The Three Lanes Inside Every Campaign
Creative director, art director, creative producer, line producer. There are a lot of titles in this industry, and when I was starting out I lumped them all into one category: the people who could hire me.
On my very first ad job, we're talking 150 people on set, I made a decent-sized mistake because I didn't understand who was in the room and who was on the Zoom. I'm not telling that story today, it deserves its own reel. But here's the takeaway.
There are three main lanes on a production. Marketing, or client: they're the money authority. Agency, or creative: they're the visual authority. And production: they're logistics, keeping everyone on schedule, on budget, and fed.
The magic on a production is when all three lanes work together, collaborate, and sometimes negotiate. Understanding what each person in the room actually does is everything. The highest-ranking person in the room is not necessarily the person who signs off on the shot or can answer your question. You have to know who to go to for each need.
To make it more exciting, on broadcast and social shoots the lanes run into each other and shift. I'm mostly talking about stills and stills-with-motion sets here. This is simply how I've learned to track the people on set and be the best collaborator I can be.
If you want the longer version, I wrote a short field guide called Three Lanes on a Production. It's free, and it's yours.