Grow Your Video Business with Ryan Koral

Find the original post at: podcast.studiosherpas.com "It takes more than pointing your camera at a human to really capture character in your video. While most wedding have a bunch of people, and often prominently feature a couple, they rarely have any character." This was the opening line of a recently published blog post by today's guest, Patrick Moreau. The blog post in question was titled Why Most Wedding Films Suck, and needless to say, it ruffled some feathers. Patrick joins us today to dive deeper into the sentiments that drove him to write the post, and what the average filmmaker can do to not only produce films that don't suck, but ones that cross borders and inspire viewers beyond the wedding film industry. If you don't know Patrick already, he's the co-founder of Stllmotion, a video company that went from shooting their first wedding with photo and video for $250, alllllll the way to shooting for some of the biggest brands in the world a few years later. How big? How about the NFL, MLB, CBS, Callaway, Canon, Toyota. The list goes on. Really big. Oh, and they've also won five Emmys. Do you want to hear the crazy part? Many of those brands approached Stillmotion to work with them after seeing one of their wedding videos. Hard to believe right? The thing is, Patrick and his team are master storytellers, and the elements of a well-told story remain the same no matter what you're covering. Whether it's one of the most important days of a couple's life together, or one of the most important days of a bunch of 300-pound dudes smashing the crap out of each other, the principals are the same. Patrick's frustration with the lack of storytelling chops in the industry is the focus of his other company, Muse Storytelling. At Muse, he teaches filmmakers how learning the art of storytelling is the biggest thing you can do to move your business forward. It's storytelling, not a new drone or camera setup that is the thing that's going to elevate you to getting those 10, 20, and 50 thousand dollar clients on a consistent basis. Storytelling has become something of a buzzword as of late, but we want to clarify what it really means, and how you can go about crafting great stories, and getting paid what your worth to tell them.

Find the original post at: podcast.studiosherpas.com Unless you've been living under a rock for the past… well, ever... You've probably realized that our industry is going through some pretty major changes. A lot of these changes are scary to us as filmmakers and video producers. Budgets seem to be getting smaller, and it gets harder and harder for us to stand out from the hordes of insanely talented filmmakers that we often find ourselves competing for jobs with. Pat McGowan is a filmmaker with over thirty years of experience in the industry and has watched these shifts take place over time and adapted to them along the way. He's the owner of inMotion, a film house based in Ottawa, Canada, as well as his new service BlackBox. He's watched what he calls the commoditization of video content take place, with giant companies taking a major stake in content production and consignment. Pat realized that there had to be a way for the average video producer to capitalize on the ownership of the content sitting on their archived drives, and earn some passive income in the process. He created BlackBox as a way to help video content owners streamline the process of contributing to stock footage companies, taking care of the entire backend process, and allowing content creators to do what they do best: Create. Great. Content.

Find the original post at: podcast.studiosherpas.com Ok, confession time. There was a time in my filmmaking and creative business journey where I almost let the business take over my life. I let the work that I was doing take over more and more of the energy and attention that I should have been focusing on my family, and I learned some really hard lessons from it. Joey and Aaron of 31 Films and Film Lab Creative were getting established in this business around the same time as I was, I'd I've been watching and admiring their work for a number of years. Right from the beginning, the thing that set founder Joey's companies apart in my mind was the culture he established. He's been able to take his companies from a one-man operation to bringing in Aaron, to now having seven full-time editors on staff! Of course, it wasn't easy for them, and they too have learned many hard lessons along the way (don't we all?). It's never easy, knowing when it's time to bring in someone else to help grow your business, but Joey has some great insights into what's worked for him. Not only has he grow his companies, but he's maintained a healthy work-life balance and focus on family for both his employees and himself.

Find the original post at: podcast.studiosherpas.com If you're like me, at some point in your life you've probably aspired to making it big and breaking into Hollywood as a director, producer, DP, editor, etc. But where did this idea of success come from? Rob Hardy was an indie filmmaker working 18 hours days on projects he wasn't passionate about, with people he didn't click with, burning himself trying to achieve that goal. He was at the point of asking himself if he even wanted to be a filmmaker before realizing that there were many paths to a successful film career, most of which don't lead to Hollywood. Rob now runs The Filmmaker's Process, a blog and growing community of indie filmmakers where he guides readers on how to redefine success for themselves, according to their own circumstances, talents, and values. He's also passionate about building a worldwide directory of film professionals to make it easier to connect with partners for our creative projects. Few if any of us will realize the dream of consistently working on Hollywood films, but that doesn't mean that we can't create fulfilling and successful film careers on our own. It just means we need to think hard about what success means to us and take one small step at a time to get us there.

Find the original post at: podcast.studiosherpas.com "You get to a point where there's always going to be something that could hold you back, and you have to decide, 'Ok, at which point am I not going to let that something be a hindrance to me starting to check things off of that bucket list that so many people have but they never actually get through." [33:57] I've been a friend and admirer of Ron Dawson for over a decade now, and he seems to have a way of making everything he touches turn to gold. Ron is currently the host of Radio Film School, a podcast that many call "This American Life for filmmakers". Before RFS though, Ron had started 2 more uber-popular podcasts geared towards the film and photography industry. Ron is now in the process of filming his first feature documentary, as well as transitioning his business and family into becoming global digital nomads. As with all successful people, Ron's story has not been without struggle. In this episode, he shares how some of the hard times have inspired his life and business and forced him to focus only on the most high-value pursuits.

Find the original post at: podcast.studiosherpas.com Ok, I hate to be the one to bring back these horrible memories, but do you remember how painful it was when every project delivery was done through DVD? Yeah, I hear ya, dealing with the whole DVD process was the first thing I offloaded when I hired my first employee, and I could not have been happier to never have to deal with it again. We've largely moved on from physical deliverables these days, but Dropbox and USB stick deliveries, while easier definitely lack the experience that DVDs and Blu-Rays gave. In this episode we're talking with Michael Guastamacchio, co-founder of MediaZilla a content delivery service that delivers the best of both worlds. Michael and his team work to provide an immersive viewing experience for your clients, while saving you from the tedium of physical deliverables.

Find the original post at: podcast.studiosherpas.com Are you one of those classic creatives who loves what they do, and is really great at it, but struggles with taking control of their business and capitalizing on their talent. I know I am, but if there's one thing I've learned, it's that just because you're a creative type person, doesn't mean you can't master the business skills as well. Brennan Dunn is the founder of Double Your Freelancing, a blog, podcast and online platform dedicated to helping creative freelancers such as videographers, photographers, software developers and more make the most of their talents and grow their businesses. Whether you're just starting out in your freelancing career, or have been doing it a while but want to take it to the next level, there are a ton of practices you can implement to your business and client relationships that will help you grow your business fast, and Brennan is here to share some of them with us today. I've been doing this kind of creative work for over a decade, but after signing up to Brennan's email list a couple of months ago and going through one of his free courses, I picked up so much useful information that I've already begun applying to my own business.

Find the original post at: podcast.studiosherpas.com You know what one of my favorite emails that I get every single week is? It's the email telling me that a client has just booked with me and my team. Then a few minutes later I get a second email with their retainer payment, then another that they've signed the contract. The best part about these emails is that I can be off spending time with my kids, or my wife, or working on other parts of my business while an automated system takes care of my new leads and clients. Adam Fried is the owner of ShootQ, having acquired the software company within the past year. In this episode, he shares his vision for how he and his team are revamping ShootQ to make it the very best studio management software on the market. My teams and I have been using ShootQ to manage our clients and workflows for the past ten years and I absolutely love it. This is one of those rare pieces of software that actually frees me up entirely to focus on the things I want to, like creating amazing films for my clients. That said, as much as I love the software, there were certainly more than a few pain points and complexities in the program. Adam basically checked off each of my concerns one by one, and it seems like pretty much every gripe I had has been addressed, and improved upon. While we'll have to wait until the end of Q1 2017 to get our hands on it, I have a feeling that this new version of ShootQ might just be one of my favorite tools that helps me run my businesses successfully.

Find the original post at: podcast.studiosherpas.com "A lot of really smart people don't get around to doing nothin'. They like to think about it, they like to read about it, and then they go to the next book and they listen to the next podcast, and they attend the next workshop, and they talk and they talk about what they're going to do. But then they don't ever get around to doing nothin'." [19:10] As creatives, a lot of us struggle to move into the launch or action phase of our pursuits. Like Ben Hartley, today's guest says, we think and talk and plan but often fail to pull the trigger. Well, if you need some motivation, Ben might just be your guy. Ben is the founder of Style and Story Creative, an award winning wedding photography and commercial videography agency that has been featured on Creative Live, The Today Show, The Huffington Post and more. He also runs the Six Figure Photography Podcast and blog aimed at helping photographers achieve success in their business, but in a way that complements their ideal lifestyle. Before all this success however, Ben was a restaurant server with a degree in oil painting who just happened to hear about a job opening at a local video production studio. With no experience in video, through determination and action, Ben found a way to get that job, ultimately leading to a long and successful career in video and photography. After hearing Ben's story, you'll be hard pressed to come up with excuses about why the time isn't right to pursue this project, or why you can't achieve that goal.

Find the original post at: podcast.studiosherpas.com I know, I know, I've been there. As creators it often feels like cheating to use templates or have anyone else do work on our projects for us. To be honest though, sometimes that's exactly what's needed to finish a project on time, or to be able to spend any time whatsoever with our families and loved ones. That's exactly why Eri Levin and Tyler Williams, co-founded Motion Array, a creative marketplace with a variety of digital assets that include Premiere Pro templates, After Effects templates, stock music and stock video. Their goal is not to reduce the creativity of video producers and editors, but rather allow them to save time on their projects and focus their creative energies where it really matters. Their content is all highly curated, meaning that everything they offer is the highest quality possible.