The Platypus Video Workshop comes to Turks & Caicos!

Posted by Chris Mann Posted in Commercial, News, Video |

Last week we learned a lot! For eight days, Andy, Preston, David and myself were barraged with ideas, techniques, tips, tricks, and best practice - in the world of “video journalism”.

Renowned photojournalists Dirck Halstead and PF Bentley brought their “Platypus Workshop” to our Neptune Plaza office to turn the four of us into “filmmakers” - in other words to teach us how to transform our wedding and commercial video productions into professional video documentaries, with the style and impact of TV shows such as NBC’s 60 Minutes and ABC’s Nightline.

Both Dirck and PF worked for Time magazine as stills photojournalists for many years, covering stories throughout the world, from Vietnam and China to Haiti and Cuba - and also assignments as White House photographers. Dirck was one of only six US photographers to accompany President Nixon on his historic trip to China in 1972, and also covered the fall of Saigon at the end of the Vietnam War. PF has photographed Fidel Castro in Cuba, and documented President Bill Clinton’s election campaign and also his last days in office.

(above) PF Bentley and Dirck Halstead teach a Platypus Workshop in our office at Neptune Plaza. Preston Dickenson, David Gallardo and Andy Mann listen attentively

Now however, PF and Dirck have brought their skills in storytelling and image-making into the medium of documentary film-making on video - and are much in demand to teach news journalists and photographers how to create effective stories in both pictures and sound for today’s increasingly multimedia environment.

Our aim in having them come to teach us was to help us develop new and exciting ways of telling stories for our clients - whether documenting a wedding, shooting a historical piece for Turks & Caicos schools, or crafting a commercial for a resort or tour operator.

(above) PF Bentley explains some of the finer points of Apple’s Final Cut Pro movie editing software to Preston Dickenson

The workshop was definitely an “eye-opener” for us - learning how professional TV documentaries are made, and seeing the short films made by previous Platypus Workshop participants, made us wonder if we would be able to emulate them. But as we discovered how to conduct interviews, find and exploit the right camera positions and angles, record good usable sound, and then bring everything together in an edit, we found that yes, with practice we too could “make movies!”

(above) Dirck Halstead explains how to craft a story in pictures. Nice shirt, Dirck!

Dirck and PF’s approach was very “hands-on” - we were given assignments to go out and complete on our own - culminating with shooting and editing a five-minute documentary on a subject of our choice in just two days! Now five minutes may not seem very long, but it can feel like a lot of time to fill when you have to find the right shots to tell a story, and then edit them together in a coherent form.

(above) PF Bentley says “No, you don’t do it that way!”

At the end of the eight days, we each presented our documentaries, and graduated as fully-fledged “producers”! While there’s always more to learn, we now feel we have acquired some valuable new skills to help us create great stories for our clients. View our finished “five minute movies” here.

A big thank-you to Dirck and PF for an informative, entertaining, illuminating, and yes, exhausting eight days!