Production with the Web

StudioNow, a web-based marketplace for video production, allows Sean Green to add to his income by editing electronic press kits and music videos.

The last few columns have shown how companies employ the Internet to foster production and post, whether by improved collaboration or new tools such as fast, secure Web storage.

It's increasingly obvious that the economy's integration with the interconnected media of the Web is a trend production professionals must figure out how to embrace or risk becoming irrelevant.

Simply put, the Web sells.

According to The Kelsey Group's U.S. Local Video Forecast for 2007-2012, for example, local online video ad revenues will see “considerable growth” over the next several years. Increases from $10.9 million in 2007 to $1.5 billion by the end of 2012 are forecast, with video ad products representing some 11.6 percent of the online advertising budgets of small and midsize businesses by 2012.

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reel-exchange Collaborate Better Online Web Video Moves Beyond Distribution

So how does a production professional get involved? Digital Content Producer and millimeter's own Reel-Exchange (reel-exchange.com) is one approach. This business-to-business community — with downloadable sample reels — offers one way to connect film and video professionals, locally and internationally, so that they might share project work and permanent positions, or even find potential collaborators for on-spec projects.

Manhattan Edit Workshop offers another variation on web-powered work opportunities. The small but busy training center in lower Manhattan has been providing courses since 2004 for editors seeking to improve their Apple and Avid NLE skills.

Founder/owner Josh Apter says that as facilities turned in increasing numbers to the workshop in their search for proficient editors, he realized it made sense to use the school's website to help place graduates.

“We allow anyone taking the classes — even if they've done so years ago — to showcase their reel on our alumni webpage, enabling potential employers to make a decision on their own,” Apter says.

Nashville, Tenn.-based StudioNow takes things a step further, creating what CEO David Mason calls a “new model of production” that corresponds to the dramatic changes in budgets and profits as media moves to the Web. “Analog dollars are being turned into digital cents,” says Mason, arguing that the move to online video requires a totally different economic calculation. Since web distribution can't yet monetize content like television can, Mason says, production costs must be radically cut if producers want to work.

StudioNow aids that by aggregating thousands of working video professionals via its website. “This enables us to build an on-demand resource to create content at a significantly reduced cost compared to the traditional production model of the last 20 years,” Mason says.

One example is StudioNow client Citysearch. For Citysearch, the company regularly sends out videographers to document their local businesses. Following a set template for both shooting and editing, the final short videos go up within days to that city's Citysearch website. For each job, StudioNow — which offers a regular series of tests to would-be freelancers — sends emails to vetted professionals in its network, bidding out both the shooting and the editing.

Sean Green, who is in business with his father at Nashville-based DigitalMaster, enjoys the added income from work on electronic press kits (EPKs) and music videos for StudioNow. While the set editing fee for a short project might be $55, he also earned $4,000 for a larger behind-the-music documentary project that required him to turn in several versions running from 4 minutes to 15 minutes.

“It's a good thing StudioNow has a marketing department,” says Green, who has worked on projects over the past two years. “There's only so much I can do by myself in Nashville.”