A human-centric corporate film project (part I)
Brief
In March 2019, I was working on a project for We-ef ANZ for their 25th anniversary. I was in partnership with Sydney-based photographer Jackie Chan. The brief was simple - we were asked to create a series of short films to celebrate this milestone and great achievement. This was part of their 25th anniversary marketing campaign and the clips were widely used on their social media platform and AILA International Festival of Landscape Architecture 2019. We have filmed 9 videos in total and each film heroes a key staff from the company.
Challenge
The biggest challenge was the tight time frame and the geographic barriers. We-ef ANZ is based in Melbourne so Jackie and I needed to travel there with our filming gears (i.e. cameras, lighting, audio recorders, etc) for filming. (Thank you we didn’t have a pandemic back then!) We only had 3 days to complete literally everything, from reece to meet-and-greet to produce to film. Apart from these, the execution of the concept is particularly challenging. We have 9 x individual storyboards for each staff, we need to make sure each one is unique and special but also maintaining the theme consistently and and cohesively throughout all the videos.
Approach
We-ef is such a great client. We established a very collaborative relationship from the outset and trust was built soon after the project was started. When trust and collaboration go hand in hand, you know a great project is going to be born. From concept development to storyboarding to filming, timing was super tight but yet a smooth-sailing process. We took a very human centric approach to this project. When we filmed the staff, as much as we want to spend more time and get to know everyone better, we only had a ridiculously short limited time (Again, 3 days for 9x staff including travelling time!) for each person. There were sleepless nights at the airbnb places banging our heads against our wall to come up with the storyboards, framing, scheduling etc etc. It really was challenging but I dare say this is also the most enjoyable project that I’ve worked at for a very long time.
Results
Each film brings out the emotions and true story of every staff, which honestly it’s quite rare and unexpected to be seen in a corporate film. And guys, that’s the true power of strong storytelling.