Hoping and Waiting

So I took the phone survey last weekend and now I'm just waiting to hear back. The survey itself was kinda weird. It asked a lot of crazy questions and I was told (by both Chucko and Annie) to answer all questions like a boss would like you to answer them. Now that I've taken the survey and am waiting to hear back I'm starting to overanalyze things. I can't help but wonder if I answered everything right or if I just messed up something dumb. 

My other concern is when and if I should contact Annie to check in. I've asked a couple people what they thought and they've all told me to do it. I guess I'm just confused as to where the draw the line between being persistent and being annoying. But I've also heard of people getting the job because they were so annoying the powers that be just got sick of hearing from them. So I think I might wait until next week to contact Annie. It'll have been a week by then and I think that's a reasonable amount of time in between. I'm still hopeful that this will work out but if they don't there's another avenue with the Indians that I'm looking into for this season. 

Possible Internship?!?!

So far 2009 has been much better than I imagined it would be. I got a raise and more hours from American Eagle and thanks to my very good friend, Chris Norris, I got a call back about a video internship with the Cleveland Indians!! :) This is the same internship Chris had a couple summers ago and he loved it. In talking to him one day he gave me his boss, Annie Merovich's,  contact information and on a whim I sent her an email asking if she was looking for any interns for the upcoming season. She said she was, explained a little bit more of what the internship offered and asked for my resume; after sending her my resume I hadn't heard anything for a couple weeks so I decided to send another email just checking to make sure she had received my resume. She said she had and would begin calling in the next couple days. Today Annie called and asked me a couple questions and then said she would send me out some paperwork and a phone number that I need to call to complete an "attitude survey". If everything matches up and looks good I'll get another phone call to go forward with the next step!! So now it's back to the waiting game, but I'm extremely optimistic about this opportunity. Chris learned a lot from this internship and I'm really hoping to do the same. So...keep your fingers crossed!!! : )

The Finished Project

It's been awhile since I've updated this here blog, so I figured it's about time. My project for the New Wilmington Chamber of Commerce has been done and online for about 3 months. I don't think the link is on the website yet, but the chamber loved it! I got some flattering compliments from all the business owners I worked with which really helped boost my confidence. It was a lot of work, but I think the finished product was all worth it. So...without further adieu, here is my final project in all its glory. I present to you: "New Wilmington: A Great Place to Live and Visit". I hope you like it! :)

Yet Another Roadblock...

So this project, which was supposed to be completed by now, is put off until September. At my rough cut meeting with Mr. McKinley, which went fantastically, we realized we had goofed on the dates of the presentation. The Chamber's July meeting was scheduled for the 18th and we thought it was the 25th. We thought an easy fix for this would be to just reschedule the presentation for the August meeting, but my professor can't make that meeting as he will be on vacation with his family. So now it looks like I will have to wait until September to present this video. I'm still waiting to hear back from Mr. McKinley as to whether or not that will work.

Until then, I'm still making corrections based on the rough cut meeting I had with Mr. McKinley July 16th. He liked the video so far, but did make some very good suggestions about more video, different audio effects, and adding some sports that I had in the first draft. Although the date for the presentation is being moved I'm hoping to have everything complete within the next couple weeks. I want to have it all finished and "forget about it" until the actual presentation gets closer. 

Something I'm also looking into as another way to post this video is with something called a "YouTube Channel." Not really quite sure how it works or what it does, but a friend of mine, Chris Norris, is using this to promote the Mahoning Valley Scrappers, the team he's working for. I need to look more into it, but this is something Mr. Weaver had suggested and it sounds like it might be another great way to bring more attention to the New Wilmington area. 

Now comes the real challenge...

Out of all the aspects of putting together a video, I would have to say editing is my favorite and my least favorite part, all at the same time. I love putting sequences together and I could spend hours making sure everything flows well, but at the same time it can be such a tedious task it drives me crazy. This is monster I've dealt with the last couple weeks. 

It's bad enough trying to put this thing together, but having to learn a new editing system has brought a new challenge in itself. Although Final Cut isn't that much different than Adobe Premier, there are a few differences, mostly in the shortcut keys, that makes the process take a little longer. Now that I've got the basics down, I can really start to play around with all the different features Final Cut has to offer. Again, most of it is the same as Premier, but there are some differences; that's what makes this project fun. I love seeing what I can do with the film in the editing stage of the process. The most difficult thing for me to figure out was how to get the text in there; that was a good hour long process.

The thing people don't realize about projects like this, is the time it takes to edit everything down. The final product may only be 3 minutes long, but it may have taken 3 weeks to get it to that point. I have a really hard time, and always have, trying to cut stuff out. That was my least favorite part about putting together news stories. With this project, I essentially have the freedom to make it as long as I want. But I can't make it too long or people will lose interest. I heard somewhere that 2-3 minutes is the average length of a promo video, because any longer and people will lose interest, but any shorter and they won't get the point. 

I'm at a point now where I'm just tweaking some stuff and making sure everything flows. I meet with my client next week and I'm a little nervous. He's been extremely helpful in this whole process and I'm sure he will have excellent suggestions for the final product. The rough draft will be up sometime next week...

Filming Day One

So I finally went out to shoot some stuff this week. I had two consecutive days off so I figured that would be the perfect time to go up and get stuff on film since I didn't have any time to do it the last time I was up that way. Well, I didn't make it up to New Wilmington Wednesday, but I did go up Thursday. I was really worried about getting everything done because I got up there later than I wanted to, but I got quite a bit accomplished before it started STORMING! There are still a few more shots I need to get, but the weather is an uncontrollable factor in this whole process. I'll have to get back up there probably this coming week (although it's a holiday weekend) to get the rest of what I need. I was able to get a really cute shot of one of the people working at Mugsies. I think it really displays the quality of service you can only find in a small town coffee shop. I did fill out release forms for the person appearing as well as the location. 

I was curious about something though. Let's say I wanted to get a MS of a business sign, do I need a location release form? Or is it clear because it's outside? I was wondering about that. When I go back to get some more shots, I think I'm going to just have release forms filled out anyway just to be on the safe side. 

I was looking over my shot list as I was out shooting and had some second guesses about some shots. I'm not sure about the whole fireworks thing. First of all, I won't be able to make it up there for the fireworks so that creates the whole issue of having to credit someone else for shooting stuff for me. Secondly, fireworks are really hard to capture! I can try to capture some from home, but that would be cheating since they're not New Wilmington's. I think it would be a really cool shot, but since I live so far away it's not really plausible. I think I'll have plenty of video and I won't really need it.

Shot List

So to try to help myself be a little more organized, I have created a shot list to follow. When I'm out in the field trying to get stuff filmed (which I'm going to do Wednesday) I'll know what I've got and what I still need to go get. This is something I didn't have the last time and I think it really hurt me. I'm a little scatter-brained, so this shot list will keep me on track. Here are the things that I would like to put in the video. I have gone over this shot list with my client and he added a few things. There may be more shots to be added, but for right now this is what I have.

• Pizza Joe's
• Short Stop Inn
• Mugsie's
• Jimmy's
• amish buggy (with the nat sound of the horse's hooves)
• HS/College sports
• house with people waving and smiling
• WC Old Main bell tower (with the bells ringing...nat sound is crucial)
• horses
• golf course/driving range (possibly)
• Silk Road
• business logos
• covered bridges
• stream in Volant (with the nat sound and hopefully some people fishing)
• churches
• 4th july fireworks
• captions from Pittsburgh Magazine

This is what I'm going to film with Wednesday, more stuff may show up as I'm filming, who knows, but this is a good start.