Category Archives: communication

New series promo – White Flag

There are times when we get into preparations for a new series at Seacoast Church that the metaphors come very easily; so was the case as we ramped up for our next teaching series, White Flag; based on the premise that to truly find victory in Christ, we must surrender our own will and ways to his.

From the time that we were able to confirm that this series would start just two weeks after Easter, we knew that our leadership wanted to be able to promote the series during the Easter weekend services when we would be likely to have many visitors.

I love it when we have the margin to create a good ‘teaser video’ and when the focal point is so simple… a white flag of surrender.

Here’s a peek at what we came up with and also a look behind the scenes from our shoot day:

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Special thanks to my cinematographer, Adam Erickson and great actor, Shawn Leberkinght.

Technical specs:

Camera: Sony FS100
Lens: Canon 35mm, 1.4
Edit: Final Cut 7
Color Grading: Magic Bullet Looks, Gorilla Grain

Tips for Church Video Announcements

ImageI recently checked my stats and was surprised to find out how many people land here looking for information about doing church video announcements. I’m kind of a student of this medium and I watch a lot of other church’s work. So, getting back to my intent for this to be a resource for other church media producers, I submit the following video announcement tips:

Keep them short – It seems that no matter when you do announcements, they are a bit of a buzz-kill, so keep them short and to the point.

Keep your ‘open’ short – I’ve seen some examples of video announcements where the opening sequence is as long as the announcements themselves. Give the piece a quick pop of branding and get to the important stuff.

Make them matter – You can’t read the entire bulletin in that time (or at least you shouldn’t), so use the medium for the most important bits of information. I’m a believer that people don’t retain more than 2-3 items any way.

Use good talent – Find someone who is comfortable in front of the camera and can communicate well. Even better, find 2 or 3 good people and do more of a rotation so that things don’t get predictable or monotonous.

Use text to back up what is being said – In every crowd, you will have a certain amount of people that are visual learners; simple text graphics that backs up important dates and times can really help people remember what is coming up.

Good audio – This means investing in a good microphone so that your talent and the script can be understood, and also a good mix of music in the edit process.

Action steps – Give your viewers something to act on. “Sign up in the lobby”, “Register for the seminar on our website”, etc. I have found that the more that you encourage people to get involved, they will.

Visuals and B-roll – Don’t just move a talking head from the stage to the screen, tell a story! Use video and pictures to help get the point across. Visuals make anything much more ‘watchable’.

50% – One of the criteria that we use to determine if an item gets in to the video is that it should effect at least half of your congregation.

Celebrate – Don’t just use the time for calendar fodder, shoot video of a big church event and put together a short highlight reel to use during your announcements. This is a great way to show people what the life of the church looks like beyond the weekend. (this will also give you great footage to use for promoting the event the next time it rolls around)

Plan ahead – Get out in front of the calendar as best you can so that you can properly plan to promote or celebrate things well. I’ve seen great ideas become mediocre executions simply because there wasn’t enough time to really knock things out of the park.

COMMUNICATE – Sorry for the bold caps, but this is one of my biggest pet peeves with what I see other churches do; all too often it seems that video announcements become the poorly produced, missed attempt at church comedy, and nothing really gets communicated. Think about how a first-time visitor will learn about your church, consider what really needs to be said for people to retain the information, and don’t waste time. It takes time to produce good video and it takes up time in your church service – Do your best to communicate WELL.

This list isn’t meant to be exhaustive, just some guidelines to help folks use the medium better. Do you have one to add here? (Questions are welcome too!)

Out take therapy

Oh, looky there… a blog!

This poor little slice of the internet has been so neglected. I really need to get back in the habit of regular posts. My apologies to the 2 or 3 of you who noticed that I’ve been so absent here.

So, I’ll kick things back off with a little slice of something from work today; When we roll the video announcements during the weekend services, they’re all polished and nice. Ever wonder what happens to the parts that didn’t go so well?

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Thanks for being a good sport, Lauren!

Video Story – Find a visual focal point

At Seacoast, we’re doing a short sermon series based on the Book of Jonah, so telling a story on video about someone running from God’s call would be great for a sermon illustration. Finding the story wasn’t difficult; it involves the wife of one of our pastors getting involved with helping people in human trafficking… I just didn’t want to do the ol’ standard testimonial video. After some discussion, it was noted that, while she never thought she could see herself doing anything like this, now it was all she could see. This not only became the closing line of the script, it also gave me a great idea for a focal point; I would have my subject walking around downtown Charleston with a camera.

Special thanks to my new partner-in-crime, Jack Hoey III, who put together a great voice-over script, and to Lisa Surratt who allowed us to tell her inspiring story.

Don’t just dive into a story and default to what you’ve always done; look at the details from different angles and listen for the visual elements. Don’t be afraid to explore new ways of telling the story.

Technical Specs:

Echo 11 – Wrap up

I’ve just returned home from 2011 version of The Echo Conference, and I am so tired. Good conferences have a tendency to do that, and I’m OK with it. Because, in truth, even though I’m dead-dog-tired and have a weekend of church services to get through… I can’t wait to go again.

Once again, the crew from RT Creative Group put together a great event where artists can come together to worship, learn and mingle.

Much can be said about the speakers, the breakout sessions, the times of worship… but those are the the kinds of write-ups that most people expect; I’d like to go a slightly different direction:

The “Now what?”

When you leave a conference like Echo, your head is swimming, you’ve met countless people whose names you may or may not ever remember, and you hope that the notes you scribbled during the keynotes make sense when you go to read them again. You picked up countless ideas; some you want to try right away, some you will shelve until you have more time to figure them out, and a few that you know would make your pastor’s head explode (but you might try them any way).

For me, the now what part that really fires me up is that I don’t have to do what I do alone! The community that I have access to is unrivaled. The easiest thing to do is to search the hash tag on twitter (#Echo11); there you will find people from all over the country (Canada too) who do what you do. People who know the value of someone a little ahead of them lending a helping hand. For you, the now what means you need to:

  • Reach out.
  • Make contact.
  • Be available
  • Participate.

This odd community needs your involvement, no matter what you do. We swap ideas, we critique, we encourage… it works! I believe the on-going spirit of Echo is that we are all working for the same King and for His glory; we’re much more effective when we work together and support each other. (If you work in church video or live production and need help with something, drop me a line (murphy24p at gmail dotcom)

See you next year.

Church Video Announcements; An on-going conversation

I struggled with calling this post ‘an on-going conversation’, it’s probably more of an obsession. While I would never classify myself as a communications expert, I’m passionate about communicating well within the church. I’ve posted about this passion before (See 8 Simple Rules for Video Announcements), and I’d really like to hear from other video producers who are tasked with making video announcements at other churches. If that’s you, drop me a line in the comments… I’d love to hear the philosophy behind the how and why from others.

I’ve been doing my current version of announcements at Seacoast Church for about 6 weeks now. I call it “The Dispatch” and thankfully, I was given a lot of artistic liberty on how to execute each week.

Some of the parameters that I work within:

  • Keep the final piece at about 2 minutes long. We roll the announcements right before the message roll-in and the idea is to keep it short but informative.
  • Cover no more than 3 calendar items. I believe that any more than 3 items will be quickly forgotten.

Here is one of my favorites:

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Some of my philosophy:

  • Video announcements allow me to tell a better story. I don’t ever want to just move a “talking head” from the stage to the screen; with the bit about the Harbor Cruise, I was able to to get onto the boat that they were using for the event. The boat, the water, the bridge… these are strong visuals and they tell as much of the story as the spoken word. A third layer in this was the music; “Come Sail Away” by Styx was a great way to help people remember that event as well. Never underestimate the value of getting a song stuck in people’s heads!
  • Pictures and a little bit of information get the point across. In the bit about Serve Saturday, with just a little bit of footage from a previous event, I was able to show that anyone can get involved, from someone with car skills to people who can throw a little paint around. An interesting side note is that the event organizer came to me after that piece ran with a concern that it needed more information, I assured her that it would be okay; all that people needed to know was already in the piece. They had only been averaging about 20 people in the past few months for Serve Saturday… we ran that bit for two weeks prior to the July event and they had 70 people show up! You don’t have to over-sell… keep it short, give people the what/why/when, and they will respond.
  • Quick reminders work! At the end of the piece, I had the talent simply ask folks to silence their cell phones and I was amazed at how many people were reaching into pockets and purses to do just that! Beyond that, finishing with a way for people to get more information is another key to communicating well; Our website will always have more information than we will ever try to fit into 2 minutes, I like to finish each week with the church’s website address.

If video announcements are something you’re already doing, or looking to start doing, jump into the conversation! Let’s help each other out by swapping ideas. Feel free to include links to stuff you’ve done so we can all see what you’re doing.

It’s about us – Echo 2011

That title will probably rub some people wrong, but if you go to the conference website, you’ll see that it is “an event for artists, geeks, and storytellers”… so it’s about that ‘us’.

Let me start by saying that I was not asked to post something about Echo, I’m sure that no one there even knows who I am. It just so happens that I recently made my reservation to go and I wanted to let anyone in church media know that this is a great gathering of like-minded people, well worth the time and money that it takes to attend.

This is the notebook that I received at Echo last year. It’s full of notes that I took at various breakout sessions and the keynotes, and I’ll be honest, a lot of ideas that I got while flying home on the final day. You see, an experience like this leaves your head spinning, in a really good way. Being around so many great thinkers and artists will have a great affect on your own personal creativity. You will leave with a few new ideas, which is cool… but I think that, even more-so, it will spark a whole new level of creativity as you head back to your church. I’ve lost track of how many times I’ve pulled out this little notebook for inspiration in the past year.

The times of worship are great, as one might expect at a Christian conference. But I love the atmosphere at Echo simply because it’s a time of worship for people who are usually doing something during worship at their own church. There is something really special about a room full of people who are finally released to worship without having to worry about who is running the lyrics or what the next camera shot needs to be. It’s a beautiful thing.

Finally, the opportunity to meet so many great people is priceless. You’ll quickly realize that most everyone you meet is looking for the same things: good ideas and great connections. A bonus: The speakers aren’t shuffled off into private rooms; they’re permitted to roam freely amongst the common-folk. (I was this close to meeting Jon Acuff last year; this year, it WILL happen)

I know that budgets are tight, but if you have any chance to get to a conference that is specifically for us weird, church-creative-types, get thee to Echo (July 27-29, 2011)… and if you go, track me down; I’d love to meet you!

(embedded video HERE)

Taming the Chaos

As much as we might deny it, the first church service of the weekend, whether it’s Saturday night or first thing Sunday morning, often times really is a dress rehearsal.

There really is no end to the possibilities as to why… The bottom line is that this is the first time that we’re doing this service and there can be bumps in the road.

In one recent Saturday night service, it seemed that Murphy’s Law was going to play out in every possible way… everything that could go wrong, just about did. All of what went haywire really isn’t the point of this post, just know that it was a tense evening in the booth.

The point is this: After it was all over and I had some time to process things and talk to people about how we might avoid some of these snares in the future, I sent out a tweet that said,

“It will never cease to amaze me how chaotic things can be behind the scenes.”

A friend of mine, who is a Technical Director at another church, responded back to me with:

“We just love to tame the chaos.”

Thanks, Rick… That about sums it up!

As I thought about that some more, I realized that it’s a choice to tame the chaos. I’ve worked in the production of live television and events for many years, and in that time I’ve been around some leaders who seem to actually thrive on the chaos and it rarely made things any easier for anyone.

Our gear will fail… people will make mistakes… stuff will happen…

Whether you’re a staff leader at a church or a volunteer who runs the Power Point slides, you must choose to be a chaos tamer. Be quick to do what you can to remedy the problems and even quicker to speak peace over those who you are working with. When things seem to be falling apart, choose to be a strong part of the solution.

A gentle answer turns away wrath,
but a harsh word stirs up anger.

The tongue of the wise adorns knowledge,
but the mouth of the fool gushes folly.

Proverbs 15:1-2