Mark Lewis: Welcome back to another Tight Line marketing strategy session for small business. I’m Mark Lewis, owner and CEO of Tight Line Advertising. And, Production Manager extraordinaire Mr. Anthony DeMalia is also here with me today.
Anthony DeMalia: Greetings! Video production is what we do. We use video all the time for clients from producing commercials for electronic media, TV, as well as digital media placement on Facebook, YouTube, whatever you need. So, in this installment, we’re going to continue talking about the power of video, and how to incorporate video into your messaging. We’ll also show you a great video project that we were lucky enough to work with the folks over at the Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex.
That was such a fun project, and it had a lot of moving parts. We got to use a lot of our toys, and we got to do a lot of stuff really exhibits what we do at Tight Line. We’re big fans of melding videos into our client’s websites. They could use it in sales presentations, videos, letters on their websites, it shows off their company in a whole lot different arena. And the KSC Visitor Complex is a great example of this use of video. We routinely edit multiple videos from one video shoot. We have all sorts of lengths, we have videos for social media, we have commercials for TV, and we create different lengths for different needs.
Mark Lewis: It’s all in the planning. We like to go out and produce a comprehensive video for a client. A video that will talk about their company and explain what’s great about it. We like to plan things out ahead of time to make sure that we get as much as possible out of a single shoot. So, whether we’re doing a three and a half minute video or five minute video that we post on YouTube we try to put a lot into it. Then we’ll make a shortened version to push out on organic social media like on Facebook and maybe even a shorter version for Instagram. Since people are doing stuff with Tik Tok we may try to do something for that format as well. For our SEO clients we will take a “How to video” or a video talking about what’s great about that company and embed it in a blog. Embedding a video into a blog is a great way of getting authority on Google. So there’s a lot of stuff that we do with video.
So, let’s get into some of the moving parts that went into working with the folks at Kennedy Space Center. There was a lot that went into this project, and it would probably help our readers to have a better understanding of all that we did for this shoot.
Anthony DeMalia: Pre-production was absolutely key. We were tasked with documenting the delivery of a SpaceX Falcon Nine rocket booster, that had been in space, to the new facility at the Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex. It was super cool, but required a lot of planning. The new facility hadn’t been completed yet, but getting the booster into the building before the facility was done was going to be key. We only had one shot to capture everything that we needed. We started by going through a bunch of top secret phone conferences and we had to understand what the client wanted, what we were capable of, and what sort final product they desired. In the end it turned out to be a lot of different things that were needed and that Tight Line was able to provide.
Mark Lewis: It was a one time deal. We weren’t able to say “That was great, can we roll back and shoot that again?” The booster was on a giant truck and there were a bunch of employees guiding the move. We weren’t going to be able to ask them to back up for us to get a better shot.
The plan was to shoot the booster delivery using drone video, but also capture ground level stabilized video along with time lapses. We were able to do a walkthrough prior to the shoot day and that was key in helping us to determine the camera locations, the sun angles, the strategies of where to put the crew and where the best movements were. Determining these things was extremely helpful because it helped us from getting in each other’s line of sight and allowed us to make sure that we were getting all the footage we needed.
Anthony DeMalia: The day of the shoot there was a lot of running. Once the booster began to be moved we had to keep up with it and stay in front of it. We couldn’t risk getting behind the booster so we had multiple guys go in different directions.
Mark Lewis: We want to give a special thanks to the Kennedy Space Center team. They were a huge help to us as the shoot progressed. Adeline, Rebecca, and Andrew were so helpful every step of the way from the walkthrough, to gaining access to places where the time lapse cameras needed to be placed and telling us where the cameras could go and where they couldn’t go. They truly helped us find the best locations for capturing the booster delivery.
It was such a fun project to work on. We hope that get to do more shoots like that one in the future.
Anthony DeMalia: As we mentioned, there was lots of running to keep up with the vehicle and that led to a pretty interesting moment for Mark. He was running and shooting photos and he got to one location that was right next to a canal and when he looked down there was an alligator not far from him. It didn’t move so Mark was able to get a great photo.
Mark Lewis: We’re so proud of how the video turned out and we’re so thankful to the other members of the Tight Line team Brandon and Tristin who helped out so much. And again thanks to the Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex folks for giving us a chance to really be part of this memorable and historic chapter. It was really cool!
Anthony DeMalia: If you guys have never been to the Kennedy Space Center, you need to check out the Visitor Complex. There are so many things to do. It’s a great place to bring your family because there’s so much to see. You get to experience history.
Mark Lewis: If you or your business is in need of high end video production, web design, SEO, digital media or traditional media Strategies don’t hesitate to contact Tight Line Advertising. We would be honored to assist you.
