Coinciding with requests for longer reviews is the arrival of a S&W 1911 – the new “E” series model with no Swartz safety and the improved Performance Center extractor. This model also has the Melonite finish and an accessory rail. The review will take a while to complete due to other work and the interests of being thorough, but I am shooting for a 7 minute Youtube video. Too long? Too short?
7 minutes is fine. Right between “that’s it?” and “get on with it!”. One would think a video review of a nice gun can never be too long, but then I stumbled across nutnfancy…
I don’t know if I’d shoot for a particular time – I’d prefer that the review is done when it’s done.
That being said there are a *lot* of reviews that are waaay too long on Youtube. It’s refreshing that a reviewer will take the time to make the reviews as long as necessary – but no longer. Remember, you’re not done when there’s nothing left to add, but when there’s nothing left to take away.
One of the things I like about your reviews is that they are concise. Please keep up the excellent work.
I prefer written reviews with lots of pictures to video reviews, but that’s just me.
I used to do both (written and video), but time constraints really limit what I can do. Once all video footage and testing is recorded & complete, it takes me about 2 hours per minute of “finished product” video to complete narration and video/audio editing, and let’s say 2-4 hours to write a 1000 word review with pics. I can work faster if I don’t have a lot of video or pics to sort through.
Range time can vary from one hour (for something simple) to dozens (for something complex or a big comparison), and time in “the studio” taking pictures can be ten minutes for a few simple product shots or 3-4 hours for a complex series of shots. Unfortunately, “simple” often becomes “complex.”
(Side note: I’m taking a photo class, and overheard a fellow student bragging that she’d taken all ten of the images in her final portfolio in under 25 minutes. I tried to think if I had spent less than 25 minutes on any one of my ten images, including concept, layout, etc, and couldn’t think of a single one. Then again, I try to avoid using Photoshop to correct my images, which can save a lot of time, I guess).
I have started producing such things for other companies/blogs and while doing so is giving me more of an opportunity to increase my efficiency and skill at all of the above, it’s also taking a significant amount of time – I spend between four and sixteen hours per day doing photos/videos/articles/etc, or researching & testing how I can do this work faster or better.
I wish I could deliver a comprehensive written review AND a video for every product, but I just don’t think it’s possible. I could cut production standards in order to do the typical “table top” YouTube review that lasts 10-15 minutes and is largely unedited, but I don’t want to go there. I will try making more in depth video reviews in order to meet demand, but they’re going to be in the same format as my normal videos.
You need an assistant that can write and use After Effects. Hire me. 😉
Photoshop, Vegas, After Effects…I’m learning as I go here :X
Seven minutes is the max you want to go for a video review, sweet spot would be between 3-6 minutes. That’s what I would “shoot” for.
I agree with Russ.
So long as you don’t approach nutnfancy levels of brevity (or lack thereof) I think you’ll be fine.
So long as you keep up your concise standard with good observations, I doubt any of us will mind you going over 7 mins. Mindless tangents needlessly padding the video’s length is what we dislike. (cough cough, nutnfancy, cough)
Thanks for the input, all. I will make usual but perhaps more thorough observations and explanations and see where it ends up.
I wish S&W would stop putting unnecessary safety features on their guns such as the internal locks and the “warning” on the side of this 1911
I agree. The warning on the left side of the frame, just above the dust cover/accessory rail, says “CAUTION – CAPABLE OF FIRING WITH MAGAZINE REMOVED”. How is this different than any other centerfire 1911 in existence? While I am very happy that they’ve ditched the Swartz system, it would seem that there are still a few lawyers at S&W exerting a legal stranglehold on the production of a non-silly firearm.
As long as you have relevant and informative things to discuss I don’t believe that 7 minutes is that long. If I’m looking at your vid then I’m probably thinking (dreaming perhaps) about getting this M1911 and I’d like every bit of info that I can get. As your reviews are much more professional than the usual reviews out there (Um, this is my gun. I got it today. It’s fuckin awesome man) I don’t think that you could run too long.