Television Production at colprod.com

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We are an old established family firm, involved in making broadcast & corporate television and other forms of communication since 1970. The company is a partnership consisting of Jane and Glen Collie.

Over our 30 years or so as a company (although Glen Collie began working in broadcast television in 1963) we have produced or been involved in almost every form of film and television production including: corporate, commercials, broadcast, feature films, live events (video assist), news gathering and AV multi-projector rigs.

Our client list has included (in no particular order) Shell, Sony, the National Health Service, Esso, Henry Boot Construction (they built the M1), Scottish and Newcastle Breweries, Honeywell, DCL (now Guiness), British International, Bond and Bristow Helicopters, Hydron Europe, The Robert Gordon University, advertising agencies such as Cockfield Brown Inc (at one time the largest in Canada), Tait & McLay, Struthers, Smith-Breckenridge, McLaren, TV-AM (morning news program mid 1990’s), the Bridge of Weir Leather Company and the international law firm of Simmons & Simmons.

We have also done other communications work (primarily internet related) for companies and organisations such as: Natwest Bank, Hong-Kong and Midland Bank, BBC, Microsoft, HM Treasury, Wellcome Trust, The AEC at Harwell, The Bank of England, Worldcom (plus Unipalm Pipex and UUNET), Meeting Makers Ltd., Diagio Group, the Association of Professional British Conference Organisers, and many others.

Among our accomplishments are two awards at the New York Film and Television Festival and an “Award of Excellence” from the International Television Association (ITVA) in the sales and marketing category for "In Praise of Ale" for the Scottish and Newcastle Breweries which starred the late Willy Rushton.

But, more important, we produced for the UK offshore oil industry, the “Helicopter Passenger Safety Briefings” for about 6 years. During that period, when every person who flew over the North Sea in a UK helicopter was briefed using our programmes (a bigger audience than Steven Spielberg), not one person lost his or her life because they were not properly trained on how to get out of an aircraft.

We also produced a training video for Shell Expro on an innovative piece of safety equipment called Air Pocket. This equipment has now become standard issue within all of the oil companies throughout the UK offshore industry.

It is nice to win awards, it is great to sell product, but the best feeling comes from knowing that sometimes, when you use your skills and abilities, people stay alive!

Recently we purchased new equipment which enables us to produce programmes in the high definition, wide screen format. As well, we can author DVD's both in standard and HD format. The addition of the Sony HVR-Z1E, which is about 10% of the size of the camera in the picture below, means we can now field a "minimalist" crew saving substantially where budgets are tight.

The complete camera kit now fits in a case which will go into the overhead locker on an aircraft, so no more carrying the camera onto the plane. The balance of the kit, lights, microphones, cables, tripod and "FigRig^® will easily travel within a standard baggage allowance. We can truly shoot on a "hit and run" basis.

We have also added new editing capability to our facilities with an apple mac based installation of "Final Cut Studio". Because this new system will allow us to edit a programme without the necessity of using an online edit suite, we can work with you to a much greater extent at the rough cut stage to try out different effects and techniques. In the "old days" this freedom would have been prohibitively expensive. Now it takes the pressure off the budget and allows us to express our creativity.

However, if what you require is something a little more than Final Cut will offer (although I can't imagine what that might be) we have an in-house editor available who is fully trained in the use of the most recent version of Avid.

No Matter what your project: commercials, training, corporate promotion, drama or music we have the experience and capability to accomplish it for you. We can deliver on DVD, VideoCD, tape, pen-stick or via the internet. Give us a call on +44 (0) 1505 323 691 or email: production "at" colprod dot com.

To see one of our most recent productions Click Here. (You will need the Quicktime Plug-in on your computer, and there will be a short delay while the movie file downloads)