Creative Production Intern Training Manual

Training Manual Overview:

1. Video Editing
2. Graphic Designing
3. Communications

1. Video Editing

❖ Content for Social Media - Guidelines

➢ YouTube
■ 5-8 mins are the ideal duration for YouTube videos
■ Cut out any empty points with no audio
● This will result in an excess of jump cuts which is not an issue
● You could also switch the cuts in between for some variation (J-cuts and L-cuts)
■ Pop something in, change clips, switch to b-roll, add sound effects etc. almost every 5
seconds to maintain the retention of the viewer
■ Make sure always to have an abrupt ending to your videos
● If you can’t guess when the video is coming to a conclusion that's a good sign that
you're nailing this point
● Doing so reduces the retention drop

➢ TikTok/Reel
■ Captions are a MUST
■ Adding a timeline bar at the bottom is an excellent touch to add to these videos
■ Utilise emojis, zoom-ins, sound effects etc. to maintain engagement
■ Whenever possible loop the video
 ● This is achieved by starting the video at a later point than the actual starting point and
adding the actual start point at the end
■ Adding hidden innuendos (eggplant emoji, PH sound etc.) can increase engagement from
the younger audience who can realise the hidden joke

➢ Advertisement
■ Utilising “Pattern Interrupts” is key
● Pattern Interrupts are anything that breaks the usual flow of the video. This causes an
attention spike in the viewer which makes them more likely to pay attention to the ad
● Bold Captions are a MUST
◆ Limiting “3 words a time” seems to work the best
◆ Experimenting with captions that have a pop animation can also be beneficial in
certain situations

❖ Cuts
➢ Footage Cleanup - It’s the process of getting rid of the unwanted and empty parts of the footage
■ Step 1: Find out areas in the footage that has empty points
■ Step 2: Chop away at the starting and ending points of the empty footage
■ Step 3: Delete and Ripple Delete the footage
■ Step 4: Remove all filler words in the footage
■ Step 5: Recheck the footage for any other points to clean up

➢ L Cut - While joining two clips, when the first clips audio overlaps with the footage of the second
clip for a small duration of time (a few frames), it’s called an L cut
■ Step 1: Join two clips
■ Step 2: Unlink footage with audio
■ Step 3: Extend the audio of the first clip for a few frames
■ Step 4: Adjust it with the second clip’s audio
 ➢ J Cut - While joining two clips, when the first clips video overlaps with the audio of the second clip
for a small duration of time (a few frames), it’s called a J cut
■ Step 1: Join two clips
■ Step 2: Unlink footage with audio
■ Step 3: Extend the video of the first clip for a few frames
■ Step 4: Adjust it with the second clip’s video

➢ Jump Cuts - When one clip cuts to another abruptly, it’s called a jump cut
■ Step 1: Find two non-continuous clips
■ Step 2: Join them
■ Use case: Break the flow of the video to grab the attention of the audience

Note: The L cut and J cut allow the editor to create a seamless flow while transitioning to a new clip

❖ Sound Design - It’s the process of using audio to grab the attention of the audience, smoothen
the entire visual experience, and in some cases break the flow of the video
➢ Background Sound
■ Step 1: Set a mood for the video based on client objectives
■ Step 2: Use the websites given below to choose your sounds/ music
● Epidemic Sounds
● Artlist.io
■ Step 3: Use appropriate keywords to search for sound/ music
■ Step 4: Use it in the video appropriately

➢ Transition sound effects

■ Step 1: Visualise the sound of the transition in use. (eg: Swoosh sound effect for a fast pan
transition)
■ Step 2: Go to YouTube, and search for the sound in mind
■ Step 3: Download it using this website
 ■ Step 4: Apply the sound effect to the transition appropriately

➢ Attention grabbers
■ Step 1: Search for sound bytes which are loud, short and snappy (eg. Booms, Claps,
Beeps, Slaps etc.) on YouTube
■ Step 2: Download it using this website
■ Step 3: Use them appropriately in places where the video is getting monotonous

➢ Foley Sound Effects - Sound effects are added to soundless footage to help emphasise the
action or ambience of the footage
■ Step 1: Pick out the part of the footage that requires emphasising
■ Step 2: Pick out sounds from Zapsplat that are directly related to the footage
■ Step 3: Use it appropriately with the footage and layer the sound effects whenever possible

❖ Colour Grading
➢ Lumetri Colour
■ Step 1: Add the “Lumetri Colour” effect to the footage
■ Step 2: Tweak the sliders of Lumetri colour to get the desired effect
● Increase “Contrast” if a cinematic effect is required
● Mess around with “Temperature” and “Tint” to change the overall feel of the video
● Increase “Exposure” if the video is dimly lit
● For most videos, the “Saturation” should be increased as bright colours tend to retain
viewers

➢ Brightness and Contrast

■ Step 1: Add the “Brightness and Contrast” effect to desired footage
■ Step 2: Tweak sliders to get the result you want
❖ Visual Effects
➢ Gaussian Blur - Blurs the video
■ Step 1: Add “Gaussian Blur” effect onto desired footage
■ Step 2: Increase value as required
➢ Black & White - Converts video into grayscale
■ Step 1: Add “Black & White” effect onto desired footage
➢ Colour Replace - Replace the selected colour with the desired colour
■ Step 1: Add “Colour Replace” effect onto desired footage
■ Step 2: Select the colour you want to replace and replace it with the desired one
➢ Ultra Key - Replaces colour with transparency (mainly used for green screens)
■ Step 1: Add “Ultra Key” effect onto desired footage
■ Step 2: Click the colour picker icon under “Key Colour” and any part of the green screen
■ Step 3: Change the setting from “Default” to “Aggressive”
■ Step 4 (optional): If Ultra Key didn't work as expected, mess around with the sliders in Matte
Generation to get the desired effect
➢ Basic 3D - Lets you move the footage in the 3rd Dimension
■ Step 1: Add “Basic 3D” effect to desired footage
■ Step 2: Change and animate the Swivel and Tilt values to get the desired effect
➢ Drop Shadow - Adds a drop shadow to your footage
■ Step 1: Add the “Drop Shadow” effect to desired footage
■ Step 2: Tweak values to achieve the desired effect
● “Opacity” changes the transparency of shadow
● “Direction” changes the angle of the shadow
● “Distance” increase the distance between shadow and the footage
● “Softness” feathers the shadow so it's not very sharp
➢ Vertical Flip - Flips the footage vertically
■ Step 1: Add “Vertical Flip” effect onto desired footage
➢ Horizontal Flip - Flips the footage horizontally
■ Step 1: Add the “Horizontal Flip” effect to desired footage
 ➢ Crop - Crops the footage to your desired size
■ Step 1: Add “Crop” effect to desired footage
■ Step 2: Mess with the “Left”, “Top”, “Right” and “Bottom” sliders to crop the footage

Note: Clicking on the “Crop” effect in the “Effect Controls Panel” lets you visually change the values through the
“Preview Window”

❖ Captions & Transcription - All transcription and subtitle work should be done through the “Text
Panel”
➢ Transcript
■ Step 1: Under “Transcript” you will find a “Create Transcript” button, click on that.
● Note: Do this process only after you have finished the cleanup process
■ Step 2: Selecting “In point to Out point only” will allow you to transcribe a specific part of the
video
■ Step 3: After Premiere has finished the transcription, you will have to go through the entire
footage and correct the auto-generated transcription

➢ Captions
■ Step 1: On top of the “Transcript Bar” there will be a button indicating “Create captions”.
Click on that
● Don’t mess with anything but the “maximum length of characters” and “minimum
duration in seconds”
● And set the Lines to “Single” rather than “Double”
■ Step 2: Select the caption in the timeline and go to the “Essential Graphic Panel”
● Change the position, font style, size and alignment from here.
● Once that is done, under “Track Style” there should be an arrow pointing upwards.
 ❖ Transitions
➢ Premiere Composer
■ Step 1: Download Premiere Composer from here
■ Step 2: Install and run it by following the instructions prompted by the exe
■ Step 3: In Premiere Pro, Go to Window > Extension > Premiere Composer and click on
“Premiere Composer” to enable it
■ Step 4: Under “Premiere Composer Panel” you will find a bunch of drag and drop transitions
which is more than you'll require
Note: Premiere Composer offers much more than Transitions. I’d suggest you go through all of the other effects
and presets it has to offer and master this tool at your own pace

2. Graphic Designing

❖ Image Advertisements
➢ Step 1: Obtain the copy of the “Headline” and “Body” that’s relevant to the advertisement.
■ If by any chance you were not given one of these, ask or come something up on your own
➢ Step 2: Model the advertisement off of other advertisements
■ Go to sites like Behance, Dribble, Pinterest and Google Images and search for
advertisements similar to the brief you were given
Note: Make sure you are sticking to the branding guidelines of the client you're working with, ignore this only if
specifically mentioned to ignore.

❖ Social Media Starter Pack

➢ Facebook Banner
■ Step 1: Set your canvas size to 820x360 pixels
■ Step 2: Create margins of 24px top and bottom as these areas are not visible on desktop
■ Step 3: Create margins of 90px to the left and right side as those parts aren't visible on
mobile
 ■ Step 4: Also roughly calculate the profile image covering the banner both on mobile and
desktop
■ Step 5: Include the company website in bold type somewhere in the banner as well as
include a CTA like “Message me” or “Dm to know more”

➢ Linkedin Banner
■ Step 1: Set canvas to 1584x396 pixels
■ Step 2: Add a message that gives a good description of what the person or business does
■ Step 3: Include the company website in bold type somewhere in the banner as well as
include a CTA like “Message me” or “Dm to know more”
■ Step 4: Also roughly calculate the profile image covering the banner both on mobile and
desktop

❖ Branding Basics
➢ Typography
■ Step 1: Select a Primary and a Secondary font for the brand
● Use Fontjoy to generate these font pairs
■ Step 2: Make sure that these fonts are the main fonts being used with all branding elements
(banners, posts, packaging, letterheads etc.)

➢ Colours
■ Step 1: Pick an appropriate colour that relates to what the business is about
● Look into “colour psychology” to figure out what colours would fit the business
■ Step 2: Use Coolors to select the colours
● Pick out primary, secondary, accent and shades/tints of black & white colours
◆ The Primary colour is your hero colour, it's the most used and prominent colour in
the brand
◆ Secondary colours are used in conjunction with the primary colour and are less in
percentage in comparison to the primary
 ◆ Accent colours are just for that little splash of color in your designs so it doesn't
look bland
◆ Choosing different shades/tints of blacks & whites can make your branding stand
out as it breaks the norm of using plain black and plain white

➢ Logo (there are many ways of doing this, here is an easy and simple way)
■ Step 1: Go onto Flaticon
■ Step 2: Come up with keywords of the brand (eg: if the brand name is YourDreamCrew,
keywords you can break from this are dream/stars/moon/night and crew/team/people)
■ Step 3: Feed these keywords into Flaticon and get inspiration from the symbols attached
with the keywords
■ Step 4: Select some of the more eye-catching symbols and create a mood board with these
symbols categorised by keywords
■ Step 5: Think of ways to mix and merge the symbols to come up with something abstract

3. Communications

❖ Workflows
➢ Step 1: List all the tasks that you have to do at your position regularly
➢ Step 2: Note down every step it takes you to do those certain tasks
➢ Step 3: List all those steps in a systematic way
➢ Step 4: Attach the time required for you to do those tasks

❖ EOD Reports
➢ EOD Reports
■ Step 1: Create a simple template with the following details:
- Date
 - Tasks completed
- Wins
- Remarks
■ Step 2: Enter data for the particular day
■ Step 3: Send it to your Supervisor
● Having a specific time in the day to do this can be very helpful

❖ Ask the right questions

➢ Step 1: After reading the client brief, visualise yourself doing the tasks and figure out major
roadblocks
➢ Step 2: Once the roadblock is identified, ask the client questions that would eliminate or reduce
roadblocks.
➢ Step 3: Example questions:
■ Where is this

Note: Avoid open-ended questions. Prepare a draft of your work and get feedback on it.

❖ How to handle deliverables

➢ Step 1: Upload the deliverable onto the file managing software of the client (Dropbox, google
drive etc.)
➢ Step 2: Make sure that the client is added to view the link
➢ Step 3: Send the client the link through slack and add a description with it
■ The description should ideally have a little bit of your thinking behind your decisions
■ Things that you did differently and why you did them differently
■ New things you added and why you added it

❖ Note Taking
➢ Step 1: Take notes while being briefed on client calls. Look out for:
■ Adjectives
 ■ Style
■ Feel
■ Canvas Size
■ File Size
■ Colours
■ Ratio
■ File format
■ Use-case for creative
■ Deadline
➢ Step 2: Ask open-ended questions. Do it only during calls.
■ Usually, the client replies with adjectives and describes a style when asked an open-ended
question. Note down those adjectives and words to your advantage.
■ If the client replies with an “I don't know” then just do whatever you have in mind and ask for
their feedback later

❖ Tracking Work data

➢ Step 1: As the client assigns you your task, start filling in the column of the Work Data Tracking
Template we have provided
■ The primary columns are “Project Description” and “Project Link”
■ You can either be super specific with the dates by adding the time as well or in general just
add the day, date and month
 Training Timeline
Month 1:

Week 1 -
1) Onboarding Call (Day 1)
2) Communications Training ( Day 2)
3) Branding Basics (Day 3,4,5)

Week 2 -
1) Social Media Starter Pack (Linkedin Banner, Facebook Banner) (Day 1 & 2)
2) Image Advertisement (Day 3)
3) Video Advertisements (Day 4 & 5)

Week 3 -
1) Create a YouTube video (Day 1& 2)
a) Emphasis on cuts, visual effects & transitions
2) TikTok Content Repurposing (Day 3)
a) Emphasis on captions
3) Travel Montage (Day 4 & 5)
a) Emphasis on colour grading & sound design

Week 4 -
1) Book cover (Day 1)
2) Video Essay ( Day 2 & 3)
3) Reaction video ( Day 4 & 5)