Friday, March 30, 2012

Keynote a good tool for animation prototyping

Keynote animation video prototype and storyboardsApple's Keynote has long been known as an excellent presentation tool on the Mac. But did you know that it can be used for much more?

The ESPI At Work blog outlined how they use Keynote as a rapid prototyping tool to quickly develop and test designs of new websites and apps. They are not alone. We also use Keynote extensively to develop storyboards and even concept video animations for client approval before polishing these concepts into final motion animations.

Of course, we could (and also do) use Powerpoint for storyboarding, but not for creating concept video animations.  The main reason for choosing Keynote is its advanced animation set, which allow not only for more different types of animations, but also for alpha-key'ed video exports, which you cannot do in Powerpoint.

You don't have to always use high-end or professional tools to develop assets and concepts, although we typically revert to these during the later stages of the development process.  But during the initial, creative phase, when speed is more important than refinement, we use prosumer or consumer applications rather than professional tools to get the job done quickly.

If you have a Mac and don't use Keynote, maybe you should check it out to see how it can allow you to quickly prototype animations and designs?  It is available from the Mac App Store.

Monday, March 26, 2012

iMovie on the iPad - good for casual videos only

iMove on iPad good enough for video editing?Now that the New iPad has been out for a bit more than a week, how good is iMovie on the iPad with regards to producing videos?  Can it replace iMovie on the Mac?

The folks at ArsTechnica posted a review of iMovie on the new iPad. Their answer is similar to what we saw - while it supports 1080p, it's a good enough video editor for casual video to be posted to Facebook or YouTube, but not good enough for any serious work.  Apart from the fact that it is tricky to import and edit footage not shot on the iPad, the editing tools are still a bit limited, lacking features such as basic color and contrast controls, plus more advanced titling.

For now, while it's great fun to crank out some home videos quickly, we will not iMovie on the iPad for anything else.

Wednesday, March 7, 2012

Adobe Lightroom for Videographers

If you are a photographer, you know about Adobe Photoshop Lightroom.  You might even use it on a daily basis - it's one of the best tools out there for managing lots of photos.

Video support in Adobe Photoshop Lightroom is greatly improvedAs a Videographer, though, you might not have cared about Lightroom too much.  But you should. With the newly released version 4 of Lightroom, Adobe not only cut the price by 50%, but it significantly beefed up support for video.

Most importantly, you can quickly apply changes to the look of your videos - change the white balance, adjust exposure, contrast, blacks and whites and make your videos more vibrant.  While you might already have other tools to do any of these adjustments, if you asset-manage your videos via Lightroom, as we do, why not also use its capabilities to make derivatives with specific adjustments?

Overall, we already upgraded and integrated Lightroom into our video production process.

Tuesday, March 6, 2012

Solve the Partner Catch-22 Problem

Video by Digital Dazzle is great for solving the partner catch 22 problemDid you know that 70 percent of all new corporate partnerships fail to drive revenue? This is because of the notorious “Partner Catch-22” problem: Neither partner wants to invest its own money and resources in developing joint partner solutions until the partner relationship has generated a pipeline of leads. Yet, building such a pipeline is traditionally impossible without first making the aforementioned investment.

Luckily, a Partner Enablement Video can offer an end to this vicious cycle in several important ways:

  • Bring integration solutions to life for sales teams and clients, even when those solutions are still in the planning stages.
  • Demonstrate key partner differentiators and benefits — cost-effectively.
  • Start pre-selling offerings in as few as two to three weeks.

A video will demonstrate your partnership, its offerings and its benefits — even before the joint solution(s) has been created. What’s more, creating a video can decrease work for engineering and design teams and enhance innovation as many video concepts and designs are incorporated into the final specification.

One plus one equals more than two
It’s often difficult for one company’s clients to visualize how a new partnership will benefit them. After all, they’re used to using the current solution in one way — by itself.

By creating a video that demonstrates the benefits of nascent partner offerings, you can create an actionable vision that will generate enthusiasm among your sales team members and your clientele. Both gain an immediate understanding of the joint solution’s benefits and experience a deeper level of engagement.

Better yet, you can use video to customize your message. For example, you can produce separate versions of your video for different customer verticals so that customers can understand how the partnership applies specifically to them. You can even target a video to your own and your partner’s sales forces so that they have a true understanding of how to adapt their selling strategies.

A successful Partnership Enablement Video accomplishes several essential goals:

  • Exhibits how the companies’ combined efforts will work
  • Clearly demonstrates the solution’s benefit to viewers
  • Clarifies the strengths and boundaries of the partnership
  • Differentiates products and services
  • Educates viewers about the other partner’s technology or reputation
  • Increases brand awareness for both companies

Having this information upfront will save time and money.

Take the example of two tech companies that decide to integrate their software products. Posting a laundry list of the benefits of each partner’s products doesn’t actually show customers the true benefit of both partners’ software components working together. Instead, the companies can use video to bring the integration to life and actually walk users through use cases and demonstrate how the new integration will work — in a way that makes the benefits immediately apparent.

Create compelling stories to strengthen your brands — and your partnership
The key to putting together a great video that will boost your partnership is making sure that your selected video producer truly understands both companies, their particular industry or industries, the benefits of the new partnership and its offering, and what it takes to capture viewers’ interest and clarify the message for them.

A quality video producer has not only specific skills and knowledge about video but also these qualities:

  • A thorough understanding of your company and your industry
  • A tried and consistent method for researching others
  • A strong foundation of communication for finalizing details

Put these pieces together, and you end up with the story of your partnership and its benefits. And compelling storytelling is the quickest way to strengthen your brand and connect with your existing — and future — clients.

 

A Case in Point
Lithium Technologies worked with Digital Dazzle to establish a systematic approach for using its partners’ distribution channels and eliciting leads from partner accounts.

The solution included creating Partner Enablement Videos, which were used, first, to train each partner’s sales teams and, secondly to present to prospective customers. According to Henry Bruckstein, then Lithium’s director of partner alliances, Lithium enjoyed a dramatic increase in qualified leads from its partners, a significant acceleration in the sales process and an upsurge in the number of sales.

 

Help Yourself
So you’ve decided to create a Partnership Enablement Video. There are few things that you can do to make the process easier and more successful:

  • Be committed to the partnership. Don’t get possessive about which company is the “stronger” partner;
  • Know your selling points and communicate them to the video experts;
  • List the benefits and differentiators of your joint partner solution; and
  • State what problems your joint partner solution solves.

 

Thursday, March 1, 2012

How to mirror your iPad / iPhone screen on your Mac

Mirror iPad iPhone screen on a MacHave you ever wanted to use your Mac to record the action on your iPhone or iPad screen? It used to be that you used to have quite an elaborate setup to do so.

Not any longer.  The new Reflection App allows you to do so via AirPlay.  And at $14.99 for a single license ($39.99 for a 5 pack), it is much less expensive than any other means we've used or seen.

What you get for your money is full iPhone / iPad (running iOS 5) mirroring, including audio, with orientation updates and video optimization features, similar to what you would get with the Xcode iOS simulator. In our tests, our iPad screen looked crisp and snappy on our iMac and audio sounded fantastic.  In test recordings via Screenflow, we saw no frame-slipping, but had some audio recording issues that we're digging into right now.

If you have a need to display your iPad screen on your Mac, esp. for screen recording purposes, Reflection is an app you need to have in your arsenal.