Hillcrest Sod Farm - Crabgrass Pre-Emergent Timing

This is the first video I did for Hillcrest Sod Farm, based in Romulus, Michigan. Seen in the video is the owner of Hillcrest Sod Farm, Mike Thompson. For our first video, Mike wanted to inform the viewers of the importance of preparing your lawn for the Spring, by starting in the Fall, as well as prevention of crabgrass during the summer.



The video was shot outside of Mike's home, and we used locations in the front of his property, as well as the backyard. Surprisingly, air traffic was at a minimum and only a few times we stopped briefly because of usual residential noise.

The video was shot with a Canon T3i, and Mike was mic'd to a Zoom Recorder that he had in his back pocket. I used the internal mic on the Canon for reference, and sync'd it with the Zoom Recorder's audio in Final Cut, and removed the Canon's audio once both were sync'd. The music was from Killer Tracks, entitled "Just Blooming".

The entire video was color corrected to balance the whites, greys, and blacks, and the contrast was boosted slightly to make the colors pop a little more.

The Infatuations "Blame It On You" Music Video

I was the DP on this music video for the Detroit-based band, the Infatuations. We shot this music video in downtown Detroit back in December of 2011, with the primary location at Centaur Bar. The music video was shot all in one day, and it was definitely an achievement in so many areas.

One of the interesting scenes in the music video was the hot rod making its way through traffic to reach the bar. When we were shooting the music video, the Detroit Lions football game ended, so the streets of Detroit were very crowded. We were stopped at a crosswalk outside the Fox Theater, waiting for people to cross, when I decided to do a rack focus from the Fox Theater sign to the driver inside the car. It was a spur of the moment shot that the editor decided made the cut!

I shot the primary part of the music video with the Canon 7D. It was a fantastic camera, which provided an extreme shallow depth of field, along with a vibrant picture. My fellow camera ops used cameras that ranged from a Canon 5D to a Canon T3i. Towards the end of the music video, we had at least four cameras going when the Infatuations were playing at the bar.

The Positive Train

I did a documentary piece on the Madonna University Women's basketball as my final project for my Field Production and Editing II class, and it was the most fun I had ever had working on a project.

I knew the assistant coach personally on the team, and he was more than thrilled about me pursuing the project. He mentioned the theme of the team was the "positive train", and making a video about it could be inspirational. After the coach was on board, I knew I wanted a talented announcer to introduce the piece. I spoke with a fellow Madonna student, Kyle, and he was also happy to come on board and do the open and close for the video.



One of my early goals was to be creative with my shot selection. I wanted to use two cameras during the interview, one a safe shot and one a "risky" shot. I wanted to go outside the box and try something new. What little did I know that during the editing process I found out, I could cut between the two cameras during any "uhs" or "ums" that may be said, and it would look seamless.

The head coach of the team gave me footage of the team at various vacation spots that they went on, and I used as the closing segment in the documentary. It really gave the piece a heartfelt moment, and I loved how it turned out.

I shot the documentary with three cameras. I used a Canon 7D, Canon T3i, and a Sony AX-2000. When it came to editing, I had to do quite the data conversion between the Canons shot in H.264, while the Sony shot in AVCHD, so I had to render all my footage to Apple ProRes to make the editing a smooth process. It took some time, but it was time well-spent.

Livonia Bakery and Cafe

I directed and edited this commercial for the Livonia Bakery and Cafe. The bakery donated food to our student film shoot earlier in the season, so we gave back to them a commercial.

After an initial meeting with the client, I sat down and storyboarded a concept on how the commercial should flow. The time limit of the commercial was 30 seconds, so I wanted to convey a quick but powerful message in the time allotted.

The commercial was shot all in one day, and it was about a 5 hour shoot. It was filmed with a Canon T3i, and some of the shots were achieved with a tripod on a track. I had a great crew for the shoot, and it went extremely well. The client was very helpful, and my storyboard helped him understand the concept of the commercial and how he had to prepare for the shots I wanted.

Madonna University Broadcast and Cinema Arts 30 Second Spot

This is a commercial spot that I did for my Broadcast and Cinema Arts program at Madonna University. The commercial appeared during local telecasts of the Plymouth Whalers games.

I shot a lot of the footage in the studio of the students at work. I had them operating a camera and stage managing. With editing, it made it appear that they were working on the TV show that is displayed with the video. The TV show is Celebrate Michigan, which airs at 6:30 AM on local channel 20 in Metro Detroit.

I used footage taken during the Capstone Film Class production of "Clayman".

WATCH "MADONNA UNIVERSITY BROADCAST AND CINEMA ARTS 30 SECONDS SPOT" ON YOUTUBE

The main thing that I wanted to accomplish with this video was speed. I wanted to see the video naturally flow from one clip to another, almost like it's one big puzzle of connected pieces.

I have a minor cameo in the video around the 13 second mark as the student with the RED One camera.

The Grosse Ile Light

A documentary that I always wanted to do was to film a lighthouse. Just something about them screams "film me". So, I was fortunate enough to have the opportunity to do a historical video for my Field Production and Editing class. Knowing that I wanted to shoot a lighthouse, I Googled the nearby lighthouses where I lived. I found the closet one, so I e-mailed them and mentioned that I was a student and wanted to do a video about their lighthouse. Luckily, they replied back quickly and said yes!

I drove about 45 minutes East to the island of Grosse Ile. I met up with a couple people from the historical society who let me onto the lighthouse property and into it as well. It unfortunately rained when I was there, so I did my best to film with what I could. After I was done shooting the lighthouse, I drove around the island to shoot b-roll that I wanted to use as the introduction in the video to the city.

WATCH "THE GROSSE ILE LIGHT" ON YOUTUBE

The older gentleman in my video, William, had a lot of old photographs that he let me film, as he told the stories behind the photographs. The historical society also had their own photographs, which I also shot. I strived to do keyframing with each photograph to have that "moving image", which kept the pacing in the video.

Fun fact - the narrator in the video is me. I used Soundtrack Pro and my Lifechat headset to record my voiceover. I was surprised how well, to me at least, how my voice sounds in the video and how it just naturally fit.

The Boy Who Was Too Old To Go Trick or Treating

This is a dramatic video that I did for my Field Production and Editing class. I did a Christmas themed video before, and I wanted to do another holiday video - and Halloween was around the corner so it was a perfect fit. The idea behind the video was about a boy who wanted to go trick or treating, but he was just too old. I recruited my 13 year old brother to play the role, and he did a good job! My Dad also has a cameo as the masked parent in the last scene.

I shot the majority of the video on Halloween. I followed my brother and his friends around, and pulled my brother or his friends aside whenever I could to shoot scenes for the video. I hadn't gone trick or treating in years, so it was fun to be in the neighborhood when the kids were out.

WATCH "THE BOY WHO WAS TOO OLD TO GO TRICK OR TREATING" ON YOUTUBE

But, being that my brother was 13, he didn't like me tagging along the entire time so I went out alone and shot b-roll that I would use as cutaways and transitions in the video. I went up to some of the houses and  politely asked if I could shoot on the front lawn, and all of them were more than happy to allow me to.

I had no lighting in the video, so I had to use a flashlight in the last scene to give some light on my brother. But, I wanted to keep with the dark tones since it was Halloween.