17 Nuggets of Video Making Truth

1. Entertain or Die- Watching video is a transactional experience, and if the video doesn't do its part, you feel cheated.
2. The Road to Bad Video Is Paved with No Intent- Before you shoot your next video, brainstorm a long list of why you're doing it and how you want to treat the audience.
3. Should It Be a Video?- If what you have to say is best said with charts and lists, it may not be a good video material.
4. Instant Creativity- Break brainstorming session into two phases: Making and List & Making Choices.
5. Know Your Audience- Use the Who, What, When, Where, and Why method to decide what will be a good way to illustrate your video. 
6. Know Your Story- Stripped to its essentials, a story has four elements: a hero, a beginning, a middle, and an end.
7. Think In Shots- Cutting shots together creates meaning and creates a richer story.
8. Make Every Picture Tell the Story- The film, a sequence, a scene, and a shot.
9. Keep It Short: The Rubbermaid Rule- If you think you need a 10-minute Web video, plan for 3 minutes.
10. Always Leave Them Wanting- What made people want to stay was the promise of something more to come.
11. Pitch It- Having a good pitch not only helped people tell my story, it made them want to tell it.
12. Know Your Video: Part 1- Genres come with certain built-in structures that the audience expects you to deliver.
13. Know Your Video: Part 2- Different structures, different movies. And so it is with your video.
14. When You Need a Script- If your story has more dialogue and detail than you can easily hold in your head, it needs a script.
15. If You Have Nothing to Say, Shut Up- Avoid: Describing the pictures, Waffle words, weasel phrases, and other mushy restatements of the obvious, and Repetition.
16. If You Wing It, It Will Suck- The most memorable home videos and docs tell stories. Those stories don't just magically appear in the edit room. You have to imagine them before you start shooting.
17. Plan with a Shot List- To make your shot list, start by brainstorming a long list of everything you might want to shoot.