Broadband Solutions are a Melbourne-based company that provide tailor-made phone and internet solutions for a wide range of clients. Here’s how we used video to help them stand out from the crowd!
The Brief
Dream Engine were contacted by Broadband Solutions to make a series of web videos. These web videos, including a range of case study videos and a whole-company “About Us” video, were designed to show new clients their range of specialty expertise.
Our aim with these videos were to demonstrate what Broadband Solutions do, in a way that was engaging and entertaining for their audience. Case study videos are used to gain credibility with potential clients by showing them how you’ve solved problems for similar businesses, and the results of your work.
Setting the right tone
Its important to set the right tone with these kind of videos. Case study videos need to be conversational and authentic, because if the viewer thinks that they’ve been scripted, then they won’t work. It’s best to have the subjects in the videos telling the story in their own words. When you get the audience to connect with the subjects of the your video on a personal level, the message is powerful because it’s genuine.
To achieve this for the Broadband Solutions videos, we had each interview set on location as opposed to in a controlled studio. There was no script. We just asked their satisfied customers questions, and they answered them truthfully. This means that these case study videos are totally authentic; it’s the company’s clients talking about Broadband Solutions’ impact on their business, from within their place of work. It doesn’t get much more real than that!
And it’s not just the visuals that benefit from being shot on-location, either. Subtle sounds like children playing in the background put the viewer in the space and help tell the customer’s story.
Telling the story
The first step was starting out at the Broadband Solutions head office. This gave us an opportunity to get to know what the team did and how they did it. We started by interviewing some of their employees, which gave us a better idea of what our cutaway footage would need to be and what we would need to cover on location.
Making the office space look professional and attractive on camera was the aim; to do this we used a special lens that gives an extremely thin depth of field. The result was that any objects in the background like bookshelves or lamps blurred away into lovely soft shapes while the subjects stayed sharp and in focus.
This technique allows you to shoot in spaces that are visually sparse on camera but still achieve an interesting look.
As always, making full use of our lighting kit was the next step to creating a clean, professional look that would reflect well on our client. Lighting does a lot to set the mood so it’s important to get this right.
With direct harsh light, the shadows on a subject can be unflattering or dramatic but we wanted to achieve the opposite. Our usual soft lights were set up to light the subjects nicely. We also used some small battery powered LED lights that were carefully hidden behind pot plants or other objects to make the scenery more dynamic.
The next step in the project was to begin travelling to some of Broadband Solutions client base in order to start getting some customer testimonials.. We started in Melbourne and then branched out further to film in Sydney. We wanted to give the viewer a really good sense of the space that these clients work in and show the benefits of the work that Broadband Solutions has done for them.
Over a number of days we visited different locations shooting interviews and cutaway footage. Because the Broadband Solutions clients were donating their time we ensured we were punctual and professional at all times. It’s a small thing – but it’s important to us!
Carefully choosing some music that would complement the tone of the story was the next step. Just like lighting, the music needed to set the right mood so we chose something that sounded confident and upbeat. When every little detail like sound, light and colour are working together then your message is so much more convincing.
We were really happy with the whole project and the client loved it too. Broadband Solutions have now implemented the videos on their website so that new clients can learn about what they do and see how effective they are at providing complete solutions to their customers.
If you want to create content to show the world what you do then contact Dream Engine today.
Ryan Spanger is one of Melbourne’s most respected and sought-after video production professionals. Ryan founded Dream Engine in 2002, and specialises in helping medium to large corporates, government departments, and the non-profit sector to connect with their audience more effectively by using video.
