Under Leveraged Assets
Multimedia storytelling generates a lot of assets: audio interviews, still images, information graphics, maybe a bit of video.
Editors and producers slice, dice and splice them all together to create a nice piece that gets posted to the web, pointed to by an email blast, viewed once by the audience, maybe. Then it languishes until the next item in the plan bumps it to the archive page.
Checkbox ticked – step and repeat.
Ouch!
Multimedia: As a Tactic
Lets be clear, multimedia storytelling is a tactic. One of many messaging vehicles at your disposal. And in today’s online centric communication plans, it offers significant impact and cost advantages over straight video or static word and picture postings.
But impact and cost are still only tactical advantages. They don’t scale very well and they don’t create strategic opportunities to forge the core message.
Multi Medium Strategy
Multi medium is a strategic approach to building campaigns by leveraging multimedia assets in all appropriate mediums at the right time and place.
When multimedia assets are thoughtfully and purposefully integrated into other mediums (print, presentations, training decks) they yield a significant strategic advantage by re-engaging audiences with familiar concepts that consistently reinforce core messages.
06
Jul 10
Johannes’ Gift
Johannes Moseki spoke with the conviction of a true and deep love for his friend Enoch. It was all on video, shot in a small hut where the two men had shared lunch many days while working together at the fuel depot in Klerksdorp, South Africa.
The voice was true, the story well told, but it wasn’t enough. I needed pictures, enough to carry the audio. I had tight headshots from the interview. They were touching — but not enough.
Johannes Moseki during interview remembering his friend Enoch Senoge.
“Can we talk to Enoch’s family” we asked.
“I’ll call,” he said. A few minutes later, “No answer, but I can take you.”
The car that Enoch died in sat in front of his house. We asked around, and neighbors gave us disappointing news. The family had gone to Enoch’s ancestral hometown for a ceremony to mark the ending of the mourning period.
Johannes stood by the car, I balked, then he began to remove the bedspreads that covered the car, he paused in thought, I shot. He stood next to the car reflecting, I shot some more. The dents from the impact of the car against the fence Enoch crashed into were clear, telling.
Johannes and the car Enoch died in.
Maybe this would work. I was hoping for a shot of the family holding a photo of Enoch. A cliche really, but telling, possibly powerful. Together with recorded remembrances and laments of life without him, it might have worked.
Finished there, we all climbed back into the car. Johannes and I jammed in the backseat. I could see he was moved by seeing the car. He was quiet except when he gave our driver directions on how to get back to the fuel depot. Then without warning he asked, “would you like to see the place Enoch died? I haven’t been by there since the accident.”
I felt protective, “are you sure you want to go?” I asked.
“Turn up ahead” he said.
One more picture I thought, maybe that would do it. Maybe that would bring it all together.
We got out of the car and carefully crossed the road, Johannes leading in a meandering path, stopping every few yards to inspect the ground at his feet, occasionally bending down and picking up remnants of the broken car. I looked up and saw the gap in the median, the place where Enoch’s car crossed, and beyond the gaping hole in the concrete fence.
As Johannes started crossed the road I could see where he was headed. I went ahead and waited – shooting as he came toward me. Not a word passed between us, not a glance. But the pictures presented themselves and I shot. That was it. I knew I had what I needed.
Johannes in thought at the scene of Enoch's death
Back in the car, I asked if he was OK. “Yes,” he nodded. The only words I could find were “thank you.”
“No, thank you sir,” he replied, then wiped a tear from the corner of his eye, gave a quick nod and turned back to look out the window as we pulled away.
To view the multimedia piece click on Remembering Enoch in my multimedia portfolio gallery.