When Will and I started Fixation Video, we spent a lot (seriously. A. Lot.) of time dreaming up all the weekly video shows we’d launch. And then we took the plunge, started the company, and realised we needed to make some money, and fast. We put the weekly stuff on hold for a couple of months whilst we worked on some really big projects for some really excellent clients. And we had so much fun doing that, suddenly it was July. 2010.
But finally, we’re launching the show we’ve always wanted to make. Frackulous will be a weekly show about mobile apps, and it’ll be the kind of show that both Will and I would delight in watching, subscribing and interacting with. And if you see either of us in the next few weeks, you can guarantee it’s all we’re going to want to talk about.
We’re launching on Monday 19th July, but in the meantime, check out the video below for a taste of what’s on the horizon.
We’re convinced about the nature of online video, but that’s probably because we sit here, eating it, breathing it and swapping video links all the live long day. You, for instance, might have other things going on in your life - Powerpoint, say, or the need to find somewhere to host 50 thirsty and particular journalists tomorrow night.
So let us pour our knowledge into your ears, with an Online Video 101 Visit. We’d like to pop in for half an hour, and take the opportunity to explain to you, your colleagues and the cleaner why online video is so important, what it can do for you, and even what it can’t do for you (I believe that’s called transparency. Or reality). We’ll cover:
- the kinds of videos that work for various projects
- where you can host video, and the advantages and disadvantages of each
- how you can maximise views
- any other areas you’d particularly like to discuss
Best of all, we’ll do all this for no more than a couple of cups of coffee and a couple of biscuits. We won’t give you the hard sell, but we will leave you our business cards, in the hope that if we’ve convinced you about the awesomosity of online video, you’ll consider us when it comes to putting those videos together.
If that sounds like a nice way to spend half an hour, email us at hello@fixationvideo.com.
We love it when people ask our opinion, and we love telling people about why we’re the awesome-ist, so when Ranieri PR asked us to do both we jumped at the chance. You can read our interview here, which features secrets of the past, some self-congratulatory hair talk and political satire. Kind of.
This was on BoingBoing today (via @rich_trenholm) and has successfully blown the Fixation Video hivemind. We won’t be good for much this afternoon, as we’ve been left with no real faith in reality. Sorry about that.
One girl.
One green t-shirt.
One Friday afternoon.
I love this so much I’m going to insist we use a version of this in our forthcoming showreel, but this was just messing around procrastinating.
New ideas are coming thick and fast here at Fixation Video and the latest is to make it so that you can stay in the office, while we go out and capture footage from London-based press announcements.
Our test piece is today’s Nokia announcement that it’s releasing Ovi Maps with turn-by-turn navigation for free on all its devices. We’ve got both the full ten minute presentation by Anssi Vanjoki, Executive Vice President at Nokia, and a ten minute demo of the new app in action available for download as both standard and high definition B-roll footage in MPEG2 format. We’ve also got an audio only version too, if that’s more your thing.
If you want to kick the tyres first, here are preview versions of the presentation and demo you can view in Quicktime:
Nokia Ovi Maps Presentation preview
And if you want to see exactly what the full quality is like, you can grabs these short test clips of the standard and high def versions:
And the best bit is, as it’s just a trial you can have them for the low, low price of free. You can cut them up, edit them down, splice them into your own material or just sit back and watch them in full and it won’t cost you a penny. We still retain the copyright on the material, but you’re free to do what you want with it - you don’t even have to attribute the footage to us, although it would be nice. Just saying.
The SD ones are just uploading now and the HD and audio only versions will be available once they’re done. If you’d like the full clips, simply email us at hello@fixationvideo.com specifying which ones you want and we’ll send you the links so you can download them. Can’t say fairer than that.
We see no reason to be precious about our new greenscreen - in this Fixation utopia, we share (for a very reasonable fee).
That’s why we’re offering our studio space to you (as long as we’re not using it). It’s set up as a greenscreen, but we’ve got a white background, should you want something more… blah. If you don’t have your own lights, we can even supply those, for a little bit more money.
And because we’re not a dedicated studio rental company, we think you’ll find our fees cheaper than most other spaces in London. We might not have a perky receptionist or lay on breakfast, but we’ve got space, a kitchen and a slightly temperamental shower, and most importantly in these credit crunch-y times, we’re… cheap. Sorry, I mean value-riffic.
You can find out more on our special new page here.
It’s the middle of January, and that can mean only one thing - Fixation Video is jetlagged up to the eyeballs, thanks to returning from Vegas, and the Consumer Electronics Show. Just over a year after our ‘ok, yes, let’s DO THIS’ business start-y conversation, we were at the show working for a variety of clients, showing off both our video and our incredible scheduling skills.
We put together video for UK Trade and Investment, talking to the companies that won a place at CES Unveiled and generally finding out what people thought of the UK technology industry (they think it’s awesome).
We filmed videos of the hottest new gadgets announced at CES for top technology site, Reg Hardware, bagging the best hands-on with products like the Lenovo U1, the new Google Nexus One and the Eee Keyboard. Views for those videos are at 36,000 and counting…
Finally, we worked with Telecom TV to film the wonderful Leila Makki discussing her picks of the show. After we filmed the footage to their specifications, we sent it over to their in-house editing team to produce the finished video - just another service in our multi-faceted-online-bank-of-services-service-portfolio.
And when we weren’t doing any of this, we were either asleep, dancing on podiums claiming to be made of gold, or whizzing round on a scooter. Phew.
So, we’d like to welcome a new staff member to the Fixation Team. This staff member will mostly be sitting there, being green, and upright, and well lit. We’re going to call him Kermit, I think.
Since neither of us fancied clearing a room in our house to paint one wall green, we’ve gone and got ourselves a studio/office/HQ/somewhere to sleep when we’ve locked ourselves out our respective houses, which is awesome. Kermit is an important addition, as it means we can now get on with experimenting with some pretty cool shit, without having to worry about booking someone else’s studio space. So, I guess this is one of those alluding, pipeline-type posts, which are particularly annoying to read. Sorry about that.
In more concrete news, we’ll be at the Consumer Electronics Fair in Las Vegas from 4th-10th January, filming for a variety of clients. If you’re there, and fancy meeting up to crash a networking event with free booze and food, let us know. We are ALWAYS on board with those schemes.
“It’s got this… thing. That you kind of… twist. And then you see this menu option, which looks kinda… cool” - we reckon there are a lot of products out there that it’s easier to show than tell.
That’s why we’re offering a special CES package, creating short videos for those exhibiting at CES, which you can then load on a USB stick as part of the press pack, put onto YouTube ready for bloggers to embed or use on the stand itself.
We recently produced Sony’s product demo videos for IFA ‘09 and they ended up embedded in places like Engadget:
Sony Walkman S Series puts on its game face for video promo
The deal is this: we’ll come and film a demo of the product using a company spokesperson, edit together a 2 minute video and hand you over the file - all for £450, which is 25% cheaper than our standard rate for product demo videos.
For a bit of extra money we can do all this in a studio, provide a presenter and put together some whizzy graphics for the start and end slide, so if you’re after something a bit more slick, get in contact. We can also do package deals if you have several products you’d like to film.
We like to think of this as our Early Bird Special, so if you’re interested drop us a line: hello@fixationvideo.com