Director’s Cut – Part 1

As promised, here is the gist of our second webinar. This webinar has been broken down into 2 posts to take you through the important steps of movie making. Yes, we said movie making because we think our ecards are just as glamorous as hollywood flicks! 

1) Concept:

Now you can’t start a movie before knowing the theme or concept that you want for the movie. You have to be sure of this right from the beginning.  So decide early if you want to make a romantic comedy or action flick or a thriller or a fantasy movie, but ensure that the concept  matches the chosen category.

2) Storyline/ Script:

After you’ve decided on the concept you should plan out the entire flow of the ecard – scene by scene.  Sketch/detail out everything so you know how to proceed.

 3) Dialogues:

In this case dialogues refer to card messages.  Punch lines steal the show and in this case we can’t stress enough on the importance of effective card messages.  It is important to have  great personalized messages in your cards. Below are some pointers that we’ve discussed before so  here’s a quick recap.

  • Me to You Message
  • Identify the sender – card copy to convey his emotions
  • Identify the receiver- card copy to connect with his emotions
  • Visuals attract but COPY sells.
Valentine's Day ecard by Ashupatodia
Valentine’s Day ecard by Ashupatodia

4) Location:

We don’t have to go to Switzerland or a beautiful location in Europe to make an ecard. We can bring them right here to us. You should decide the feel of the card and decide on its background. You may choose an autumn backdrop or a winter one or have a morning scene or a night one. You can also choose to display an indoor scene vs an outdoor one. For example in the above ecard Ashu chose a rich satin background to illustrate the emotion of love. Whatever image you choose it must be available to be used for commercial purposes and you must check for any copyright concerns.

 5) Cast:

You can choose to include self-drawn cartoons i.e. character animation or model images. For model images you need a model release form to abide by copyright laws.

 6) Direction:

Direction is putting it all together. Different techniques and softwares need to be used for different type of ecards. So this will depend on whether you are making a postcard, an animated card, a video card or a flash card. Adobe Photoshop is one of the most user friendly tools.

 In next week’s blog we’ll cover other steps that will help make your ecard a blockbuster!