How To Use Logical Iterations To Keep Momentum When Creative Stalls Production

13 Sept

You've got deadlines. Non-negotiables and delivery expectations. Good creative is critical, but it's subjective. So what if it keeps you waiting?

We moved right through this Ark Studios production with creative sign off at every stage. The director loved the ‘electric’ look of the VFX. In the final days, the agency raised legal concerns. They could not be sure ‘electrical’ was going to pass with broadcast standards. They needed a new creative right before delivery. Fair enough. Most Flame ops build shots with revisions in mind; nothing is baked in and nothing is discarded. Just back up a few renders, home in on which assets are ‘electrical’ → remake them as ‘puffs' & re-output. Now the same creative is certified safe. Play-out is back on track, no difficult calls.

Creativity isn't linear. It goes in circles, zig-zags, loops and U-turns

If you're not getting sign-off quickly, production feels harder. Tiredness creeps in, ops get frazzled, that weirdness from earlier is back, but now it's 6pm. How do you deliver that to a deadline?

Shelf Subjective Musings with a Quick Critical Analysis

Creativity can be head fuck, especially when time is tight. I have found that the answer is always (yes obviously) …to look at the shot. This takes you out your head for a minute. The shot tells you what it needs. Scan for attributes; meaning, timing, movement, impact, relationships, colours and so on. This shows you the facts — you need to do x, y & z for the shot to work. The pass is complete; no subjective second-guessing → send to client.

Each Step Reveals The Next

The iterative process of making stuff look great can’t start until you have the first pass, which is usually shit, or it should be, if you made it fast enough. The point is; measurable progress is bench-markable; each step builds improvement. There’s no point conceiving an intellectual concept about your shot, then just breathing it onto the screen. Have you tried describing an image to someone using words? Most of it gets lost in translation. You need pixels—transformed, not concepts. I aim to get you the first rough comp in a couple of hours, then just iterate… till beautiful.

Creativity is Logical, like 1, 2, 3

Forget final outcomes & get to work on the iterations; v001, v002, v003. A quick production chat usually reveals a consensus; combine this from v001, and that from v003, which makes a client pass of V1-004. After client review, numbering continues V2-005, V2-006, V2-007. Perhaps the client will receive V2-008. Far from banal fastidious-ness, these numbers track and record important social functions; internal numbers count up until as internal discussion remain without obligation—we can create. Then, if consensus is reached, we commit. We seek client approval, and record it with another big V number [yes, it’s for Victory]

If we follow this system, client calls are much easier. When they need to know why something is the way it is, most humans are OK with any response— so long as it it unified.

A ticked-off list builds creative confidence

This is perfect for fast paced productions;

Good choices can be iterated quickly.
Going fast doesn’t make it less right.
A whole batch of beautiful shots can be delivered very quickly.

Grant McKean