Evaluation

Our brief was to create an upbeat and atmospheric promotional video for a family run and orientated cafe. We were given a lot of details on what they were looking for in regards to length, target audience and features. We tried to stick to these to give the company the ideal promo they were looking for but we also negotiated some parts of the brief that we felt would help sell and market the cafe better. For instance, they wanted the video to be around 15 minutes long but we agreed around 4-5 minutes to keep it fresh and the audience interested. After receiving the completed brief, we arranged a meeting with the client to further discuss and negotiate ideas.

We worked well as a team; working on previous assignments together we knew each others strong points so could adapt well to creating the best possible video for the client. We all had an influence on each part of production but split the production into 3 main parts where each of worked to our strengths of pre-production/planning and ideas, shooting and editing. This meant each key part of production was done to a high standard and got completed quicker as we knew what each team member was doing and communicated well. In our meetings with the client, we arranged shoot days; keeping a professional and on going relationship with client and in our production meetings we arranged planning and editing days which we all stuck to, completing the video ahead of time. We also scheduled a second shoot after the first edit when we had to go back and re record some sound footage which was missing/of a poor quality. As we had planned ahead of our deadline, it meant we were able to fit in another shoot day and still reach a final cut in time.

We had very few constrains, we had no problem with time, financial or legal issues because we had well planned. Regarding legal constrains, the client has asked for an upbeat, happy backing track. As we couldn't feature songs that would be copyrighted we had to find a royalty free site and find a piece which would fit the video and what the client has asked for. As we were working to a brief, we needed to stick what the client requested so we didn't find we had any artistic differences as we were working to please the cafe. We had already planned and story boarded so each team member new the expectations.

We were pleased with our final product and we felt it fitted the brief well but also felt there were things that could have been changed. We would have liked one more shoot day to get more shots in better lighting as on the day the weather was poor and it was essential to capture the cafe in the best light creating a good pathetic fallacy. We also would have liked another re-shoot to get higher quality shots which we weren't happy with in editing. Our main obstacle we found with the promo was the sound; on our first shoot we used and external mic plugged into the camera and it wasn't till edit that we realised the mic had captured no sound in the interview scenes. When we scheduled a re shoot of the interviews we used separate recording device. Although we had now successfully captured the sound, the quality was still very poor and had to be edited in post-production. Overall we were pleased with the appearance of the video but the problems with the sound brought the general quality of the video down.

 Our client received the video well and was happy with the final product. They  it hit the brief successfully and highlighted the cafe to its best points, aimed at the right target audience and fitted the codes and conventions of a typical promo video. But agreed if the quality of the sound was better, it would've given the video and more professional look. It is key to get good feedback from the client, not only to keep them happy which what you have produced but also to create more work with future clients as testimonials is essential in corporate promos.

QUESTIONS TO ASK YOURSELF:

         

-         What kind of briefs have you worked with and what was the most effective?

(Contrast with the least effective.  Give three reasons why it was the most effective – back this up with results.)

-         How effective was communication between you and the client and you and your team?  What strategies did you use to achieve this?  What strategies could you use to improve?

-         What obstacles were there and how did you overcome them?

-         Name three things about the final project that you are pleased with (give specific examples, if you are talking about a shot provide a screengrab)

-         Name three things you would want to improve (again give examples)

-         Feedback (screenshots of feedback, your summary, how important is good feedback from clients?)