Behind The Pixel: Closing The Animation Communication Gap

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Will
Hey there.

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Kathryn
Hello.

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Will
Welcome back.

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Kathryn
Thank you for having me. You did.

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Will
That last time.

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Kathryn
What?

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Will
Not say welcome back.

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Kathryn
Did I?

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Kathryn
Well, welcome back again. I'm retconning.

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Will
Nice.

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Will
We have a great show for you today. Yes. We just had a great conversation with the team over at Gusto.

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Kathryn
Yes.

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Will
And just to be clear, I wanted to mention this now so that people are like, "Gusto, the payroll HR company?"

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Kathryn
No.

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Will
Not the payroll company. This is Gusto, a Matter company. They are a creative force that brings brands to life. They're also part of a holistic effort that elevates brands at Matter. With Matter, they're able to leverage their myriad of services and tell better, more complete stories on behalf of their clients. We learned a lot from them on this call.

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Will
I think it was really, really insightful and really helpful.

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Kathryn
I think it's been really cool to hear about how a lot of the time, the challenges that a lot of creatives and business owners are facing are like similar problems but just happening at different scales. Yeah, sort of how to navigate those and how different creative teams navigate and solve those challenges is actually really cool to learn about.

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Will
Another thing that has been happening, I think, is I've been taking things away from these conversations and realizing that the challenges that we're talking about, these knowledge gaps, are not just happening to us. Right? They're happening to other companies and other creatives within those companies as well. So it's really honestly validating.

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Kathryn
Yeah, because we're getting a little bit of validation for sure that we're not just talking in our little bubble about the different challenges that are happening in the industry. They, they happen everywhere. And so it's, it's very cool to see the different approaches.

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Will
So I'm going to introduce these guys. So we sat down with Tim Bradley, Nicole Bedard, and Joe Skoniecki, executive producer, art director, and senior motion designer at Gusto. And they were fantastic guests as the first time we had three people on. Yeah. So it pushed us a little bit.

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Kathryn
But.

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Kathryn
But in the best way.

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Will
But in the best way and in fantastic conversation.

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Kathryn
Yeah. So we were really, really happy to talk with them. So with that, why don't we just jump right into the conversation?

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Will
Let's do it.

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Kathryn
Well, hello, everyone.

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Will
You're here.

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Kathryn
Thank you so much for joining us. We're really, really happy to have you. We're really happy to talk with another creative team because I'm sure there's a lot that we're going to be able to dive into here.

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Will
I just got to say before. Yeah. Yeah. You guys are the first creative team that we've had as a unit.

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Kathryn
Yes.

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Will
Three, three people. I think you're pushing the limits of all of our technologies.

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Kathryn
We'll find out together. Yes.

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Tim
You could have fooled us.

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Kathryn
But yeah. So I think we should start by just having our audience get to know each of you a little bit more. And we also recognize that sometimes we've talked about this before in a different episode of the podcast, but sometimes creative studios will have the same name for a role. And maybe sometimes that role is exactly the same in terms of activities or tasks, but sometimes it's different.

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Kathryn
So could each of you give us an idea of who you are, what you do, and kind of what Gusto is all about? Maybe I'll start by, I've heard the term, popcorn-ing it over to Tim to kick things off.

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Tim
Awesome. I Like that. Yes. I'm Tim Bradley. I'm an executive producer at Gusto. Also, VP with Matter, the agency, holistically. Gusto. I kind of like to describe it as like the moon to the earth, of the greater agency. We're very autonomous. And there's that gravitational pull, of course, but like, we're mostly out to, you know, create and serve our own clients independently, which is awesome.

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Tim
And yeah, there are 22 creatives on our team, a healthy chunk of motion designers and animators, which Nicole and Joe can introduce here in a second. And then, the rest of the group is rounded out by writers, directors of photography, directors, editors, and podcast producers. And our footprint: about half the group's here on the East Coast, sort of like Boston Metro North and then Denver, CO, and Portland, Oregon.

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Tim
Nice. I'm going to popcorn it over to Nicole. Awesome.

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Nicole
Hey, so I'm Nicole Bedard, and I'm the art director here at Gusto. So I help, you know, lead our motion graphics animation team. Sort of a fun fact. When I started here seven years ago, I was the first full-time motion graphics hire. Nice. Yeah. So which is very cool. So in that time, the team has grown to seven with experiences and, you know, all kinds of disciplines and expertise.

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Nicole
So it's been super rewarding to see the team grow from its humble beginnings to where it is now, totally. And so I'll pass it over to Joe.

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Joe
Hi, I'm Joe Skoniecki. I'm a senior motion designer here at Gusto. I've been here just under five years, and now I work directly under Nicole lately. Now that I have a senior title, I'm kind of managing some junior designers. I'm kind of helping facilitate more projects, and my hands are in storyboarding and so frames and animation and all that stuff as well.

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Kathryn
Right? Yeah. You know, it's.

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Kathryn
Always interesting to see, even if you've been at a company for a long time, how your roles might start to shift and change as you're going up the ladder or you're, I've heard it's, of course, a vertical letter and a horizontal letter sometimes.

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Kathryn
Yeah.

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Tim
For sure. I guess building your own rungs along the way, too.

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Kathryn
That's a fair way to think about it. Yeah, totally. Yeah.

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Joe
That's awesome.

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Will
So let's talk a little bit about the process. You know, we know everyone's production process is different. So I'm very curious about what a typical production workflow looks like. Can you just give us a rundown, a little overview on that, like what you do with a new client when they come through?

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Tim
Yeah, sure. So I'm usually the first voice or face that the prospect sees. We're kind of a unique entity where it's like we have a lot of tenured clients, you know, that you've been working with for around six, eight, ten years respectively, of our sort of like tripod of stable clients I like to describe. And then we also have our integrated marketing and public relations peers that have their roster of clients on retainers for those disciplines.

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Tim
But then those often have project needs, you know, like customer stories or events and recruiting efforts or employer branding and things like that that we support with. And then, of course, we're hustling this year to get the next new client, too, right? So it's a unique challenge sort of every day, but ultimately starts with a conversation, right?

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Tim
Just like a lot of times, a client is like, "I need this thing," and it's not like it's a red flag, but it's kind of a yellow flag of, like, are you sure? Like, are you sure that's what you need? And so it's a lot of just like asking questions and why, you know, the layers of why, like why do you need this?

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Tim
And so usually that helps us understand who they're trying to talk to, of course. But where and when, and why again. And so we develop a scope of work based on that. We've really found that each studio is unique, but for us, it's like, what does that flagship piece, that premiere piece we call it, right, that whatever it is, call it like a 9o-second explainer for new a new product launch or something like that.

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Tim
Right. It's pretty, pretty standard from there. It's helping them understand how they can leverage that asset beyond that 90-second piece. Right. So, you know, obviously, the social versions, animated gifs, audiogram static frames, we have a couple of cool stories where our illustrations then evolved into trade show booths on behalf of the clients. Right?

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Will
So that's very cool.

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Tim
Sort of just sort of like understanding how they can make the most of this, this experience with us and the, you know, the product, I guess, so to speak, right? Totally. Once the scope of work is established, you know, it can always evolve, but at least it's like guardrails to show we're hitting milestones and budgets accordingly. And then, at that point, it's usually, if not already, a conversation with Nicole and Joe as far as esthetic and how we are going to approach this specific project uniquely for that client.

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Kathryn
Yeah, I was actually going to kind of follow up there with Joe and Nicole about the sort of at what point in the production process you are involved and how often you manage or navigate the client relationship. Or is it mostly internal? Like, what is that what does that relationship look like for you?

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Nicole
Yeah. I mean, sometimes I'm involved with those conversations with Tim. Sometimes it's like directly after we've established scope, you know, I look at what the project needs are like. We have to really have a good idea of what direction we're going to go in. So at that point, it's like, as I said, with the team of seven people who have a lot of different talents and skills.

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Nicole
That's like, who on the team would be best suited for this project? And then, of course, we're also talking with our copywriting team, say, you know, talk about what the story is going to look like. So yeah, you know, sort of, let's say, trickle down, but I'm, I'm brought in at that stage and then ripple.

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Tim
Ripple effect.

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Nicole
That's a better word.

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Kathryn
Yeah, I think that's...

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Kathryn
Collaboration. Right there at its finest when you're brainstorming the right terminology.

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Kathryn
To use, that makes sense. Awesome. Exactly.

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Kathryn
Yeah. What about you, Joe?

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Joe
Yeah, I would say, like, after kind of what Nicole talked about kind of gets set and going when we start actually developing the style of something, you know, we move into mood boards and style frames and storyboards. That's generally where I come in, and the rest of our team to try and start to really solidify what the client is looking for.

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Joe
And a big part of that is education. Like Tim said, like, what do you really want? What do you really need? And how can you utilize it to its fullest? Maybe a character piece is the best thing to do. So along with style frames, it would be character design. It would be like showing how these different pieces can work together.

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Joe
And then through there, you know, following through through animation and sound design and final cut through those deliverables Tim talked about.

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Kathryn
Nice. Yeah.

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Tim
And expectations all the way.

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Kathryn
Yes, always. It's always needed. It kind of...

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Kathryn
This leads into, like, the next question we had, which was kind of, you know, if I'm a marketer or a potential client, then I'm coming to your door. And I've maybe never made an animated video before. I could be really intimidated by the whole process with everything I've done in my own research or just getting referrals from people.

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Kathryn
I'm curious what kinds of pitfalls there are at each stage of the process that you try to avoid and whether that's a, you know, communication problem or an education problem or everything in between, like what are some pitfalls that each of you try to avoid in the process? Because I imagine, too, that you each have a certain subset of responsibilities with the client in some way.

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Tim
Yeah, for me, especially with the... "inexperienced," doesn't sound fair. But just someone that hasn't experienced this before. Usually, the first word of caution that I'll explain is the levels of key stakeholders. Right? Like like that seems to be something that can get glossed over. If it's not accounted for early and often. It might be like a product marketing manager and like, oh, we need this thing.

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Tim
Okay, sure. This seems very clear to us. And we'll go through the milestones along the way and then towards, you know, not exactly the finish line, but towards, you know, let's say, animation or, like, very far along. They'll be like, oh, well, my CMO doesn't like the story or something. And so, well, this person was never included in any communication to this point.

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Tim
Right. And so, you know, that's often that look in the mirror of like is that on us, so we're trying to like really establish that precedent early, right? Like who are the key stakeholders? When do they need to be included? And then we'll often caution them like, well, actually, they should all be here when we're establishing the esthetic when we're talking to the script, and we're talking through the audience and things like that.

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Tim
So that's probably the biggest gotcha that just falls on everybody, right? It kind of makes the product marketer look bad. It makes us like just run up against deadlines or whatever bandwidth is included. So yeah, that's probably the biggest one from my perspective.

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Will
Yeah. I'll just chime in for a second here; that's something that Alex Salsberg brought up last time in our other podcast, which is basically like, you don't know who in the room is actually in charge of the conversation. But there's also, like, who do you have to make happy? It's kind of sometimes two different people?

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Kathryn
Yeah, I'm hearing a lot of similar the same problem is still happening but at scale. Yeah, that's, you know. So how do you navigate that challenge there?

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Tim
I heard this great story. It's like this quip the other day that was like, Yeah, of course, you want to make your CEO happy, but how do you do that? By making your audience happy, right? Like your audience is happy by default, your CEO is going to be happy. So just helping them, you know, whoever's lower on the totem pole, understand and appreciate that.

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Tim
And we have to instill that trust that we have their audience's best interests in mind. Right. And that, by default, will make the CEO happy. Yeah.

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Will
Yeah, that's really good framing. Like if you frame the conversation always from the audience's perspective, then that's a nice out for anyone.

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Kathryn
Yeah. Yeah.

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Will
That's even, even if you're in that low totem pole or somewhere in the middle, you know, if you're like, Oh, is this going to make the audience happy? That's always like a mindset shift.

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Kathryn
I've heard the phrase what is it like to have a happy wife and happy life. And maybe there's something there that rhymes with clients.

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Kathryn
Or like mothers. Yeah. Happy Mother's Day. Happy Mother's Day. Yeah.

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Kathryn
Very interesting. But yeah, I don't. Nicole, Joe, do you have something you want to add there too?

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Nicole
So I think for a lot of clients, there's a desire to have this thing yesterday, right? Which makes sense. The sooner it's in the world, the faster it's doing work on your behalf. But I encourage clients, you know, not to rush the process because this can often come around and kind of bite us in the end.

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Nicole
So, you know. Yeah, yeah.

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Will
Do you hear that? Clients. Oh, you hear it?

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Nicole
You know, visual changes, you know, for example, are easier to make, quicker to make earlier in the process, you know, still image in the storyboard. That's easier to change than once we fully animated it. So, you know, again, do it in the storyboard, for example. If we rush that process, there's a possibility that we then have to put even more time into the project in the animation phase, which ultimately takes longer time to complete.

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Nicole
So yeah, just giving each step the respect and time that it needs will ultimately lead to the best project in the end.

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Kathryn
Yeah, yeah.

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Will
That's fair. I mean, if you... I forget what example it was; I don't. It was like an Instagram story or a LinkedIn post or something like where some guy was like, Okay, 10 minutes to draw Spider-Man. 2 hours to draw Spider-Man; and you know, 50 hours to draw Spider-Man. You can see the immense difference in the quality of that visual image.

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Will
And so that's kind of the same thing. You've let the artist do their thing through your eyes and through your input, but give it the time that it needs.

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Kathryn
All within...

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Kathryn
That fun budget.

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Joe
Yeah. I was going to say Nicole and I often, when we talk to clients or we're prepping something to be presented to a client, it's important to remind them of like a show versus tell mentality. You know, we put together scripts, we work with copywriters, put together scripts, and then when those scripts are sent to the client, they tend to add a few more words.

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Joe
They don't necessarily know that that means that the video will turn from 90 seconds to 5 minutes or who knows what.

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Joe
So yeah.

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Joe
It's great to have, like, you know, oh, instead of saying we do X, Y, and Z, we can show our characters or show our motion shapes doing something reminiscent of that and show them coming together. We can show them performing an action that lets the audience and the viewer know what they're doing. You know, knowing that your viewers are smart enough to know what's going on on-screen, along with hearing the voiceover, is challenging, especially when you don't work in creative, you know, separating those different sides of the brain.

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Joe
But it's really fun when you get to do that, and people are like, Oh, that makes perfect sense. The balls on the screen are doing that.

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Joe
So it clicks, and it's like, Yeah, I feel like it's like when a, it's like a client gets to like learn a new language when they get to see something come to like the fruits of their labor come together and they're like, Oh, I understand the process now. I understand how it all works. It's like, you've done it, and we're so proud of you.

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Kathryn
Client Yes. We're like, Oh my God, you guys did it.

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Kathryn
You're doing it. Absolutely. That's awesome. Yeah.

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Will
Yeah. One of the things there that it reminds me of, I think, is like, what I realize is that we work with a lot of nonprofits. We work with folks who are writers; With a writing-first mentality. And coming at it from a visual perspective is always like a challenge for them, I think. And it just, yeah, it just takes a little bit of time to learn the language, but once you get it, once it clicks one time.

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Kathryn
It clicks forever. Yeah, yeah.

00;17;28;25 - 00;17;32;07
Kathryn
It's like learning to ride a bike. Yeah, yeah. Totally. That's awesome.

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Tim
A few things we've tried to embrace. And again, it just depends on sort of the client individually, but like having those examples from a past experience, right? It is sort of like, All right, here's what the script in the storyboard looked like. V1, And then here's the final product, right? So we sort of talk through, and that handholding might feel arduous or whatever, but it's like it's helpful.

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Tim
No, take that time that Nicole was talking about, right? Just taking the time on our behalf shows that we care enough for them to understand where we're trying to go with them. Right. The client.

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Kathryn
Oh, definitely. Yeah, yeah.

00;18;06;29 - 00;18;24;01
Will
Yeah. A quick follow-up to like navigating that space between creative communication, are there any opportunities in there? Like if I, again, coming at this from a new place, I've never done this before. What are my what are some opportunities there that I can, like, take advantage of?

00;18;24;21 - 00;18;52;16
Nicole
So, you know, if we're talking about a client or this is their first experience creating a video, I think this first time will probably be what feels like the hardest. And moving forward, they'll be more familiar with the process. We're comfortable with the process, and if they move forward with us, we'll already have that understanding of their brand and that experience with them so that together we can create something, you know, more seamlessly.

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Nicole
And that's something that we really love at Gusto is creating those partnerships in those relationships so that we can be our client's champions.

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Will
You're speaking our language.

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Kathryn
Oh, yeah. And I've honestly, for some reason, I've never made this kind of analogy before. But it's like if I'm deciding I'm going to go to the gym, that's my New Year's resolution. Like there's always a hump there to get through of like this, this sort of like mental hump of like, oh, but you know, I'm starting to question it, and I think is it worth it?

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Kathryn
Right. And if clients see like they know that short-form is coming, they know that GIFs are here, but there's something there that they just have to get over that first hump, and then everything's smooth sailing from there. So I totally feel that. Yeah.

00;19;36;03 - 00;19;58;28
Joe
One thing that I think clients will discover it's like to mention in the beginning is that they don't necessarily know what they want or what they necessarily need. You know, we've had people come to us wanting a brand anthem, and it kind of turns into more of a product explainer, or it might be something that's like, Oh, this might be better fitted for a social cut that really shows off this particular product in this way.

00;19;58;28 - 00;20;17;07
Joe
Or, like, let's show you why. Like, this seems like it would be a better story. So not only do they see a whole new light, but they're like, Oh, we do need that. And we actually have all of these products that we would love to like to go through and showcase. And after they see one, things can be templates, or things can be branded in a way that they're like.

00;20;17;07 - 00;20;36;21
Joe
They can see all of our products doing this. This is great, which is obviously very rewarding, and it's cool to see them kind of figure that out and realize that you don't have to pack everything into one piece because, as we see in today's market, shorter and shorter videos are becoming more popular with the advent of shorter social media.

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Joe
It's like TikTok and all of that. So it's, I don't know, it's like an evolution of things.

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Kathryn
Yeah, that's it. As a total side note, there is a YouTube channel that was called 5-Second Films or something like that. And I think we're get, we're getting back to that. Like we're circling back around like we started there for a while, and then it got longer, and then it's back to even shorter. Like 1/2 would be all you need.

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Joe
It's.

00;21;00;13 - 00;21;11;06
Joe
It's wild. Yeah. And you see Gen Z getting into the workforce doing their ads now, and you're like, whoa, these kids are changing it up. Yeah. Like we're going to see we're going to see some really incredible things soon, I think.

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Kathryn
I agree. Yeah.

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Tim
Well, and I mean, like quite specifically with clients, we're like, don't sleep on the gif. You know, it's like that, that simple motion, you can plug it. It's so versatile in emails and presentations, etc., that it's like it's using that thing, it's, it's, it's for this very reason that the plant, that sort of seed of an idea that like what if on their client's behalf right so it's it's excellent.

00;21;35;29 - 00;21;40;08
Will
I'm sorry, Tim. Did you say GIF or GIF?

00;21;41;06 - 00;21;41;18
Tim
Of boy.

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Kathryn
Yeah.

00;21;43;03 - 00;21;45;25
Kathryn
The whole podcast is going to be derailed now.

00;21;45;25 - 00;21;49;08
Will
I always say GIF.

00;21;49;08 - 00;21;50;23
Kathryn
To mix it up makes sense.

00;21;51;26 - 00;21;55;18
Will
Because it can't be wrong. It cannot be.

00;21;55;18 - 00;21;57;25
Kathryn
So yeah, I'm, I'm a GIF person.

00;21;57;25 - 00;22;00;03
Tim
So meanwhile, I'm like checking myself. I'm like, what did I say?

00;22;00;03 - 00;22;04;04
Kathryn
Totally fair. Oh yeah.

00;22;04;16 - 00;22;22;07
Kathryn
So I'm curious, kind of in the interest of time as well; I'm going to maybe jump ahead a little bit. How do you decide what creative mediums? We've talked a little bit about this already, but how do you decide when a client's coming through, what creative medium is best for their potential strategy, or what they're trying to go further goals?

00;22;22;13 - 00;22;34;26
Joe
Because I think, Tim, you mentioned this a little bit that, like, sometimes you're trying to convince them a little bit. Maybe they come in, and they say, hey, I want to make, you know, 30, I don't know, whiteboard videos, or I want to make 30, you know...

00;22;35;26 - 00;22;39;24
Kathryn
Yes, you are good. I'm so glad you had the same reaction.

00;22;39;25 - 00;22;40;03
Tim
All right.

00;22;40;10 - 00;22;46;04
Will
It is an audio medium, but if you're listening, everyone just shifted in their seats.

00;22;46;04 - 00;22;47;02
Kathryn
Uncomfortably.

00;22;47;13 - 00;22;57;02
Kathryn
Yes. Right. And so how do you make the case then to be like, oh, well, let's do five videos of a different quality and a different nature? Like, what does that process look like for you all?

00;22;57;24 - 00;23;19;17
Tim
Yeah, I mean, this is a squishy one, right? Because it's like you don't. You obviously don't want to be, like, rude, and you obviously want to carry that. You know, you want to be empathetic to what their goal is like, what the client's trying to achieve. And so I think it's an internal reminder of that, whilst also, you know, being patient and being like, okay, well, you know, I hear you.

00;23;19;24 - 00;23;56;19
Tim
I understand where you're coming from. Experience says this. The industry statistics say this; attention span says this; like the use case of where you're trying to accomplish this goal is better in X, Y, and Z ways. Right? So a lot of it's just like fact-checking, in a way. I suppose so. Yeah. You know, you get, I think a lot of it is just like, no, we're fortunate that we have like thousands and thousands of videos and experiences under our belt that it's just like it's kind of easy to look in the portfolio, you know, I understand where this is coming from, but this way based on experience holds merit, you know?

00;23;56;19 - 00;24;00;05
Kathryn
Right. Usually, that's fair. Yeah, that makes perfect sense. Yeah.

00;24;00;05 - 00;24;31;12
Kathryn
It actually makes me have kind of a quick follow-up question thereof, like, you know, we've had situations before where a potential client will come to us and say, I have a very specific thing that I'm looking for as an example. And then if you don't have it, maybe we can't do the work. And so I'm curious if you've had that situation before too, where it's like how to do you either showcase that like, you know, this is the closest example we have to it, but it might not be exactly what you're looking for because, you know, as as I'm sure you imagine, too, we're trying to like if we're trying to expand our artistic capabilities,

00;24;31;12 - 00;24;47;13
Kathryn
too, but we don't have that specific example like it's a sort of chicken and the egg situation of like how do you convince clients to get on board with trying it, maybe even a new style that you haven't done before? Yeah. Curious how you've approached that, either artistically or on the business side.

00;24;48;03 - 00;25;10;11
Tim
So we all know good, fast, cheap, right? Oh yeah. It's, it's kind of its kind of in this same spirit where you got like you have a story, you got direction, and you got your esthetic, right? So if clients or prospects feel like, ask Do you have... and I'm making this up, like a healthcare technology startup animation about a product that's for this audience.

00;25;10;11 - 00;25;30;23
Tim
You're like, if, if we had that, we would have already created it for you. You know what I mean? It's like it's so specific, but like usually we're able to be like, no, but if you can watch these 2 to 3 examples; like this one, watch it for the direction; watch this one for the story, this and for this sort of style or esthetic and of course, like mood board really helps like congeal that too.

00;25;31;06 - 00;25;44;04
Tim
That tends to get them over the hump a bit. So I think it's just, you know, sort of being patient and nimble, and we watch a lot of videos and examples, right, to just to sort of have that the Vimeo likes or whatever in the background.

00;25;44;17 - 00;25;44;24
Kathryn
Right.

00;25;45;20 - 00;26;07;09
Tim
And Instagram likes. We have a whole inspiration channel on our internal teams sharing like these; these are examples of future use cases or opportunities. Right. So yeah, you know, there's not a silver bullet to everything, but it's like just trying to meet the middle of that Venn diagram as much as possible tends to help.

00;26;07;29 - 00;26;31;10
Nicole
It is a lot like showing examples of both what we've done but also what we aspire to. Something I say to clients often is, like, it's just as helpful to hear what you don't like as it is what you do. So we know how to differentiate you from perhaps your competitors, maybe things that haven't worked for you in the past.

00;26;31;19 - 00;26;35;23
Nicole
No feedback is bad feedback. It's all helpful.

00;26;35;23 - 00;26;40;25
Tim
Yeah. And we're always very excited when they share a whiteboard video and go; we don't want to do this.

00;26;40;25 - 00;26;49;06
Kathryn
Oh yes, that comment was...

00;26;49;06 - 00;26;50;04
Kathryn
It was a slippery slope.

00;26;50;04 - 00;26;54;03
Kathryn
But we saved it. It's good. Perfect. Yeah.

00;26;54;26 - 00;27;07;24
Will
So I want to tap your sort of futurist minds here. Where do you see the future of marketing content going? Like, what are you exploring out there?

00;27;07;24 - 00;27;31;00
Joe
Honestly, like I mentioned before, I really think short form is going to take off. And I think something that I personally... and we all are on social media, we all have feeds that we scroll through, and we see what it's being turned out. I think we're going to start seeing a lot more of an authentic type of marketing beyond just Corporate Memphis, beyond these almost flat icons and basic stock photography.

00;27;31;17 - 00;27;43;05
Joe
We've had conversations with a couple of clients that are like, We really want to move away from this. We want to add texture; we want to add this and this. And I'm like, Oh my God, that's the one I want too. That's so fun.

00;27;44;12 - 00;28;06;17
Joe
So I definitely think that that's a very exciting direction that we're headed in. I do also think, unfortunately, that AI is going to slowly inch her way in regardless of what we want, which we've talked about internally a lot. It's really cool to see certain capabilities through techy beauty or like helping us rotoscope. As Lord knows, that's very tedious.

00;28;07;21 - 00;28;08;00
Kathryn
Yeah.

00;28;08;03 - 00;28;27;19
Tim
It's very fun to see those certain things kind of be implemented into our workflow without kind of picking away at our ability to be creative. It's like a comforting, right, like again, which sort of a lot of what we're talking about here through this process is that like clients are, they're going to get their reps in there. Like they're going to see the power of a video in their marketing, right?

00;28;27;19 - 00;28;45;13
Tim
So it's like they're going to have a hunger for more. And I think that's inevitably going to bear fruit for everybody in this in this call. But also, like you know, internally at those clients and the stakeholders, too, it's like a lot of our clients are setting up their own studios, their own creative teams internally. And I think that's a good thing, right?

00;28;45;14 - 00;29;07;28
Tim
Because it's like a scary factor of video production. Like, you know, just five years ago, it was like sort of a non-starter. But now it's like, no, you need to do this. And it's showing in volume too, what Joe's talking about. Right? You're able to niche down very specifically to these specific audiences and pain points and the channels and the mediums.

00;29;07;28 - 00;29;33;08
Tim
Right. And so I think it's it's all positive. And I think we're also here at really fortunate that, like, we have our live-action production side too, right? So like, we can approach a client's situation with that opportunity too. And honestly, though, I think our most fun ones are when we're able to blend. And I think that's where a lot of clients are going to go to, is like, you really do need the human being a lot of times right, to help humanize what it is you're trying to achieve.

00;29;33;08 - 00;29;51;19
Tim
But you know, the stock video doesn't get you very far. And like custom is difficult because like you need a lot of it to cover a 90-second video. Right. So I think motion isn't going to go anywhere, either. So it's really, and that's a, you know, the brand's best opportunity to show off their expression, like their visual aesthetic.

00;29;51;19 - 00;29;55;25
Tim
So I think it's it's really exciting. Yeah. I think the future is bright.

00;29;55;25 - 00;30;14;05
Kathryn
That makes perfect sense. Yeah. Yeah. I'm curious because you just kind of touched on it a little bit. Do you all have a favorite project that you've gotten to work on or something that spoke to you that maybe you weren't even anticipating? Because we've talked on the podcast before about how like, sometimes we get opportunities to learn something new that we weren't expecting at all.

00;30;14;05 - 00;30;23;22
Kathryn
Like we've had clients for the American Canoe Association, and we learned all about paddling safely in the water, and we did not know that was a thing until that started. So and like.

00;30;23;22 - 00;30;29;11
Will
I just had Kelsey on the yeah, we talked. She's the education director at the association.

00;30;29;11 - 00;30;30;09
Will
And yes she.

00;30;30;09 - 00;30;37;03
Will
Loves us, and we were talking about animation, they're like, we know so much about paddling that, like, I'm such a better paddle.

00;30;37;05 - 00;30;46;09
Kathryn
For it, right? Right. Like, I can't wait to do that. So. Yeah, what, what kinds of projects have you worked on that you were excited to learn from? Maybe we'll start with Nicole. This test.

00;30;46;10 - 00;30;47;11
Kathryn
Yeah, yeah.

00;30;47;11 - 00;30;48;10
Tim
Nicole goes first.

00;30;48;17 - 00;30;49;15
Kathryn
No pressure. Yeah.

00;30;50;24 - 00;31;16;16
Nicole
It feels like such a long list. Being here for seven years, it's been a lot of really amazing projects. To sort of piggyback on what Tim said, I think some of my most memorable projects are the ones where we've had an opportunity to collaborate with, not to own the process, but a lot of people come together. One of my favorite favorites, it's a little bit older at this point, but it's for Monotype.

00;31;17;00 - 00;31;19;22
Nicole
What designer doesn't love typography?

00;31;19;23 - 00;31;23;14
Will
Really! I'm excited.

00;31;23;14 - 00;31;38;28
Nicole
Yeah. So we've been working on them for a little while now, and one of our first projects was to help them launch Helvetica now. Yeah, so we made there a commercial video for that, and it was a pretty expedited timeline.

00;31;40;13 - 00;31;44;18
Kathryn
We understand. Yep. But you know.

00;31;44;19 - 00;32;05;27
Nicole
Working with our client, our main contact was in the UK. So we took, and we have people on the West Coast, right? So we took full advantage of those time change differences where we would send something at the end of our day and have really concise, clear feedback to start our day the next day. So yeah, yeah, yeah.

00;32;05;27 - 00;32;25;08
Nicole
And that was like was quick paced, but it felt organized and efficient, and it's helpful to have, you know, a client like Monotype who really knows what they want and that kind of situation. So we could dive right in at the time when that video was released; it was one of, I think, their most successful campaign at the time.

00;32;25;16 - 00;32;27;09
Nicole
And we have a bunch of hardware.

00;32;27;13 - 00;32;27;26
Tim
Yeah.

00;32;28;28 - 00;32;32;03
Nicole
That's in our claw machine.

00;32;32;03 - 00;32;34;04
Kathryn
And that's.

00;32;34;14 - 00;32;53;17
Kathryn
It's so interesting when a client, like sends something as a return I worked for a company once, a video game company that worked on a Willy Wonka game. And then, like after, after the project ended, like, we just got this huge box in the mail, and it was all Willy Wonka candies and stuff. And, like, the studio was, like, hyped.

00;32;53;18 - 00;32;55;14
Kathryn
For, like, you know, three weeks.

00;32;55;14 - 00;32;57;00
Kathryn
just like on candy.

00;32;57;00 - 00;32;58;28
Will
On cocaine. Exactly. Yeah.

00;33;00;15 - 00;33;04;02
Kathryn
It was a lot of fun. Yeah. What about you, Joe? What did you like working on?

00;33;04;13 - 00;33;25;03
Joe
One of my favorite projects that we work on pretty much every year is the New England Venture Capitalist Association and BCA. They have this big awards show, generally like Winter Fall, where they present a bunch of awards, and each year, they have a new theme, and it has evolved from our first one, James Bond. Our second one was The Wizard of Oz.

00;33;25;11 - 00;33;36;26
Joe
We've done Marvel, and last year we did my favorite was Alice in Wonderland, and we did everything from hand-drawn animation. It was all in this beautiful watercolor ghost style. It was.

00;33;36;26 - 00;33;37;16
Will
Nice.

00;33;37;16 - 00;33;54;08
Joe
We did character work; we did a lot of the marketing material and the posters outside, and through that, we can like to push and be like, I want to try these different animation techniques. I want to rig with limber, I want to rig with this to all of these crazy things, and they just eat it up. They let us go ham, and it is so much fun.

00;33;54;16 - 00;33;55;18
Kathryn
That's so fun.

00;33;55;18 - 00;33;58;24
Will
That is, venture capitalists are going to go in.

00;33;59;04 - 00;34;00;17
Kathryn
Oh, yeah, right. Yeah.

00;34;00;23 - 00;34;03;19
Will
They're willing to take the risk.

00;34;03;19 - 00;34;04;15
Kathryn
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

00;34;04;24 - 00;34;14;07
Joe
Yeah, yeah. It always pays off great. And it's a very fun, collaborative project through which we get the whole motion team, which is always a wonderful, fun thing to do.

00;34;14;08 - 00;34;14;25
Kathryn
That's cool.

00;34;15;07 - 00;34;22;27
Nicole
And fun. Fact for that. A few weeks ago, a bunch of us on the team just found out we are New England Emmy nominated for that show.

00;34;23;11 - 00;34;24;09
Kathryn
Awesome. Congrats.

00;34;24;09 - 00;34;27;16
Will
We're excited for you.

00;34;29;06 - 00;34;30;05
Will
We'll throw in the sound effects.

00;34;30;05 - 00;34;31;04
Kathryn
Yes yes.

00;34;31;04 - 00;34;32;02
Nicole
So wish us luck.

00;34;32;08 - 00;34;34;23
Kathryn
Yeah, that's awesome. Yeah, yeah.

00;34;35;01 - 00;34;37;21
Kathryn
Well, that is very cool. Yeah, I know. Again, maybe...

00;34;38;01 - 00;34;40;20
Will
Did Tim have one? I don't know.

00;34;40;29 - 00;35;10;18
Tim
The one for me is the launch we did for WebEx for their WebEx hologram capabilities. And so what was unique about this one is, you know, it's a product showcase, and it's technically like not their product. It's through Oculus and other VR devices, right? So it's like software enablement. But then they had this camera array that does allow for individuals, you know, remotely like this to be like in hologram, but they didn't have the camera ready for us.

00;35;10;21 - 00;35;31;07
Tim
So it was really like, okay, how do we tell this story? So a lot of it was green screen and plates and working with talent and like, you know, doing the show versus tell experience. So the way we did that was with a Cinema Robot. So this allowed us to do that; the tracking and the camera move repeatedly, right?

00;35;31;07 - 00;35;54;09
Tim
So that we could do the layers. And so that was a really unique one for us using the cinema robot. But then it also just had like a very tight timeline. So it's not like we, we shot everything at Buck's offices in, in New York, which is a super cool experience too, and yeah, I just got to work for a really talented crew in Brooklyn, and then we had our 3D guy Derek (shout out Derek) he was in New York with us as the sort of the VFX supervisor.

00;35;54;09 - 00;36;12;24
Tim
Then we came home, and, man, the team who knocked it out of the park, and similarly, that product did really well, and I think it is their highest-performing video on their YouTube channel right now too. So yeah, it's always like the scary ones, like tend to bear the most, most fruit in a way, you know.

00;36;13;00 - 00;36;29;09
Kathryn
I mean, there is something to be said about that. Like in, you know, we've had internal discussions about sort of our like our sort of workplace boundaries to be like, okay, we if we can, we never want to be able to work overtime, right? If a client calls us at six, we might say, sorry, we'll see you on Monday instead of Friday.

00;36;29;23 - 00;36;47;17
Kathryn
But there is something to be said about having moments where there are those tight turnarounds, and you have to kind of really problem-solve in a slightly different way. And even if it feels exhausting at times, there's something about the camaraderie that comes through that process, and the things you learn from it, that are actually quite special.

00;36;47;18 - 00;36;48;07
Kathryn
Yes. Yeah.

00;36;48;10 - 00;37;01;23
Will
And it always reminds me of something like a flower or something that has to grow like it. It can only really grow if there's resistance, right? Like if there's something sort of stopping it going, and like that's how you kind of get to a better place.

00;37;02;07 - 00;37;03;24
Nicole
So there's just a bit of adrenaline, too, you know

00;37;03;29 - 00;37;06;12
Kathryn
Yeah.

00;37;06;12 - 00;37;07;27
Nicole
It's a little addicting at times.

00;37;09;27 - 00;37;10;11
Tim
Yeah, yeah. Dopamine.

00;37;12;18 - 00;37;14;01
Kathryn
But you know, in a good way.

00;37;15;11 - 00;37;39;27
Tim
Yeah. I was just going to say that I think the alternative is probably worse. The ones that just, like, don't have a deadline, and they just march on, you know, to infinity. Yeah, we've, we've coined them as snails. We have our snail clients and our snail projects here. And we keep talking about like creating like a physical race map, like moving our snails along the finish line.

00;37;40;09 - 00;37;44;07
Kathryn
Oh, that's a great idea. Yeah.

00;37;44;10 - 00;37;56;00
Kathryn
Yeah, that was like a follow question I was going to ask on the side, which is like sort of like what in internal thing do you have that's kind of like that adds a little bit of like play to your day-to-day so that feels like one.

00;37;56;00 - 00;37;57;01
Kathryn
Yeah, yeah.

00;37;57;04 - 00;38;13;02
Joe
Oh, I can jump in and tell you we have a, we have a cat chat, we all talk kitties. You can see my little cat scratching post back there. Yeah. But every day, when our cats are doing something crazy or wild, or they're just sitting there, we have a chat, where we just throw them into it.

00;38;15;06 - 00;38;16;27
Tim
It is a great little dopamine hit.

00;38;17;04 - 00;38;19;08
Kathryn
That's very cool. Yeah.

00;38;19;14 - 00;38;34;18
Kathryn
Yeah. We've talked on the podcast a number of times about like the end of some of our episodes, not the interview ones, but some episodes that we've done will like to share some of the bad ideas that we have. We pitch bad company ideas to each other, and it always gets really elaborate.

00;38;34;18 - 00;38;38;14
Will
And I have, you know, Google Keep that has been going since 2017.

00;38;41;08 - 00;38;42;18
Tim
I really like that. That is so fun.

00;38;44;26 - 00;38;45;24
Tim
Make a yearbook out of it.

00;38;45;25 - 00;38;46;14
Kathryn
Yeah, yeah.

00;38;46;16 - 00;38;51;08
Will
The way we describe bad ideas. It's like, you know, solutions to problems no one asked to solve.

00;38;51;08 - 00;38;52;07
Joe
Right? Exactly.

00;38;52;14 - 00;38;55;24
Joe
I'm thinking about what branding would look like for them.

00;38;55;27 - 00;38;59;10
Kathryn
Yeah, that would be so cool. Maybe.

00;38;59;12 - 00;39;04;23
Kathryn
Maybe our next bad idea. We'll call you guys, and we'll figure out how to collaborate. We'll put a project together.

00;39;05;20 - 00;39;08;22
Kathryn
Yeah, it'll be well.

00;39;08;22 - 00;39;09;16
Joe
Awesome. Yeah.

00;39;09;17 - 00;39;10;11
Will
Thank you so much.

00;39;10;12 - 00;39;10;24
Kathryn
Yeah.

00;39;11;05 - 00;39;21;05
Kathryn
So I guess a final question we have here is, you know if people want to reach out to either, you know, one of you or all of you, what's the best way to get in touch and learn more about what you do?

00;39;21;16 - 00;39;40;12
Tim
Yeah, we are at letsgusto . com. On, email, hello @ letsgusto, and yeah, Instagram @letsgusto, so we try to keep it pretty simple there. Yeah, and then Nicole, Joe, and myself are pretty easily found on the gram as well.

00;39;40;20 - 00;39;42;06
Kathryn
Awesome. Mm-hmm. Yeah.

00;39;42;17 - 00;39;46;00
Kathryn
Any final thoughts? Does anything want to add before we wrap up?

00;39;46;01 - 00;39;49;09
Joe
I just thought this was awesome. Great fun.

00;39;49;23 - 00;39;50;24
Kathryn
Super fun. Yeah.

00;39;50;24 - 00;40;12;06
Kathryn
No, thank you so much for taking the time. We really appreciate it. It's lovely to get to know you all. And it was actually really awesome as a quick aside, too, you know, we had a conversation, and we were talking about just like, hey, let's, you know, get to know each other a little more. And then we just happened to meet each other physically in person in the bathroom area at Another Age Productions, which was so cool.

00;40;12;06 - 00;40;13;10
Will
Shout-out to Another Age Productions.

00;40;13;10 - 00;40;14;05
Kathryn
But yeah, yeah.

00;40;14;15 - 00;40;15;23
Kathryn
Yeah. It was just like, oh, hey.

00;40;16;02 - 00;40;17;08
Kathryn
Oh, look, it's you!

00;40;18;13 - 00;40;20;12
Tim
It's like I was just emailing you, right?

00;40;20;12 - 00;40;20;22
Kathryn
Right.

00;40;21;11 - 00;40;33;08
Kathryn
Yeah, yeah. There's beauty in that. So awesome. Yeah. Thank you so much for taking the time, and yeah, we just really appreciate it. So we look forward to learning more from you and following you and all the good stuff.

00;40;33;16 - 00;40;33;29
Nicole
Same!

00;40;34;11 - 00;40;35;21
Tim
Thank you. Thank you so much.

00;40;35;28 - 00;40;36;12
Nicole
Thank you.

00;40;36;13 - 00;40;50;24
Joe
Thank you.