Perfect Form

I developed this project as a series to jump-start Paleohacks’ waning involvement in fitness content.   The company had let relationships lapse with a few fitness personalities so, first and foremost, we needed a format that we could use to test new talent, while still producing usable content.

I was looking to grow new talent instead of hire somebody with an established following, so I reached out to a number of contacts and started talking with a few people who were suggested.  I was looking for somebody who taught fitness professionally, who was comfortable and engaging on camera, and who was knowledgeable and organized enough to work with me to develop the scripts we’d need. Two names rose to the top of the pile and I started working with them to develop scripts for the proposed format.

The “Perfect Form” format was created as a way to create evergreen content without much confusion changing hosts, as more testing became necessary.  It was built in three parts, walking through the correct way to perform an exercise (appealing to people new to fitness), common mistakes (intended to help beginner and intermediate viewers refine their form), and then options to scale and adapt it (which covered a contingency of our demographic that wasn’t able to perform an exercise, or their opposite, people who needed additional challenge.)

Since the host wasn’t going to be consistent, other aspects of the format would make up for it.  I chose a local studio location with a clean industrial look and large daylight windows that was flexible, inexpensive, and regularly available.  Lighting was kept bright with an attractive rim light from the window to best show necessary detail and compliment the body.  The footage was shot on two cameras, the wider one locked off on a tripod and the tighter on a slider to keep up the movement and energy.  Both cameras shot prime lenses between f/1.4 and f/2.  We shot four separate videos over a single 8-hour shoot day, which included load-in, setup, tear-down and load-out.

I wanted to keep the format bright, energetic, and interesting, so I went with more stylized visual look in editing and graphics.  I highlighted the different talent by pulling out colors from their wardrobes, and kept them consistent throughout each video.  The combination of elements made the format quickly recognizable and unique to Paleohacks, yet easy to recreate.  They stood out on social media and YouTube as clearer and more produced content than the competition and attracted new subscribers to our channels.  Additionally, they served as a staple in our fitness catalog so that we could keep people inside the Paleohacks ecosystem when linking them to basic instructional resources.