Vertical Video That Doesn’t Embarrass You
A one-day course in planning, shooting and editing short vertical film, for people who have to make it themselves.
Most vertical video is made by pressing record and hoping for the best.
We’ve all done it, and sometimes it works. The phone is already in your hand, the format is meant to be casual, and everything you’ve seen suggests you shouldn’t overthink it. But watch enough of it and the pattern becomes obvious. The videos that hold your attention were thought about before they were shot. The ones that don’t, weren’t.
This hands-on creative day is about the thinking and how the algorithms actually decide what gets seen, because ultimately good storytelling is the strategy.
Before you press record
We start where the work makes a huge difference, the planning. Not detailed storyboards pinned to a wall, and not a shot list you’ll abandon before you’re even half way through. Rough is fine. Scribbled is fine. Hollywood scribbles too. What matters is that you’ve made the key decisions before you start filming, rather than halfway through the edit when your options have already closed down.
You’ll learn how to find the one idea your video is really about, and how to let go of the other three. How to decide what the first two seconds are doing. How much you genuinely need to capture, and how much is just insurance you’ll never use.
The discipline of the short form
Vertical video is a short story format, and short stories have rules. They start late, they end early, and they trust the audience to keep up.
We’ll look at what works within those constraints — how to build a shape that carries someone from the first frame to the last, which themes hold up at this length, and why the strongest short films are usually about one small thing rather than several large ones. We’ll watch real examples, good and bad, and work out what separates them.
In the edit
The edit is where you find out whether the plan was any good.
We’ll get hands-on with a few editing apps that will get you started, nothing that demands a subscription or a film school and use straightforward filmmaking techniques to lift those key moments you identified out of your footage. Where to cut and, more importantly, when not to. How rhythm and sound do half the work. How to make an idea land without a caption over-explaining it.
Then we share it with the world
We’ll also cover how these platforms actually decide who sees your film, which is less mysterious than it looks, and turns out to reward exactly the things we’ve spent the day working on.
You’ll finish the day with a finished film, not a folder of clips and good intentions. We’ll talk about publishing it properly, captions, formats, thumbnails, and the difference between posting something and putting it somewhere it can be found.
Who it’s for
Anyone who has ended up responsible for making video without ever being trained to. Communications and marketing teams, charity and museum staff, freelancers, small business owners, teachers, anyone who has been handed a phone and a deadline.
You need no previous filmmaking experience. You need a smartphone, and something you’d like to make a film about.
What you’ll take away
- A repeatable planning method you can use on your next fifteen videos, not just this one
- Working knowledge of two editing apps, and a sense of which one suits how you work
- A finished vertical film made on the day
- Not feeling intimidated by the platform algos
- A far better instinct for why a video isn’t working, and what to change
Who’s running it
I’ve spent twenty-five years teaching people to tell stories with a camera. I’ve designed and delivered creative workshops for the BBC, the British Council and Film Education, and co-designed Skills for Success, Apple’s global storytelling and communication programme for its iOS Developer Academies, which I’ve delivered in Italy, Indonesia, Brazil and Saudi Arabia. I’ve been an Apple Distinguished Educator since 2002, and I write and produce short films that have screened at international festivals and on television.
Details
The open course — One day, 10am to 4pm, in London and Cambridge. Groups are small, and you’ll work in twos and threes so everyone gets time on their own film. From £245 per person. Dates announced shortly — [Join the list] and I’ll let you know first.
In-house for your team — The same day delivered at your offices, for groups of up to [16]. [Get in touch to discuss.]
Online, in two halves — Two half-day sessions a fortnight apart. You plan and shoot between them; we edit together in the second. [Get in touch for dates.]
Bring — A smartphone, headphones, and something you’d like to make a film about.