Thursday, March 4, 2010

What Can OK Go's New Music Video Teach Your Church?

OK Go, of treadmill fame, released their newest music video three days ago on YouTube and already has 2.5 million views. (That's almost 35,000 views per hour!) If you haven't seen it yet, here's the video.



Behind this incredible Rube Goldberg Machine lies a considerable amount of creativity, planning, and hard work. To understand just how much work went into it, check out this video of Adam Sadowsky, president of Syyn Labs in which he explains the process. (There is a slight profanity warning.)





I see three lessons for anyone


1. Find the Experts


The band knows music and they know how to be creative, but in this case the sought the experts. A lot of churches try to do everything in-house. I understand the cost-saving benefit of this, but sometimes some outside assistance can mean the difference between pretty good and jaw-droppingly amazing.  




2. Make No Small Plans


A building at my alma mater, The University of Texas at Arlington, had a phrase inlaid into the main exterior wall that read "Make no small plans." Look at the list of requirements the band gave to Andy. They wanted a minutely timed machine that was massive in scale. Challenge the barriers of what is considered possible.Does your church have the same schedule every Sunday? Do you do the same events year in and year out? Shake things up and make no small plans!




3. Plan, Plan, Plan, Adapt


The saying is "Every general has a plan until the first shot." The creation of a complex machine like we see in the video requires months of planning. They began planning the video in August and completed the project in January. And even with all that planning there were still times they had to adapt the plan to make the machine work.  Some churches have trouble with the planning phase; others have trouble adapting their beautiful plans. Both should be remedied. 




4. Nothing Trumps Hard Work
Shooting the video took twenty 18-hour days to complete. 

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