SkillCasting

While catching up on my RSS feeds this morning, Gizmodo had this post. Watch this.

Landscapes: Volume Two from Dustin Farrell on Vimeo.

The photographer is Dustin Farrell and he shot this with a Canon 5D2 DSLR. Mr. Farrell, bravo!

I watched Amazon’s Kindle Fire video in awe. Yes, I think the Fire is an intriguing new device but it was the video that caught my eye!

Differentiate your video marketing

These are your typical “talking head” type of videos. I like how they had multiple speakers, at different angles, and different focal points. The background is cleaver too. I like the tan backdrop with the backlight behind the speaker. It provides a nice gradient effect. But what I think stole the show were the special effect drawings illustrating the talking points of each speaker.

I produce a lot of talking head types of videos because they’re less expensive to produce and they allow the speaker to connect with the viewer. These types of special effects can really transform a regular talking head video into something really special though. However, I know it’s not for everyone. And lets face it, few small businesses around Overland Park have the budget of Amazon. But when you’re planning your video, think about ways to differentiate your video marketing and illustrate your talking points to make your video marketing more effective and memorable.

The people behind An Inconvenient Truth have turned their sights on the educational challenges in America. Definitely not a small undertaking. Now I won’t get into all the politics on this or their previous effort. But what is aparent though is the fact that training and education aren’t going anywhere. Yes, it’s morphing. But there is more of a need now than ever to coach, train, and educate.

Here’s their promo video:

TakePart: Participant Media – Waiting For ‘Superman’ – Infographic from Jr.canest on Vimeo.

What do you want to teach? How are you going to do it?

[via Lars Hyland]

I was reading an article over at CNet on how Tiffen was introducing a “steadicam” for the iPhone. If you’re not familiar with steadicams, they’re camera mounts that are typically counter-balanced to smooth out the camera movement. If you’ve ever watched a video shot with a handheld camcorder, you’ll immediately understand the benefit of a steadicam. They remove all the camera shaking.

But this post isn’t about steadicams. I wanted to watch the video to learn more but what really caught my eye is that I think this entire video was produced with Apple’s Keynote presentation tool. This is important because the average user can create a video just like this. Where something like this used to cost thousands of dollars, we’re now able to produce this at home.

I see transitions & effects that are native to Keynote here. QuickTime video is easily embedded into Keynote and adding a soundtrack is easy too. What do you think? Was this created entirely in Keynote?

So here we have a decent size company producing videos with Keynote. It makes me wonder what individuals and small businesses can produce. Do you have any examples of professional “down & dirty” videos you’ve produced? Let me know in the comments.

Nancy Duarte from Duarte Design produced a very polished presentation with their 5 rules for effective presentations. If you’re not familiar with Nancy, she wrote the book Slide:ology – The Art and Science of Creating Great Presentations. This books is so good, I ordered copies of it for my contractors in 2008. Nancy knows how to develop a great presentation.

Now what I’ve found interesting with this is that she did it entirely in PowerPoint 2010. I know most of her presentations have been done in Keynote. In addition to great presentation tips, this video makes me want to at least look at the new PowerPoint.

Does this mean Microsoft may actually be getting hip?