Got a brief?
Kicking this whole thing off is really simple. First things first: gather your thoughts, ideas, drawings, musings and team thought showers (yeah, that’s a real thing, unfortunately), then just give us a nudge. We’ll chat about the kinda things we do, your budgets and timeline and how we’re going to work together to make some real sweet visuals.
If you already have a fleshed out brief, great! If your ideas are more of a collection of late night fag-packet scribbles, that’s okay! As long as you have an idea of what you need doing and your objectives for getting it done are clear, we’re going to get along just fine. We’ll talk about your content strategy (or help define it if you don’t have one!) and start exploring the kinds of videos you like, and more importantly, the ones that don’t quite tickle your pickle.
We take all that info, deliver it to the creative team, and watch as rainbows and sparkles fly from every orifice whilst they work out the most effective way to tell your story. The production team work alongside the creatives to work within your budget and objectives, mapping out a timeline and plan of action that results in a video project we’re all gonna be proud of.
Once you’re all happy and all our boxes are ticked, we sign on the dotted line and hey presto! We’re ready to roll.
Pre Production.
Once the brief is clear, we understand your strategy and the creative’s been fleshed out, it’s time to start planning the shoot (although realistically, pre-production often starts alongside getting the creative nailed down—flexibility is key!). Logistics and planning, mmm.
Using the holy trifecta of a solid script, the director’s storyboard, and a guide budget, our production team is given the green light to start booking and hiring. Battle stations, people! We’re talking locations, crew, equipment, props—all the ingredients required to cook up your delicious project. We’ll handle casting, location permits, rights, buyouts, health and safety and just about anything else life and ‘the man’ chucks in between us and getting your film made. We dot our i’s and cross our t’s before making sure there’s room in the production schedule for lunch. Then it’s time to shoot!
Production.
The right people for the job.
Depending on the scale of your production, we can be talking anything from a 40-cast-and-crew behemoth to just a one-man, run-and-gun scenario. It all comes down to your budget and the concept—sometimes a one-man crew is all you need, no matter what sort of cash you have behind it.
Either way, with a plethora of directors, cinematographers, sound ops, 1st ADs (and any other role you can think of) in our little black book, no matter what the scale, we’ve got the crew to get it done. With our talented and experienced in-house team, we already stock the firepower for pretty much anything you could throw at us, but we can always draw from an arsenal of additional filmmakers and production crew we have to hand. Luckily, being in the trenches and making tons of videos with awesomely talented people over the years means we’ve made a lot of great friends, and we know just who to call on when we need ‘em.
Up to our ears in gear.
We already own the kit needed to produce high-end video content and we don’t charge you for it, which means that your budget is spent on screen where it matters most.
On larger shoots, or when more specialist equipment makes sense, thanks to our carefully-pruned relationships with local rental houses (ie. regular bribes of cake and beer), we get budget-friendly deals on the latest and greatest in cinematography technology to really pump up the quality of your content.
Location, location, location.
We’ve dealt with all kinds of productions using all kinds of crews, talent and equipment and locations. We’ve filmed out of helicopters, on boats, underwater and underground. Ain’t no kinda terrain gonna stop us. Even if it’s -6°C up a mountain in Scotland and the lenses are starting to freeze over, you bet your bottom dollar that we’re getting that perfect shot. (That was an actual thing, by the way—you can check out the video here)
We’re a professional and amicable crew, which means we’re here to make friends as well as great content. We won’t leave a shoot location in a state, or piss off your staff if we’re working with them on set—it’s important to us that we make the whole thing feel like a dream for all involved. Ultimately, we give a shit about both the output and the experience itself. That’s how we’ve forged so many long-lasting client relationships.
Post Production.
Working closely as a multi-discipline in-house team means that we have a variety of viewpoints and creative approaches so that no two projects are the same. An interesting transition here, an impactful, long held shot there—it’s those magic moments that really come together once an editor gets their grubby mitts* on that footage.
We throw our projects together using Adobe Creative Cloud software running on top-spec machines (mostly MacBook Pros and iMacs, but we also use monstrous PCs when we need some extra juice). Editing and basic colouring is done in Adobe Premiere Pro, then handed off to DaVinci Resolve for any in-depth colouring work.
*Disclaimer: we pride ourselves on personal and in-office hygiene and our mitts are in no way grubby.
You’ve signed off the edit and you’re happy with the flow. Nice! Now it’s time to make those visuals sing. Colour grading (or colour correction) is an important part of the process. It’s here that we start to really bring out the mood and feeling; where the entire emotion of a shot can be changed with just a few skilled twists of a dial. From rich, punchy, vibrant scenes, to more muted, pastel or moody tones, it’s the grade that really accentuates the vision for the film, and we take our time in this stage to ensure that everything looks as pretty as possible.
Often, videos need name titles, some interesting on-screen graphics or some weird and wonderful overlays to whack on the video. That’s where our motion graphics people come in. We design, develop and animate all kinds of graphics in-house to help support the production using tools like After Effects and Cinema 4D.
Animated typography and eye-catching subtitles are incredibly common for social media-based videos—we’ve got a good eye for what works and what doesn’t, depending on your target platforms. We also work alongside talented VFX artists to construct creative and interesting ways to represent ideas and products, as well as enhance scenes and touch-up any practical effects we may carry out on-set. “Fix it in post”, amirite? (No, you’re not)
Depending on your project, we may need to cast for a voiceover artist. We’ll work with your brief and preferences to cast the perfect voice after whittling down a shortlist and you having your say. We’ve got a great network of local artists and studios, as well as the ability to cast and work remotely with more specialist, regional voices, when needed.
We work in the pre-production stages to identify guide tracks which help set the tone of the project, then we’ll either commission a producer or composer to create a bespoke soundtrack, or choose something from a variety of online libraries, depending on budget. The market for this stuff has exploded in recent years, and thanks to its competitive nature, we can all reap the benefits of some incredibly high-quality tracks at relatively affordable prices—albeit depending on the type of usage you require for your project.
With the right sound design behind your content—the sounds of the city, leaves crunching underfoot, a pencil drawn across a page—the feelings conjured are amplified. It pushes a video beyond visuals and engages your ears on a level above just listening to a nice backing track, turning it into an immersive and thought-provoking experience. In other less pretentious words, “it sound gr8 and make video better”.
Content Review.
You’ll review any works-in-progress using Frame.io, which allows for privately and securely uploading, reviewing and approving media from anywhere in the world. Goodbye, long, confusing email chains—hello clear and concise feedback! You can log on via secure, private links to review edits and directly comment/annotate at various points in the timeline. It’s an easy-to-use platform that speeds up the process and makes sure nothing slips through the net. Feedback is delivered directly into our editing software, ensuring that each comment is addressed and relevant amendments are made. We bloody love it.
We also operate a fair amendments policy, whereby we’re happy to make changes to the edit until the client is happy with the video—so long as changes are consistent with the original brief, you sneaky buggers!
Delivery.
Whether we’ve helped you develop your content strategy, or you’ve got your own plans afoot, you’re likely gonna be throwing up your video on several platforms. You might even need it on a DVD (*shudder*). No matter what your intentions, we’ll make sure you’ve got all the files you need, whether that’s a compressed MP4 for socials, full-res MOVs for presentations, or a bunch of those awkward resolutions for bus stops or banners at events—we got you.
About to throw your content across social media? Hold your horses, sunshine. Where are your subtitles? Whilst most people tend to watch TV with the sound on, when it comes to social feeds, very few will listen with audio as they’re scrolling. This means it’s super important to get your content transcribed and subtitled so that viewers can be dragged into your narrative message without making the almighty effort to hit that unmute button.
We’ll transcribe, translate (if necessary) and subtitle your ads, supplying you with .SRT subtitle files for the social platforms that support them (giving viewers the choice to watch with subs or without) and for those that don’t, we’ll supply versions of your video with the subs ‘burnt’ in so that they’re always visible.
When your ad is being delivered for broadcast on TV, one of the biggest hurdles is clearance. There are a ton of rules for what you can and can’t show on screen. If your ad doesn’t get cleared by the powers that be (they’re called Clearcast and they take this stuff pretty seriously), it ain’t gettin’ on the box, no matter how hard you sulk. If you want your ad on TV, it’s crucial that we consider clearance right from the get-go.
We work closely with Clearcast right from the initial stages of the project to make sure that the creative is suitable for broadcast, as well as nit-picking through annoying bits like legal supers (the small print) and substantiation of any claims you’re making. Can you prove that your cakes cure baldness? No? That’s what we thought. The same goes for cinema and radio ads, with the CAA, BBFC and Radiocentre all wanting to have a look to make sure that we’re following their sacrosanct guidelines.
Once your ad is done (good Lord, look how awesome it is!) and everyone’s happy (hooray!) we’ll take care of all the other fun bits like legalising, clocking and 5.1 mixing for cinema, then we’ll ping it all over to our good friends at Honeycomb so they can send it off to the broadcasters.”
We also do...
Photography
As you can imagine, many of our videographers are also keen and talented photographers, often taking on stills projects for our clients.
Graphic design
Our in-house creatives are also a dab hand at graphic design, many having existed previously as freelance designers.
Web development
We've also got in-house expertise in web development, from simple static sites to more complex CMS-driven ecommerce sites. We built this very site by our own hand, don'tcha know...
Other services.
Strategy
Creative
Production
Fancy a chat?
These lovely human beings look after our clients. Look how chirpy they are! Don't you just wanna pick up your phone and give 'em' a call? Or, if interacting with humans in real time saps your energy (know them feels), feel free to lob us an email.
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