The pre-interview has made it so that I feel so much more confident going into production when I'm telling a story. Things still change as I go through and capture the pieces I need, but I have a pretty good idea of the story I want to tell and how it will relate to the audience I'm working to connect with.

Yes - having a team to lean on makes it so much more manageable! I recently directed/produced a 2 day shoot out of town where we had about 36 hours to conduct 4 interviews and gather b-roll, all while being unsure of the settings we'd be in. I did all the preproduction I could to answer some of those questions and craft the stories, but we found there were still so many unknowns. My stress level was significantly lower, though, because when we were on location I was able to delegate and collaborate, and as a result the stories are already looking to be even better than I had initially anticipated. Don't ever think it's all on your shoulders - if you have a team to work with, that's what they're there for. Filmmaking isn't an ego game - it's all about telling great stories.

Love it! It doesn't always work having them do the first draft on the script, but I felt pretty confident after talking with him, and then he delivered! Thanks for sharing!

@@SmartphoneStorytellers I’d have to imagine more often than not it doesn’t work out that well. But that was great synergy between you and the client to be able to use dialogue he’s very practiced with but then weave in the testimonials in a way that was fluid and not forced feeling. About 10 yrs ago, I worked for a couple small NPO organizations (finance and operations side) and we would have killed to have something like this. Really great stuff.

It really does make the shoot day less stressful. I've also found that it opens up the relationship between myself and the client to be able to push back on ideas when something is presented that may not be best for the video. It helps them to see that you're invested in the project beyond it just being a gig, and I've found they're more likely to trust my input as we make decisions.

That's great! Preproduction when working on a narrative is even more important - there are so many moving parts that if you don't do the prepro, then you're going to be focusing more on logistics and not enough on the performance.

That's a great way to look at it - preproduction is the "measure twice" aspect of construction, the cut once is when you're on set executing it. Great analogy!

So true! I still tend to shoot more b-roll than I end up using, but when it comes to the edit I try to be ruthless in making sure that I'm only using the pieces that work best for that story. It hurts to cut out the pieces that are good, but if they're distracting from the story you're telling then they're only hurting you.

Yep. There certainly is a chance everything will still work out great, but you may be leaving so much potential on the table if you don't do pre-production!

Love the transparency - I've completely been there before. It can be hard to take the time ahead of the shoot to really dive in. And it doesn't mean every video ends up not being good - it just leaves potential on the table and makes the project a bit more stressful. I'd encourage you to take even an hour before the next project to at least think through a few of the pieces - you'll never know what inspiration may come from it!

Love it - a great script can still fall flat if it doesn't sound like the person who's delivering it. Especially if that person has a "known voice."

100% - the number of times I've set a solid plan for a project only to show up to the shoot and need to change things is more than I can count. There are so many moving parts that can impact what you're actually able to capture.

It can be difficult to put the time aside, but it always pays off for me!