Global Production For the Modern Media Age: Q&A with SideXSide Studios

Jordan P. Kelley, Content Director, BrandStorytelling

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Brand storytelling is facing yet another moment of upheaval. When Gabriel Silverman and Jamie Coughlin Silverman founded SideXSide Studios in 2015, it was a moment of disruption. Newer, younger companies with access to cheaper cinema-grade cameras could do more with less, unlocking the power of premium documentary storytelling for brands and nonprofits who realized this opportunity to rise above run-of-the-mill video content. That was at a time when a well-made video on Facebook would make people pause and watch. 

Now, video storytelling is no longer optional. It is an essential piece of a brand’s internal and external communication strategy. But it has become a Catch 22. Brands need it, yet the flood of content means audience attention is pulled in more directions. And, quality storytelling, whether or not it involves time-intensive preparation or production in remote corners of the world, requires significant investment.

The co-founders of SideXSide believe they are at another moment for reinvention. The U.S. and European-based studio has developed a pipeline that significantly reduces global content production spend, utilizing greater access to technology, resources, and connectivity than ever before. 

Gabe and Jamie led the development of this model with brand partners, such as the global hotel company Hilton. Now, in an era of shrinking content budgets and greater competition for attention, they are sharing how this production model can transform a global company’s approach to content marketing. BrandStorytelling caught up with Gabriel and Jamie to learn more about their global production model and how it has impacted their ability to create great work and keep costs low, all while maintaining a global first approach:

Can you share the story of how SideXSide Studios was founded in 2015 and the key factors that shaped its early development?

Jamie: Founding SideXSide Studios for us was a shot at charting our own course during a time of great upheaval in the media industry. 

We were working at two of the top newsrooms in America at that time. Gabe was a video journalist at the Washington Post and I was managing editorial and burgeoning brand video content at USA Today Sports. That was the moment when legacy papers were making their ‘pivot to video.’ With the advent of DSLRs like Canon’s 5D mark ii, backpack journalism and the ‘one-person-band’ reporting style exploded. It was clear that audiences wanted authentic, documentary-style video with a cinematic perspective – video content that was more engaging, and didn’t fit a boring, cookie cutter presentation. And even more, it didn’t require a traditionally large team to produce. 

Despite embracing this new method for the production of video content, many companies, including our employers at the time, struggled to take advantage of the medium in a profitable way. At the same time we were seeing continuous rounds of layoffs all around us. While we were grateful for the experience and the ability to work on stories that really made a difference, it was clear the future of video content within traditional newsrooms was unstable.

As we moved into the production world, our scrappy, never-miss-a-deadline, journalist’s attitude stayed with us and became a defining advantage. Using my producing and management expertise and Gabe’s storytelling chops and creativity, we had a real opportunity to build something that stood apart from more traditional production companies.

What were the primary disruptions in the brand storytelling landscape at the time, and how did SideXSide position itself to take advantage of those changes?

Gabe: These conversations are as much about cultural shifts as they are about technological changes, since they go hand-in-hand.

The same technology that unleashed backpack journalism was also helping to bring cheaper, more creative and more intimate video storytelling to brands of all sizes and kinds. Authenticity was key, and every brand, whether a large corporation, a small company, or even a nonprofit, was competing to communicate directly with audiences. The brand’s ethos was now as equally on display as their offering.

Being a production company rooted in backpack journalism and documentary filmmaking, we quickly found our niche telling visual, nonfiction stories for large nonprofits and a few Fortune 500 companies. There are companies you call for the beautifully-crafted, super expensive car commercials. We couldn’t compete there. But we could be the small, nimble team you can send anywhere in the world, with a lot of unknowns, and we could come back with a beautiful and impactful story that brought the authenticity audiences were craving. 

Nearly ten years on, there is more video content available than ever before. How do you see brands evaluating the role or value of video content from a decade ago to now?

Gabe: In a lot of ways, the industry has become a victim of its own success. Today, there is much higher demand for video. It’s essentially mandatory for any communication strategy. But this has naturally divided attention and made it harder for people to break through the onslaught of content.

We’re seeing a lot of organizations needing to do more every year with stagnating budgets. This has led to another interrogation of the value of video. Or at least how to really maximize budgets, while finding new ways of measuring success. It’s a conversation I think is really healthy for the industry.

Brands still need to communicate with visual storytelling but not every objective deserves higher-budget production. Similarly, high-end and intentional films still play a critical role for organizations. They just need to be clear on where best to use those stories. 

SideXSide has introduced a new production model to reduce global content production costs. What inspired the development of this model, and what are its core components?

Gabe: The top line is that we’re combining our tested production process for making non-fiction content, with our world-wide network of talent, and using technological and project management infrastructure that allows for seamless global collaboration.

For years, many of our clients would work with different producers in various regions, or try to manage a network of freelancers. They recognized the value of quality storytelling, but it is extremely time consuming to manage production, and ensuring a specific style and quality is a real skill. 

We developed the global production model to give our clients a single point of contact for telling high-quality, emotive, nonfiction stories anywhere in the globe. The idea is to make managing quality and messaging as seamless as possible, and as cost effective as possible.

Since our founding we’ve been a company that operated globally. At this point we’ve had productions in more than 50 countries. But how we operate has evolved. Before the pandemic our teams would fly globally. It was a way we could guarantee quality and style. Since the pandemic that has shifted for a number of reasons. At first it was about physical restrictions. Production didn’t stop during the pandemic, so we all had to figure out how to get the job done from afar. That led to a lot more localized collaboration.  Money is now tighter so travel costs are an easy target for savings. 

Localized production has big benefits, and is a more inclusive process. Local crew can tap into stories and relate to subjects in a way that can be really beneficial to the nonfiction storytelling and creative process. Before, working as journalists we encountered so many amazing and fearless video journalists and filmmakers around the globe. In the last five years or so, tech and internet expansion across the globe has created greater access to this world-class talent. Unfortunately, economic realities of the news media and documentary industries have also taken a buzz saw to so many jobs, so there are now even more talented storytellers looking for ways to use their craft. 

How does your new production pipeline leverage advances in technology and connectivity to improve efficiency?

Jamie: I'd say that SideXSide is a "global first" company. As we saw the trend of the media production industry becoming more decentralized, we invested in a global infrastructure: we built relationships with local producers in other countries, we supplemented our team in D.C. with an office in Austria, and we hired team members across time zones.

Our post-production infrastructure operates at a global speed we couldn’t have foreseen just a few years ago. We can shoot in Kathmandu or Shanghai on a Tuesday and have a rough cut in our clients’ hands before the weekend. We’re really proud of the tech capabilities we’ve built out, and will continue iterating as new tech becomes available.

The final piece was creating a project management process that operates around the clock. For example, this summer we produced 15 productions globally in just three weeks. Running the projects solely from the U.S. would’ve created untenable lags in our process. So we have teams collaborating across the globe in every phase of production to make complex production challenges appear seamless to our clients. 

At a time when many production companies were investing in facilities and traditional tech, we were staying true to what inspired us to start the studio in the first place: embracing access to new technology to tell more authentic and impactful stories. 

In what ways has your collaboration with Hilton served as a proving ground for your approach to content production? (What measurable outcomes have you observed in terms of cost savings, efficiency, or audience engagement as a result of this new production approach?)

Gabe: We’ve been really fortunate to have worked with HiIton for almost 8 years. We’ve built up a lot of trust between us, and that’s allowed us to continually explore and incorporate innovative ways to approach content production. 

Our relationship ‘s evolution has paralleled the overall shifts in the production world. It has really helped us hone the model and continue driving toward the best experience for our clients as possible.

Compared to traditional project-based work, we’re saving clients around 20%.  But there are also other intangible benefits that are critical. We’ve worked with them a long time, so there’s no need to educate a new vendor on tone or language. That’s true for all our clients. And it buys back our client’s time by not having to manage complex international productions themselves. 

What can other studios and brands take away from the success of your innovation? What advice would you impart on those looking to adapt to a rapidly evolving media landscape?  

Gabe: Times change quickly and often that change is inconvenient to our own career paths, but it's important to continue challenging yourself technologically and interrogating culturally where it’s all heading. 

Before I applied to graduate school for Journalism in 2011, I visited my uncle at work, where he was a director for a national nightly news program in Washington. The production room where my uncle sat was built for a film era, and he was the only one sitting in a room built for 10 people. Change is the only thing we can rely on in this world, better roll with it.

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Learn more about SideXSide Studios here.

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About Jamie Coughlin Silverman:

Executive Producer, Co-Founder, SideXSide

Jamie’s boundless curiosity about people – how they think and love, what they do to and for each other – is at the heart of her work.

She’s a producer, writer and journalist whose work has been recognized with a GLAAD Media Award, White House News Photographers Award for Best Documentary, an Emmy nomination, a few Addys, and more than a dozen film festival awards.

She wrote and produced SideXSide’s film TransMilitary for Logo TV and Amazon Prime, which won the SXSW Audience Award for best documentary. Along with her fellow SideXSide Studios co-founder Gabriel Silverman, she produced Transgender, at War and in Love for New York Times Op-Docs, which was nominated for an Emmy.

Jamie is a Gotham Documentary Lab Fellow, RIAS Journalism Fellow, and Film Independent Fellow, and her work has been supported by top independent film funding organizations.

Before Jamie co-founded SideXSide in 2015, she managed the editorial and branded video content for USA Today Sports. Jamie speaks German.

About Gabriel Silverman:

Director, Co-Founder, SideXSide

Gabe’s first lessons in storytelling came sitting around the dinner table with his grandparents; some who escaped war, others who fought in it. Stories were all they were able to bring with them to America to keep their culture alive.

Gabe began his career at The Washington Post, winning more than a dozen awards for his reporting, including an Edward R. Murrow Award for his investigative work, a White House News Photographers Award for Best Documentary, & two Emmy nominations.

His directorial feature debut, TransMilitary, premiered at SXSW 2018 where it won the Audience Award for Best Documentary and received critical acclaim. He was named to the 10 Filmmakers to Watch list by The Independent.

Gabe is an alum of the Gotham Documentary Lab, Film Independent/CNN Docuseries Lab, and RIAS Fellowship.