Stories
News, project launches and thoughts from our team.
Healthcare Video: Imagining Better for a Brighter World
“Every day, thousands of primary care providers head to the front lines of healthcare in Canada. They’re by our sides for moments big and small, and motivated by a singular vision. To help everyone lead happier, healthier lives.”
We are so proud to premiere this suite of healthcare videos supporting the public launch of the David Braley Primary Care Research Collaborative. An incubator, focussed on advancing and strengthening primary care in Canada.
Beginning with the story of the incubator itself and following up with five more, we drew a rich picture of the DBPCRC and its research goals. Through multiple layers of live-action footage, music, voiceover and animation we illustrated their mandate – to improve the lives of Canadians through better delivery and implementation of care. Each video was crafted in collaboration with the public relations team at the McMaster Department of Family Medicine,
Thanks to everyone at McMaster’s DFM for allowing us the opportunity to expand your story! We are honoured to capture the work of this inspiring group of people, pushing toward a brighter world for us all. For more of our McMaster University or healthcare video projects, check out our education or healthcare portfolio.
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GOOD AS GOLD
50th anniversary documentary launch for McMaster University
McMaster University’s Medical School is a world-renowned hub for ground-breaking research and cutting-edge education techniques. They are also our long-time partners.
Because we have worked together so often over the years, we’re familiar with the kinds of stories they want to tell and we’re comfortable with the messages they try to convey. There’s a mutual trust there, built over countless hours of working together.
So when McMaster’s Faculty of Health Sciences approached us to put together a project commemorating the 50th anniversary of their medical school, we had to deliver a product worthy of a golden anniversary.
Mixing engaging interviews of past and current leaders with fantastic archival footage, we crafted a short documentary that told the story of McMaster’s School of Medicine, from humble beginnings to their bright future.
All that hard work really paid off. The result is a personal account of the medical school’s story, from the people who brought it to life and keep it thriving today.
Take a look at our short film below, which premiered at their 50th Anniversary Gala last week.
Happy anniversary, McMaster! We can’t wait to see what our next collaboration will bring!
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Project Launch: McMaster IBEHS Program
“Healthcare challenges are one of the biggest problems facing today’s society”
McMaster University is transforming these healthcare challenges into new learning experiences. Bringing the Health Sciences and Engineering faculties together, into a hands-on, project based 5-year program – the new Integrated Biomedical Engineering and Health Sciences Program.
“Biomedical problems are very complex. There is the human element and the technological element and in order to solve these types of complex problems you need experts of many different areas of study and many different backgrounds, this program is going to produce such graduates.” – Colin McDonald, Assistant Professor, McMaster University
McMaster has a world class reputation in both health sciences and engineering. Consistently ranked internationally among the top 40 universities in the world for medicine and health sciences and rated one of the top ten engineering schools in Canada. At Double Barrel, we were thrilled and honored to help McMaster launch this groundbreaking program, which is the first of its kind in Canada!
“Double Barrel helped bring our vision to life. The team’s creativity and diligent work resulted in a stellar product that helped raise the profile of our new Integrated Biomedical and Health Sciences Program.” – Monique Beech, Manager, Public Relations, Faculty of Engineering, McMaster University
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PROJECT LAUNCH: McMaster Faculty of Health Sciences Hall of Fame Video
“World class professors, clinicians, students, researchers and innovators, global leaders in interprofessional education. At McMaster Faculty of Health Sciences, this is who we are.”
How do you pack all the achievements of a world-class health sciences program into one 5 minute video?
When McMaster’s Faculty of Health Sciences asked us to produce this piece for their annual Hall of Fame event, we knew this would be the challenge. For decades, McMaster’s medical program has been a bastion of multi-disciplinary medical achievements and pioneering teaching techniques. Showcasing that to an audience of their peers was no small task – but one that we were so honoured to be part of.
McMaster is continuously proving to be one of the best universities in the world being ranked globally in the top 50 with medical campuses in Niagara, Waterloo and our beautiful city of Hamilton!
McMaster and it’s academic hospital partners are working hard to change patient care in Canada and around the world. We are proud to have been a part of this project, supporting a Hamilton staple like McMaster!
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PROJECT LAUNCH: DeGroote School of Business
Another week, another launch!
For the past few months, Double Barrel has been working alongside the DeGroote School of Business – McMaster University~ helping them add some video to their fantastic new brand campaign, ‘Education With Purpose.’
Our resulting piece ~ this 1:40 cinematic trailer ~ premiered at their Accolades event last week in Toronto, before an audience of distinguished partners and alumni.
Shot by Tyler Tekatch & Christoph Benfey, music composed by Sasha Szlafarski, script by Kitestring’s Holly Gibson, edited by Taylor Heres, audio mixing & mastering by Hive Studios, cameo by Kristel Bulthuis. Proof that it really does take a village to make something great.
Thanks everyone!
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PROJECT LAUNCH: W Booth School of Engineering Practice
Today’s engineering graduates have a tough job ahead of them. From water quality to sustainable living, from climate change to aging infrastructure, the engineering classes of 2015 and beyond will be expected to have the skills necessary to tackle the grand challenges of tomorrow.
The W Booth School of Engineering Practice provides recent grads with that skill set, through interdisciplinary education combined with experiential learning and mentorship. Their tagline: “Inspiring innovative leaders who will transform the world.”
No small task.
When the W Booth School came to us for help with their new commercial, we were excited to get involved. Double Barrel has a long history with McMaster’s Engineering department, but we hadn’t had the opportunity to work with the Master’s program. We knew that this would be a particularly tricky project – within a tight timeframe, showcase the depth and breadth of experiences and opportunities a W Booth graduate would attain.
After much discussion, we decided to go with a combination of green screen, animation and live action in-the-field footage.
After one particularly long shoot day with an amazing team of W Booth Graduates, our animator Taylor Heres set to work in the edit suite. Sketching, animating and keying out the green under the guidance of director Tyler Tekatch. We couldn’t be happier with the end result.
Many thanks to the W Booth School for involving us in such a great project!
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PROJECT LAUNCH: McMaster University
Engineering is the invisible thread that holds so much of our day-to-day lives together. And when it comes to getting teens excited about a STEM career – it pays to reveal just a bit of the science behind their everyday experiences.
We set out in October of 2014 to create a 30 second broadcast commercial that did just that. Using skateboarding as our metaphor – and an extreme slow motion camera – we aimed to capture the forces of friction, momentum and gravity.
The end result is something we’re all so proud of. Screened in theatres from Hamilton to Toronto (in IMAX no less!) and also in Calgary, we hear this piece is on its way to theatres in Hong Kong!
Many thanks to our amazing crew, as always. Shot in slow-mo by Ty Tekatch and Christoph Benfey, with animation assistance from Antenna Visual Communication. Edited by Taylor Heres. Starring skateboarding superstar Alishia Stevens, and Hamilton’s own Arts Awards nominee, Alyssa Nedich. Many thanks to New Line Skateparks for allowing us to shoot at their construction site in Oshweken, Ontario!!
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PROJECT LAUNCH: Michael G. DeGroote School of Medicine
Choosing a university is one of the most difficult decisions a young person will make. For pre-med students, a top quality educational experience needs to combine with other elements, like practicum and research opportunities, to be considered truly well-rounded.
McMaster’s Michael G. DeGroote School of Medicine is renowned for educational and research excellence. With campuses in Waterloo, Niagara and Downtown Hamilton, virtually every type of educational and practicum opportunity is possible. This creates a marketing challenge all its own – with so many options, how do you adequately showcase the program to potential students? In such a hugely competitive post-secondary market, how do universities stand out?
At Double Barrel, we are grateful to have a long history with McMaster. We were thrilled when the outreach department at the DeGroote School of Medicine got in touch. We love having the opportunity to showcase what makes programs unique – and this was a particularly interesting challenge.
After multiple creative discussions with the team leads from each region, we honed in on one simple fact: the experiences that McMaster’s medical program offers are as unique as the students themselves. Each undergraduate can mix and match the program options to best suit them, their particular specialization and career goals. This is where we took our inspiration.
Through individual student stories, we highlighted specific regions, campuses and the practicum opportunities that exist within. Our three students – Steven Huynh (Hamilton), Kaylyn Merrifield (Waterloo) and Barbara Tatham (Niagara) were documented from home to classroom to work placements, while their personal narratives describe why they feel particularly drawn to the medical profession. The resulting video vignettes are personal, emotive and uniquely entertaining, highlighting just how varied your experience can be through the Michael G. DeGroote School.
Says Program Coordinator Lea Matulovic, “Roz, Lee and the entire Double Barrel Studios team made working on this dynamic project a great experience. They were extremely organized and provided us with the flexibility required to capture a vast variety of individuals and locations. Their professional, yet fun approach made for easy collaboration and their expertise; creativity; and willingness to understand and meet their client’s needs resulted in a finished product that exceeded our expectations!”
Thanks to the Michael G. DeGroote School of Medicine for bringing us on board!
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Pressure Cook Your Way to Great Content
Real artists ship.
This maxim, attributed to the late Steve Jobs, revolves around the notion that creation of great creative work depends upon the ability to overcome obstacles and come up with the best possible result. Ideally (in the context of video production) – a piece that will in some way emotionally resonate with your audience, given a limited amount of time.
Content creators can empathize with this quip. ‘Shipping’ (or in our world, ‘producing’) requires said producer to weigh messaging and artistry against obstacles to produce a piece of communication that will resonate with a wide & varied audience. Usually needed by, like, yesterday.
Last week I sat on a small panel of industry judges for McMaster University’s second annual 24-Hour Film Competition – a fantastic local event, held inside the Joey & Toby Tenenbaum Pavilion at the Art Gallery of Hamilton.
These competitions are a crash course in the ‘real artists ship’ mentality, as students race against the clock to develop their original stories into fully fledged short films in just 24 hours.
Sitting in the centre of the crowd at the jury table, I felt an immediate kinship with these students. Double Barrel evolves into a kind of 24-hour film crew on each production we undertake, paratrooping into storytelling situations and determining obstacles – developing the best way to get a client’s message across in a limited amount of time. In our world that’s usually about two months from script to screen, nowhere near the suffocating 24 hours of the festival.
Similarly, marketers, brand managers & professional communicators are consistently hit with this same challenge when trying to get their messaging across to a wide demographic. Especially via video.
The winner of this year’s McMaster 24 – the giddy, oddball short ‘What are you STAIRING at?’ quickly emerged as the best film of the night. Its creators – McMaster alums ‘Mobhouse Crew’ won over the jury due to their ability to incorporate the unique messaging (one line – “do you want some more of that? I don’t think so”) with locations and props required by the film fest (a chair and a set of keys) while still taking us, the viewer, on a full circle ride complete with understandable arc and well thought out ending.
The audience gave four minutes and forty-four seconds to the filmmakers, and they rewarded us with a cleverly scripted film complete with original musical score and tight ending.
So – what can marketers/brand managers and content creators learn from this mother-of-all meat grinder of creative production? Three things.
1. Determine your constraints and work within them.
As any 24-hour film fest-er will tell you, it all starts with the script. Getting real with your limitations and having fences around your ideas actually allows you to be free creatively once you’ve determined what they are.
Are you tight on locations? Budget? Actors? Does the video need to be a certain length? What does it need to get across and to whom? On what distribution platform? These are all constraints that will ultimately make your production that much better once you’ve figured them out. Make sure you’re clear and honest up front with the things you have to achieve (and the limitations you have) in order to make the production process smooth and satisfying for all involved.
2. Be laser-focused in your vision.
In the world of 24-hour film, there’s no time for distraction. Once you’ve determined constraints, go after your story. Full throttle. It’s easy to fall prey to fun and flashy, so stay true to a ‘Top 3 List’ of focus points and messages. If your finished piece doesn’t clearly communicate a message and have some sort of story arc that your audience can follow, it’s not going to get you on the podium.
3. Stick the landing.
This is the absolute without-a-doubt most difficult part of a piece, and also the most rewarding when it’s done well. This year’s winner “What Are You Stairing At” absolutely sold us with a perfect ending. I’ve heard that people only remember the last thing you’ve said, so keep that in mind and go into your production with a firm sense of what you want the ending to be and make sure everything else lines up.
The rest, as they say, is history.
Roz Allen is a partner and director at Hamilton’s Double Barrel Studios.
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McMaster Goes to Moscow with Double Barrel Studios
https://youtu.be/jBLFcnplcTU
WEBSITE ( www.eng.mcmaster.ca/future )
TWITTER: @goeng1mac (#Girls20Summit, #MacEngGirls20)
@McMasterU @McMasterEng @DoubleBarrel_
by Deborah McIvor
What began as a single conversation about women in the world of technology has evolved into a global movement with tangible results: the G(irls) 20 Summit. And now, McMaster University has joined that conversation with an engaging mini-documentary produced by Hamilton’s very own Double Barrel Studios.
Women in Engineering: Our Global Future, created for McMaster’s Faculty of Engineering, explores the wealth of career opportunities that await young women in scientific and technological fields. Filmed and produced locally by Double Barrel Studios, this video is now taking a trip abroad to be shown on an international stage.
On June 17, 2013, delegates at the fourth annual G(irls) 20 Summit in Moscow, Russia, will view this engaging video as part of the official program. Established in 2010, the G(irls)20 is an organization that promotes the economic empowerment, education and entrepreneurial training of girls and women globally. The Summit brings together delegates, who are all girls, aged 18-20, from each of the G20 countries and the African Union for open discussion, leadership cultivation and entrepreneurial development.
As the only academic partner of this year’s G(irls)20 Summit, McMaster worked with Double Barrel Studios to create an original, thought-provoking video exploring the pressing global need for women in the fields of science, technology, engineering and math, or ‘S.T.E.M.’ careers. Double Barrel’s founding partners Roslyn ‘Roz’ Allen and Lee Hillman have brought their years of experience as filmmakers to the table to collaborate with McMaster University once again on an engaging outreach project.
“We entrusted Double Barrel to communicate our values and our vision, and to work collaboratively with us to share our unique story with the world,” says Arlene Dosen, manager of recruitment and communications in the Faculty of Engineering. “It was a distinct pleasure to work with Lee and Roz and the final product was indeed worthy of an international stage. Lee and Roz are consummate professionals, and I would work with them again in a heartbeat! ”
With a top-notch team of professionals such as cinematographer, Christoph Benfey, or director of photography, Tyler Tekatch, Double Barrel Studios has a wealth of expertise in the film and broadcast television industry to draw upon.
“When we were asked to work with McMaster Engineering on this mini-documentary, we were excited at the possibility of creating a piece that would inform and inspire audiences,” says executive director, Roz Allen. “It’s always a pleasure to produce engaging, forward-thinking material, especially when the message is this important. McMaster and the G(irls) 20 Summit have succeeded in highlighting the countless possibilities for women who take on leadership roles in our society. We couldn’t be more pleased to have brought this message to life on screen!”
Hosted by Elaine Kunda, member of the McMaster Alumni Association Board of Directors and lead advisor of the G(irls) 20 Summit, this ‘mini-doc’ intends to inform and inspire women who may become our future engineers. In the video, McMaster faculty members Heather Sheardown, Saideh Razavi and Sarah Dickson examine the reasons why there are fewer girls in these fields and share insights into the economic and social benefits of recruiting women into them. And engineering students, like Trinette Wright, share their passion and commitment to solving the world’s problems.
Elaine Kunda is impressed with the end results of this collaboration. “Our original plan was to video tape a basic ‘Q&A’ with some faculty and students from McMaster Engineering, but Double Barrel Studios came in and took our simple idea and turned it into an amazing short documentary. It is wonderful to see how they brought our idea to life!”
The G(irls) 20 Summit will include special guest speakers such as Arianna Huffington (founder of The Huffington Post), Jennifer Buffet (NoVo Foundation president) and Lauren Bush Lauren (founder of FEED). The G(irls) 20 Summit delegates will spend several days in workshops (June 15 – 18) with two days learning from presentations and panel discussions that will be livestreamed on www.girls20summit.com . The delegates will have the opportunity to view the McMaster video and to draw their own conclusions about what can be done to open up economic possibilities for women around the globe. They will then engage with the concepts and finally, spend a day developing a communiqué that will be presented to the G20 Leaders Summit in Russia in September 2013.
“Attracting women to scientific or technological fields is a challenge for most G20 countries,” says Kunda. “I think the video raises topics that will stimulate an engaging discussion and it will resonate with girls and women who see it.”
