I drove down to Ashaway last Friday afternoon and shot video of this beautiful home.  This highly decorative home seemed like a perfect place to live if you enjoy lounging with some great scenery both inside and outside the home.  This house is also great for parties and gatherings both indoors and out.  They have a bar area inside the den which is pretty spacious as well as outside by the pool.  It sits on at least a few acres of land.  The backyard was huuuuge!

[Show as slideshow]

Palmer Ranch Multiple Community Tour Video

Ok, where do I begin here…  This is a video that is showing the surroundings of this multiple community area.  Basically it is footage of someone holding the camera out of a car window as the car drives around to all these communities getting the roads, golf courses, buildings, and other visually entertaining sights.  This is a pretty basic community tour video.  This one in particular could have been done a little better and more professional.

Use Appropriate Music

Right when the video starts to play you hear this quirky horn music that makes you feel like you’re at an elderly nursing home polka party.  I wish i was exaggerating here, but listen for yourself…  It may have been very worth it to spend a few extra minutes or call some people to obtain some more appropriate royalty free music loops.

Use a tripod

Getting very smooth pans across areas is tough by hand, but is still totally worth it.  It appears the entire video is all bumpy and shaky.  The cameraman could have tried to stay a little smoother if riding in the car videotaping was their best option.  But I think integrating a few smoother tripod shots for specific areas, or just a better overall attempt to keep things very smooth would have resulted in a much more appealing video.  Still can’t get over the music though…

One of my favorite parts was at 2:45 where the camera zooms into the specific community sign at the entrance and then up pops an image of the same sign that overlays it, but not exact so it is a little confusing.  But I’m critical of those types of , what I call, mistakes.  That would have better worth not spending the time to overlay the graphic and then animate it.

HAR Market Report Video (click for link)

This Video is not that bad at all.  They do have good color keying, which means they are actually standing on front of a green screen.  If you haven’t noticed, they are not actually standing outside, yet instead use three different background behind the 3 different angles of video shot.  They each have wireless mics hooked up and the audio sounds pretty good.

Showing Graphic Titles and Numbers

It was good to see that they finally had cut in a graph with numbers.  During the report they threw out a lot of stats and numbers and I know I’m not an expert with housing market research but i had a hard time keeping track of everything.  As they mentioned one thing they quickly jumped to more and more information and I was completely lost.  Now had they been able to condense the material down a little bit and throw in titles or graphics of those numbers during the times they were referring to them, there’s no doubt in my mind that an average viewer would be able to absorb and retain all the information being unleashed.

Know Your Lines

The bald guy did a pretty good job at looking somewhat charismatic.  Well, maybe not charismatic but at least confident of the material he was speaking about.  Now talking for long amounts of time in front of a camera isn’t easy.  You need to practice as well as rehearse.  Otherwise, you will look like the guy on the left as he is noticeably looking off to the side of the camera and obviously reading a cue card.  This, to me, distracts me from the important information he is trying to say, if any.  Reading a cue card professionally also takes practice.  It is better to use those more for the big points you already know about and as help staying organized during your speech.  They are not as useful when you have to look off the camera the entire time to read word for word.

This is just my own personal opinion but a video like this has much more potential to be much more entertaining.  Well maybe not entertaining, but at least more engaging.  Perhaps that could be done through more cutaways to graphs or imagery, or a little music, or perhaps some dancing clowns in the background.

Two Minutes with Creig – Realtor Video Review (click for link)

The Creig Northrop Team of Long & Foster Real Estate has a video series where they offer information and advice to home buyers.  Personally I believe every agency should begin their own video series and speak out to potential customers so kudos to them.  However, this video has the potential to appear more professional or “official”.

Pointers For Better Real Estate Video

Set Up Your Background

For starters, The logo in the background is part hidden by a lamp.  So, anyone watching this video or even quickly scanning it will not get the full name of the company.  They are left with “Creig and Northro”.  Initially after i watched the entire thing I began to write about it and jotted it down as “Creig and Northern”.  That logo on the wall looks nice and it wouldn’t take that much effort to move the lamp and change the angle to get it in the shot nice and clear for the viewer.

Use a Tripod

It is unavoidable to notice the very shaky cameraman.  It’s almost as if the cameraman wasn’t even trying to hold the camera still.  Tripods are a good way to remain still on camera.  They can be inexpensive and they attach to every camera out there.

Good Sound

In most cases for a setup like this not having great audio is not a deal breaker.  Yet the overall quality could be much more enhanced by having clearer and better quality sound.  If the video camera you are using does not have a mic output, then you are out of luck there.  But if it does there are inexpensive wireless mics out there that you plug one end (transmitter) into the mic jack on the camera, and the receiver is attached to the person speaking and the mic is then wired up the shirt and clips on the collar or coat or somewhere not too noticeable.  This will greatly add to the quality of sound.

Know Your Content

In this case he appeared to know his subject matter and content, but you can tell he looks off a little bit to what can be assumed to be cue cards.  This, done at a minimum, will not make or break the overall piece.  Excessive looking off the view of the camera lens will distract a viewer  from the information you are trying to get across while at the same time make you look like you don’t know what you are talking about.

Having an unprofessional looking and sounding video makes people feel like they can pick up the camera and do it themselves.  This may make people feel like you could just be some guy out there picking up a camera and yapping away.  Despite the fact that you may want to have a local appeal in your video, there’s no reason you can’t apply a few simple extra steps to make the video more professional.  By doing this you do not run the risk of appearing unprofessional and an unreliable source of information.

This was the original real estate video promo for the home page of Realty-Video.com. Personally I liked it but it contained some content that was unnecessary for the general Real Estate agent / agency looking for this service.

Ian documents his mysterious real estate photos job in his car on his way to and from Wakefield RI.

Ian briefly speaks about his virtual tour real estate production methods an introduces a new video camera that will be used for video taping real estate properties.  The Canon XA10 will be used to achieve great picture quality as well as super smooth motion shots in the video virtual tour.  A sample with the camera is also shown.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MpK0RirxAzc