The life of a freelancer is a life of on-the-job-training. It will be (especially early on) a career of trial-and-error that will guarantee you moments of success, failure, and near-misses. But it's through those experiences that the freelancer gains valuable knowledge that will help to improve one's craft and one's business acumen. 

I was a freelance video producer & director for over 10 years, and in that time I learned quite a bit about networking, developing business, maintaining client relationships, marketing, and so on. My biggest lessons were learned after I completed a project. I would look back and dissect it, analyzing what worked, what didn't, and what I needed to do to make sure the next project was even more efficient. 

Here are the 3 things I learned to include in every contract before starting a project. These are by no means the only things I learned, but I think these items are essential to include in every video production contract. 

Since we're about a month away from the 2015 NAB Show, I thought it would be timely to look back at some of the useful information I came away with from last year's sessions.

In this post, I want to talk about green screen workflows. Those of you who have worked on green screen shoots before (and that's probably a majority of you) know how important it is to properly light your green screen and light and place your talent. Otherwise, the edges of your key will be blotchy and your talent will have a green glow.

I had the opportunity to attend Jeff Foster's class, in which he provided some extremely valuable information for setting up, lighting, and shooting green screens. By adhering to his tips, you can get a nice, clean key in post-production.