Interested in Canon certification and/or our Canon camera classes? The Association has been delivering the best DSLR Boot Camp in Los Angeles for 3 years. This year we are taking the Boot Camp on the road as well as continuing our classes in Burbank, CA.

In February we have our Pro Level I Canon Boot Camp (Feb 25th – Burbank), which is available to anyone whether or not experienced with Canon cameras. Pro Level I classes usually feature guest speakers from the industry who have experience with DSLR Filmmaking, such as Dana Christiaansen or Eric Schmidt.

In March, Creovision will host both Pro Level I and Pro Level II (Level I Grads or Industry Pros only) in Prague, Czech Republic! Class dates are March 10th & 11th, and March 17th & 18th (Level I and Level II, respectively). The classes are open to anyone, but seating is limited. Visit the Prague site HERE for more information and to download the class application. We are very excited about the Prague Canon camera classes as Polly Morgan, DP, will be joining the Boot Camp Team as an instructor! 

Future Boot Camp Dates are listed on the right side of this blog, or email me at trevor@theassociation.tv for more information.

Sometimes the only thing that seems to stay the same in the social media world, is that it is constantly changing. Facebook and other social networks constantly update their look, add features, and generally confuse the rest of us with a dazzling array of change, change, change.

While this might whet the appetite of the early adopters, keen to stay on top of the very latest technological advances, the rest of us might not be as happy with yet another “thingy” to figure out. Personally I’m very happy to let a big tech corporation update and advance their technology, but I prefer to have the benefit of their work be in the background, so I can focus on my work and make a living. Also, it’s obviously easier to focus on ONE thing rather that 20 things that keep changing.

Maybe it’s just because I’m male, but it’s challenging to keep up with 20 social network platforms that don’t stay still! Blogging, however, has essentially stayed the same over the years.  And blogging is a crucial part of keeping your company on top in search results. Additionally, a well setup blog can be the hub of an effective marketing plan and simplify any corporate social media effort.

A key, key aspect of blogging, is that you OWN it. Marketing exclusively on Facebook or other free platforms is risky if that’s the only marketing plan you have. Why? Facebook owns everything you put out. Ask yourself this very important question: Do you pay Facebook for your Page? For your personal profile? No, you don’t. Facebook can literally yank your page at any time. Same with Twitter or LinkedIn.

But a blog is different, especially if you are paying for the domain and hosting. It can’t just be taken away because someone complains or flags your content. Wouldn’t you rather own your content, and retain the ability to push content out to the same social networks you have now as a “distribution campaign?” Keep in mind, posting something on Facebook has a shelf life of about 1 hour. It’s soon gone, pushed out of sight by a constant stream of content. Blogs are consistently located in one spot (owned by you) and are easier to find in search results today, tomorrow and in the far future.

I recommend looking over your activities and start writing about what you do every day. Give people a taste of your company and how you help people. Give away free tips. Help someone every day and write about it. Interview other people in your industry and give them a platform to promote how they help others too. Do it every day, but at least once a week. Technically, there are some really good reasons to blog which I’ll get into in later posts. For an overview of social media, watch my free webinar, Demystifying Social Media for Business, which includes a section on blogging that might be helpful to the novice.

This month Fletch Murray, President of The Association and Chief Instructor of our Canon camera classes, had the honor of speaking at the South Bay Filmmakers Meetup Group.

While he was probably more focused on talking about the Canon DSLR 5D and 7D, I thought I’d take the opportunity to mention what a great opportunity social networking groups are to spread the word about your company without spending a lot of marketing dollars.

Customer Feedback

No matter how good you or your products and services are, having someone else outside of your company mention a few good words is pure marketing gold. After the event was finished, attendees logged into Meetup to give their feedback on his talk. Here are a couple of excerpts as an example:

The rest of comments can be viewed on the Meetup event page here.

Meetup (and other social networking groups that actually meet in person, like Biznik) offer a powerful way to get in front of your target audience, gain exposure and even get clients with minimal cost. Sure beats advertising or Pay Per Click in terms of cost-per-lead. And it’s fun. Look for online social networks that lean towards meeting in person – face to face meetings are the best for the relationship building that leads to a potential work contact.

During our Pro Level Two workshop, students get a chance to shoot scenes for a short film that show what they can do with their Canon 5D’s and 7D’s. Our last Pro Level Two Canon Boot Camp had three set-up scenes to shoot:

The video below is the rough cut preview of the third scene:

For the opening close-up lighting of the candle, we put Canon’s 28-135mm on a 14mm macro extension tube, on the Canon 7D.  The extremely short depth of field draws attention to the candle’s flame.  The rest of the shots are from the Canon 5D with an L series Canon 70 – 200 mm shooting at f 4. This “long lens”  threw the candles out of focus (they were eight feet away).

A china ball lamp served as the key.  On some of the shots we held a three-inch square white candle to add a flickering fill light as the Porta-Jib Traveler arced across the actors.

The flame lighting shot was shot on the Canon 7D.

March 2012 marks the month that The Association takes the Canon Boot Camp on the road for the first time! Are we going to Phoenix? Nope. Are we going to New York? No.

We’re swimming the ocean blue to put on the first ever European Canon Boot Camp! Yes, we will be making history (well, we’re excited about it, so it’s pretty historic to us!) in Prague, Czech Republic. One of the most visited cities in the world, and a historic cultural center of Europe, it’s only fitting the boot camp touches down here to teach some DSLR Magic.

The event is sponsored by Creovision, a professional production and post-production studio in Prague, and number of partners. The 2 day workshops feature our Pro Level I and Pro Level II Canon camera classes with hands-on training and drilling in the use of Canon’s HDSLR 5D and 7D. And, of course, those attending will receive their Canon certification by The Association.

Since I don’t speak Czech, the classes will be delivered in English, which actually makes it all the more universal for those attending. The current class dates are March 10th and 17th for Pro Level I. Both Pro Level I classes are followed by Pro Level II on the next days, March 11th and 18th.

Anyone interested in taking the boot camps may apply! Just fill out the application and email it in. You may also reach out to the boot camp coordinators, Martin and Markus. Here is their contact information:

We thank Martin and Markus for inviting us out for what’s sure to be a memorable boot camp, and we’ll keep you updated on our trip as we can.

Our December Canon camera class Pro Level I students were treated to special guest speaker Dana Christiaansen, who shared his experiences working with the new EOS C300. Dana has extensive experience shooting commercial productions for car brands such as BMW, Suzuki and Scion, as well as others.

Dana gave us a taste of what it was like to work with him on the short film directed by Sam Nicholson, ‘XXIT‘, shot with the C300. Basically, you have to be ready to run! Keep an eye out for Part 2 and Part 3 where we explore technical aspects and lighting with Canon’s C300.

To see Part I of Dana’s talk, click on the video below:

The rest of Dana’s filmography and videos of his works as a cinematographer can be viewed online.

Interested in more tips from the trenches? Come to our Pro Level I & II  Boot Camps! The next one is in just a few days, on January 28th, where Eric Schmidt will be sharing his first hand experience in shooting feature films with the Canon DSLR 5D and 7D.

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I know it is hard to believe but I didn’t win the lottery…again. I thought I’d try to win without playing my kids’ birth dates for once. Oh well. Not that I play every weekend.  I’ve gambled on the lottery maybe ten times in the last ten years. I don’t feel bad about it. Five bucks now and then has about as much chance of paying off as money invested on Wall Street. We all used to believe that we had to have a portfolio of investments.  Many of my friends and family saw their investments disappear. We’re in baffling times.

More baffling to me is why companies gamble on commercial productions they put on TV. Especially now, when every dollar really counts! Judging from the ads, these companies skip all the vital steps to making an effective direct response TV ad and then wonder why it doesn’t pull leads.

What do I mean by vital steps?  Well for one thing, know your target audience, thoroughly. Not just the demographic.  Know what imagery they’re receptive to. Know what they “think” about products or services similar to yours.  Know what about your product or service they will respond to positively. Know what emotion your target audience is sitting in. Know what words and phrases they agree with. These are just a few of the things we research.

If you don’t know these things before beginning the creative part of making a custom video production, you’re going to miss your target audience. You’ll disconnect with your audience to a greater or lesser degree.  Like the guys who marketed the Chevy Nova in South America, where “No Va” means “won’t go”. Duh.

Here’s another example.  We’ve had clients come to us with a product named Klimadynon. It alleviates discomfort during menstrual cycles.   We tested some alternate names and renamed the product so it didn’t communicate that it was for women who act like a dinosaur now and then.

If you don’t know your audience you’re wasting your money.  You’re not just losing sales, you may be driving them away!   If you don’t know your target audience you’ve reduced the chance of your ad being effective by 70%. It’s like playing darts blindfolded. You can’t see the target.  How do expect to hit a bull’s eye? We see advertisements on TV all the time that miss the target audience. They don’t cause the phone to ring.  The sponsor has wasted his money. Is there a better way?  You bet ! We’ve used it for years on our corporate clients and we started using it on our TV commercials.  It’s proven and scientific.  It takes the guesswork out of marketing.

All advertising is a gamble. Our proprietary methods put the odds in your favor. Otherwise, you may as well play the Lottery.  Your chance of winning is lousy but at least you’re not throwing away so much money. A better way to go is to find out how we can help you win with an effective marketing plan.  It’s a sure bet.

The Association’s Canon Boot Camp has a special guest scheduled for Jan 28th’s Pro Level I class.

Eric Schmidt. Though you may not recognize the name, you will certainly recognize the work. Having DP’d commercials for Miller Genuine Draft, Snapple, Toshiba, and Verizon as well as music videos for Coldplay, Michael Jackson, Adele, The Flaming Lips, and Beck, his body of work is not only impressive, but an integral part of pop culture.

Foo Fighters’ music video “Best of You“, which he filmed with director and oft-collaborator Mark Pellington, won an MTV music video award in 2005. A year earlier they earned an ASC Outstanding Achievement Award for their work on the TV series Cold Case. Obscure, he is not.

The imagery in Schmidt’s 2011 movie I Melt with You, starring Rob Lowe, Jeremy Piven, and Sasha Grey, is even more striking than his otherwise mainstream work. A story about three 40ish best friends who find themselves revisiting a disturbing pact made years earlier, Schmidt’s cinematography creates a world of chaos, depth, and strange beauty.

A core belief in the filmmaking world is that the image is universal. A film should be able to tell a story without the use of dialogue. If that is true, then Eric Schmidt has succeeded without question, which is why we’re eager to hear what he has to say to our students at the January 28th Pro Level I Canon Boot Camp.

Eric will be giving our students advice, answering questions, and talking to us about using a DSLR, which he used to shoot I Melt with You.

“The freedom to shoot handheld, to crouch down, to throw it under your arm, switch shoulders or stick it out of a window was the greatest part of shooting with [DSLR]” says Schmidt in an interview with HDVideoPro.

Anyone interested in getting trained on the Canon DSLR 5D & 7D can find out all about our Canon camera classes by visiting canonbootcamp.com for the next event dates, or click on the links on the right of this blog for a specific upcoming class date. 

Celine Duong is one of the busiest creatives at The Association, and it’s clear that she’s dedicated to the work and her students. We sat down with the 23-year-old production junkie and talked with her about how she got her start, and what she loves most about the Canon Boot Camp.

Where are you from?
Well, I was born in Paris, France and spent the first ten years of my life there, then I moved to Los Angeles.

What do you do here at The Association?
I’m a Canon Boot Camp Instructor specializing in the 7D, I work in the creative division helping develop scripts and concepts for the film projects we do, and I’m a part of the marketing and promotion division for The Association’s Canon camera classes.

When did you get interested in cameras and film production?
During college when I studied abroad and they wouldn’t let us take the production classes, but I realized that was what I was interested in. You know what they say, you always want what you can’t have. That whole year, I was itching to get my hands on some gear, get some guidance and shoot.  So, during my senior year of college I completely focused on production.

I took all the production classes, got an internship, and my life became 100% involved in that field because I wanted to mock-up what it would be to be in that career full-time. It proved to me that it was something I loved to do and was pretty good at, so after college I kept pursuing it in LA. Now, here I am!

What’s your favorite camera?
That’s a hard one! I love DSLRs, especially the 60D, the Canon 5D, and 7D. My favorite camera would be a hybrid/unborn child of a 5D, 7D, and 60D. I love the look of the 5D so I want its huge sensor so that I could get the shallow depth of field, the 7D for its slo-mo capabilities, and the 60D for its flip-out monitor. So technically my perfect camera doesn’t exist… [laughs].

What’s the most exciting project you’ve ever worked on?
I worked on a documentary as a camera operator with my 7D, where I filmed at a camp for underprivileged student-athletes. The camp provided them with activities and education that taught them that they were more than just their athletic ability. By the end they had turned into well rounded young men and had such confidence. I was only filming them, but I really felt like I had become a part of their transformation. That was really special for me.

What is the best part about The Association’s Canon Boot Camp?
Our caliber of students is evidence that no matter how experienced you are, you can always learn something new. For example, the DP for Texas Chainsaw Massacre is a past student. We get to teach pretty knowledgeable people a new skill, which I think is really cool.

On the other hand, and just as exciting, are the students who have absolutely no experience. There was a past student who took his camera out of the box and literally did not know how to turn it on. By the end, he know exactly how to operate his camera, all the ins and outs. We have many students from both categories and the pace of the class seems to be right for everyone.

If you have any questions about The Association or want to register for an upcoming Canon Boot Camp workshop, please call us at 818.841.9660, or visit our website. The updated dates and times of the next boot camp are on the right side of the page.