Our Product is Explanation
All posts for “ourwork”
A few weeks ago, we posted "Seeking Producers of Video Explanations" and wrote:
We see an opportunity for a win-win. Every day, we receive multiple emails from organizations that are looking for custom explanatory videos... The opportunity we see is to create a way, through our website, to help organizations find video producers who can be hired to produce custom videos.
Since that time, we've been working on a project to bring this idea to life. It's called the Common Craft Explainer... Continue Reading
What is an Explanation?
Posted by: leelefever on November 12, 2008- 4:00pm
Categories: Explanation, feedback, openthread, ourwork, thisite
Sachi and I been talking about this and we're curious what you think. What is an explanation? What are the skills required to be a good explainer? What makes a good explanation?
Client Video: Ford Sync in Plain English
Posted by: leelefever on November 2, 2008- 4:00pm
Categories: clientproduction, ourwork, paperworks, plainenglish, video
We were hired by Ford Motor Company and Social Media Group to produce this video about Sync - a Microsoft technology that uses voice activation to control cell phones and mp3 players. In learning about the technology, we became fans of Sync, especially now that you can get a ticket in Washington State for holding a phone while driving.
For quite a while now, we’ve been flattered to see others create videos that appear very similar to ours. In many cases, these are positive videos that are used as classroom exercises. We encourage others in the education world to create Common Craft-inspired videos. Of course, some producers have taken the idea in new directions and mediums, which we also encourage. Further, some producers choose to publicly attribute Common Craft for inspiring their work - and we deeply appreciate this kind... Continue Reading
Yesterday I had a great talk/interview with Jeff DeCagna of Principled Innovation for his P.I. Podcast. We talked about the Common Craft story, but also about "Being Lightweight", based on the recent series of posts. Big thanks to Jeff for the invitation.
Have a listen on Jeff's site.
For the last few months, we've been "foundation building." For us, this means taking the time to focus on the business behind Common Craft and how we communicate our business to you. Our goal is clarity - if we are clear about the exact business that we run, then we're more able to illustrate our value to potential customers. It's hard work and something we're excited to see come to fruition. Now that it's in place, we can really focus on videos.
The elements of the foundation:
Licenses -... Continue Reading
Making the Election Video: Behind the Scenes
Posted by: leelefever on September 1, 2008- 5:00pm
Categories: Behind the Scenes, election, government, home, lessons, ourwork, video
People often ask for a look at how we make the videos. When we were putting together the the "Electing a US President" video, I made a special point to take photos of the process. Here's how it works:
Every video starts with a script. If there is "secret sauce" it happens in writing the script because the script drives the video. We use Google Docs to collaborate until we feel like the script is close to finished. Then, we start looking at a thumbnail storyboard.
I draw the scenes for the... Continue Reading
The Google Reader team hired us to create this one minute introduction to Google Reader.
Our other videos for Google include:
Google Docs
Mobile Maps (My Location)
Google Apps with Salesforce
View all of our custom client productions.
The Demand for "Explainers" and The Giant Pool of Money
Jay Rosen has written article that I could quote 1000 times. It's called National Explainer: A Job for Journalists on the Demand Side of News. It focuses on the huge success of an episode of "This American Life" called The Giant Pool of Money, which serves to explain the US mortgage crisis.
This episode has been downloaded 50,000 times more than any other episide. Why? Because the producers (Ira Glass and Alex Blumberg) focused on explanation instead of information.
When we talk about... Continue Reading
We are blown away with the response to the recent post "What Videos Should We Make?" Not just the quantity (over 50 comments and lots of email), but the quality. It's exciting to see suggestions that have opened up new ideas and ones that fit with a couple of the themes that have been top-of-mind.
As I've told Sachi recently, it feels a little like we're at the edge of a pool, preparing to jump in. We're confident that we're on the right track, but the content of our future videos will... Continue Reading