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Nov 22
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Serendipitous Films Creates Web Videos for Permian Lide

By Uncategorized

Recently, SFilms was contacted to produce a marketing video for tank and vessel manufacturer Permian Lide.  The original scope was to create a 4 to 5 minute video, with shorter two minutes and one minutes versions pulled from the longer piece. Permian Lide is one of the leading manufacturers of steel and fiberglass tanks and vessels for the oil field industry.  They have plants all over the country and SFilms visited them all.  A key to the production of this video was to have drone work capture the scale of the facilities, as well as give a different perspective inside the plants. Here is the long version.

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Nov 20
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Production Value in Corporate Video

By Corporate Video Production, Tips/Techniques, Uncategorized, Video Production

What’s Trending in Corporate Video One of the trends in corporate video production has been the increase in production value.  This can be attributed to several factors– companies realizing that their brand image is directly tied to quality of their corporate communications, and the advent of new and better tools for production. Old Days of Corporate Video Twenty years ago, only large corporations could afford a video department.  It could easily take a million dollars to build out a video production facility with a camera and edit room.  In Dallas, one corporation dropped over a million dollars in the early nineties to finish out a little studio. One tape deck (like a Sony BetacamSP BVW 75) was $45K new.  A camera could easily run $70K.  In the nineties, the computer revolution started taking hold (as it had with desktop publishing)…

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Nov 04
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Use of Music in Corporate Videos

By Music Video Production, Tips/Techniques, Uncategorized, Video Production

The Corporate Video Music Track A powerful music track can change a corporate video dramatically.  Sure there are the times where a company is playing the video silently at their trade show booth, but most of the time, videos are watched and listened to. The foundation of editing is the soundtrack.  Often, when we’re in post production on a corporate video, the audio is the first thing we lay down.  This is common with the “documentary” style corporate video.  We find all the interview soundbites, lay in the music (so we know where to take a breath for a short video montage to music) and often cut to beat for the high impact sports style corporate video. The Source of Corporate Video Music Licensing music is an important aspect of corporate work.  Production companies looking to cut corners have placed…

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Nov 01
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Why Dallas for Corporate Video?

By Corporate Video Production, Tips/Techniques, Uncategorized, Video Production

The Big D King of Corporate Video The Dallas metropolitan area is a have for corporate video production and corporate communication.  A strong crew base, many video production companies, studios and resources are available in Dallas.  Some might say this is due to the strong number of large corporations headquartered here.  Names like Exxon, Kimberly Clark, Frito-Lay.  But all the large companies will have their own video production divisions or departments.  And you can point to places like Houston– they have many large corporations but the video and film production resources available in Houston are small in comparison to the Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex. The key to the corporate video industry in Dallas is the number of progressive and growing mid-size companies.  Mid-size means they need the communication muscle that the large Fortune 500 companies have, but don’t have the internal…

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Oct 31
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Office Space Available

By Corporate Video Production, Tips/Techniques, Uncategorized

We have several offices available for sublease here at Serendipitous Films.  One is a large corner office measuring 17ft8in X 17ft9in.  Another is a small office that is 14ft6in X 8ft3in.  We also have a reception area, common areas such as kitchen, etc. Our offices are located in Haltom City, a suburb of Fort Worth, on the Dallas side.  We are in the Studios121 building on Airport Freeway.  The synergy here is great, with 3 stages and other creative businesses in the building. At Serendipitous Films, we produce corporate videos and communications, commercials and feature films.  If you think you might be interested, give us a call and let’s chat.

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Oct 30
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Editing the Corporate Interview Video

By Tips/Techniques, Uncategorized, Video Production

Corporate Video Documentary Style One common style of corporate video is the “documentary-style” approach– the story told through interviews.  This can be in conjunction with a voice over narrator, but more commonly, told entirely through interviews.  It’s called “documentary-style” due to most docs relying heavily on interviews. Production The quantity of interviews can vary– a good number is a minimum of three (though there are times the one person video works, especially in a short video, or web video that’s around 60 seconds or so).  We’ve had projects where we’ve shot as many as 30 people for one video.  Because Dallas Fort Worth is home to many large corporations, we see many videos shot in this style in the metroplex. Post Production The way we approach the Doc Style video at SFilms is to create one timeline of “selects.”  We…

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Oct 28
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How Long is a Corporate Video?

By Corporate Video Production, Tips/Techniques, Uncategorized, Video Production

It’s a Matter of Length One of the most common questions we get asked by our clients is how long their video should be.  In some ways, it’s akin to asking how long is a piece of string.  Well, it all depends.  Let’s look at some of the variables. Variables for Your Corporate Video Who is your audience?  Is it an older crowd that grew up on 1960’s and 70’s television and movies?  Or is it a much younger crowd who has grown up on YouTube?  That younger person is not going to easily sit through even a ten minute video, unless you keep a very fast pace in the editing.  Likewise, the older person might be turned off a bit by the “MTV” style editing.  We did a video on a retirement plan– it was a little longer than some…

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Oct 26
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SFilms Assists TopPup

SFilms Assists TopPup in Opening of NTE

By Tips/Techniques, Uncategorized, Video Production

After more than three years, and nine months early, the construction has all but come to an end in Northeast Tarrant County, home to Fort Worth and neighbor to Dallas.  NTE, the North Tarrant Express, is a project to widen a heavily congested portion of roads through six municipalities near Fort Worth, connecting to Dallas.  TopPup Media was called on to video document the construction over the past two years, and SFilms partnered with TPM to make that happen. Construction video is extremely different than the normal corporate video shoots.  First, all crew people out in the construction zone had to be safety trained and wear the proper safety equipment.  Also, the type of shots for showing construction are different– the story is told through aerials and timelapse, with a little standard video shooting. We have really enjoyed shooting for NTE…

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Aug 30
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One Person Shoot and Edit

By Uncategorized

Shooting And Editing Sometimes, we get a call for us to send one person on a client’s job that requires shooting and editing.  In this post, we’ll discuss the best practices and tricks/techniques to help it go smoother. What to Take on a Video Shoot and Edit: For a recent job that required the Shooter/Editor to be on a tour bus with the client, our shooter took five cameras, a MacBookPro and several USB powered harddrives.  In addition to support equipment like tripod, etc, he also took a drone for aerial footage.  The cameras were a C100 for main recording, a 5D mark 3 for additional shots and the ability to shoot stills for the client as needed, and three GoPros. The biggest hit for the client was the drone– we were able to get those “wow” shots that pulls…

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Jul 31
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Going On-Camera for Corporate/Commercial Video

By Corporate Video Production, Tips/Techniques, Video Production

Tips and Suggestions for being interviewed on camera Congratulations (or condolences) on you being selected to be in front of the camera for that corporate video.  Maybe you’re a client and are doing a favor for a company with a product or service you love.  Or you’re employed by a company and have been selected to tell the corporate story.  Here are some tips and things to keep in mind to help you out. Most interviews are conducted “documentary” style—you’re being asked questions by an off-camera interviewer, so you’ll look at them and not the camera.  When you look directly at the camera and talk, it’s usually a “spokesperson” role, and is very different to the interview we’re talking about here. Many people desire to have the questions beforehand.  There are pros and cons to this.  Most likely, you’re being…

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