Understanding Media Production And Techniques

Advertising is like a form of communication, often intended to persuade the viewers or listeners to purchase or consume a product. It crosses numerous platforms from broadcast, print, billboard and online.

Video production, or videography, is the art and service of videotaping, editing, and distributing a finished video product. This can include television production, commercial video production, and corporate and event videos.

Elements of video production include (1) Pre-Production, (2) Production, and (3) Post Production, and all video productions are organized this way to ensure that the process is a seamless one, and the final-result is as envisioned. Production is the shooting stage of your shoot, which includes cinematography, audio, lights, as well as directing, art and effects. Video production can be used at sporting, school, stage, wedding, church, and similar events to provide recordings of the events. Event video production can also be used to broadcast events live to viewers at home such as a press conference or concert. Video of live events can be sent by microwave or satellite from the event location to a studio in order to be broadcast.

Tips for video production

The best way to understand video production is to think of it as a process. The process is always the same, whether you are producing a simple video or a intricate one. Here is a description of the process, step-by-step. It can be broken down into three phases.

Pre-production

Production

Post-production

Pre-production is probably the most important and the easiest. Even if you want to outsource most of the work, you can (and should) do most of the pre-production yourself. Pre-production includes everything you do before you ever touch the camera.

First, think about what you want your finished video to be. Ask yourself these questions.

Who is your audience?

What does your audience need or want to hear?

What does the audience already know?

What style of video would appeal to your target audience?

What is your budget?

What resources do you have readily available?

The answer to these questions will determine most everything else.

Next, think about what you should actually go and get on video tape. Do you need to interview experts? Do you need footage of specific things that represent your subject? Where and how will you video tape these things? Plan it all out. Make phones calls. Schedule crews, etc.

Write out a first draft of your script. Nothing needs to be carved in stone at this point, but a working script will help you collect all your thoughts. A good script should be conversational. Pretend you are explaining the subject matter to a friend. What would you say to them? Write that down and then modify it by using more colourful words and better descriptions.

Video scripts are best if they use simple, short sentences. Avoid long, complex words that will be tongue twisters. Read it aloud to test it. Have someone else listen to you and get their reaction. The production phase includes gathering all of your raw materials. All your raw video and audio. This phase probably takes the most work and know-how, especially if you are shooting everything from scratch.

Post-production is the phase where you take all your raw materials and assemble them into a finished video. Mostly, post-production means video editing. There are many wonderful computer video editing programs that do a great job. Personally, I use Final Cut by Apple Computers. This is an advanced video editing program that allows you total control over every single aspect of your video. Most beginners would never want to fool with it. A beginner would be much better off with a simple program like Windows Movie maker or iMovie, which are both free. Those programs rely on pre-produced templates that make it much easier and less complex.

Sony Vegas Movie Studio is a popular program that is inexpensive and allows more control than the freebie programs but isn’t nearly as complicated as Final Cut.

Video editing is also a step-by-step process and I have many free tutorials here on video production tips.com that will help you.

So there you have it, a brief description of the process of video production.

Audio production

The post process in recording acoustic music is often referred to as mixing, as this process happens after recording the musicians. In electronic music the workflow is usually quite different, and in this context the term “post processing” would typically not refer to the actual mixing process but rather what is applied to the resulting mix-down.

With today’s increasing amount of music software and musicians creating electronic music in their homes, post production is often done by the musicians themselves. The process typically involves equalization, audio level compression, multi-band audio compression, and limiting. This process somewhat overlaps but should not be mistaken for the term mastering, as post production is usually performed on a per-song basis, whereas mastering is aimed at preparing an entire list of songs for a specific media type.

Audio Post Production usually refers to audio that is synchronized with video. This applies to TV, cinema, and commercials. One major aspect of audio post production is the use of ADR, or automatic dialogue replacement. Sometimes the original, or production audio, lacks in performance or quality, and the actor or actors are brought into a sound studio to record some or all of their dialogue from the project. Other elements such as foley, music, and voiceover are also added during post production.

Online multimedia production

Multimedia is the use of several different media to convey information (text, audio, graphics, animation, video, and interactivity).

As multimedia solutions, we understand the solutions that use animation, as a rule, they are developed in Flash. As distinct from static texts (html), multimedia allows to show your product (service) in action, can include audio/video fragments thus making the story about your company more dynamic and attractive and helping it to reach better effect than a static solution could.

Research has indicated the following areas are important for new entrants in the creative industries:

Client service – As a service industry, the client is at the heart of the operation. Some of the most junior roles (such as runners, assistants and receptionists) can be the most customer-facing. As is often said, clients are hard won and easily lost.

Transferable skills – the ability to apply the same logic and thought processes from one area of advertising to another makes any new entrant more employable.

Good numeracy / literacy skills and attention to detail – entry level roles are often responsible for a large about of “data wrangling”. Logging information as well as monitoring numerical data needs to be accurate in a pressurised environment.

Good timekeeping and self organisation – good organisation skills are highly sought after in all industries, but particularly in advertising where deadlines are tight.

Speaking and self presentation: these skills relate to client service but are of great importance in a sector where image is important.