Why should your brand matter in video?

The American Marketing Association defines a brand as a:

“Name, term, design, symbol, or any other feature that identifies one seller’s good or services as distinct from those of other sellers.”

Your brand, in its definition, describes your company’s reputation. In fact, your brand can be known for excellence or for less than desirable by the tribes that follow your company.

Brand = Customer satisfaction. Brand = Value. Brand = Your next customer.

Take video, for instance. Video’s presence online has increased 400 percent since the turn of the century. So many people want to jump on the bandwagon of putting a video online that they forget they are affecting their brand’s reputation depending on what they post.  

Let it be known that video done professionally can elevate your brand. Professional video companies are trained to be aware of the brand guide or brand standards of their clients. This way, the effect a video can have on a brand is always positive.

“But, I’m a small company,” you say. All the more reason you should pay attention to your brand; otherwise, that’s what you will always be: a small company. If that’s your desire and growth is not a factor, this blog is not meant for you.

Many times we’ll visit with clients who don’t need a complete brand makeover but a “freshening” or “elevation” from their existing, tired brand. Because a brand’s foundation is so important, we ask our clients from the start of their projects with us (whether its video or web) if they would like to visit their brand with a new perspective. We have enjoyed elevating and freshening brands such as Essential Knowledge, Renzenberger, Indiana State University Foundation, and many more.  

One last item I should mention: Think about the videos you are watching. If they are poorly done, does that increase or decrease the brand of the company presenting it, from your perspective?

Quality Video equals Brand Elevation.

Don’t get caught doing your brand a disservice without the help of a professional video firm. Your customers and clients will notice, and you’ll be grateful for the sterling reputation your brand continues to have.

Google Fiber “status update” for Kansas City

Patrick Pichette, Google's chief financial officer

For the last 10 years, I’ve been personally following the progress of fiber connectivity.  I first started to hear about the “miraculously fast” bandwith of fiber-optic cable in the summer of 2001 – said to offer up to 100 times the fastest DSL/Cable connection available today.  But, to my dismay, the market has seen almost zero progress on this front over that time (except for maybe network infrastructure development to “prepare the way” of an eventual fiber offering.)  I thought by now the internet would be a completely different animal.  A place where websites, movies/TV and games would all be a seamless fully interactive experience.  But, even though the technology is here, it simply hasn’t happened.

Well, in July of last year, Google elected to use Kansas City, MO and Kansas City, KS as testing grounds for building a real-working Fiber connection service!  

Video Editing on the Go: Good or Bad?

The expanding market of consumer and pro-sumer products is making video editing more accessible. Everyone with an iPad, iPhone, DSLR, and laptop can do it. The popularity of viral video and higher quality home video has been pushing this market for a while now.

The smartphone and tablet markets are growing at alarming rates, as are the app markets. There are several video editing apps available today on the market, including iMovie and Avid Studio (released 2/3/12). If you are shooting most of your videos on your phone or tablet, then these apps make it super easy to edit together a good home or viral video.

There are pros and cons to these apps in the video production industry.

Cinemawide coming to shelves near you!

Vizio has released their new Cinemawide 3D TruLED TVs to the public! What this means for consumers: A true cinema experience like the producers & directors wanted you to have.

If you already have a widescreen television and blu-ray player, you may have noticed that while the movies are in widescreen mode, they still have those “black bars.” Most consumers thought that this annoyance would be eliminated by having a widescreen television.

The truth is that most movies are shot in cinemascope, or even wider than widescreen’s 16:9 ratio. They are shot at 21:9 or wider, and then cut down for your television.

Customer Service: Less is Not More

I was reading an article posted on Techdirt about the SOPA/PIPA legislation that was just recently shelved. The article, which can be found here, is about how the gaming companies are supporting the bill even though the gamers (according to the article) are not. To sum it up, one gamer sent a letter to SEGA asking them to oppose the legislation and got the following in response:

“Generally these issues are caused by bad installs or junk data that’s stuck in the system memory. The first suggestion would be to perform a hard reset on the device. It’s best to attempt this any time you experience performance problems with your device or have an app crash. If it doesn’t work, its suggested that you uninstall the app, perform a hard reset, reinstall and then perform one more hard reset before launching the game.

“If you’re problems continue, please let us know.”

Now if you’re like me, your response upon reading this was “that’s about as expected from a big corporation.”

Wait, what?

Why is that

Success in a Foundation Campaign

Prizm is honored to have been a partner with Indiana State University Foundation during its $85 million campaign.  The campaign was the first comprehensive campaign in the school’s 160 year history.  Prizm was engaged to elevate the brand, showcase the March On! Moments through video storytelling, and design both a live event experience and an online presence.

We are so proud of Indiana State and are honored to have them as a client. Read more about their campaign’s success here.

CES 2012 Recap: On the horizon for video

The Consumer Electronics Show (CES) is one of the largest annual technology “release parties.”  Thousands of tech companies and a whole host of celebrities (including Will.i.am., Ryan Seacrest, Justin Timberlake and Justin Beiber…just to name a few) are all a part of featuring new electronics from phones to robots – both in concept and in actual coming-to-market form.

There were many BIG announcements for video this year – both for video creation and for viewing video.  Most notably amongst them were the following cameras and TVs:

Prizm as a Time Bandit? Ah, yes!

As we begin a new year, it occurs to me that I have spent a dozen years now with Prizm.  How can that possibly be?  After all, to contemplate 12 years in future tense feels like a much longer span of time than it does to look back on that same number of years.  And the scary part about it is that as I age, time seems to just go faster and faster.  But enough of that conversation, it could lead me down an entirely different path.  Hmmmmmmmm…Perhaps another blog?  Perhaps not…we shall see.

The purpose of this blog, though, is to give you, the reader, an inside perspective on Prizm, and why, as I look back over these past years, it is easy enough to recognize why time here passes so quickly.  There are a number of contributing factors, all of which could be a singular cause of time slippage, depending upon which angle one views life through, at, and with Prizm.  I have decided to list my top five in no particular order:

Merry Christmas from Prizm!

If you haven’t already seen our Holiday EVM (Electronic Video Message), catch all of the marshmallow-y, hot cocoa-y, Christmas Carol-y goodness here.

Wish you’d received this in your inbox? Email your contact information to marketing@prizmproductions.com to receive future videos like this one.

Shot Nomenclature

Like many other industries, video/film production has a set of standards understood by all video professionals no matter their experience level. These standards include a language by which we create short-cuts to expedite production processes.

One example is shot nomenclature. Rather than a director commanding camera one to “zoom in on the subject and compose a shot that starts just above his waist and ends right above his head,” the director can just say, “Get me an MCU of the subject.”

MCU stands for Medium Close-Up, and it is a shorthand command for