Choosing the right creative treatment for your video

At Bigtank, when a client initially enquires about having content created, the first stage is to find out with them why that content is needed, who the audience might be and what it has to achieve for them. We then look at the most appropriate visual treatment for the project - and often this is a decision between filmed content, animation or a combination of the two. Each style has it’s positives so we’re going to take you through some considerations when deciding what is best for your business.

We love working with people at Bigtank, and we find in the initial project meeting when people are talking to us about a product, service or a life experience, and they really get passionate about it and begin talking from the heart and not just the head, we'd always try and look to capture that. This passion is one of the best ways to connect with your audience, get them engaged and compelled to act. This ability to portray emotion is one of the major advantages to filmed content.

That's not to say that you can't motivate people with animation. Absolutely you can, but animation projects tend to work best if they’re more statistic and fact driven projects. Walkthroughs, explainer videos, step by step guides and getting across lots of facts and figures are all perfectly suited for animated content.

Another superb use of animation is if you have existing assets within your company. What I mean by this is, maybe you've had a document, brochure, or some other kind of content designed for print or web use. On those you may have icons, fonts and stock images which we can bring to life in an animated film alongside a voice over script and music track. Great for social media campaigns.

Another thing to consider, and perhaps the most important from a business point of view, is the cost of animation vs filmed content. If creating an animation from scratch, it’s likely to involve much more production time than if you were to simply film a spoken message during an interview.

Regardless of all of this - it’s all about creating the right treatment for the message and audience, not getting the message and audience to fit the treatment. Understand what you want to achieve by having video content produced before you start to look at the visual creativity.

For more guidance on this, be sure to check out our strategy page online where you’ll find a useful guide on how to plan your project from the lightbulb moment right through to broadcast. Get more video insights by Bigtank at our Vlog Page.