An anniversary film is one of the few videos a whole company watches in silence. The first small office, the first machine, the first order, colleagues long retired. These images carry weight for those present, and for newer staff, customers and partners they are the quickest way to understand the company. The material isn't filmed. It's found: photos in departmental drawers, old catalogues, recordings of past events. So the work is sorting and post-production, which is what Chipscat does.
A common structure
- Opening: one emblematic image or line, perhaps something the founder once said.
- The beginning: why the company was started and how it looked.
- Turning points: a new plant, the first overseas customer, a change of product, a listing, a hard period survived. Three to five, not a chronicle.
- People: long-serving faces, group photos over the years, the team growing.
- Now: the scale and shape of the company today.
- The future: a few words from the leadership on what comes next.
For playing at the celebration, four to six minutes is right. However long the history, attention in the room is limited; fuller material can go into a separate long version.
Where to find material
- Inside the company: event photos, recordings of parties and trips, old catalogues and adverts, awards, press coverage.
- Private albums of founders and senior staff, where the earliest photos usually are.
- Retired colleagues, long-standing customers and suppliers.
- Old tapes and discs, which need digitising first.
Appoint one person to collect, and send departments a clear request: which years, which subjects, by when. Sort by decade, with the year and event in the file name or a separate list. See how to send large video files.
Handling old photos and footage
- Prints: a scanner at high resolution is best. With a phone, use daylight, shoot from directly above and avoid reflections.
- Quality: old material is low in resolution and noisy, which is normal. In post, layout (a frame, a timeline) usually works better than enlarging it too far.
- Damage and fading: important photos and old footage can be restored separately, assessed through our repair page.
- Presentation: slow camera moves and layering; see making a photo video that doesn't look like a slideshow.
Think carefully before using AI to animate people in old photos. AI can change how someone looks, which is unwelcome to colleagues and families who knew them; see turning photos into video.
When the early record is thin
- Interviews. Founders or senior staff telling the story; a voice and a face persuade more than any image.
- Objects. The first product, an old sign, a handwritten ledger, early business cards, in close-up.
- Context. Year cards and the industry of the time, as motion graphics.
- Illustrative scenes. AI can produce illustrative scenes, provided viewers can tell they aren't historical photographs. They mustn't stand in for the real record.
Interviews: what to ask and how to record
Staff can record interviews on a phone or camera and hand them to us to edit. Questions that tend to bring good answers:
- What was a day like when the company had just started?
- When was the hardest time, and how did you get through it?
- What made you think "this company will make it"?
- What would you say to the colleagues who came through it with you?
Film landscape, with a fixed camera, in a quiet room, the speaker facing a window. See recording clear audio without a microphone.
Confirm beforehand
- Facts: years, names and titles, checked by someone who knows the history.
- People: whether and how to show former or deceased colleagues and difficult episodes is your decision.
- Customer and partner names and logos: the public version needs their consent.
- Review: this kind of film usually needs the top executive's approval, so schedule it; see getting a corporate video through internal approval.
Versions after the event
A shorter public cut can sit on the "About us" page or serve as a brand film; sections by decade make social clips; interviews can be edited in full as an oral history for the archive. For the whole event, see the videos a corporate event needs; the overview is commercial video editing for businesses.
FAQ
The material is plentiful and disorganised. Can we send it as it is?
Yes, but sort it by decade at least and note the important events. Without labels we can't tell years or people.
How far ahead should we start?
Collecting usually takes longer than production. Start the call for material two to three months before the event.
Can it fit the venue's large screen?
Yes. Confirm the specification with the venue first; see LED wall video sizes and specifications.
