And What do YOU do for
a Living?
By the time of the publication above, even a magazine with
"Audio-Visual" in its name knew that those it catered to
had an inflated sense of themselves. The 1981 Media
All-Stars.... We weren't in "audio-visual"; we were in
multimedia, or film, or media, or communications, or.....
ANYTHING but audio-visual.
After, all "a-v" meant those geeks in school who knew how
to set up 16mm Bell & Howell Film-o-Sound projectors,
who knew how to use the slide projector's zoom lens, or who
got extra credit for advancing the filmstrip every time it
went "ping". What we were doing for a living, despite using
many of these same tools, was different... it was.... it
was....
Actually, none of us knew. Even at the height of our
careers, the majority of those in the picture above didn't
quite know what they did for a living-- at least they had a
hard time putting it in a sentence. It had something to do
with slide shows, but some produced big ones with live
casts, some did thoughful two projector documentaries, some
had moved on to film, some were technical wizards, some
were writers, and all of them had trouble at cocktail
parties when someone asked, "What do you do for a living?"
I'll take one of those--- things that you do.
It was one thing if your friends or parents couldn't
explain what you did, but the real laugh to me was that our
clients didn't have a clue either. They just knew it
worked.
An early customer of ours, Mike Krawczyk of the Milwaukee
Repertory Theater, called our stuff "slide talks". Another,
Joe Caruso, of the Milwaukee County Transit System, called
them slide-films. Referring to the technical end, client
Martin Panning of RipSteel termed our stuff "spaghetti",
since he had to drag projectors and cables around to show
his show.
Whatever it was, we liked what we did. Our stuff had
scripts, soundtracks, and pictures, and it was all timed
together. Audiences, laughed, cried, or snored. But it was
usually in a movie-like setting-- a darkened room.
Although text slides and speaker support type slides were a
big part of many people's businesses, that was not our
original intent when we began. Our original "brochure",
called the SLI "Prospectus", promoted the story-telling
strengths of slides dissolving to music, and specifically
touted our "exclusive" twin-dissolve process.
After we got a few shows under our belt (we called 'em
"shows"; that seemed to give em some heft), we realized we
had developed a few rules. These rules helped our work look
like something more than two projectors, a dissolve, and a
Wollensak cassette deck:
* No vertical slides. We never wanted to break the
theatrical illusion of film.
* Heavy-duty soundtracks. Sound effects, interviews, and
music (often music we would never listen to ourselves)
added perceived value to the package.
* Constant emotional and pacing changes, dictated by the
music. A new concept was always heralded by new music.
* Narration fit for Ed McMahon. Tight scripts, few words,
incomplete sentences. (Our scripts rarely were received
well unless read out loud to the client).
* In-camera tricks that mirrored the hot cinemagraphic
techniques of the late sixties and early seventies, so
people thought they were watching a film. Rack focus.
In-camera pans (daring when you only have two projectors).
* The use of basic film language. Long Shot. Medium Shot.
Close-up. Cutaway. This was a by-product of the film
classes I took at Marquette.
In short, the language of a good movie. I guess, if we
could have made films, we would have. But that involved
money, and money wasn't part of the deal. In 1972, there
were industrial film companies, filmstrip and art-slide
type companies, and, across the country, punks like us. We
didn't fit into the other categories, and we didn't like
the phrase "audio-visual" but, dammit, we were stuck with
it.
What we did try to do was bring a heightened sense of art,
communication and urgency to "a-v". Since the "old school"
of producer seemed to basically be producing schlock (so we
thought), we worked extra-hard to add value to what we did,
Not that we defined it that way. We just knew that you were
only as good as the last show you did, and that's all we
had to show. We were 22. We had NO body of work.
Even something as "average" as a religious training
filmstrip was treated as the second coming. Here's our
summary of our pitch to the religious magazine Hi-Time:
All this for a filmstrip entitled, "Afraid to teach
Religion?"
Later, I'll talk about the various partners and
personalities in our little history. All added something to
the definition of what we did. After three or four years of
slide shows, we were also doing filmstrips, film, and
multi-media extravaganzas (such as the "Urban River"
exhibit at the Milwaukee Art Center, which featured eight
screens, quad sound, and led to the eventual development of
a full multi-media department at the renamed "art Museum").
So for a while, were were called SLI Multimedia, then,
Sorgel-Lee Multimedia.
The fight for self -definition is the biggest fight the
fledgling firm has. And in our first ten years, we all
fought for our favorite media. Ric liked slides. Rob (a
partner you'll meet later) liked film. I didn't really
care, since I did the soundtracks and acted more or less as
creative director on most projects. One of our first
promotions stressed the famous (since everyone's used it)
"all under one roof" concept, which says, basically, "we
must be good, we got everything". It could also mean, "so
you're not good at anything". But in our constant search
for definition, we felt that having photography, audio and
script in-house was a strength. I'm sure it was.
We kept fighting the "audio-visual" phrase, even, for a
while saying "Sorgel-Lee Riordan Means Media", which got us
quite a few calls from radio stations trying to sell us
time.
In fact, in our first few years we got pretty cocky. Since
we had three good writers on staff (Rob Riordan, Linda
Duczman, and myself) we decided we could do what those
martini drinkin' ad boys did (I was very good at the
martini part). We sent out a direct mail piece touting the
fact that "A Recession is Good for Business" and letting
folks know that our strength was that we didn't need
account executives. The ad agencies liked that.
Simultaneously, we mouthed off in an interview with the
Milwaukee Sentinel, which led to these headlines:
It took us a long time to get work from ad agencies. We got
a lot of mail from them, though.
EMBRACING AUDIO-VISUAL
As we matured, and had a number of successes under our
belts, we grew to embrace the concept of "audio-visual".
This was probably our best period of self-definition. It
was most accurately portrayed in a brochure that Paul
Counsell and Neil Casey did for us. They were just out on
their own, having split from Cramer-Krasselt, and needed a
client. We needed help. Perfect.
They wrote for us, "If it's audio-visual, we do it. From
concept to completion. Our team of writers, directors,
photographers, cinematographers, graphic designers, audio
specialists, editors and programmers will work with you
from first draft to final applause.
Slide presentations. Videotapes. 16mm films (live action
and animation). Filmstrips. With mono, stereo and quad
sound".
We can dress up a speech with a tray of slides. Or stand an
audience on its collective ear with a multi-image
extravaganza.
But perhaps most important, we know what to do when. We can
match the right message, media, equipment and cost to your
specific objectives. Then we add a bright dose of creative
thinking.
Which means you get an effective presentation that's on
time, in budget, and refreshingly out of the ordinary.
Man, I wish I wrote that.
Those nice kids Counsell & Casey eventually ended back
up with the small agency they had abandoned, C-K, except
now its not so small.
GET OUT THOSE BUGGIE-WHIPS
At Sorgel-Lee's height, we were doing extremely large stage
shows, along with all kinds of other normal stuff (from
filmstrips to film to video). But even Ad Age wouldn't let
us forget what business we were really in:
We began defining ourselves by the technology, something
folks in visual communications often do (how many people do
you know running web page companies today? Where will they
be in ten years?)
We decided to embrace multi-image. Multi-Image was the
phrase that described the 3,6,9 or 15 (or more) multiple
projector slide shows that had taken over our industry.
They had flash, and pizzazz. They sold great. And they made
for great meetings, at a time when there was no such thing
as video projection. But by embracing that phrase, and not
the broader definition of what we were doing, we were
setting a time line for ourselves. Audio-visual would have
been safer.
One thing I've learned about marketing (and maybe it is
only one thing) is that niche marketing is a fast fix which
will work. Eventually, Sorgel-Lee dumped video, film, and
even filmstrips to go with our "roots"-- slides, renamed
multi-image. This had a magnificent short term impact. But
the flip side is that you can die when your niche dies,
unless you adopt a broader definition... not as good for
the short term, but better in the long run. If the railroad
companies had only though of themselves as being in
transportation, trains might have wings.
Nonetheless, once we pursued technology, the race was on.
After I left the renamed (once again) Sorgel-Lee to start
my own firm, I rebelled against technology, and started
what we called an "A-V Agency".
We'd do the thinking, and hire the production. But I had no
real experience at that kind of finance, and had a hard
time letting go of the control of the creative production
steps.
It wasn't long before the broader A-V agency was once again
abandoned in pursuit of the next big technological edge.
Ric got real big in slides. My company got real big in
video. Both our companies closed Thanksgiving week of 1989.
Ou technologies were no longer new, and the margins were no
longer there.
Oh, and those A-V All-Stars at the beginning of this
article? They're all out of business, too, except one firm
in Seattle that never married itself to "multi-image",
despite its strengths in that medium. They used the word
"Communications" in their name. Well, it's not
"Audio-Visual", but its close.
By the way, I STILL don't know what I do for a living. But
I don't go to as many cocktail parties, either.