditional filmmaker, but I’m also a YouTuber and it’s a very interesting spot to be in the sense that I can use what I’ve learned traditionally as a filmmaker and apply it to social media. And I think a lot of filmmakers have kind of a blind spot when it comes to social media.

Sven
They look down upon it, or they don’t see quite how it’s going to benefit them to get involved. And I think there’re so many ways how it would benefit you. First of all, you can make better content than many other people as a filmmaker because you have the skills. And secondly, you can suddenly own things that you create. A lot of filmmakers work for hire when you are a creator.

Sven
Most of the stuff you create, you own. So you can license it, you can sell it, you can do whatever you want with it. Owning the content becomes even more important.

For more tips on post-production, check out MediaSilo’s guide to Post Production Workflows.

MediaSilo allows for easy management of your media files, seamless collaboration for critical feedback and out of the box synchronization with your timeline for efficient changes. See how MediaSilo is powering modern post production workflows with a 14-day free trial.

You’re ready to pitch on a big project or new client and want to put your best creative foot forward. But how do you show them your best work in a way that makes them take notice? When it matters most, you want to show a reel that not only makes your company look great but can also be customized to the particular client’s needs, even if it’s on short notice. Here’s how to make that happen.

What Matters When You’re Building Reels In House

Keep It Together

Every additional step it takes to get your work samples onto your finished reel is another obstacle between you and your potential new work.

Think about all the disparate components involved in delivering a video showreel:

• Cataloging and storing all the pieces of content you want to include
• Choosing and finding the best ones for the particular reel
• Gathering them from storage into your reel-building platform
• Making sure they’re all in the same correct format
• Designing a template or format to showcase them

With all these steps, you must find as streamlined a solution as possible. Since the reel is your primary calling card (tailored, of course, to your prospective client), you’ll want to make it possible to draw from the entire archive of your company’s creative work samples, as well as any job-specific or client-specific creative references and illustrative examples you need. If you need to hunt them down in more than one place and move them to another, you’ve already lost time, and team members may overlook important pieces.

Choose a solution that doesn’t require people to take the media out of various other systems and move it, transfer it, convert it or send it to another system. It should all be ready to go and easy to look through. Once you have a library of all your finished work and other elements uploaded, cataloged, tagged and easy to search, you can easily use it as a resource to create customized pitch reels whenever you need.

Many companies use a variety of different tools to present and share their work, but very few are comprehensive solutions and many require a significant amount of oversight and expertise to keep track of and run smoothly. The multi-tool approach requires numerous steps to collect assets and deliver a polished reel. It also means paying multiple monthly fees for different tools and multiple storage costs and licenses across those tools. It also creates more moving parts that can potentially fail when you need them.

Instead, look into building a setup that combines all of these functions in a single place so that everything is compatible, easy to find and ensures your presentations are consistent and reliable.

Keep It Simple (But Attractive)

You want tools that are simple enough that anyone can easily create a reel when prospective clients want to see one. And “anyone” could even mean a junior staffer who happens to get a reel request when everyone is out of the office. One of the main reasons to bring your reel-building in-house, in addition to cost savings, is the ability to turn things around quickly. Your responsiveness alone—along with your ability to turn around a beautiful presentation quickly—will make a strong impression from the start and potentially get you the chance to compete for projects you might have missed out on otherwise.

Make it easy for salespeople and technophobes to pitch your company’s services by finding a solution with premade templates, customizable design themes, and drag-and-drop presentation-building features now available on many modern platforms. The most efficient in-house reel-building systems don’t demand tech or editing skills, nor require you to hire someone especially to manage the solution. You’ll save lots of money and time by choosing a platform that doesn’t require heavy training, a systems background, coding knowledge or substantial IT support.

Use these features to create a consistent and appealing look, and then make it standard for all your presentations. A unified look is a sign of professionalism. The ability to simply plug in an asset and have it “just work” saves many nail-biting hours otherwise spent struggling with incompatible file formats, overcomplicated editing software, and painstaking creative guidelines. Since you’re selling your creativity and taste, it’s important to keep in mind that every presentation you send out represents your company’s creative standards, even if it wasn’t put together by an art director or designer.

If there’s any caution that must be taken around allowing business development people, sales reps, producers, and other non-creatives to build effective creative reels, it’s that you have to create firm standards for your presentations in advance. There should be fixed guidelines for what your materials look like and a system for making attractive showcases that consistently represent your company’s brand while incorporating your prospective client’s. You want to avoid forcing individual users into making their own design decisions on the fly. That’s a recipe for quickly turning a potentially captivating portfolio into an embarrassment. Set up templates that fit the image you want, and then apply those templates automatically to any reels or presentations that go out for any purpose. It will make you look professional, regardless of your company’s size.

Technology Is Your Friend

While the process of creating and sending out reels may be mired in the past, technology has provided a host of advanced tools that can help you make your reels work even harder for you. You can use tech to up your new business game if you take full advantage of the tools available.

Make sure your reel-building solution offers robust data reporting built-in, so you can make better, faster and more effective decisions about how to follow up on the presentations and reels you’ve sent out. The available resources these days go way beyond the basic Google Analytics codes used on the showcase pages of yesteryear. Beyond basic viewing stats, you can eliminate uncertainty around the business development process by knowing not just whether your reel was viewed (or wasn’t) but also when it was watched, whether and how widely it was shared, which parts the client viewed, how long they spent on each part and which bits they viewed more than once. That definitely can help you decide what should go on each reel and if you’re likely to get their business or at least attract their interest. You can even use it for A/B testing to determine what performs best and what to include on future reels. All of these types of insights can signal interest, consideration and the urgency of a decision. Finding this type of solution can help you make better, more profitable new business decisions.

The right technology also helps keep things under (digital) lock and key. All clients like to know that their valuable work is safe and can’t be accessed randomly. Since you’re usually using existing clients’ work to attract new ones, you want to be respectful of your existing clients when you show their work to new prospects. By doing that, you’re also letting your new prospects know that you’ll take the same care with any work you create for them. Unlike showcase websites and traditional asset storage solutions, modern asset management and reel-building systems can also offer higher-tech security features, like watermarking and personal access codes. Once your materials are uploaded, you can make sure that only the people you want can access your files and view your reels. This allows you to show new work to potential clients even if it’s not yet ready to be viewed by a wide audience. And it lets you privately and safely share your other clients’ work without compromising their business. You also don’t have to settle for old-school basic protections like passwords if you feel you need a higher level of security. Some platforms offer more advanced multi-factor security and even integrate it with their analytics so you can keep track of who is seeing your work in real time.

Make Your Next Pitch A Fast One

The arduous process of finding new clients and bidding on their work isn’t going away any time soon. But with tools that let you quickly put your prospective clients front and center – using the beautiful work you’ve already created – you can get on the shortlist and possibly even short-circuit the process of winning more work.

Want to learn more? Watch the webinar now!

Learn how Wiredrive can enable your creative process with a free 7-day trial.

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At the end of 2022, we surveyed 367 Shift Media customers in the film and television industry on their workflow to gather insights on the latest trends from pre- to post-production. The goal was to help others better understand the opportunities and challenges our industry has overcome recently.

Just as the pandemic brought new ways of doing business, so does the challenging economic climate we face going into 2023. As budgets face scrutiny and managing costs becomes more of a priority, streamlining processes with more comprehensive solutions will be more important than ever.

Read the Full Report Now

Who We Surveyed

Key Insights from the report

Remote Work Is Here To Stay

The challenging economic climate in 2023 will bring new challenges that require streamlining processes with more comprehensive solutions, with many still working from home.

*Fully or Semi-Remote.

Uplift In Virtual Production Projects

Production teams have adapted to having fewer people on hand and learned to lean on virtual tools for remote production. Here are the tools that they use most:

*Participants were allowed to choose more than one response. OTHER includes: Frame, Airtable, Frankie

Distribution Workflows Require A Digital First Approach

Streamlining processes is essential as the need to create high-quality content at a fast pace increases in demand.

“We get as much done in pre-pro to prep for production, so things go more smoothly. Using tools such as MediaSilo and Asana, we’re able to access any assets or briefs we might need.”                                     

Read the full Video Production Workflow Report

MediaSilo allows for easy management of your media files, seamless collaboration for critical feedback and out of the box synchronization with your timeline for efficient changes. See how MediaSilo is powering modern post production workflows with a 14-day free trial.

One of the first things any post professional needs to get a handle on is the concept of a “codec.” Short for “code/decode,” a codec is the method that is used to write your video and usually audio into a file.

The analogy I find most helpful when talking about codecs is that of a language. You have an idea, and you can write that idea down in Hindu or Swahili or Cantonese. With video, you have an image, and you need to record it; you can also record it in any of a variety of codecs, depending on what you are hoping to do with that image and who you need to communicate with.

Codecs Vs. Wrappers

One of the first questions that come up is often, “oh, is a codec the difference between .mp4 and .mov and .mxf?” Actually, those aren’t codecs. Those are wrappers. If we want to continue our language analogy, you can think of those like the format of a written document. You can have a German language magazine or a Ukrainian magazine, but both are magazines. Or you can have a Ukrainian magazine and a Ukrainian book; both are Ukrainian but in different wrappers.

Codecs and Wrappers work the same way. You can have an H.264 (one of the common video release codecs) that you write into a .mp4 file, a .mov file or a .mxf file. It’s still written in the same language (in this case, H.264), but you put it in a different format depending on your use. In this case, MXF (media exchange format) is the most robust professional format, while MOV is an older QuickTime movie format, and MP4 is a popular consumer format. Something like YouTube accepts all three, but your phone is unlikely to be able to play an MXF file, while it’ll almost definitely play an MP4.

What Are You Using the Codec For?

We broadly divide up the uses of codecs into three categories: capture formats, intermediate (or editing) formats, and release formats. All of these tasks for a codec have different jobs, so we use different technology to achieve that job.

The job of a capture format is to capture as much of the on-set information as possible. You want the brightest brights and the darkest darks and the full range of colors in front of you captured as best you can. The job of an intermediate codec is to be easy to work with; you want your editing process to feel easy, with applications opening quickly, timelines whizzing by, and quick exports for client approval. For final release, the goal is different; the file will generally only be played linearly (forward from beginning to end), without skimming or image manipulation, so all you care about is making the best-looking image in the smallest file possible.

These are all different tasks, so we often use different codecs, or different flavors of codecs, to achieve them.

Download our free Guide to Codecs now.

At the capture stage, we frequently use either RAW formats, which aren’t even really codecs, or larger codecs with high bitrates to capture all the possible scene information. The bitrate of a codec refers to how many Mbs are allocated per second to create the image, with more Mbs offering higher quality images. There are capture formats that are close to 2000 Mb/s for 4k video capture, which can quickly fill up a hard drive and can be too onerous for even powerful computer systems to easily deal with.

This is a great time to remember the difference between Mb and MB: Mb is “megabits,” while MB is “megabytes.” Megabits are usually used for datarates of something happening in real-time (like uploading/downloading data or playing files), while Megabytes (and the larger gigabytes and terabytes) are used for data storage. Bits and Bytes aren’t equal: a byte is 8 bits. That means a 2000 Mb/s file capture format works out to around 250 MB/s.

To make matters worse, since we do multiple different things with files, you’ll often see their data rates written in different ways. For instance, intermediate codecs will often talk about quality in terms of MB/s, while a release codec like H.264 will often be discussed in terms of Mb/s. If you think about it, it makes sense since the intermediate codec will be taking up storage space on your hard drive, while that H.264 will be streaming over the internet, but it can take a second to get used to.

RAW

RAW isn’t a codec since it isn’t even video yet; it hasn’t gone through the “codec” step of “code/decode.” RAW formats take the RAW sensor data, unprocessed, and compress it. It still needs to go through all of the processing to even make it a usable video file.

Because of the unprocessed nature of RAW files and the massive file sizes of capture video codecs, as soon as we get into post, the first step is often doing a demosaic (sometimes called a debayer). This process takes a video file from one format (RAW) and translates it (there is our language analogy again) into a codec for use in editing. You don’t have to worry too much about this transcode process since we generally reconnect back to those original video files for our final color grade, so image quality loss in this transcode isn’t a major deal.

The Intermediate Codec

We then get to edit our smaller files wrapped up in a more manageable codec, usually with a data rate under 200 Mb/s (25MB/s), sometimes even down around 100 Mb/s or less (12MB/s). This makes life much, much easier while you are editing since the computer has to bring much smaller files “live” into memory while you are working, and your edit process can feel smooth and painless instead of slow and tortuous.

Another major feature of editing codecs is that they typically focus on intra-frame encoding instead of inter-frame encoding. This means that the compression they apply (and all the video we ever work with has some compression) is applied one frame at a time instead of looking at multiple frames and encoding them together. Intra means “inside,” and you can think of this as each frame is only compressed “inside” itself. With inter-frame encoding, the encoding is spread between frames.

Inter-frame encoding, sometimes called Long GOP encoding (for Group of Pictures), is wonderful for a final release format, like a file you put up on YouTube. But it’s very frustrating in post-production since you are going to be moving forwards and backward and scrubbing over clips quite a bit. To do that with a Long GOP codec, the computer has to constantly be looking at all the frames around an individual frame in order to “draw” that frame accurately.

With intra-frame encoding, the computer has to do a lot less work. Every time you land on a frame in your timeline, the computer only has to look at one individual set of data, one frame, to “draw” the frame on your screen. It’s much easier on the processor and makes for a faster edit process. Once you add a cut, with intra-frame encoding, you are A-OK. With inter-frame encoding, the computer still has to keep referencing those other frames outside the timeline to draw that frame.

The big codecs that are used in editing (Apple ProRes and Avid DNxHR) use intra-frame encoding and are available at a variety of bitrates, so you can choose a reliable codec for easy editing at a bitrate that fits the power of your editing workstations and the available space in your storage.

Online & Release

After you edit, you reconnect to your capture format, whether it was RAW or a larger capture codec, and do your online color grading session. Typically this requires a more powerful machine since you are working with the larger capture formats that were used on set. From there, you’ll transcode the movie into your release codecs.

This typically involves a larger file (something like a ProRes 4444 XQ file or similar) that will become your master file and will be delivered to your client and a smaller file for web delivery. That web delivery file is where a Long GOP codec like H.264 becomes a great fit. Since it’ll be watched linearly, the image benefits of Long GOP compression will outweigh the drawbacks.

Check out our handy guide on the most common codecs for a better understanding of how they work and how they fit into your post workflow.

For tips on post-production, check out MediaSilo’s guide to Post Production Workflows.

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MediaSilo allows for easy management of your media files, seamless collaboration for critical feedback and out of the box synchronization with your timeline for efficient changes. See how MediaSilo is powering modern post production workflows with a 14-day free trial.

Our Senior Director of Innovation, Michael Kammes, recently sat down with Richard Sanchez to talk about his work as a visual effect and assistant editor. Richard has assisted on the films “Robin Hood” and “Naked“, the television series “The Good Place” and “I’m Dying Up Here.” More recently, he was the visual effects editor on “Bill & Ted Face The Music” and “She-Hulk: Attorney At Law” for Marvel Studios. As co-creator of Master the Workflow, Richard provides in-depth training and information for aspiring film and television editors.

In this interview, they discuss why you need VFX turnovers, collaborative workflow between teams and demystify conflated VFX terms. Richard walks through his process and gives aspiring VFX editors a preview of what they will learn in his Master the Workflow course.

For more tips on post-production, check out MediaSilo’s guide to Post Production Workflows.

MediaSilo allows for easy management of your media files, seamless collaboration for critical feedback and out of the box synchronization with your timeline for efficient changes. See how MediaSilo is powering modern post production workflows with a 14-day free trial.

As anyone who’s ever shot any type of film or video project can tell you, filmmaking is a hard and complicated process.

It requires a great deal of planning to put together a script, cast and crew for a short film that you’re looking to shoot with friends over the weekend. It’s difficult for most to even imagine the amount of planning that goes into bigger projects like feature films — or even bigger projects like television shows.

Yet, for years, great showrunners have found ways to pull everyone together and execute on highly complicated programs that shoot several episodes simultaneously while coordinating many different skilled directors, actors and crew.

But how do these showrunners keep everyone on the same page for so many of a project’s style and nuance elements? Well, the answer is often tone meetings. Let’s explore this essential part of any television or streaming show’s success and see how you can facilitate and run tone meetings of your own.

What are tone meetings?

So, what are tone meetings and what are they all about? Well, in short, tone meetings are any production meetings held to help keep different key creative contributors in sync about various creative decisions and aspects.

And while tone meetings can be used for any variety of project types, they’re most often used to help with television or streaming shows as a way to get the myriad of different creative storytellers (like directors, editors and other creative managers) on the same page about certain elements of style, voice, and — well — tone.

For example, showrunners for television shows often hold tone meetings before each season with the different episode directors and editors to share info about the story beats and talk through overarching themes for the season as a way to keep everyone synced together.

Why tone meetings are important.

Generally, the bigger the scope of the project, the more important tone meetings become. And even if you’re working on a small project with a tight group of friends, chances are you’re going to sit down with everyone and explain some of the nuances behind the script and story.

For larger projects requiring many different managers and department heads, the need to keep everyone on the same page becomes even more necessary. After all, you don’t want one director shooting one episode a certain way, then having an editor edit it completely differently.

Tone meetings are a critical part of television production, which showrunners often make a regular part of their process. It helps them keep tabs on how the overarching themes are being treated or developing and allows them to rest assured that their overall creative vision is executed day in and day out.

It’s also worth noting that conflicts can arise on any set, and tone meetings are often the best venue for different parties and departments to come together and air out their disagreements in a safe and supportive space — rather than holding grudges through the rest of production. If you do find yourself in a situation where you’re running tone meetings for your project, don’t be afraid to let people talk freely. Having experience at every level of a production team, I can say that sometimes the most minor roles can give the most impactful feedback.

Tips for running excellent tone meetings.

So now the question becomes, how can you facilitate and run tone meetings for your own projects? In truth, that answer is really up to you and your needs for your show or program. However, while each project will always be different, some steadfast tips for running tone meetings can help you develop your own tone meeting agendas.

• Start as early in the creative process as possible
• Include only the key creative decision-makers
• Take copious notes and track all creative changes for reference later
• Check-in as often as necessary to keep everyone informed
• Follow up at the end to see how you’ve done

Some showrunners use tone meetings simply as a way to keep their ironclad creative vision steadfastly followed. In contrast, others might use tone meetings as a way to encourage directors and editors to bring their own ideas and visions to the table.

Keeping your tone meetings on track.

We should also talk a bit about how to keep your tone meetings on track. When starting on a production, it can be helpful to outline a timeline for when tone meetings should happen (and be sure to stick to this schedule). For those without tone meeting experience, it’s a good general rule to include tone meetings early and often, after each major stage of production, including scripting, pre-production, production and post-production.

To keep things moving, try to keep the conversations rooted in a shared cadence and language. Like any meeting, tone meetings work best with a clear agenda that outlines who will speak and present information and in what order. Any topics you want to cover can be shared beforehand, letting all parties know what they should bring to discuss.

Ultimately, at the end of the day, tone meetings will only be as successful as the amount of focus and weight you put on them. So make a plan, include your key creative filmmaking allies, and have fun exploring how you can develop and run tone meetings for your own projects, big or small.

For tips on post-production, check out MediaSilo’s guide to Post Production Workflows.

MediaSilo allows for easy management of your media files, seamless collaboration for critical feedback and out of the box synchronization with your timeline for efficient changes. See how MediaSilo is powering modern post production workflows with a 14-day free trial.

Every creative team is a bit like “The A-Team.” We’re all specialists who try to be great at what we do. And in a perfect world, our whole team comes together to win the day. While Hannibal may be the team’s leader and signal-caller, everyone has something to add to the equation, and ultimate success wouldn’t be possible without everyone’s contribution. So how can we pitch in and take our shows to the next level? Here are some ways to use your skills to put your mark on a great show while still keeping a cohesive vision.

Understand the strengths and weaknesses of your show’s production pipeline.

The shooting patterns and ways personnel are assigned vary a bit from show to show. And each organizational structure has its strengths and weaknesses. Some shows shoot their episodes individually in the order they will air. Others may produce episodes in blocks, with the same team assigned to all of the episodes in that block.

Each method has its strengths and weaknesses. Producing one episode at a time means that the director can focus completely on that episode, and all of the footage and elements needed will be finished within a fairly narrow window. This can help streamline production and keep things on schedule. It can also allow a director to really put a significant imprint on a particular episode, making it possible to choose a director with the perfect skill set for that episode’s themes and style.

On the other hand, shooting in blocks can give the production team more continuity, with a single director influencing and being exposed to more of the season’s ongoing story. Shooting in blocks also offers some obvious production efficiencies since those episodes can basically be shot like one feature over a period of several weeks. This means that locations that repeatedly appear throughout the block can be scheduled together, and shooting itself can be much more efficient. Editors can also start to assemble the entire story arc that is set to unfold over multiple episodes and make sure that it’s working.

However, shooting in blocks also has its drawbacks. In some cases, an editor may have to wait for critical elements of the episode that airs first because they haven’t yet shot critical scenes that will be done at a later location. Members of the creative team may also be unavailable for specific sessions because the various episodes they’re working on may be at different stages of completion at the same time.

Having a plan that takes advantage of the benefits of your production pipeline while minimizing the potential logistical challenges is really important in keeping things running smoothly and creating the best show you can. A smart production plan can help you avoid potential issues of availability while also maximizing creative continuity.

Use your resources.

With so many people working together to create one final creative product, there are a host of resources to take advantage of. Whether the show is brand new or has been on air for years, there are tools at your disposal that can be used as references. Some of those things are objects or files, show bibles, visual references, notes from tone meetings, and even past episodes.

But there are also human resources that can add a whole layer to the creative process. One important one is the script supervisor. If your first involvement with a project is during post-production, you probably won’t know everything that was discussed on set or everything that happened during the shoot. But you can gain a lot of that knowledge by talking to the script supervisor and reviewing the script notes. There is often a knowledge gap between those who were present at the shoot and those who are using the footage that was captured. The script supervisor and notes are one of the ways to create greater overlap, as mentioned earlier, between two phases of production that may not be well connected.

Script notes contain valuable information about each take, as well as call attention to differences between setups and takes that might not be immediately apparent. They also can provide insights into what each setup is trying to achieve. And those insights can be useful to essentially every department in the process, from edit to sound to visual effects and color correction. They can make the difference between capturing necessary subtleties in the finished episode and missing out on some of the layers of the show (or creating inconsistencies that you’re unaware of).

Another important resource can be the editors of the show. Not only are editors potentially useful to producers, writers, or directors because of their familiarity with footage and past episodes of the show, but they also can be a great resource for each other. Multiple editors will often be working on separate blocks of a larger show, and the sharing of insights about footage, existing assets and show themes can often help each of them do their jobs better.

Always think of the big story.

When creating an episode of a show, it is normal to get very focused on the specific moments and details of that particular episode, or even a particular scene or moment. And because episodic television has isolated creative aspects in each installment, it’s sometimes helpful to take a step back and look at the big picture. This is obviously most important in serialized shows where there is a bigger story arc going on, but can also be helpful in procedural or installment-based shows. Keeping in mind how the details fit in with the overall direction of the series and what the show might look like in upcoming episodes and seasons can be a helpful approach. It also provides opportunities to create anticipation or hide fun clues between the lines. Always remember that you’re telling a big story as well as the small one.

Be consistent, but also don’t be afraid to take chances.

Every show has its stylistic signatures and patterns. But for a show to have longevity with an audience, it also has to evolve and even surprise once in a while, or it can lose its excitement. While it’s important not to depart from important aspects that give the show its identity, it’s also helpful to take some chances now and then that help keep things fresh and surprise the viewer. You create rules to set expectations. But you can break them to make a point and create a powerful moment. However, when you break rules, always do it for a reason that serves the bigger purpose of the character, story, or plot development. That bigger-picture view is what gives the show internal consistency even when you change things up a bit.

Be yourself. Let other people be themselves. 

In any process that has layers of approval, it’s always tempting to try to guess what the next people in the pipeline are going to think about what you’ve created or helped create. But it’s important to resist the temptation to incorporate those guesses into your work. Each layer of approval is there for a different reason and serves an important purpose, including yours. Trying to anticipate and “correct” things that you find valuable but worry others might find problematic can become an unfortunate trap for a number of reasons.

The first problem with trying to anticipate feedback is that you’re simply guessing what other people might think. But people are subjective and surprise each other all the time. If you’ve guessed wrong, you may have compromised or changed the episode to compensate for a problem that never existed. The only person whose view you can represent accurately is your own. By replacing that with what you think someone else might think, you misrepresent their interests and potentially deprive the project of your own.

You were chosen for your job because of what you can add to the process. So make sure you’re giving the team that. Otherwise, you may end up with a double emphasis on the input of whomever you’re trying to anticipate and no real input from you. Others will happily provide their own suggestions and critiques when it’s their turn. In the meantime, be yourself, and recognize the value people are counting on you to add.

How much time do you have, and what matters most?

Television is usually created with a faster workflow than other forms of filmed entertainment. As a creator and artisan, you’ll be faced with seemingly impossible deadlines at times, and the need to make important choices on the fly. It can be very helpful to take a step back and assess what you can accomplish in the time you have, and then take stock of what matters most. Television episodes are riddled with flaws, but a strong production team usually manages to avoid the really problematic ones. A large part of that is being able to prioritize what really matters to the finished product and what only annoys the makers.

To make production and post-production run smoothly, it’s often useful to divide input or revisions into three categories: “must have,” “nice to have,” and “if there’s time.” Even if something is a major task, it would be an error to ignore the “must have” changes that are critical to the story and characters. Once those are complete, it’s time to move on to the “nice to have” list. Each of those will make the finished product better, so if you can get through them, you’ll end up feeling pretty darn good about the finished product. But don’t fall into the trap of making a number of easy-to-address “nice to have” fixes before the “must haves” are all sorted. Last, you can start to pick off the “if there’s time” items, comfortable in the knowledge that if you don’t get to all of them, it won’t be a disaster. That kind of process will help keep important things from slipping through the cracks during the hectic episodic television creation process.

How can you make the piece the best it can be?

Most importantly, keep in mind that the final goal is to create something that’s as exciting and entertaining as possible. Your ultimate goal is to make each episode the best piece it can be. Before you sign off on your work or give your approval, it’s always worth asking whether the elements you’re charged with are as good as they can reasonably be, and think about whether there are any obvious ways to make them better (within reason, of course).

In the end, you’re creating entertainment. And the ultimate goal is to capture your viewers’ minds and attention. Have you done everything you can to do that?

Make sure nothing slips through the cracks.

When the episode is finally finished and ready to go, it’s always useful to have extra sets of eyes look at everything. Each person in the process tends to look at things in a different way and with differing priorities. While the showrunner is most likely to catch problems with overall storyline and consistency, they may be less attuned to details on the audio track. And the editor is more likely than the colorist to notice oddities in scene transitions. So giving everyone the chance for a final once-over is always good practice.

Another good practice is to have people watch the final product on a variety of different setups. Something might sound great on a theatrical mix stage in Dolby Atmos but not work the same way when played on a laptop or older television. Or a critical plot element might be visually obvious on a giant theatrical screen but not read properly on a phone. Yet there will be audience members watching on all of those platforms. It’s always good practice to not only view your finished piece on the best possible equipment but also on the most common lesser equipment that your viewers are likely to use. See your show as they will see it, and you’ll be sure you know what their experience is like.

Part 3 Recap:

• Understand and take advantage of the distinct strengths of block shooting or individual episode production. 
• Use all available references and resources to keep things cohesive, including show bibles, story meeting notes, visual and stylistic references, and even past episodes to keep the whole team on the same page. 
• Script notes and editor insights on the footage can solve a lot of unforeseen problems.  
• Always take a step back and consider the largest arc of the show. Consider whether your choices fit with the big picture. 
• Be consistent with the show’s voice, but don’t be afraid to take chances. This is the only way to keep a show fresh and engaging. 
• Make the creative choices you think work best for the show. Don’t try to preemptively overcorrect for what you think other stakeholders might say about a cut. Other team members can be their own advocates. Your job is to be you. 
• TV moves fast. Be realistic about what you can accomplish. Prioritize your battles and do the things that will have the greatest importance and impact for the viewer first. 
• Don’t forget final checks. Yours may be the last eyes that catch a slip-up. 
• Always watch the finished piece on a variety of formats and equipment. The home audience won’t always have the perfect studio you do, and you need to make sure the show works on mobile or a laptop. Critical picture elements need to work on a small screen, and the mix should be intelligible on any speakers.

Read the entire 3-part guide to Making Memorable Television now.

For other tips on post-production, check out MediaSilo’s guide to Post Production Workflows.

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