{"id":2921,"date":"2012-03-13T09:00:08","date_gmt":"2012-03-13T16:00:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/fwdlabs.com\/blog\/?p=2921"},"modified":"2015-07-12T00:11:07","modified_gmt":"2015-07-12T07:11:07","slug":"making-googles-best-best-man","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/fwdlabs.com\/blog\/making-googles-best-best-man\/","title":{"rendered":"Making Google&#8217;s &#8220;Best Best Man&#8221;"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Best Best Man - Google Docs for Android\" width=\"640\" height=\"360\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/iwmG43D0vD4?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/fwdlabs.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/google-android-commercial.jpg\" alt=\"\" title=\"google-android-commercial\" width=\"320\" height=\"240\" class=\"alignright size-full wp-image-2923\" \/><\/p>\n<p>David Kruschke works at Studio G, Google\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s in house video production team, as a director, producer, and editor. FWD:labs spoke with him about the new spot, &#8220;Best Best Man &#8211; Google Docs for Android.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p><strong class=\"q\">What were your decisions behind the &#8220;best man&#8221; storyline?<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong class=\"a\">David Kruschke<\/strong> We thought a wedding would be a fun and interesting reason for people to collaborate.  It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s also something people could easily relate to. We tried to emphasize the fun side of it with our production design and character quips. <\/p>\n<p><strong class=\"q\">And, the camera angles that anonymize the user while demonstrating gestures and features?<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong class=\"a\">DK<\/strong> I wasn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t specifically seeking to anonymize the user.  If you watch closely, all the characters actually have personalities that come across by the type of edits and changes they make to the best man\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s speech.<\/p>\n<p>The camera angle came about because I wanted the look and feel of a wedding but didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t want to use green screen or go on location.  By shooting top down, we were able to convey the essence of a wedding by building what I call \u00e2\u20ac\u0153micro sets\u00e2\u20ac\u009d.  These sets look realistic from a bird\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s eye perspective (top down), but if the camera was angled any other way, you would see the studio and the lighting gear.<\/p>\n<p><strong class=\"q\">What would you say are the key elements to keep in mind when directing a product video and what do you have to avoid?<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong class=\"a\">DK<\/strong> You need to remember the main message you want the audience to take away from the video and have a strong vision about how you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re going to achieve that.  It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a short amount of time and you do not want to distract from the message.<\/p>\n<p><strong class=\"q\">How much time did it take to shoot the video vs. time spent in post-production?<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong class=\"a\">DK<\/strong> Thanks to the great team of people we worked with, the video only took two days to shoot.  <\/p>\n<p>Since I was also the editor for this project, I stayed late on day one and assembled the footage.  On day two, I spent my lunch and breaks cutting in the selects.  By the end of the shoot, I had a pretty good rough cut to show.  Two weeks after that, the Official Google Blog post featuring this video went live.<\/p>\n<p><strong class=\"q\">How have product videos impacted the nature of advertising over the last few years?  What&#8217;s changed?  Thoughts on the future of product videos?<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong class=\"a\">DK<\/strong> Product videos have become a popular advertising method because the entire message can be delivered in a few minutes (or even less) and people have fun watching.  At least the good ones, that is.  When a product video goes viral, the viewers win and the company wins.<\/p>\n<p>Having a clear script is becoming more important than having the highest production value.  In other words, it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s more about what\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s being communicated than how gorgeous and smooth the shots are.<\/p>\n<p>I think in the future we\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ll see companies placing more and more focus on education to draw in more users.<\/p>\n<p><strong class=\"q\">Moving forward, what type of product videos would you like to do next, and still in the director&#8217;s chair?<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong class=\"a\">DK<\/strong> I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d like to keep doing what I am doing: communicating the value of Google products to the users.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>David Kruschke works at Studio G, Google\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s in house video production team, as a director, producer, and editor. FWD:labs spoke with him about the new spot, &#8220;Best Best Man &#8211; Google Docs for Android.&#8221; What were your decisions behind the &#8220;best man&#8221; storyline? David Kruschke We thought a wedding would be a fun and interesting [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":29,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2921","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-film","category-web"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/fwdlabs.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2921","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/fwdlabs.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/fwdlabs.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fwdlabs.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/29"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fwdlabs.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2921"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/fwdlabs.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2921\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/fwdlabs.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2921"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fwdlabs.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2921"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fwdlabs.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2921"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}