Below are some behind the scene photos of our time at Wellfount with Jeff Kirk and Paul Leamon.

1. It’s the lens, not the body
5d, 7d, 60d, which camera do I get?  Rather than focusing on the camera body focus on the lens.  Camera bodies change from year to year, but the lenses are what really hold their value.  Get a lens with a large aperture and fork out a few extra hundred to get it stabilized, it’s worth it.  I shoot 80% of my work on a Sigma 17-50mm 2.8 os.

 2. Use headphones and record directly to card with headphone jack
Audio is defiantly a drawback to the dslr world.  You can buy an external microphone and plug into the line in the camera, but you have no way to monitor the audio without a headphone jack.  So I use the h4n audio recorder on top of the camera as an external microphone and a way to monitor the audio with the h4n headphone jack.

Basically it’s the same setup as filmmaker JJ Kim seen in this video.

3. Use a variable ND filter when outside
When you shoot video your shutter speed should be twice your frame rate.  So if you’re shooting 30fps the shutter speed should be 1/60.  And with your shutter speed at 1/50 or 1/60 and your aperture wide open, you’ll notice your shot will be overexposed on a sunny day.  So avoid cranking your shutter up (which will make movements look choppy), and invest in a variable ND filter for those bright locations.

 4. Better to shoot underexposed than overexposed
Most of the time, use this as a rule of thumb.  Once you’ve shot something where the whites are overexposed and lost, there is little to nothing you can do in post production to fix this.  On the other hand if something is underexposed, you can brighten the picture up to some degree in post.

 5. Test out lenses before you buy
Lenses can be extremely expensive.  Try them out before you buy.  If you live near Indianapolis, Roberts downtown is a great place to rent gear or there are several great online rental sites such as lensprotogo.com.

Added Bonus:
Now that you have gear and lenses you can also start or brush up on your photography.

When he openly shares these stories, his audience is rapt. We wheeze from laughing too much. Our jaws hurt from gasping over and over again. We shake our heads in collective disbelief. My brother’s stories are amazing, but if he sat down to write them down, I have no doubt that they would fall flat.

I talk a lot about controlling your message, setting the right tone, capturing the appropriate voice and maintaining consistency. These things should never get in the way of a good story. Sometimes you should toss the script and let the players play and just let the story unfold.

I also talk about the importance of authenticity. When you, as a marketing professional, corporate communicator or business owner, ask the people who live and breathe your business to help tell your story, you’re getting the real story. Sure, there’s editing and polishing to be done, but don’t be afraid to rely on your good questions and their real answers.

This journalistic style of storytelling is perhaps best represented in documentaries and documentary-style videos. Matt Kiefer, our resident video guru, is a big fan of this video from New Balance.

While the message, tone and voice of the video were certainly important to nail down prior to shooting the New Balance video, the story unfolds like a real story would unfold. The characters tell the story in their own words, as if my brother were right there, just letting it happen.

Next time you are expected to do what everyone else does, just do something a little different.

Oh, I guess it’s not so different. Copy Cat! (ha)

One of the first things that really got me jazzed about this book was the idea of a Culture Book. A Culture Book  is a mini book about the culture of your company… after that, you can make whatever else is inside it all unique to your company. I asked each person at Silver Square to submit, individually, what they thought the culture was here. I asked them not to talk about this assignment as I wanted it to come from them specifically. I’m also going to add photos of our get togethers, of our upcoming office move, maybe of some pitches we do, who knows what all we’ll add to this by the time the year is done. I like that it will document, year after year, what we do and how or if our culture shifts. I’m shooting for constant improvement.

So check out the Zappos Culture Book and keep your eyes peeled for a contest we’re launching next week to win your very own copy of Delivering Happiness.

(for our email readers the video is here)

But the actual vision board I feel good about. I was so engaged going through the images on my board that I wasn’t really paying attention to how long I was talking. (My explanation of my vision board is longer than Raquel’s and Angela’s combined.) Recurring themes were meditation and developing an abundance mentality about time and money. Now if you’ll excuse me I need to go practice my mantra about diving into a pool of gold coins for a few hours.

I hope you enjoy our videos and I encourage each of you to create your own vision board and do these together with your team at the office.

I already shared a little bit about what was on my board in my earlier post, but a few things made it on there that are new:  polar bear for more trips to the zoo, some organic wine for me to place in this empty mini wine cellar at my house, a trip to Napa because every wine lover should go there to unwine and take in that amazing bit of country, some very hip shoes for that wardrobe I’ll be working on and some green cleaning products so I don’t feel like I’m placing chemicals directly on my children each time I clean where they eat and play.

So here it is! What is on your vision board?

I hope you enjoy my first video blog… I think I could increase my energy level a bit. ha I will get better at this. I promise…. or if it’s really bad, you can tell me to stop doing them in our comments section.

If you’re viewing this in a feed, thank you for subscribing, and you can watch the video here.