I shot a handful of interviews with the LA performers for this years “New Years Rockin’ Eve” with Dick Clark and Ryan Seacrest. Check out this promo and be sure to tune in to ABC on new years for the festivities and live performances!
American Music Awards 2011
December 26th, 2011 by Jeff No comments »Here are the pieces that I shot for the 2011 American Music Awards Red Carpet Webcast. I was director of photography and one of two camera operators for these segments, and was an Associate Producer for the production and during the live broadcast.
The Meth Project, with Darren Aronofsky
November 12th, 2011 by Jeff No comments »Some frightening and fairly effective imagery in these anti-meth advertisements, done by The Meth Project and Director Darren Aranofsky.
And if these didn’t creep you out enough, you can check out a bunch more anti-meth ads on their official site.
http://www.methproject.org/ads/tv/
Time to Tweak
October 23rd, 2011 by Jeff No comments »
Sports talk. There are very few sports that I follow, but I’ve been attending Columbus Blue Jackets games since they joined the NHL in 2001. They are one of the few teams that I actually follow game to game, and this year they’re killing me.
0-7-1.
Something needs to be tweaked. Major changes aren’t going to help. They have a good team, a good fan base, and a great arena. But something is off.
My thought? The mentality in the locker room needs a change. When the jackets walk to the ice, they pass graphics and billboards of “Hardcore Hockey”. What is that doing for anyone? Do the players even notice those words anymore?
Almost all college football teams have a motivational something, be it a statue like the Georgia Bulldogs, the Clemson Tigers touching Howard’s Rock, or the alumni banner the Michigan Wolverines jump to before every game. Some people say it’s superstitious, but it’s that little “piece of flare” that gives the team a kick right before the game starts.
Clemson players touch Howard's Rock before a game. During the 1960's, clemson coach Frank Howard placed the rock at the entrance of the stadium and the team won the game. So from then on he told the team to give 110% "or keep your filthy hands" off of his rock.
So what is “Hardcore Hockey” doing for the Blue Jackets? I’m not in the locker room so I can’t talk for the team, but that saying doesn’t seem too motivational for me. What will it take to motivate this team before they step on the ice? It’s an open question, I really don’t know. Get a badass cannon for them to tap on the way down to the ice?
The Jackets need a spark. Now what’s it gonna be…
A Legend in the iClouds
October 6th, 2011 by Jeff No comments »
This image was designed by a 19 Year Old from Hong Kong. http://jmak.tumblr.com/post/9377189056
Steve Jobs, co-founder of Apple Computers, passed away last night. His work and the products his company produced has changed the way we view technology, and have been a major part of my life and career. I have had Apple computers in my life as long as I can remember, stemming from the Macintosh Plus (which is still functioning, but used as a large clock). I excitedly purchased the first ever iPod, with a physically rotating wheel. I believe I still have that as well, and it still functions.
If it wasn’t for Apple and iMovie, I would not be in the career field I am in today. Making dumb videos with my friends in middle and high school forced me to learn the program, to manipulate it to do what I wanted, and learn new ways to edit video. I learned Final Cut Pro in high school, and have used it regularly through high school, college, and into my professional career.
Apple is not dead. I understand that. They will continue to change our lives through technology and computing, and I want to pay my respects to the king of the PC. Mr. Jobs, you will be missed.
Below are the apple products that myself or my family have owned. I have never owned anything but apple computers. We could play the software game too, but I think this is enough.
Masterful Mob Marketing
September 22nd, 2011 by Jeff No comments »HBO’s Boardwalk Empire is doing some crazy marketing in the NY area for their new season. As a quick catchup, Boardwalk Empire is about the mob in prohibition-era Atlantic City.
First I heard that all tolls in Atlantic City are being covered this weekend, “Courtesy of Nucky Thompson”. Nucky being the mob boss portrayed in the show by Steve Buscemi.
Then I found the piece de resistance, courtesy of my friend BK.
HBO is running a prohibition-era train on the 2/3 track in Manhattan on the weekends in September.
“The subway will run between 42nd Street and 96th streets, making express stops in between. It’s interiors will be adorned with images of Nucky Thompson, the corrupt political boss at the center of Boardwalk Empire who stays in power by dispensing both fear and favors.”
Chances are I’ll be running around the west side this weekend, trying to catch this train. Oh, and there will also be people giving out free Metro cards, again, Courtesy of Nucky.
Read More: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/09/01/emboardwalk-empireem-brin_n_945691.html
Vimeo: The Music Store
September 22nd, 2011 by Jeff No comments »Vimeo just added an awesome little feature. The Music Store.
A built-in stock music site seems like a really smart move for Vimeo.
Vimeo tends to lend itself to the creatives in online video producers. Think of it like this. Youtube is like a large wall in the city. There’s a ton of shit graffiti tags, undecipherable black squiggles layered all over each other. And any cool, creative artwork turns out to be part of a poster for a new acne cream. Vimeo is that little door off to the side of that wall, that opens into a cool little art gallery. Incredible creativity that doesn’t get nearly the respect it deserves.
The addition of this music store is a great step into teaching inexperienced media producers how to do it legally. For a couple bucks, you can license a song to use in your web video. If it’s a commercial video? That’ll be 100. And you can move on from there. Youtube restricts, removes, and limits viewership on thousands of videos every day (probably way more than that) because of unlicensed music being used in videos. Vimeo teaches you to legally license it so they don’t have to take it down. Bravo Vimeo.
So browse around, search by genre, find the right song for your video. Pay a couple bucks, and LEGALLY post up your video for the world to see!
http://vimeo.com/musicstore
Production: Miss Universe 2011
September 7th, 2011 by Jeff No comments »For this show I was acting as a field camera operator for the NBC side of the show. I went to a whole bunch of events with the contestants and interviewed about half of them. Here is a video, produced by Jenn from the web team, about the massive crew that it takes to make the Miss Universe show a success.
We’ve been in Brazil for three weeks, and I am starting to really enjoy this city. Really cool places, great people, and great nightlife.
This is the other video that I produced for the web, as an intro to the web videos.
There are still a few more days to vote a contestant into the semifinals! So go to http://missuniverse.com/members/contestants and vote! Ten votes per day, so rank a few different girls.
The Devil’s Disaster
August 3rd, 2011 by Jeff No comments »A few months back I wrote a little piece about “The Devil’s Double” after seeing the trailer. I even titled it “Scarface in the Sand”. With a story about a modern-day gangster with all the wealth and women he wants, a kick-ass movie poster and a heart-pumping trailer, how could they go wrong?
I would compare The Devil’s Double to Public Enemies in the way that I was disappointed. The trailer was great, the story had so much potential, but they tried to hollywood-ify it with a romantic side-plot that didn’t work at all. You know it’s not looking good when people in the theater start to laugh at serious moments.
I really think that the love story was the main issue. The rest of the movie was a bit slow and the scenes jumped quite a bit. I feel like they could chop a half hour out of this movie and make it quite a bit better. I did stay through the entire movie, but it was a struggle. Learned a little lesson from this…
No matter what kind of movie you make, hire the best trailer editor you can.
Life In A Day
August 3rd, 2011 by Jeff No comments »
Life In A Day is a documentary by producer Ridley Scott and director Kevin Macdonald. Teaming up with Youtube, they asked the people of the world to film something during their day, answer three questions (what you love, what you fear, and what’s in your pockets?), and send them their video. People from over 140 countries went out on July 24, 2010 and filmed. They then returned, and sent in more than 80,000 clips totaling around 4,500 HOURS of footage. The 2010 Miss Teen USA® show was on that day, and we submitted footage of Kamie winning and answering the questions. Unfortunately our footage didn’t make the final cut.
Let’s give the first round of applause to the editing and research teams that went through that 4,500 hours of footage. I wouldn’t have been able to do it. And especially because most of this footage is from the average joe with his flip video camera. I can reasonably guess that a large portion of the footage they recieved is something like the following.
- Left camera recording, filming floor, feet, or inside of pocket.
- Flowers
- Pets
- People filming themselves talking
But they found some diamond needles in that massive haystack of footage.
The film’s storyline is the course of the day. Sun rising, people waking and going through their day. Several characters pop up repeatedly throughout the film, but it is very much a large montage of life across the globe. Some incredible, funny, horrifying, and interesting moments were captured for this project and it was these moments that brought life to the film.
The beauty of the film is also pretty incredible. I’m sure a handful of amateur and professional filmmakers submitted content to the film, but I’m giving the points to todays consumer technology. The availability of inexpensive, high-quality, high-impact cameras is remarkable, with cameras like Flip, GoPro and others making cheap cameras that record full 1080p video. Yes, there is a visual difference between the GoPro and say a 5D, but if you put the cheap consumer cameras in beautiful conditions you’re going to come back with something pretty.
Life In A Day is still in select theaters, and I’d expect it to hit Netflix soon. Definitely worth checking out if you see it at a theater near you.
