How do you make a fitness video?

[Paula N]

I've always been a little curious about the whole process of making a fitness video. How do instructors get started? There are hundreds of really oustanding fitness professionals in North America, and I've always wondered why more of them don't make videos. I know there are the initial start up costs, and they need publicity to help distribute and sell their video, in order to recoup their costs. Does anyone know what sort of network is in place to help out beginners? A lot of the popular video instructors own their own studios. Do most instructors grow just through word of mouth?

It's just something I've always been curious about.

[Crescent Moon]

You will probably find this article interesting.

www.vitasvibe.com/instructorsywtmav.html

[PamelaP]

It seems like a lot of the most commercially successful workouts are by celebrities who branched into fitness. But then you have an exception like Billy Blanks take the country by storm. Oh, I know he did martial arts movies, but he was hardly a known commodity.

I have wondered where people like Kathy Smith got their break into videos. She had a lot of guts to take on Jane Fonda back when that was practically the only workout tape series anyone was doing.

[Pykkalo]

I think the cost is the major issue. I read "FIRM for Life" and i think that they said something about having to come up with more than $50,000 to make and produce Vol. 2... and the videos cost $60 apiece!

[MelissaAnne]

Hi, I usually lurk every few weeks so I usually don't post.

It probably helped Kathy Smith and Billy Blanks to be in LA. They probably had investors that were clients in the film/tv business. About two years ago there was an article in a local NYC paper about a trainer on LI. One of his clients helped to bankroll his video and the newspaper discussed what they went through. I don't know if it actually ever came to fruition.

I think Collage Video really helped alot of the "unkown" fitness professionals by carrying the CIA videos in the early days.

[Aline]

1. He already had buckets of money from investors to start, since he had a VERY successful workout studio going for years.

2. He had celebrity/students who believed in his workout so he lots of media exposure way before the 1st videos came out.

3. Once the ball was rolling, all he did was put out a cattle call for participants on the internet, hold daily live classes for 2 months straight letting the camera crew do their thing.

Voila: dozens of "live" series of tapes almost instantly. No endless Firm-style retakes and picky editing like Anna seems to go through for Fitprime and the classics like she describes in her book.

I think for less well-known instructors, getting investors would be a big problem.