How to prepare for an interview video

• Talk it through, don’t script it. Agree on the three or four things the video has to say. Answers that are read sound read.
• Know your first answer. Expect to be asked who you are and what you do, and have a clean one-sentence version ready.
• Pick the quietest room, not the prettiest. Air conditioning, fridges and traffic show up in the audio long before they show up on camera. A carpeted office with a door beats a glass lobby.
• Plan the B-roll. List the places, products and people we can film around the interview: the shop floor, the lab, the team at work. That footage is what makes an interview watchable.

• Solid, mid-tone colors: navy, gray, earth tones.
• No thin stripes or tight checks. They shimmer on camera (it’s called moiré).
• Skip pure white, and logos that aren’t yours.
• Wear what you’d wear to meet a client. You should look like yourself on a good day.
• Bring a second top in case the first one fights with the background.

I set up the lights and audio before you’re needed, so you walk into a set that’s ready. You’ll wear a small wireless mic, with a shotgun mic just out of frame as a backup.

• Answer in full sentences. If I ask what your company does, say “Our company helps…” rather than “We help…”. My question won’t be in the video, so your answer has to stand on its own.
• Look at me, not the lens, unless we’ve agreed otherwise.
• Stop and start again whenever you want. Nothing is live, and the edit uses the best take.

I interview in both. If your team or your customers speak Spanish, it’s worth recording both versions on the same day while everything is set up.

The full interview, a short commercial cut, and clips for social. That’s the format of the interview-and-commercial pairs on my video page, and it’s why an interview day is one of the best-value shoots a company can book.