2019 Aims & Objectives

Well it’s that time again. January, a month that always seems to feel like a long Christmas & New Year hangover. Usually the time to think about how to burn off the excesses of mince pies and all the turkey trimmings…

Most of us will be back to work within the first week of January and that is no different for those of us in the creative industries. The festive period usually gives us some time to down tools and enjoy some time with family and friends.

For me, January is a month of relative excitement. Looking forward to a new year and a fresh start. Perhaps a chance to look at the previous year’s material and put together the latest showreel (that is coming soon friends, don’t worry!).

2018 was a huge leap into the unknown for me. At the end of March I took the plunge to leave my day job and pursue my business full time, a goal I had looked to achieve for quite some time. I actually felt relatively confident with the amount of work I already had in place.

Rather luckily it paid off, with some unexpected extra gigs coming in to help see us through the remainder of the year.

Admittedly there have been some highs and lows, some stresses and quite a few late nights but nobody said running your own business was easy. I will always maintain that the key is riding through every wave, no matter the difficulty as you will always get to the end of it.

One thing’s for sure is that every part of it has been a learning curve and that is where things have brought us here in January 2019.

Taking everything I have learned in the last 12 months, I am looking in to the New Year with some new aims and objectives. There are many things due to shift around and that is the reason for writing here about it…so let’s get right in to it!

Blog

One thing I felt I neglected in 2018 was a regular update to the blog. I love writing and sharing my advice and knowledge with anyone who may stumble upon it. When I initially got my website going around 2015/16, I knew I wanted to include a blog. I understood the benefits of writing about topics linked to the business I’m in, though also knew it was something that would have to be regularly updated and fed with new content. I felt a monthly update was achievable and for the first year that almost came to fruition. My trouble thereafter was that my workload began to get in the way which meant the blog started to fall by the digital wayside, not least of course because I hadn't researched any new topics to cover.

In 2019 that is set to change. My aim is to commit to at least one new post per month, and would like to add some new types of posts or categories not previously covered. So far I have 11 topics I aim to cover in 2019 (great start don’t you think!?).

Alongside the usual post styles giving advice aiming towards potential clients and anyone who is simply curious, I will look to include some equipment and gear reviews - but not in the typical sense. There are plenty equipment reviews out there, well covered on blogs and in video form on YouTube, particially catered for the geeks that are interested (hands up - me included!).

The aim I hope for these reviews are to discuss a particular feature of a product which really interests me or has changed the way I work. Alternatively this may also take the form of highlighting a quirk or a feature I have discovered within a product I use and is currently not well documented, hopefully serving to help fellow photographers and filmmakers.

Although these posts won’t be for everyone’s interest, this year I am taking the rather ruthless approach and releasing content which satisfies my own objectives as well. There will be other posts which may be of interest to you and personally, I feel by not writing and publishing my own posts I am limiting my reach and potential engagement with a new audience. This may or may not work but I am willing to take the risk and commit to these instalments to see how they work out in the long run.

The Atomos Ninja V recently highlighted a strange yet rarely documented quirk. Look out for a post detailing this very soon.

On that front, look out shortly for a quick and dirty note about an issue I discovered whilst using the recently launched Atomos Ninja V.

Website

One of the more progressive changes will be some layout and design alterations to the website. This something that will take some time to work on in the background, so expect some minor tweaks on the current layout before a complete refresh, fitting in with our new brand identity.

Brand Identity

Speaking of which, you may have noticed a new logo appearing here and across the social media presence.

Through 2018 I have been working with Stuart McQuarrie of Artl Design to concept a fresh brand identity.

The old logo was drawn and designed by friend Shauni Brown whilst running her Bold Tea designs business venture. Shauni done a cracking job on creating the original logo and designing business cards which really helped settle a brand identity for the first few years of business.

As the business was growing however, both in terms of workload and clientele but also in the way my work was being delivered and my style developing, I felt a new, updated look and identity could help reflect the direction I am heading towards.

I got chatting with Stuart at a business show early last year and after a few meetings, I was confident he could interpret my vision into a fresh and modern brand identity which would help take us to the next step.

Take a look at our new logo in action for our ending screen which will appear on showreels and commercial projects.

Work

The most prominent change in 2019 I hope to achieve is a shift towards more commercial and editorial work.

2018 certainly brought a good variety of projects and also saw our busiest year yet with wedding films. 16 weddings at 11 different venues was a 100% increase over 2017.

Wedding filmmaking is growing in popularity and is certainly a great area of filmmaking to be involved with. Throughout 2018 however, I realised some minor aspects of the genre I was beginning to enjoy less.

As a workaround, I will be restructuring my wedding film packages in my quest to keep the creative juices flowing and hopefully speed up turnaround times - a win win situation for everyone.

A shift toward more commercial and editorial projects, both in stills and video for me would be a way to further develop my craft as well as hopefully being more flexible in my workload. There are some key areas I wish to explore and introduce some new services, such as real estate & property walkthrough videos and 360 virtual tours - some exciting 360 and VR content coming soon!

Furthermore, personal projects and test footage will become more prominent, again echoing my previous comment about fulfilling my own creative desires with the content I release. Personal projects are always an excellent way to display technical and creative skill, as well as potentially reaching a new audience.

Behind the scenes on a corporate video shoot.

Social Media

With Facebook and Instagram now including some great tools and features to help engage with audience, I feel in 2019 I should utilise these to boost my social media game. Recently I have become more active on Instagram, using Stories quite regularly. With regards to Facebook, I felt I somewhat neglected my profile in much the same way as not updating the blog so reguarly. I know I have many followers on Facebook who may not see posts on Instagram so i feel I should keep everyone in the loop on both platforms more effectively.

Some of the content you may see appear more often is behind the scenes content. Having done a bit of research, I found that people quite like to see the process going in to some of the projects i’m working on, so look out for this as the year goes on!

If you haven’t already, go follow us on Facebook & Instagram!

Learn more about the process behind our film production.

Hopefully that rounds out some of the plans I have in place for 2019. One of the reasons for writing about these intentions is to aim and commit to them, perhaps looking back at this time in 2020 and see how much was actually achieved.

I’d be interested to know what kind of content you’d like to see throughout the year. Comment below and let’s start the conversation!

Whatever your plans or resolutions may be, I hope you have a fantastic year!

Dan