What actually happens on a solar video shoot day

▶ 0:00Hello, everyone. You join us today as we're off to Ireland with Richard, videographer. Say hi. Hello, mate. There you are. We're off to Ireland to shoot with ActiVate. Cut it very fine because we were actually shooting with ActiSmart today in Birmingham, but we've just arrived. We're going to check our bags in, check Richard's 12 batteries in, ready for the shoot, and you will see us on the other side, probably once we land in Ireland. Here we go.

▶ 0:25I've just got my daily fix of complaining about price ads on LinkedIn, so I'm feeling good, feeling refreshed and well-noticed. Happy days, eh? Yeah, happy days. So after a lovely stay at that hotel, we turned up at the first sight and David got all right to it. We always like to record things on a gimbal and do things a bit more handheld, a bit more movement in the background, makes it a bit more engaging.

▶ 0:47And then we had a nice funny moment with David getting up the wall here. Okay, so we're actually going to review live one of the creatives from the first sight, and I'm going to talk a little bit about why we did certain things at different points. So here we go. David here from ActiVate Energies. We're at a traditional Irish home here in County Laud, a beautiful house.

▶ 1:10So yeah, right off the bat, within the first kind of five seconds, we want to make sure that there's some sort of visual change that completely changes what's on the screen. Because this is super important so that it is very clear to the viewer that they're not going to be about to watch a two, three minute video just of one angle with no editing, kind of like following someone around, which could be perceived as quite boring.

▶ 1:29We want to make sure that it's visually engaging within the kind of first five, six seconds at a max. And also we like to do some nice fancy transitions using the branding of the company as well. Home here in County Laud, a beautiful house. And they've got a solar system. Where are the panels? They've also... Again, drone.

▶ 1:46We bring a drone to every single shoot. It's super, super good for getting more versatility into the shots. And it's just completely different to what anything else you could capture on the ground. That, an house house. Connected to the home. We've used this roof. Now, the pitch on this roof is very slight. So we've used them.

▶ 2:04Yeah, so our editors, obviously, they're experienced with stuff like CapCut, which allows you to add these captions and things like that. But what really takes it up a notch and actually provides valuable editing that genuinely makes things easier to understand and higher converting is the fact that they're also familiar with more experienced tools like After Effects, Premiere Pro, etc.

▶ 2:23That is what allows them to do things like this. So actually highlighting and drawing attention to certain things that we want to be... or that are being talked about on screen at any one time. You know, if you say mounting system, it might not be immediately clear what we're referring to, but with the highlighting, it absolutely is.

▶ 2:39Mounting system to pitch the panels further. This is an 18-panel, 8-kilowatt system. These are 18 ATLAS Activate Energy panels. So another thing is don't shy away from or be afraid of sharing technical things. A lot of the leads that we see coming through already know what kilowatts are. They already know what kind of battery they need.

▶ 3:01They already know how many panels they think their roof can fit, things like that. The market is becoming increasingly more educated. Of course, there's still that top of funnel where people are still kind of learning about the systems that are available. But increasingly, there's people that have done spreadsheet maths that have watched a hundred YouTube videos before they're going to make a purchasing decision.

▶ 3:18And this kind of technical talk actually really resonates with them. Mounting system and the panels have been engineered for the Irish weather. In particular, for high winds, these panels aren't going anywhere. Now, where's the... And again, you can see consistently changing the background, the framing, how far away he is from the camera, how close he is, all of that kind of stuff to make it engaging.

▶ 3:37Inverter, where are the batteries? This is the cable coming from the panels. Feeding this solace. Again, stuff like that, highlighting the cable run and the route of the power. It makes systems that, at face value, can look really complicated. The panels. You know, with all the cables here seem actually really simple because you can show where the power is going and how everything interacts with one another.

▶ 4:02Five kilowatt hybrid inverter. This is the dongle. This gives you all the information on your phone. This is an interesting one to call out as well. So, what we like to do is record the subject speaking and just keep the camera very much focused on them while they're talking. And then afterwards, whatever they mentioned or talked about or gestured to, we'll then go in and basically farm or get B-roll secondary shots of them doing that action.

▶ 4:27So, this was actually recorded separately to the audio that you can hear. But it means that we can get these really nice tailored close-up shots to kind of elevate what they're talking about. And again, bring versatile. But it also feeds us as activated energies with your system. These are two 5 kilowatt Duracell energy modules.

▶ 4:44This is a 10 kilowatt Duracell energy system. This battery has the ability to buy the electricity at the cheapest rate at night, running the home throughout the day off the cheapest race. Allowing your solar system generate free energy back to the grid, making a profit. In the event of a power cut, this Duracell battery pack will feed this backup socket.

▶ 5:08OK, this cable run. And there you go. So, again, using more experienced editing techniques to illustrate concepts that otherwise are quite hard to show. So, in this instance, you literally, by design, can't see the cable run. And it's really important to call that out because it's a step that the company have gone to deliver a better service and to make this appropriate for this homeowner, taking the power from this outbuilding into the home.

▶ 5:32So, we really want to draw attention to it. So, we love doing stuff like this. Under the ground, going from the building right up this fence. As you can see, this grass is growing back. You can barely notice that the duct is there. And as you can see, again, we get multiple different takes so that it's really fresh. So, poor David had to do this probably two or three times.

▶ 5:53But you can see that you start with the take on the ground. Then you go to the drone, which gives a much better bird's eye view, back to the ground, back to the drone. Coming to this gravel area, cross here, and into the home. From a practical point of view, this is an access area. People go in and out of here, maybe with their bins or whatever.

▶ 6:13So, we've kept everything up quite high. And we also love to draw detail on the specifics of a system. You know, the real-world application of the system and why certain things were done for the homeowner. Because really, it's very rare two systems are the same. And this point of an access, you know, walkway isn't particularly the most interesting point in the world.

▶ 6:35But it just shows a wider point, which is super important, around activate energies really caring about the end result for the customer and their day-to-day lives, right? From the lip of the roof, we've got a real natural shelter. So, if you want to do it once and do it right, click the button below, share some details, and we'll be in touch.

▶ 6:55Yeah, so you also always want to make sure there's a call to action in the video. And sometimes you'll have multiple call to actions throughout the video because people will potentially take action 10 seconds into the video or at the end. But in this scenario, it's just right at the end. And we also use a hold screen. A quick tip, I know there's definitely going to be some other agencies watching this.

▶ 7:14So, I'll see these on your next video ads. But we like to use a hold screen at the end that basically just gives someone the time to actually digest what they've just seen and then actually click the button, which is obviously what we really want them to actually do in this scenario. Of course, you would have seen there at the end as well, we've got a nice little logo animation coming in.

▶ 7:32We like to do this for every client because it's just such a nice touch. People love seeing their logo kind of come to life. And it's super important for just brand recognition. You know, we're going to be putting out a number, several of these different ads. And at the end, they're always going to see that logo. They're going to see part of the logo pop up with the transitions throughout the video, right?

▶ 7:50And it's just going to get cemented in their mind. And especially if you're doing any other marketing activities. So, Activate, for example, are advertising in local supermarkets. Then that logo is going to come straight to mind. And they're going to go, oh, I remember David's video on Facebook. And hopefully, it's just all going to spur together to form a really effective campaign.

▶ 8:11Here we are, turning up, Activate, SSE airtrustity offices. We've just finished filming on the first site. Obviously, classic dude, got to record any behind the scenes. But we've got some really nice stuff with a nice underground cable lay. Really high-mounted battery and inverter system to keep the access to the little walkway for the customer.

▶ 8:33And here we are. So, no idea where I'm going to park, but exciting times. Okay, so classic from me. Completely forgot to record any of the rest of the day because I had to lock in on getting the content. But as you can see, went into the office, got some really lovely office shots. Then went into the warehouse and did quite a lot speaking about the Atlas panel, which is completely exclusive to Activate, which is really cool.

▶ 9:02What makes Atlas Solar unique? So, you might think it's quite weird that he's holding the little leaflet, but it's a nice shot to kind of cut between to show what's on the paper as well. So, why did we bother? Why did we come up with Atlas Solar? Activate have now consistency, reliability. And then we went ahead and went to another two sites.

▶ 9:23One was a really picturesque, modern house that they'd only been built about five years ago, I think. Really cool. The homeowner actually built it in themselves. They had a background in construction and stuff. And then finally to a house with a more typical solar array that had actually been referred by their neighbour.

▶ 9:38So, we got some really nice content there as well, which hopefully you can see on screen right now. And there you have it. So, we finished up the day by doing a bit of a goofy pose. We like to get our clients to do that at the end of the filming day. It's always good fun. And then Richard and I rushed to Dublin Airport because we weren't quite sure when the shoot was going to finish.

▶ 9:54Sometimes we finish at kind of like 4.30, but often we'll run on to kind of 6.30. I think the latest we've ever done is about 7.30. So, we rushed to the airport, check on the Ryanair app, and it says that there's spaces available for the flight, but you can only buy the ticket at the check-in service. And we give the hire car back, get the shuttle to the airport, get to the airport, get to the desk, at which point they tell us that the flight is full.

▶ 10:15So, we're now stranded in the airport with no hire car anymore that we'd booked for two days and given back early. And we ended up going on a very lovely little trip, walking down the canal to the centre of Dublin, having the best burger ever and kind of reviewing some of the footage that we'd got that day and just getting excited about the ads that would be produced.

▶ 10:34So, there you have it. That's a typical kind of filming day. Well, actually, it's pretty atypical because obviously it's international. But it gives a bit of an insight into what might happen on filming day because a lot of the clients that come to us, that's the first thing they ask. You know, what's actually going to happen?

▶ 10:48What's it like? Is it all scripted? Is it not? Is it da-da-da? Who's there? So, hopefully that gives you a little bit of an insight. Cool. Hope you enjoyed watching and I'll catch you in the next one.