You’re familiar with green screen, right? The now-ubiquitous technology that lets the person on camera appear to be anywhere in the world (or beyond)? What you’ve probably also come to expect as the norm — outside of action movies, at least — is the video being shot from the waist up with the subject sitting stationary. But that’s just the beginning of what green screen technology is capable of. That’s why, at Denver Film & Digital, we are thrilled to tell you that we’ve got the newest technology that lets us film green screen video showing — you guessed it — legs!

We’re totally geeking out over our new green screen that allows the virtual location of a video to go beyond the shoulders to include the ground. But it’s about more than Steef just loving any new video tech that he can get his hands on; it’s about giving you endless options for an economical yet professional video where there is no limit to the locations you choose.

The new green screen means that you don’t need to build a set or be anywhere particularly compelling to look like you are right where you want to be. You can look like you are sitting or standing in literally any setting you want to be in for your marketing or music videos. Take our friend Ed Atkinson of Liberty Home Loans. In his marketing, he describes himself as his clients’ “mortgage Sherpa,” so we had some fun putting him in a fitting setting to create unexpected videos that are sure to make him stand out above other mortgage brokers.

The green screen is especially valuable if you want to produce marketing videos for your business or nonprofit, but have a small or less-than-interesting workspace. With our special technology and know-how, we can put you in the midst of an entire set of your choosing, whether that be outer space or another office space.

If you want to keep it simple, your video can have a clean and sleek white background, which is great for a modern website style and lets the edges of the video blend in with your site’s page for a seamless look. The options really are endless.

While green screen lets you look like you’re on location, shooting video with this technology is convenient because you don’t have to scout for locations or travel to them, and you can have endless options for where it looks like you are, yet the cost is no more than if the video were actually shot on location.

To learn more about our fancy new green screen and what it can mean for you and your organization, contact us today at ssealy@denverfimdigital.com or 303-274-9319.

You are probably familiar with the feeling of visiting an e-commerce site that is all about the products but leaves you wondering who’s behind them and if the company really is reputable.

One way to combat the perception of an e-commerce company being run by robots or people with suspicious motives is through a video on your website and social media that shows the real people behind the organization. As with this video we produced for Keystone Water, you can put a face (or a few) to your e-commerce business, helping instill trust with current and prospective customers.

The Keystone video doubles as a testimonial for the company’s top-notch customer service and seeing a person behind the business. We meet Director of Operations Michelle Brozovich and she walks us through several of the company’s products and the benefits of using Keystone over competitors. She then addresses the paramount topic of customer service, explaining that it’s what sets Keystone apart from other providers of water dispensers and accessories. Finally, we see real customers providing testimonials about how Keystone Water excels at customer service.

So not only does this video show us a real person behind Keystone, but it shows the social proof of satisfied customers, taking away any potential mystery about what this company is about and who runs it.

According to one study, 65 percent of 1,000 people surveyed said they’ve “cut ties with a brand over a single poor customer service experience,” and you probably don’t have to think too hard to come up with a company that makes you relate to this stat.

With a video like Keystone’s, you can show what your company is all about and connect with potential customers while showing that you do care about customers and how they perceive your company – you want them to know you and feel comfortable buying from you. If you can also show that you provide stellar customer service, that’s a big bonus.

If you want to learn how Denver Film and Digital can help your e-commerce business put its best face forward to get more sales, contact us at ssealy@denverfilmdigital.com or call 303-274-9319.

Although we create compelling, impactful and entertaining videos with fresh footage, the inclusion of archival assets can be an affordable way to make a video dynamic and bring it to life in a way that new footage alone might not.

Not only does the new complete video become more vibrant, but old photos and videos can get a whole new life and a chance to make an impact in a way that they hadn’t when being looked at as a single still or video, or sitting in a filing cabinet or collecting dust in a basement. Thanks to the latest video and editing technology, they get to be viewed as a piece of a bigger story.

A recent video we produced for The Listen Foundation (http://www.listenfoundation.org) is a great example of how to combine elements from a variety of sources with our new, professional video footage, for a single video that tells an emotional story spanning decades.

For portions of the video, Listen Foundation parents sent us videos of them explaining their stories of how the organization impacted their hearing impaired children and their families. Viewers see the parents talk about the early days with The Listen Foundation, and along with those videos, we wove in still photos of the children through the years along with videos of their early therapy sessions from more than 15 years ago. The children — now ranging from young adults preparing to go out into the world to having children of their own — also sent us video testimonials recorded on smartphones, in which they provided a powerful, firsthand look into how the therapy helped them find success as they grew up.

The ability to electronically transfer a smartphone video to be part of a professional video is particularly useful when scheduling and locations are issues for those involved or if there are budgetary constraints. Giving people the option to provide their own video for parts of the main video is a way to keep production costs down, while ultimately producing a professional piece. While the format may be different than how we would shoot, we can smoothly transition between the various videos and photos, making them all support the overall video.

For the professionally shot piece, we talked to Listen Foundation therapist Nancy Caleffe-Schenck who worked with the children in the video, beginning at when they were as young as a year old. She gets emotional as she thinks about these clients and all of the hard work the children and families put in, and viewers get a sense for how committed Listen Foundation therapists are to their clients’ growth and success.

With all of these elements combined — old video on VHS tapes, family photos, smartphone video, and new, professional video footage — we created a powerful video that tells the emotional story of how the Listen Foundation’s work affects families in a way that viewers who aren’t necessarily familiar with the organization can feel and understand. Watch the video for yourself to see what we mean!

If your business or nonprofit has a story to tell and old photos or videos to help tell it, give Denver Film & Digital a call today at 303.274.9319 or email us at ssealy@denverfilmdigital.com.

Even those of us who consider ourselves an open book still find that we may struggle to discuss particular issues or talk about something difficult with certain people. It might be because we’re dealing with a painful topic or because there’s some kind of stigma around talking about whatever the issue is. Video can be extremely helpful in breaking the ice when it comes to opening up about these tough issues in a group setting.

A powerful example of using video for this purpose is the 10-minute video Denver Film & Digital produced for the Carson J. Spencer Foundation < http://www.carsonjspencer.org>. The video was used to supplement training Denver Fire Department’s 1,100 employees on the topics of mental health awareness and suicide prevention. It was used as a conversation starter on the difficult subject.

Utilizing video for this purpose is ideal because it provides consistent messaging every time. This video was used in dozens of training workshops and helped ensure continuity across each one.

As we see in the video, firefighters and commanders talk about how they are trained to help others, and to analyze and put out fires. Traditionally, they aren’t trained to care for themselves and their own well-being. Instead, they learn to not show emotion or let things get to them so that they can go on from one site to the next, doing their job.

However, we’ve learned that this kind of mentality is detrimental not only to the firefighter, but to the company and his or her family.

The CJSF works to change that.

In the video, we see multiple firefighters discuss challenges of the job and how beneficial it is to have peer and professional support to help overcome challenges, both personal and professional. But while they stress the importance of a support system for mental health, they express the difficulties of talking about their mental state. Firefighters, like police and other first responders, are taught be the strong ones, after all.

“I do feel like showing too much emotion may hinder the way people look at you professionally,” said firefighter Juan Vigil, expressing his struggle over how much to discuss the hardship of losing a friend and colleague to suicide. He added that he was even uneasy about doing the interview for the video. But, he said, “It’s important to hear these stories, because we need to tell them. We need to get them off our chest. Keeping them in isn’t the way to heal.”

It was clearly difficult for Juan and his fellow firefighters and commanders to talk about mental health, but they did it. And they exemplified behavior that trainers wanted others to emulate.

Doing the in-depth interviews in a safe, quiet environment made it more likely that the officers would speak their minds openly. It almost certainly produced a more powerful result than having the officers speak in front of a room of their peers where they would feel compelled to put on a brave front.

When the video was used in training, their candid reflections gave permission to other firefighters to admit their struggles, and even consider asking for help.

This type of video can be useful to any nonprofit or other organization dealing in difficult topics including loss, mental health, addiction, abuse or lack of economic stability. To learn more about how a video can help your organization start conversations about tough topics, contact Denver Film & Digital at ssealy@denverfilmdigital.com or 303-274-9319.

We have stressed so many times how powerful the “show” aspect of video is as compared to simply “telling” alone. The numbers that show the ever-increasing popularity of video help back us up in these sentiments.

One of our favorite ways to help clients show instead of only tell is by producing videos that help them introduce a service. These videos combine several of the most impactful aspects of video marketing to create a helpful tool that quickly, clearly and easily lets potential customers and clients know what you have to offer.

Take this video we produced for Jennifer Whitton-Trujillo of Energine Marketing. In this video, Jen introduces her Lift Off! Club where small business owners learn how to best market their businesses. In just three and a half minutes, viewers gain a solid understanding of what the Lift Off! Club offers, how it works and what actual clients’ takeaways are.

There are distinct aspects to the video that make it effective.

First, there is the telling. Viewers are introduced to Jen, and she shows that she is an expert by talking about the pain points her clients have. We see that she understands them, and that sets her up as being someone who can help.

Then, we cut to an actual meeting of a Lift Off! Club —the showing — where we see Jen in action with clients. No one is explaining or telling us what the Lift Off! Club is all about. Instead, we see and feel it for ourselves. We get a feel for the setting, setup and what one might expect going to a Lift Off! Club meeting.

That showing is followed by a client testimonial. In this case, a client compares the services that Jen offers with what other companies do. This is powerful, because this isn’t Jen, the business owner, telling why her company is different, but it is instead a client of hers doing that. This is a kind of social proof, and social proof/testimonials cannot be underestimated.

Seeing the client explain why the Lift Off! Club stands out among marketing services dovetails nicely into Jen explaining in more detail what the service is all about. There isn’t time to show a whole meeting, so instead, we have Jen explain how the Lift Off! Club works and show that in a different way than before — with bullet points. As you probably know, bullet points are effective in helping people understand and retain the basic points that need to be made.

Once we have seen and heard in various ways how the Lift Off! Club works, we see more testimonials — more social proof — from the people who have experienced and benefitted from the service. We get to hear about their experiences and get their takeaways to gain an even better understanding of what we can expect after going through Jen’s program.

Finally, all of the information is wrapped up with a call to action from Jen, and we see the information on the screen for how to find out more or join the Lift Off! Club. The video does not just have an open ending after explaining what the program is about. Instead, it very specifically says what the viewer should do and how to do it.

In less than four minutes, the viewer has a good sense of what the Lift Off! Club is all about and is likely to believe in its effectiveness after hearing from multiple people who experienced its benefits.

The techniques we used here for the Lift Off! Club are transferrable to any service you want to introduce. It’s just a matter of including the effective elements of having the expert tell about the service, seeing that person in action and hearing from customers or clients who can vouch for the service in a way that will interest potential clients to give it a try.

If you’ve got a service or program that you’re ready to market in an effective way through video, give us a call at 303-274-9319 or send us an email at ssealy@denverfilmdigital.com, and we’ll talk about how we can help you get there!

If you’ve checked out our previous posts, you know that we’ve discussed several ways to use video for marketing, including for testimonials, showing that you’re a trusted expert, getting buy-in and raising money via crowdfunding. And as the stats pile up showing how much more effective marketing videos are than text and photos, it’s become clear that video is also a powerful way to display products.

You can show different facets of a product, or video it in action, if that’s an option, given the type of product. Or, if you have something that changes, but is more, umm, stationary — like a tree is — you can do what Pine Lane Nursery in Parker, Colorado, did, and produce videos for products, showing them off through video and slideshows of still photos.

The videos we produced for Pine Lane Nursery pack a big punch in less than a minute each. In each video, we see Tree Guru Bob Hardie standing near a specific type of tree while he shares information about it, including what to expect for each season in terms of care and the tree’s appearance. In addition to seeing a portion of the trees available at the nursery in the video with Bob, we see still photos that show the type of tree in different seasons or stages of life.

These videos pay for themselves over and over for a few reasons. For one, they are evergreen (no pun intended!) meaning that they are useful to viewers beyond any foreseeable timeline. The team at Pine Lane can use their video of the Canada Red Chokecherry tree for marketing purposes as many times as they want to. As long as there are Canada Red Chokecherries, there will be people wanting to learn about them. Product videos are great to put on your company’s website and also to share on social media or in email newsletters.

In addition, the video provides multiple benefits. It shows the products offered at Pine Lane, shows what the nursery’s location looks like, shares valuable information for anyone interested in this type of tree, and positions Bob and his team as trusted experts not just in their field, but in the specific area of North-Central Colorado tree care. Not only will these factors make the video helpful to Pine Lane’s local current and potential customers, but they’ll education people anywhere in the world who finds their videos and has an interest in these trees. Again, we see Pine Lane’s products and see its team as experts.

If you want to learn how product videos can benefit your business, contact Denver Film and Digital today. You can reach us at 303-274-9319 or ssealy@denverfilmdigital.com.