A single commercial shoot can and should feed a dozen placements: a broadcast spot, a YouTube pre-roll, a vertical ad for Instagram and TikTok, a square post for Facebook. The trick is that those versions aren’t just the same video resized. They have to be planned before the camera rolls, or you end up with crops that cut off heads and 15-second versions that make no sense.
This guide covers the lengths and shapes you’ll be asked for and how to get all of them from one production day.
The four lengths and what each one is for
Most campaigns are built around a family of durations. Each has a different job.
The :60 tells the full story. It works on your website, in YouTube placements people choose to watch, in presentations and at events. It’s the version with room for a founder’s voice, a customer moment and a proper ending.
The :30 is the workhorse. It’s the standard broadcast and streaming TV length and a common paid social length. It keeps the story but drops the second example and most of the breathing room.
The :15 makes one point. It’s often what runs on connected TV, pre-roll and social ads. There’s time for a hook, one benefit and your name.
The :06 is a bumper. It’s a single image or line plus a logo, designed to remind people who already saw the longer spot. On YouTube, six-second bumper ads are their own format and can’t be skipped.
Plan the cutdowns at the script stage
Here’s the mistake we see most: a brand shoots a beautiful 60-second spot, then asks the editor for a :15 after the fact. The editor discovers the story only makes sense in order, the product isn’t shown until second 40, and there’s no single line that sums it up.
When we write a commercial, we write the cutdowns at the same time. That means:
- Identifying the one line or image that will carry the :15 and the :06 on its own.
- Making sure the product or service appears early and often, not just at the end.
- Capturing a few standalone shots that make sense with no context, for bumpers and hooks.
- Recording voiceover in short, self-contained sentences that can be dropped without breaking grammar.
Our NY Auto Collision ad works this way. The before-and-after idea at its heart reads in six seconds as easily as in thirty, because a damaged car becoming whole again doesn’t need explaining.
The four shapes: 16:9, 1:1, 4:5 and 9:16
Aspect ratio is the shape of the frame. Different platforms favor different shapes.
16:9 is horizontal, the standard for TV, YouTube, websites and anything on a laptop. 1:1 is square, still useful for some feed placements and carousels. 4:5 is slightly taller than square and takes up more of the screen in Instagram and Facebook feeds. 9:16 is full vertical, the native shape for Reels, Stories, TikTok and YouTube Shorts.
Going from 16:9 to 9:16 means losing more than two thirds of the width. If your subject sits on the left of a wide frame, the vertical crop either loses them or has to slide around awkwardly.
If you’re unsure where to start, a sensible default for most small and midsize brands is a 16:9 master for the website and YouTube, a 4:5 version for feeds and a 9:16 version for Reels, Stories and Shorts. Square is increasingly optional, so ask whether you really need it before paying for it.
How we shoot for every shape at once
The solution is framing with all crops in mind. Our camera monitors show guides for vertical and square crops, so the operator keeps the important action in the center safe zone. We shoot at high resolution so a vertical crop from a wide frame still looks sharp.
For campaigns where vertical matters most, we sometimes shoot dedicated vertical setups instead of cropping. The VALA apparel campaign is a good example of the vertical-first mindset: its promos and ads were made for phone screens, so the clubhouse bar and garden court scenes were composed to read in a tall frame.
Text and graphics need the same care. On-screen type designed for 16:9 often lands under the caption or buttons in a 9:16 placement. We build graphics in separate layouts per ratio so nothing important gets covered by the platform’s interface.
Audio needs a plan too. A :06 has no room for a voiceover sentence that starts slowly, and a vertical social cut may need to work with no sound at all. We mix each version on its own rather than chopping a single mix, so music endings land cleanly and nothing cuts off mid-word.
Delivery specs by placement
Every outlet has technical requirements, and they change often enough that we confirm them for each project. As a general picture:
Broadcast TV usually requires exact durations (a :30 has to be precisely 30 seconds), specific loudness standards, slates and closed captions, and files delivered through a station’s approved system. Your media buyer or station will provide the spec sheet.
YouTube accepts most high-quality files and does its own processing. Upload the highest quality master you have and add a proper caption file rather than relying on auto-generated captions.
Meta (Facebook and Instagram) favors 4:5 for feeds and 9:16 for Stories and Reels. Burned-in captions help, since many people scroll with sound off.
Connected TV (streaming services and smart TV apps) generally wants 16:9 at high resolution, with durations of :15 or :30 and broadcast-style audio levels.
What to ask for in your next project
When you start a commercial production, list every place the video will run before anyone writes a word. That list becomes the deliverables schedule, and it shapes the script, the shot list and the edit. If you want help building that list and a shoot plan that covers it, book a strategy call and we’ll map out the versions with you.
