How to Make a Launch Video Using Envato Elements

On June 5, 2018, Envato’s subscription service, Envato Elements, introduced video as a category.

It was an exciting move, and turned what was up until then a graphic assets, photo, and WordPress template library, into one of the best value subscriptions in the industry.

It was an exciting moment for us, and for our creative community. And, so, to celebrate, and promote it, I made a video.

I’m very glad with how it turned out. But, it should be noted, videos like this, although short, can take a lot of work. And, although the final result may be exciting, the process making it a reality sometimes isn’t. You can learn more about the typical video production process in our Video Marketing Guide.

Making this video, however, was relatively straightforward. Here’s a little insight into how I did it, and how my subscription to Envato Elements made it incredibly easy.

Making a video about video for a video making audience is a tall order. But, I knew from the beginning that I wanted to create the video exclusively out of Envato items.

So, I spent some time browsing the library of Envato Elements, collecting assets that would fit our script. I downloaded a lot of motion graphics animations, and some stock footage, and paired them with words in the script to which they best aligned.

The first two lines of the script lend themselves to a space theme. So, “Something big” features visuals of a purple galaxy. And, “has landed” features visuals of the sun rising over the earth from space. We really wanted the word “Video” to pop on screen, so we wrote it in capitals, and inserted a gold background behind it. Then for “arrived”, I found this elegant animation of a door opening to reveal a stream of light.

With enough assets to match each line of the script chosen, I needed something that would visually bring it all together.

After Effects templates are great for this type of thing. They provide you with a structure to work to, and feature placeholders for your text, and footage.

Fast Typography is a video style that’s very popular at the moment, particular for content that’s going on social media. I knew that this was the style we were going for, and so I set about finding the right template for us on Envato Elements.

After testing out a few, I decided on this one by FluxVFX.

It features a good balance of text animating with a lot of character, yet isn’t busy, featuring few other animating elements. It would fill our need to catch the eye, but would stop short of overwhelming them by having too much going on.

I spent some time bringing the template in line with our brand guidelines. This mostly involved changing the font, and highlight colors, eliminating the glow around the text, and altering the words just featuring an outline to be filled with white, consistent with the rest of the copy.

I inserted the script, paired each line with the relevant visuals, then spent some time tweaking the timing, and order of the video.

The hardest thing about producing a video like this is that you can lose context over how well it communicates its message when you’re stuck in the weeds editing it. Allowing enough time to take a step back, stop working on it, revisit it, and request other people’s feedback on it is vital.

For this, I relied on my stakeholders within the business to check the latest edits, to out what was working, and what wasn’t. Envato’s Campaigns Manager and I went back and forth adjust the order of some parts of the copy. The “modular structure” of FluxVFX’s template meant each frame of the video was broken down in such a way that reordering things was super easy.

Envato’s Social Media Manager also had suggestions on how quickly we mention the value proposition, and what the video is actually announcing in order to make the biggest impression on Facebook.

Having fresh eyes check out my work helped me identify what needed improving. And, more than that, because these were my stakeholders, it ensured that the final result would be as effective as possible for their channels.

Once the final rhythmic, and copy tweaks were made, the video was in the can, and ready to go. And, on June 5, we rolled it out on Facebook, YouTube, and resized it to be an Instagram Story.

I’m really happy with the final result. It’s quick, punchy, and performed well on Facebook, and Instagram.

But, the best part is that every part of the video was created using an Envato video asset. From the After Effects template, to the motion graphics, and stock footage, pretty much everything you see in that video was downloaded, and used out of the box.

So, the next time you consider creating a video, remember this one, and that it was made with a single creative subscription.