Gorgeous & cheap? – Create beautiful shoots on a budget

Postcards from Rethink Central

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Prefer to read? Here’s the transcript:

My name is Liz Scully. I’m a business strategist. And as many of you may know, I am also nomadic.

I have filmed these Rethink Postcards all over the world.

In fact, obviously, I’m filming one right now. This one is in Malta.

What I want to talk to you about is how easy it is to film like this. And it’s particularly easy to film in Airbnbs as your set. This lovely rooftop is above the place where I’ve been staying all winter.

I often actually just rent an Airbnb just to shoot in.

Let me tell you about that. It’s actually very lovely.

The most important thing if you choose to do this is

you must get a written okay from your landlord to do it.

If you don’t have it – an email is fine – but if you don’t have a release they can ask to have your videos taken down. And if that is a sales video or something on your website or something you filmed for someone else that’s going to be a disaster. So ask!

When you ask, two things might happen. One is that people will say ‘Absolutely!’ and triple the price. And the other is that people will get very suspicious and ask you what’s going to happen.

And that’s because traditionally, shooting on location is quite a mess. Big film crews arrive, stuff gets taped to the floor, there are big wagons outside full of food. So what you need to do is

explain that it isn’t going to be a big, messy production.

You can say that your crew is going to be one person – like it is here.

But what I normally say is ‘I’m going to be shooting some videos. It’s me and a friend who are going to be doing it. There’s no mess. No fuss. No catering. No wardrobe. I won’t stick anything to the floor. It’s going to be in and out and very easy. Is that okay?’

I have never had anybody up the price or say I can’t do it. So, you first of all get that.

The next thing to think about is:

is it noisy where you are?

Obviously, where I am, it’s quite windy. But is it noisy?

We’re not filming downstairs in this apartment because it has beautiful tile floors which make it very bouncy and a hard sound.

If you have to film in that environment and I filmed once in a beautiful New York loft apartment that had beautiful cement floors and a gorgeous view of Manhattan behind me, so we just laid quilts and duvets and blankets on the floor to just absorb the sound a little bit. That’s all you need to do.

You can do that if you’re recording a podcast. You can do that if you find that you’re on a video call and it just sounds a bit hollow and echoey. So, you add something to soak up the sound. You checked with your landlord, and everything is fine.

Then you want to make sure there’s enough space to do it.

I know this sounds ridiculous, but if you have a very small balcony, then you need to make sure there’s enough space for two people. For you and your tripod and your lovely camera person. In this apartment, there’s another little, tiny little space. There’s no space for me to stand let alone two of us.

You can also do all of this without having a videographer but

I strongly recommend you do hire somebody local to do the recording.

All over the world, there are fantastically skilled people who come with great equipment, are very pleasant to work with and really don’t cost that much. Especially, compared to buying your own semi-professional camera, they are a world away.

They will also edit for you. Again, you don’t need anything fancy. It’s called in the industry ‘top and tail’. They will snip the top, snip the bottom and as long as you’ve managed one take where you sound like a fairly coherent human being, you’ll be fine.

Also you’ll know I’m shooting outside which as an Irish person in the direct sun is quite adventurous. We don’t normally do daylight very well. I would normally put sunscreen on to open the fridge.

But here, and in fact everywhere, you want direct light.

Natural sunlight is always going to be better than trying to shoot indoors.

I worked in lighting in film for 20 years and it hurts me to say this but it is always better to simply go outside and shoot.

Because if you don’t have a Hollywood level of hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of lighting it’s not going to look anywhere near as good as 3/4 light across your face and a little bit of direct light.

So, you go outside and shoot. You make sure there’s enough space for you and a cameraman or a camera person of any sort. You have hired someone local – and truly it will cost you a couple hundred bucks. It is worth it every time. I have shot with people all over the world and they have never let me down, always good. You have deadened the sound so it sounds great. And you have asked your landlord.

You do that and you can be churning out beautiful videos

– just as easily as I am and just as well.

In fact, please tag me on your next video. I would love to see it.

And if you have further questions come along to my next Q&A. There’ll be a link just below. And I would love to see you there.

Next live call is October 10, 2023 - Noon Eastern / 6pm UK.
Come along to ask your questions about launches, strategies for marketing, Masterminds or whatever you're stuck on in your business.

Add your email below and I'll send you the zoom info for the calls. See you there!

Or come say hello on Instagram here.  I microblog daily.