It’s Easter…and you only get one shot at it

Excepting the fact that we’ve been able to buy Hot Cross Buns and Easter Eggs since the stores took down Christmas decorations, Easter is an important time for many clients’ marketing calendars.

It’s the time of year that—all things chocolate—becomes a fervid obsession for all of us.

Getting the food money-shot

Getting the perfect melting chocolate shot is up there as one of a visual producer’s all-time greatest challenges. With chocolate it has to be right the first time. Miss it, and the scene needs to be set up all over again. More time. More product. More money.

Social media has become so integral to clients’ marketing plans. Almost 10% of all marketing budgets are being allocated to these online channels and this expected to continue to grow over traditional marketing channels.

Enter still photography’s close cousin—video

Video content has well and truly made its mark in this space, with engagement figures demonstrating the power of video versus stills for cut-through1.

BuzzFeed’s Tasty food video brand is a perfect example of knowing the power of food video production. Some of their simplest recipe how-to videos take engagement to a mega-scale, reaching upwards of 180 million views. While this brand has been around for three years and has a multi-million dollar publishing company backing it, it serves to show consumers’ love for all things food.

Maximising video budget

Today’s agile marketing teams understand the need for an always-on content strategy, seeding content to to build a band of committed followers. This means there is a great need to cost efficiently produce video content.

If the videographer doesn’t have the equipment and know-how to produce this type of content, the chances of getting multiple videos done in a day is slim. If you need to reshoot because you missed the money shot, there is a chance that your budget and time restraints won’t stretch to doing it over.

The importance of style

The importance of food styling—having an intimate knowledge of how food behaves when shooting video under varying light conditions—is paramount. Unless you or your client has deep pockets, you don’t have the luxury of endless takes when filming food video.

Knowing the right angle for the lighting and the camera makes all the difference when you’re capturing the perfect icing sugar sifting slow-mo or that delicious get-in-my-belly gooey chocolate spill, as the spoon breaks through the delicious outer core of a lava cake.  

Hop to it

While the Feast team is finessing every angle of our chocolate, we’re sending out wishes for you to heartily enjoy yours this Easter….and if you need help with that, you know who to call!

1 https://www.ama.org/publications/MarketingNews/Pages/video-content-about-to-explode.aspx