wordle

This is one of the coolest things I've ever seen on the internet for creative people. Maybe I'm late to the hooplah about Wordle, but graphic designers have got to be GIDDY about this. It's pretty fun to throw your blog in and see how the words pop up and reflect bits and pieces of who you are. You can also copy/paste any text, and change the the colors & layout to your liking. Pretty innovative idea and such a brilliant way of accomplishing an abstract piece of art in a fraction of the time it would take to do it otherwise. Give it a try!! :)

Wordle

video: theAMP promo

This is a promo I just completed for a new ministry that Ryan, Josh, and I will be pushing hard in the next couple months called theAMP. I hope it gets you excited--and if you live in the Atlanta area and the vision speaks to your heart, I hope you'll consider partnering with us! It's very heavy on After Effects, which I'm still learning slowly but surely. I might do a more detailed breakdown of the technical aspects of the video in the near future, but I'm just too busy right now to commit to that, so for now here is the promo itself. HUGE thanks to Casey Darnell for allowing us permission to use his song "Stand In Awe" off his new CD Words In Motion. Casey will be at our first AMPsaturday event on September 20 and we are SO excited to have him!

If you're intrigued and want to find out how you can help make this ministry happen (we will need all the support we can get), feel free to contact us and we would love to get you involved in any way possible. Ryan and Josh will have some posts later today explaining a little bit more what theAMP is about and why we're doing it, and after the site launches on August 1st, there will be a lot more information available about the effort. For now, enjoy the promo--and if you feel so inclined as to post it on your blog to help us generate some buzz, shoot me an e-mail and I will give you the embed code for the video! We would love to get it out there as much as possible!

sorry for being MIA + cool commercial

So it's been about a month and a half since I last blogged. Sorry. This past month has been a journey as with any other--I did some shoots, I edited some stuff, we went on a road trip, my brother-in-law got married (congrats Rick & Lys!), I learned about some exciting potential work opportunities, we hit a dog with our car (he didn't make it), Ryan & I worked a concert, Miranda continues to excel at Southside, and I'm still trying to get inspired and learn more and grow as an artist and as a person and as a follower of Christ. That's the long, tall, & short of it--I'm sure I'm leaving some stuff out, because it was an exciting month with lots of twists & turns. As always, sorry for being slow on the blogging side of things. Maybe this month will be better?

Anyway, I caught this commercial on TV last night and it wiped the floor with my eyeballs so I felt like I had to post something about it. It's from the motion graphics guys at Psyop and it's for the new HP TouchSmart PC (I'd be willing to bet that they edited it at least part of it on a Mac though...irony?) I love the sophistication and concept, how the computer is supposed to make you feel like a maestro--it feels like poppy, freeform visual artistry, but it's also justified conceptually, which is more important than the pictures themselves because it gives you a reason to watch. The visuals are obviously striking but the sound design also lends a lot to the experience. I would love to see a "making of" featurette on this sometime like HP did with some of their earlier promos:



(Here's a higher res version from Motionographer.com)

video: do.justice

*song used with permission from: Eddie Kirkland (artist) / John Mark McMillan (writer)
"How He Loves", ©2005 John Mark McMillan, ASCAP / CCLI

This is a video I had the huge privilege of editing last week for the singles ministry at Buckhead Church, which on April 19 joined forces with singles from all 3 NP campuses to engage in service projects around the city of Atlanta. You can find it on the Buckhead Church Blog today and it will also be in the 10B4 for the next couple of weeks. I couldn't be more excited--I'm so grateful to be a part of a church community that really cares about the city we live in, that really cares about doing everything it can to bring JUSTICE to this city and to these people. It is worth celebrating!

Huge thanks to Eddie Kirkland (who performs on this recording) and John Mark McMillan (who originally wrote the song) for allowing us to use "How He Loves" in the video, an incredible and passionate song which really is what drives the piece in my opinion. The graphic & color scheme was originally designed by Brian Manley for their print/web campaign and I just mixed the elements to make them work for video. The growing vines are from DigitalJuice.com (we used the same vine element in a baptism video for Catalyst Church last year so that's why it looks a little familiar stylistically; I don't think it's bad to recycle from time to time). Some of the footage was in 4x3 and some of it was in 16x9, so I had to do some stretching/cropping to make it all fit into the 16x9 timeline, but my hope was that the overall look would be messy enough to disguise the cropping and bring more attention to the actual information, which is at the heart of what's being communicated.

Special huge thank you to Joel Thomas & Jeff Henderson for the opportunity of editing this piece, and I hope that people are as touched by these numbers as I was. 2400 meals delivered? 700 gift bags made for homeless people? 15 TONS of sand moved to create a volleyball court for inner-city kids? Wow. As Jeff says in his blog update, it's not about Buckhead Church, it's about Buckhead--and I'm so humbled by the grace and willingness of the people of this church to donate of their time, energy, and sweat to reach out to the kind of people who need it most in this community. This is a church that truly cares about people. If you live in the Buckhead area, you have got to come check out this movement. God is ALIVE in this place and I'm so excited & grateful to be a small part of it!

EDIT: I got an anonymous comment from someone regarding the graphics, saying: "actually the original do.justice logo was created by a designer named Leighton a year ago for 722." My apologies to Leighton or anyone else involved with the original design. I worked off of a source package from graphics that Brian Manley put together this year, which included the logo that was designed much earlier. The logo itself is a really cool piece of art and if anybody knows of the original designer's web page, let me know and I'll link to it. Thanks for pointing out the mistake and my apologies for the ill-informed post! Properly crediting people's work is very important. Sorry Leighton!

back with a bunch of videos (& more to come!)

Boy oh boy have I fallen out of the blog loop over the past month! My apologies to anyone who's been directed here from Carlos's blog or from Gary's blog (two blogging behemoths who with very tiny links have collectively doubled my stats)...it has been another busy month and the blogging part of my life has felt like a third priority to the family side (which for now is just Miranda and I, but still extremely important), and the work side (which has been piling up big time this month). Here are a couple of recent projects I've been involved with:

MarriedLife Live promo video:



(I also got to edit the interview that will play at the event on May 17 & 18. Most of the edits/cuts for that and for this teaser were pre-produced in writing by North Point, so you can thank them for the layout and timing. Mike Davis did the primary text & motion graphics as well, so essentially, my role was just a final assembly of assets with music. You can also find this teaser their website here: http://www.marriedlifeonline.com/live)

(P.S. The b-roll supplied by Gungor's people was in 4x3, which drove me nuts, haha...I would love to hear about some creative ways that any of you editors have fixed this problem with your projects. What do you guys prefer? Cropping/expanding, or keeping native with graphic elements on the sides?)

Mountain Lake Church interview piece:



(This was shot with the help of the one and only Ryan W Fitzgerald, my good friend & former SPD of Catalyst Church, who is currently available for contract video/audio/lighting/production/creative/consulting work...you name it, he can help. The b-roll that was provided to me for the edit was very limited, so I feel like the piece as a whole has a lot more potential than it ultimately delivers, but it was a quick turnaround, and I am thankful to Todd Nichols for the work. Again, a shout out to PremiumBeat.com for the background music.)

North Point - revised Baby Dedication "Advice" video:



(We made a few changes to the video I previously posted on the blog, which hopefully will make it more of a "heart" piece. I am also getting the chance on an ongoing basis to edit together moving-photo montages of all the babies being dedicated at Browns Bridge, Buckhead, and North Point, which are played during a performance song at the closer of the event. A couple weeks ago the montage edits involved about 128 photos total, which was pretty intense for the turnaround, but fun to do! I also got to video-direct Baby Dedication at Buckhead on the last Sunday of April, which I'll hopefully get to do again on May 18. HUGE thanks to Kendra Fleming for all the work in this area!)

North Point Campuses' 10B4:



(I'm only doing the "exporting" to campuses & assemblies for these on a contract basis...Matt Gibson does all the editing, Brad Bretz does the keying, Lane Johnson masters the audio, and Dave Blakeslee & the media team do the shooting. So my hand of involvement is VERY small, but I am so excited to be involved & to be learning from these amazing editors & creative geniuses. I feel like I have grown a ton as an editor and have been challenged big time just by observing Matt & Brad do their thing, so I'm incredibly grateful to play even a tiny role...plus, I get to be called the "The Finisher", which is awesome because it makes me feel like a comic book character!!)

There's quite a few more clips from North Point, Southside, Revolution Church, and others from this month that I would love to put up here, but they will have to wait till a later posting. I'm so excited to have had these opportunities recently and I hope and pray that I'll have more of them heading this way in the future. Sorry again for the lack of posting--as soon as I get fully caught up on sleep, I'll make sure to come back and get caught up on blogging as well!!! :D

catalyst church closes its doors this month

"thank you, catalyst church"
"catalyst church closing"
"pray for catalyst church"
"stop"
"the second worst day of my life"
"a difficult day"
"sunday thoughts: announcement that catalyst is closing"
"hard times"

• If you haven't already heard, Catalyst Church--the NP strategic partner in Greenville, South Carolina for which I've done numerous video projects and which recently attempted a giving campaign to revive its financial existence--will officially hold its last Sunday next week on April 20th, 2008. I know it has been a difficult decision on the part of the staff and they have wrestled with it for months now, and my prayers go out to the Catalyst Church family. The staff--Ryan Fitzgerald, Casey Ross, Jake Miller, and Sarah Canterbury--have all become dear friends of mine over the past 6 months (I have known Ryan for a few years now); and so I just ask that you pray for their futures in ministry as they are all now effectively out of a job. These are some of the most committed, God-fearing, faithful individuals I have ever met and I truly consider it a blessing to know them and call them friends. I look forward to what the future holds for each of them and I can only trust that God has their best interests in mind because of their honest and authentic hearts for Christ.

• Most importantly I implore you to pray for the attenders of Catalyst Church who will be seeking guidance as they look for a new church home in Greenville. In spite of the anger, frustration, and sadness that they might be feeling right now as a result of Catalyst's collapse, please pray that they are able to keep their eyes on the cross regardless of the next church community that God leads them to. It is not the church itself that saves people, but an intimate relationship with the son of God, and I trust that he will lead them all in the right direction as only he can.

• Here is Casey's announcement from Catalyst Church this morning, with Eddie Kirkland closing the service in a beautiful and appropriate fashion with his original song "Lift High". Thanks Ryan for recording it for those of us who couldn't be there:



[If you get a chance, head over to Casey, Jake, & Ryan's blogs and offer them a kind word or a prayer. It means the world to them right now. Thanks.]

video: southside "parental advisory" bumper

Here's a quick series bumper I put together this week for the middle school ministry at Southside Church. Jeremy will be tackling a subject that is notoriously poignant for teenagers, especially throughout the middle school years...dealing with parents! It was a loaded concept creatively which made the bumper fun to dream up, and Jeremy sent me all of the "rebellious" text phrases up front which I appreciated greatly. He also sent me the sermon topics--"Taking the initiative to "honor" your parents", "Seeing things from your parents' perspective", "Communication with parents", etc. In short, he gave me the three things most important to "creative" dudes: 1.) information, 2.) parameters, and 3.) trust. It made this project fly by and helped me to know that we were on the same page from idea to completion, which is extremely vital to maintaining an efficient workflow.

The animation is just a simple camera fly-through in After Effects with some grunge and random paint splatters mixed in from VideoCopilot's "Riot Gear" effects library. The song is a royalty-free selection from Revostock and the "thought-voices" are from a quick voiceover session Miranda and I did in the 2nd draft stage of the piece to add a little extra flavor to the audio. Miranda did great. I HATE the sound of my own voice, but I have been told in the past that I sound like a middle schooler so I guess it works for this piece. Overall it should be a pretty cool intro into Jeremy's message and it came out decent enough despite the short time frame we created it in. Huge thanks again to Southside for the steady stream of work; they are a great group of people and as always I'm incredibly grateful for their continued encouragement and trust (which makes it a lot easier for me to share Miranda with them. ;) I look forward to working on even more projects with these guys in the future.

video: north point baby dedication

• I'm always extremely honored to be offered the opportunity of shooting/editing a video for a church or ministry, and this piece was no exception. The good folks over in the Waumba Land department of North Point Community Church contacted me a couple weeks ago about doing a video for their upcoming Baby Dedication, and I was thrilled to take them up on it! I need to offer a HUGE thanks to Brad for passing my name along in a crunch--the Waumba team needed this video shot & edited on a quick turnaround, and since NP's media team was already slammed, this video got farmed out to me as a contract piece. I couldn't have been more excited and I am so grateful to have had this random opportunity to do an edit for one of the most innovative churches in the country.

• The turnaround on this video was tighter than most--we shot on Tuesday 3/25, the edit was finished on Thursday 3/27, and it played on Sunday 3/30. The shoot itself was rather standard--11 interviews in one location, DVX100, lighting rig, lav mics, etc. My good friend George Kinyanjui joined me for the shoot and helped make setup and tear-down a breeze. We had originally hoped to shoot the interviews using 2 cameras, and Kendra & Lindsay at NP were awesome enough to help us get access to a hefty JVC camera from the student ministry, but despite all of its bells & whistles, the camera errored a whole lot during the shoot & ended up being unusable. So, I did a little improv with the DVX and asked the subjects (who were all NP staff) to sit there and smile at the camera while I panned and zoomed across their faces for b-roll purposes as it became a 1-camera shoot. Big thanks to all of the people we interviewed for being accessible enough to take the time out of their busy post-Easter week schedules to offer their insight. The basic concept was to ask each of these people to give one piece of experienced advice to new parents & to get a montage together to show in the context of the Baby Dedication event as people committed their infant children to Christ. The advice that all of these seasoned veterans gave was incredibly insightful, and I hope that the new parents at the event end up learning as much as I did from these great conversations. Miranda and I probably won't have any kids for a while, but when we do, I'm sure I'll be watching this video over again. :)

• When the shoot was done, I asked Lindsay to send an e-mail to all of the people we interviewed asking for pictures of their families that we could integrate into the piece. Most of them responded within hours, which was awesome considering the short timeframe that we had to get this completed. The effect on each of the pictures is pretty simple--the blue flourishes are adapted decorative elements from the "Evolution" package of Video Copilot's effects series; the isolated saturation on the pictures was achieved by pasting the pictures on top of themselves in Photoshop, desaturating the top layer, and using a soft eraser brush to pull out the parts I wanted to see saturated again--then I just keyframed each final rendered picture in AE to gradually come up in saturation from 0-100 as the flourishes came in. Relatively simple effect that I could copy/paste over and over again to pretty much any picture as long as I could crop them out wide enough to fit the frame naturally. The music is (yet another) royalty-free selection that I bought from PremiumBeat.com--as always, I love doing business with these guys in part because of their incredibly reasonable per-song licensing rates, but also because of their habit of personally thanking customers for our support. It also just so happened that the piece I used ("Fresh Morning") was 3:00 exactly, and since we were aiming for a video of "about 3 minutes in length", it ended up being an incredibly helpful guide for cutting.

• I heard that there was a slight framerate/formatting mishap with the video earlier this afternoon about an hour before Baby Dedication was set to start, but I'm hoping that Micah (their production director) was able to convert it in time (I love Twitter). My big learning for this piece--even if the turnaround is quick, always make sure you get all the info ahead of time before exporting & turning in a project. I turned this in with a 24p framerate, and their system only runs 29.97 and 59.94--once again, vital to know this info ahead of time...twas totally my bad, but I think it worked out! Once again, I can't even express how excited I was to get to do a piece for North Point, & I consider it a huge blessing and an honor to be trusted with an element of such a sensitive & poignant event. Big thanks to Lindsay & Kendra for the work, to George for helping me set up & tear down the shoot, and to Brad for helping me get this project in the first place. I had a blast!! :D

josh bayne on wheel of fortune

Set your TiVo's! Or your VCR's! Or your generic DVR's! Or your DVD-R's! Josh Bayne, my good friend and worship leader extraordinaire from Catalyst Church, will be on Wheel of Fortune TONIGHT at 7:00pm ET. No joke. Seriously. Check out your local listings for channel information.

Yes, I know the results (he taped about a month ago). No, I'm not sure how or if he'll use his Wheel of Fortune experience as an tie-in illustration on stage one day when he's leading people in worship... :)

Check it out!!

video: southside church "next" promo (the other next)

• Here's a piece I put together for Southside Church last week on a pretty short notice. It is a promo for their "Next" events that take place for their adult worship environment (not to be confused with the student ministry series that I recently edited a bumper for). It is an opportunity for attenders (new and recurring alike) to learn more about the church's history, strategy, doctrine, and vision for the future; and a chance for them to figure out how to become involved and take the next step both in their relationship with God and their relationship with Southside as an institution.

• Martin and I fleshed out the concept briefly on Wednesday of last week, I started editing Thursday afternoon, and I had a full res in his e-mail on Friday morning--it was a pretty quick edit since the b-roll was already there and it was just a matter of finding the right clips and putting them together with our graphic scheme. Music is from PremiumBeat.com. If I had more time to do it I probably would have tried to give the primary "freeze frame" template a little more animation & pizzazz, and I might have played with the text placement a little in the final sequence, but I think it accomplished its objective. It's more of a concept piece than anything, and I hope that the idea we had came across clearly for the short time that we had to produce it.

• So, Miranda had her first day on the job today at Southside Church and is LOVING it--I will make sure to keep posted on any new exciting things that are happening there. And big thanks to Martin & Chris for letting us continue to attend & pursue membership at Buckhead Church on Sundays because of our proximity & involvement. Miranda is loving the work environment at SS and we couldn't be more thankful to NPMI for their focus on family as a priority for staff (and come to think of it...does this mean my freelance stuff with them will be piped down through her??--"Hi Joe, this is Miranda at Southside Church"--WEIRD!). We also put down our first payment on a second car--it's a used PT Cruiser and its name is Pete. Nothing too fancy, but they did polish it before we picked it up so it looks pretty enough. It's gonna be nice not having to bum rides off of people when Miranda has the CR-V. I feel like a grown-up now! :)

video: catalyst church 10b4

• Sorry for the long delay in posts--it has been a busy month (again). Here's a project I just wrapped up for Catalyst Church, the North Point strategic partner in Greenville, SC. It represents (to my knowledge) the first effort by a strategic partner to produce a campus-specific "TenBefore" (or 10B4). If you're not familiar with the TenBefore, it is a segment that North Point Community Church produces on a weekly basis (for each of its 3 campuses) to maximize the time that attenders spend sitting in their seats waiting for the service to start. Over the years it's developed into a go-to avenue for showcasing promos, information, & original media without compromising the flow of the rest of the service. They use a host (Kelly Lintz) who welcomes first-time attenders, promotes upcoming events, and presents a cheerful introduction to the North Point model of doing church--all in the span of about 5-10 minutes. It has become a staple at Buckhead, Browns Bridge, & North Point, providing a familiar personality who sets the tone each week for the excellence that awaits in the actual service.

• Ryan approached me months ago about attempting a TenBefore for Catalyst, which at first seemed a little overwhelming for both of us (and to some extent still does)--the behind-the-scenes stuff we had read about on Brad's blog about the 10B4 showed a complex process from week to week that involves a hefty team at North Point; and at this stage, a hefty team is something Catalyst doesn't have. One of our solutions for making the week to week grind less taxing was to lessen the frequency of the shooting dates--to shoot quarterly/seasonally instead of weekly. By covering all foreseeable events for the next 3 months on each shoot, our hope was that we could shuffle the host material around enough to give the 10B4 some basic functional variety and have a unique sequence to show each week. Besides the fact that our host will be wearing the same clothing in every piece until the summertime, there may be other caveats to shooting quarterly--which we hope to evaluate over the next couple months in order to improve our next shoot with some fresh ideas.

• Here are the basics we needed to get down to get the ball rolling:

HOST:
• Sandy Delonga is a friend of ours from Buckhead Church that Miranda has babysat for on numerous occasions and who lives about 5 minutes from us. She also happens to be a professional host, actress, and voice-over artist, with an impressive resume and an incredibly professional work ethic & consistency on set. She was AMAZING to work with and I can't say enough about how seamless & spot-on her delivery was take after take. She was also EXCITED to work on this project, which made shooting a blast. Sandy is unbelievably solid and we look forward to working with her more in the future!!

• One of the most obvious questions for Ryan and I in the beginning stages was whether we should get a unique host for Catalyst or ask Kelly Lintz herself to fill those shoes. We wanted to emulate, as best we could, the quality & efficiency of North Point's TenBefore, which would require an actress whose professionalism was comparable to Kelly...so we might as well have asked her, right? Not necessarily. The biggest issue we needed to consider with asking Kelly was the precedent that it would set for the rest of the partners moving forward. As of right now, there are 15 strategic partners and counting, with more to be added soon. If every partner were doing a unique 10B4 segment from week to week, it would be impossible for Kelly herself to catch up and go from place to place. In the same way that there is a unique SPD and a unique lead pastor for each Strategic Partner, it only felt right for us to find a unique face for the 10B4 as well. Sandy Delonga fit those shoes beautifully, and will make an excellent personality for representing Catalyst Church each week. Her quality and professionalism is completely up to par with Kelly's, and proof that there are indeed other people out there capable of doing this just as well.

LOCATION:
• The kind folks over at Buckhead Church let us shoot in their KidStuf Theatre--which was an unbelievable honor and we can't even begin to express how grateful we are. As we've been told, it may have been a one-time thing to shoot in there, as scheduling is not always easy, but we are so thankful to have gotten to shoot our first piece in our dream location!

FILES:
• Matt Gibson, Brad Bretz, and Vicky Stevens were incredibly helpful in getting us on our feet with a template for editing the TenBefore. Everything from background images to sound effects to the 10-minute timer to the intro/outro sequences, were all sent to Catalyst directly from North Point and are now available exclusively for the NP Strategic Partners to use if they choose to create a 10B4 segment. We still needed to pay for a music licensing agreement with Bluefuse for the rights to the song beds, but for the most part, everything was there for us to work with--even After Effects files for the name text and Final Cut files for the reflection parameters under our host's feet. It couldn't have been more comprehensive of a package, and we are SOOOOOOO thankful that North Point was willing to share their source files to make this highly-established service medium replicable for the partners.

GEAR / EDITING:
• We tried to light the green screen as best we could with our limited resources--my Lowell 4-pt kit & some standard Home Depot style worklights (yeah, our budget was blingin'...haha). We couldn't get a teleprompter for the shoot, but Sandy (our host) owns an "ear prompter" which is actually hidden in her ear throughout the entire piece--which kept all of her deliveries & timing consistent which was awesome for editing. We had originally planned to shoot in 4x3 on my old Panasonic DVX and work that into the widescreen edit, but we found out the week of the shoot that our friend Robert had access to a JVC GY-HD100U, so we jumped the gun and decided to shoot in full 720p24. The camera has lots of limitations (thanks again to Bob-O for sitting through the arduous capture process...), but for what it's worth it gave us an excellent HD picture to work off of. For keying, I had tried to use Keylight in AE like Brad & the NP gurus, but my 1.5GB of RAM hated me for it...so I managed all of the keying in FCP with DVmatte Pro, and used the Edges filter in Veescope Key to top it off. I did all of the keying/compositing in full HD sequences and then downconverted them to DV afterward for a pretty decent-looking result.

These are the first segments that are in the version above (with over a half dozen more shot & still to be edited for future weeks)-

Opener - Intro/background/timer straight from North Point. We plopped a keyed-out Sandy into the sequence they gave us, applied the preset parameters, put Sandy's name in there, put in the timer, added music, and voila--a solid opener. Music from Bluefuse.



WaumbaLand - I shot all of the b-roll for this back in October when I was up in Greenville filming the environments. The script is straight from North Point and the music is from Bluefuse.




Baptism - This is an original, and is an adaptation of the baptism video I edited for Catalyst back in November. The script & logo are Catalyst's as well. We had fun thinking outside the box for this one. The backgrounds are simply the same stills that NP gave us, with some color effects. Music by Kristian Stanfill.


InsideOut - Straight from North Point / Re:Think; I just added the tag at the end with logo & date.






Strategic Partners - The graphics & environment are straight from North Point for this one as well. We were only able to get a final composite to work with and so I had to build/rebuild/reanimate certain parts in pieces, but it worked out! We might play with the language a bit next time we do this one to make it more Catalyst-specific. Music from Bluefuse.


Closer - Outro/background/timer straight from North Point; simply plopped Sandy in there and tried to deliver big on the final music cue. Hopefully will provide a nice transition into the beginning of the service.




• We sent it out to Brad & the NP guys earlier this week and received some pretty encouraging responses, which is a huge deal for me personally and definitely makes the work that went into this feel worth it. Big thanks again to Ryan for the opportunity/challenge of shooting & editing this behemoth, and a huge thanks to Brad & the team over at North Point for their help and support during this process. We couldn't be more grateful for the opportunity to help set the course for what's possible for media teams at the partner churches, if enough hard work & planning is done on the front end. Looking forward to expanding & improving this process as the months roll on with Catalyst. This has been a HUGE learning experience!!

[ BIG SIDE NOTE: Miranda is now the "Service Programming Assistant" at Southside Church (another NP partner). She'll be helping Martin Huggins, the SPD, with planning, volunteer organization, and other administrative duties on a part time basis starting Tuesday. I couldn't be more excited for her!!! =D ]

comment of the week + green screen gets some action + february in a nutshell

Thanks Josh. My blog misses you too.

It's been a crazy few weeks.

Here's a basic summary of some of the recent stuff. This post might be pretty long; sorry in advance for the lengthiness!

• Shot a 10B4 for Catalyst Church featuring Sandy Delonga--an extremely talented actress/voice talent/host who has done numerous TV ads and has her own voiceover studio...she is the real deal and brings a LOT of professionalism to this piece. HUGE thanks to our friend Erinleigh and the folks over at Buckhead Church for hooking Ryan and I up with the chance to shoot our first 10B4 in their KidStuf facility, North Point style. Really, Brad, it looks like we are trying to copy your every move, and the truth is, we are. ;) Big thanks as well to Carlos for stopping by and offering some much-appreciated encouragement, and an extra huge thanks to Robert for helping us get access to a 720P camera (and for hanging out at my apartment for 5 hours afterward as we troubleshooted capturing difficulties). Though it's never fun trying to learn a new camera on the day of a shoot, we came away with some solid visuals, which with a little color correction should eventually look great for this style of project. I am glad to be getting some use out of this green screen investment.

• Here is a screen grab of the raw stuff--there are shadows but it's not horrible, and Keylight in After Effects has been cooperating so far. My lack of RAM is atrocious though--I am currently 19 hours into a 44-hour render (I'm not exaggerating). That means I can start editing on Monday, if all goes according to plan. Anybody have any inexpensive tips for making a G5 go faster?

• Also shot a parody of a Justin Timberlake video for Greg over at the high school ministry for Southside Church. Once again, full green screen rig was employed (as well as a beautiful green mat that Miranda constructed for him to dance on), and we had the rare chance to shoot in glorious 1080i. We wanted to replicate, as best we could, the visual look of the actual music video, and I think that we came pretty close--it seems to have hit a slam dunk with most of their staff; and, if all goes well, it will play live on their center screen at Inside Out tomorrow night, with a full band clicked in sync and everything. Still trying to parse out the appropriate way of posting that clip on the blog--I might post the visuals without any audio attached, or something of that nature. For now, here is a screen grab. Hope to post the full clip soon in some capacity. Had a BLAST working with Greg and watching him dance like a pro!

• Last week, I spent some time over at Gary Lamb's Revolution Church, consulting, checking out some of their equipment, and giving them a status update of what would be required to construct a full IMAG setup around some great camera/switcher gear they've recently acquired. Not sure how, if, or when they'll make the full leap financially and volunteer-wise, but I'm excited for them. Had a great time hanging out with Gary himself and Adam, their Digital Pastor. They are a crazy bunch, and it was cool to see them fired up about what is possible for their target audience in the future. They understand how the mind of an unchurched person works, and that is more than can be said about most churches in the world. Great to meet those guys.

• We are a couple of steps closer to finding a location for our first AMPsaturday event with theAMP! This ministry, which hopes to build community and cultivate young worship leaders in the Atlanta area, has been a long time in the making and will involve a lot of hard work on all of our ends to help it come to fruition with excellence. We hope and pray that it is more God's project than ours, and that our involvement helps only to further His vision for a new generation of musicians in this region. It is looking pretty hopeful as of right now. Stay tuned to Ryan & Josh's blogs for more info as it becomes available!

• Spent the last couple weeks volunteering in Buckhead Church's main auditorium, and LOVED it--the worship atmosphere is so grand and incredible, it's hard to explain just how something as simple as running ProPresenter can feel like a participation in the transformation of people's lives for Christ. I love tracking with all of these guys and getting to know Jeff, Carlos, and the whole incredible crew. Their passion for life change fires me up from the bottom of my stomach. I can't get enough of it.

• I recently edited together some of the footage I shot down in Destin, Florida a few weeks ago for Giles Properties, a small Atlanta-based business that rents out vacation homes. The goal was to create 2-3 minute web-only video tours of the houses that would entice people to stop by. Not the most glamorous type of shoot/edit in the world, but it kept me working this month and we love the couple who own the business. I still have about 7 more of these to finish, but they're coming along:



• Assistant Directing video at KidStuf tomorrow morning at Buckhead Church. Big thanks to Brian Miller and his crew for giving me the chance to hang out and learn from their awesome Nickelodeon-esque operation, and to be involved making a difference in kids' lives. Miranda is leading worship at Upstreet (and is singing there every Sunday this month) and we couldn't be more excited!

So there is the full report for right now and what we're up to. Theoretically, I could really afford to chop this up into various blog entries, but since it's been so long, I thought it'd be worth dumping it all down and starting fresh. Thanks for stopping by and tracking with me on this random journey of work, life, videos, green screens, and craziness. Happy March! :)

video: "next" bumper

Here's a quick series bumper I put together last week for the Middle School & High School ministries at Southside Church, the NP partner in Peachtree City. Integrates some mixed shots with a couple of green screen elements using Jeremy, their middle school director. The basic concept presented to me originally was to muster together footage of people saying "Next" in various circumstances and edit together a montage. Rather than turning to stock footage or taking the time to secure actors & locations (time & budget were very limited), Greg (high school director) and I plopped Jeremy in front of a green screen and had him improv some characters that we could build around. We also shuffled him around the school that Southside meets in and had him shout out the word in various situations. The piece came out fun & energetic (with music from PremiumBeat.com), and is not, in itself, high on concept or depth. Not that it needs to be. For its goal, and to add a little much-needed pizzazz to a youth teaching series that wouldn't have otherwise had the advantage of media/branding, we tried to give it a cool, fast-paced vibe that the middle school & high school students would enjoy and that would entice their attention. Thanks to Greg for hooking me up with the work. Always a pleasure to hang with the Southside crew!

video: high tech ministries

This is a video that I shot & edited this past week for a company called High Tech Ministries, a non-profit Christian organization with around 3000 constituents that holds an annual prayer breakfast and weekly bible studies for technology professionals here in the greater Atlanta area. It is a very structured, interview-heavy video that leans toward a much more "corporate" style than I am used to, but the goal was for it to be appropriate for the business audience that will be viewing it, and High Tech ended up feeling like we achieved that. On my end, it involved trucking it over to 9 interviews and setting up/breaking down my 4-pt Lowell kit, DVX, mics, etc, all 9 times in 9 different locations around Atlanta. Needless to say, I burned up a lot of gas last week. The guys I interviewed all made up for the craziness though, and I had a blast getting to know each of them and hear their stories.

The editing was pretty straightforward and simple--the interviews were all one-shot deals (I wish I could have brought along a second camera for some kinetic B-roll, but that wasn't a possibility); all of the pictures are from High Tech's website (as is the logo), the music is royalty-free from PremiumBeat.com (I LOVE working with those guys!), and the motion graphics are all elements I scavanged together from DigitalJuice jumpbacks & motion elements. One of the things that bothers me most about this piece as an editor is that it is so left-heavy; I shot an odd number of interviews but I tried to balance the piece by shooting as evenly as I could--5 on the left and 4 on the right. In editing, some adjustments had to be made to keep the mission on point, and we ended up not using one of my righties--so alas, I was left with 5 interviews on the left and 3 on the right...hence, the "left-heavy"-ness of the piece. Of course, most people never notice this type of thing (or ever will), but it had my visual sensibilities raging for more balance. Oh well--the story hedges through properly and I suppose that is all that matters in the long run with a piece of this nature.

Big thanks to Michael Johnston for hooking me up, Matt Stevens and the whole crew over at High Tech for the welcoming arms, and all the guys we interviewed for their openness and willingness to let me set up a light kit in their office (special huge thanks to Giff, who is not in the video, for braving the cold outdoors for his interview!). The final result is not the most "artsy" or "poppy" piece I've ever done, but hopefully it accomplishes the goal of seeing more business people touched by a Christian organization that is designed just for them. Matt and Charlie are doing a great thing for the business/tech community in Atlanta, and it was a pleasure to contribute to their vision. If you're in the technology community in Atlanta and are looking for some quality fellowship & relationship-building, head on over to High Tech Ministries and check out what they have to offer.

compassion bloggers

I'd be remiss if I didn't post about this. If you're not already aware, there is an incredible group of bloggers (many of whose blogs I read on a daily basis) who are using their influence on the web to bring awareness to the widespread physical and spiritual poverty that so often slips under our cultural radar. They've gathered together under the umbrella of Compassion International, which flew them out to Uganda last week for an 8-day blog-a-thon. They're posting pictures, videos, stories, and insights, all in the name of bringing awareness to the internet-savvy masses who read their blogs--each post another compelling reason to sponsor a child on the other side of the world.

Miranda and I sponsor a girl named Mariam in Uganda through World Vision, another Christian organization dedicated to tackling the poverty epidemic. Many of the bloggers are getting the chance to meet the children they sponsor--a fantasy that has eluded us so far, the emotional implications of which I can scarcely imagine. If you're not already sponsoring a child, consider what $30/month means to you (an internet bill, or a coffee habit)--it could make the difference of life or death for someone halfway across the planet. Head on over to the blogs to hear some of these stories yourself; it's worth the few minutes of your time to see what God is doing in the hearts of so many Christian leaders. Huge props to Compassion International for recognizing and harnessing the power of the "blog-o-sphere" as a ministry to an Internet-savvy generation. This is one of the most innovative and cutting edge projects I have seen in a long time. Check it out.