The Brief
We were invited to make an explainer video from a company called Mara EFS, to promote their new Mooring Buoy – a new innovation developed by its founder, George Smith – on their website, on social media and at live events.
The film was to be shot in Plockton, on a stunning part of the west coast of Scotland, with plenty of action, beautiful cinematography, and ofcourse: Yellow Tractor’s signature sound design.
The main challenge:
Two Yachts would be used for demonstrating the use of the buoy, manned by two crews and demonstrated by an actor – on filmed onboard a moving yacht.
We want a film that will really stand out within the competitive marine yachting world.
Oh, and we’ll need some heavy duty raincoats, and yachting shoes!
The Solution
Live shooting: 3 days, including one initial visit to find the best locations and practice some of the more extreme onboard yacht and small dinghy filming action.
3 filming locations simultaneously using walkie talkies
To make this work we needed some highly detailed pre-planning and logistics for a series of choreographed action on a moving yacht over 2 days.
3 Camera angles planned for the buoy shoot
- ABOVE and in front of the stern – drones.
- YACHT LEVEL – moving camera with gimbal.
- BELOW – handheld but stabilised camera from a slow moving dinghy with outboard motor.
To get all the camera angles shot in sync, walkie talkies were used to keep drone operators (parked on a small island) and our crew and actor on board each yacht and motoring dinghy (to get those really low action shots from below the stern of the yacht ).
Sound Design – Carefully edited music was developed in order to guide viewers between each section of the explainer video, timed to the second to match each clip from start to finish.
Final Output:
- Desktop & mobile – Website, Youtube, Facebook and various other social media
- Large Format Screens – Live events
Results
The new video of their new marine buoy innovation has already created a lot of interest in the marine world, both on social media and on large format screens at events showcasing their new product.
The company has attracted several new partners and substantial investment since the release of the video.