The Project
Inspiring faculty, spirited students and amazing resources - our TV commercial production for Stony Brook University illustrate how students go further, faster.
+ About SBU
Stony Brook is one of America’s most dynamic public universities. It is a center of academic excellence and an internationally recognized research institution that offers all students a world-class education.
OBJECTIVE
Entice newly admitted students to enroll at SBU over other schools.
After workshopping a few approaches with the agency, Blue State Digital, we decided the best strategy was to make the piece feel almost like a music video. It should pop with enthusiastic, authentic sound bites and quick cuts depicting a plethora of student life experiences, all timed to the beat.
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Showcase SBU’s world class reputation.
The second video commercial provided an opportunity to highlight the university’s position as a top-tier STEM-focused research institution as well as the diversity of the community through conversations with accomplished faculty.
We also featured SBU’s affiliation with Brookhaven National Lab whose mission is to “advance fundamental research in nuclear and particle physics to gain a deeper understanding of matter, energy, space, and time.”
Make the students and faculty sound natural and relatable.
Pre-interviews were conducted via Skype or on the phone with a number of prospective interview subjects. This helped us to select the individuals who would best represent the story we wished to tell about SBU and established a degree of comfort and familiarity that translated onto the set during the shoot.
Juggling Schedules
With our shoot only a week after students returned from Winter Break, there was no time to waste. How would we fit interviews and B-Roll with a bunch of college students and busy professors into a shoot schedule of only three consecutive days?
In the week leading up to the shoot, we coordinated with a dozen students and professors, securing locations (and backup locations) on and off campus for each interview subject.
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Our crew was lean and nimble, allowing us to move quick. While filming one interview, our Production Coordinator would be securing the next location, sending reminders to university staff and interview subjects. Sometimes meals amongst crew would be staggered as well to optimize efficiency and maximize the amount of footage captured.
A rigid schedule was planned out before the project ever got the green light. Therefore, the SBU marketing department, creative agency and our production team were all on the same page. Delivering cuts in lockstep with our post-production schedule, soliciting notes via Wipster and incorporating the feedback into subsequent cuts.
CLIENT AUTOMATION TOOLS
To effectively manage the scheduling of non-profit video commercial productions, Sam utilizes automation tools to help clients stay on track with the project’s progress.
+ Calendly Scheduling App
+ Google Forms
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+ Wipster Video Collaboration Tool
FINISHED PRODUCT
The products included several deliverables of various durations and aspect ratios for a digital New York Time ad, Instagram video posts and embedding on the university’s website.
Turnaround was super tight. We needed to have the video commercial productions ready before any students got their acceptance letters and to meet the deadline for publication of the New York Times ad.
TRIVIA
Staff at Brookhaven National Lab ride bicycles to get around. The main building is a giant loop and the whole lab is so big that it has its own zip code.