The latest interview in our video series features Brandon Millard, our Senior Interactive Media Designer here at Ellison Europe. The video gives an insight into what his role entails and his daily work life.
Here’s what Brandon had to say:
Here’s the full interview with Brandon:
Introduce yourself and your role?
My role here at Sizzix involves creating all of the interactive content that we share with our consumers on a day to day basis. Anything from quick make videos, through to product tutorials, hacks, and most of the photography that you’ll find across our social media channels and website.
What attracted you to a media role?
I’ve always been a bit of a gadget geek and my role in media provides that cross over between my education in design with my interest in all things techy. I think that the more time goes on the more we are interacting more with visual content, especially videos. This role allows me to be a part of that new and exciting realm of marketing.
Have you always been creative?
From a young age I’ve always had an interest in most things creative whether it was art, photography, cooking and even music; although I never managed to see through learning to play an instrument. My grandad had a long career in joinery and I remember spending school holidays building bird tables with him in the garage. My dad is also a talented sculptor and spent years of his life designing figurines for WADE pottery, anything from small animals to Betty Boop collectables. So, I feel like I’ve inherited a lot of my creativity from my family. I also think a big part about being creative is having a general curiosity in the world around you and wanting to solve problems, I hate it when I can’t find a solution to something.
How do you come up with the initial concepts for videos?
The ideas for our videos come from all sorts of places. Obviously first we look at what our consumers are interested in, take flowers for example, we created our floral series which focusses on making a variety of flowers using dies you already have. Looking into trends is also another great way of generating ideas, especially when you’re trying to gain new audiences. Take our hacks series for example, everyone loves a good life hack and I’m sure at one point or another we’ve all found ourselves scrolling through youtube or facebook looking at all the fun things we never knew we could do.
What is an easy but effective way to get your personality across through filming/editing?
A lot of the videos we produce here at Sizzix involve little talking or written words, simply because we cater for worldwide audience and the content we produce needs to translate globally. To keep things fun and interesting we try multiple things. From using upbeat music to accompany our videos, adding sound effects when necessary and by using our hands to add life and personality to the videos. If you ever watched Zzzap! as kid you’ll know what I mean by that. Simple hand gestures such as clicks, waves or just the way you bring something into shot can make a huge difference to your video.
What is the filming accessory or feature you’d be lost without?
Honestly, the best thing about the videos we produce here are the ideas themselves. Without the creativity and ingenuity of the in house design team producing the projects they do we wouldn’t have the kind of inspirational content to share that we do. You can have all the gadgets and accessories in the world but if the subject your filming is substandard it won’t make a difference. I’d definitely be lost without the skills of our creative team.
What do you think the key differences are between a successful and unsuccessful video?
Going back to what I said in my last answer, it’s the idea that makes a video. CCO of Pixar, John Lasseter says that “no amount of animation will save a bad story” and I think the same message translates into any video. If the ideas aren’t good, then no amount of music, sound effects or hand gestures will keep people engaging with your content.
What is your favourite aspect about your job?
Like any job I have my usual week by week tasks that don’t really change. However, my role allows me to look into so many different aspects of marketing, media and design that many other jobs wouldn’t. I’m fast approaching my 3 year anniversary here at Sizzix and in that time alone I’ve looked into multiple types of photography, 360 video, Virtual reality, Augmented reality and had the chance to be involved in leading and creating multiple ongoing video series.
