A video production brief has two jobs. It needs the thinking of a creative brief, and it has to give a director and producer what they need to plan a shoot. Most video briefs do one of those well and skip the other.
Below is a full example for a made-up company, written in the eleven sections of a one-page creative brief. The shaded notes are the places a video production brief needs something a standard brief doesn't. If it's close to what you're working on, you can start from this example and change it.
Lantern Children's Museum membership video
A children's museum with about 300,000 visits a year. Most families buy day tickets two or three times a year. A membership costs about the same as three visits and includes parking, but fewer than 1 in 20 families have one.
Families don't do the math at the ticket desk, so they buy a day pass every time.
Families keep paying more than they need to and come less often than they could. The museum stays dependent on rainy weekends and school holidays.
Parents of kids between two and eight who have been to the museum at least once. They're at the ticket desk or on the website, a bit tired, with a kid pulling on their sleeve. They'll give a video about 20 seconds.
“Memberships are for families who come all the time. That's not us.”
“If we come three times it's paid for. And parking's included.”
Three visits pays for the whole year.
A family membership costs about the same as three day visits. Parking, which is $12 a visit, is included. Members can come for one hour on a weekday without feeling like they wasted a ticket.
Film in public galleries only, during closed hours. Every child on camera needs a signed release. Captions burned in, since most views will be muted. The price shown has to match the website on the day it runs.
A 60 second video for the website. A 20 second cut for the lobby screens. Three 15 second cuts for social in 9:16, each built around one kind of visit (rainy day, quick weekday visit, birthday). A version with no voiceover for the ticket desk screen.
Kickoff 21 September, script and shot list 2 October, client review 6 October, shoot 17 and 18 October, rough cut 28 October, final 7 November.
The One-Page Brief is free and there's no sign-up. It checks your brief for the usual problems, and you send it as a link so people can comment on the section they mean and approve it with their name.
Need it as a file?
The One-Page Strategy Kit has the creative brief, the messaging framework and the measurement plan as fillable PDFs and Word files, for when a client wants a document. It's $19.
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A weekly note on account planning for agency strategists. One thing that changed, the tension in it, and what I'd do Monday. The first part of every issue is free.
Written by Cody Simmonds. I also write The Rationale, a weekly note for agency strategists.