Final Bumper

Making of Featurette

Week 2: Water

We are starting a summer series in May that will last 10 weeks on Mount Sinai. We are going to remake all of the scenes using stop motion animation. We started with some sketches of all the characters and the mountain and then created the collage with different fabrics. This has been the biggest team project we’ve done. Every single member of our creative team has touched this project. It has been really neat to see how well we really do work together. We have a ton left to do but we are definitely getting into a rhythm.

We’re doing a series on the Holy Spirit next week. The over arching metaphor is the idea of steroids. When people see what followers of Christ can accomplish your first thoughts would be they’ve received some supplemental help. It’s a three week series and I jammed this out in after effects. Once again I benefit from strong art. I make things spin and flip and everyone is happy.

The approach was to focus on the topics and not so much on the title of the series. So we made up a specific graphic for each week and went with a gatorade style type treatment. We then went with just the J and placed our tongue in our cheek and placed an asterisk next to the J.

A little promo piece we threw together in a week. We are going to refine it in the next week or two. This was used as an invite to people who do not normally attend our church. We tried a new approach. We thought about showing our strengths and what makes us distinctive and we kept coming back to our message.

We have wonderful weekend services, but really we aren’t doing anything that would wow you or would look different than anything you’ve seen or experienced, so there is no need to show a bunch of service clips. We thought we would try to hook people on the vision and placing us in the broader context of what people are thinking about and are desiring from an encounter with God.

Have I told you that I went to Israel last month? Yeah I did, it was great. There is a ton of footage and we probably won’t get to much editing until after the New Year. I strung together some b-roll that I shot from Jerusalem. It’s raw but it looks great. I didn’t mess with it. This is raw video off of our Panasonic HVX-200. After looking through a viewfinder for a week you forget how good these cameras are. I swear it looks better through this camera than it did in person. But maybe I was too busy and was always looking through the viewfinder. Anyways, here is my compilation of clips. There is no sound. You’ll have to put on some of your Matisyahu music in the background for flavor.

Dave Griffin has extended his entourage to include Dave Mudd. Dave is one of our newest youth leaders. The dynamic between him and Dave Griffin is great. This was one of our first team teaches we did with them. We had fun with this idea of an entourage, having the youth campus pastors being an entourage and sharing their stories.

This video is part one of a project I am working on with the good folks over at GFR. They have a great ministry. They take the whole micro finance idea to a new level. You commit to a family to help them start their business with a sustainable self sufficient model in 3 years. You are encouraged to go visit the family you are partnering with. They also have a neat way for you to buy small things that help people get out of their situation. You can buy a goat or cow to help them get off the ground and started in their plan. You can finance the beginning of their business. All of this then helps redeem the people, nation and world. You can transform the world one family at a time.

The next part of the project will show people who have gone. What a neat way to support these people. I think once you have connected with them face to face it takes away any “hand out” feel to it. It makes it a true partnership. I’m excited about the good things they are doing.

Lot’s of drama getting this photo done. It actually was raining and early September in a driveway where the Jeep was shot. Originally a Diners, Drive-ins, and Dives red convertible was necessary, but we modernized to the jeep wrangler.

So what do we do for a bumper? After scouring through every second of stock video out there, we gave up. Seriously Amy and I were furious, and we were exhausted from the production of the curriculum and now we needed 4 people in a jeep in a fall setting. Or do we? Finally we got out of the box all together and focused on an aspect of the ride. Touch up the footage so it looks “fall-y,” added the key scripture of the series and some music.

I think the simplicity of the image and the tempo of the music convey the peace that lasting joy is based on. We will be pushing people to memorize the scripture as well, so reinforcing the scripture helps too. I keep watching this and it keeps making me happy. Not a whole lot of this project has made me smile with the craziness of deadlines, but I think I am going to be proud of this once the dust settles. Lots of hurdles but our awesome team jumped over every single one.

One of my favorite things ever is leaving off the E in words to emphasize the X! How ‘in your face!’ So Xciting and Xhilarating!

Anyways, aside from my sarcasm, this will always be one of my favorite bumpers. Obviously I would do this better now than I did 3 years ago. But it helped me learn some things in after effects and has the Xcitement I was aiming for. And I found good, well, usable stock footage.

Yes that is Jeff Griffin in the last shot and graphic for the series. Him and Dave Griffin skydived for a funny opening video to the series.

New series we started this month. This is the bumper I created for it in after effects. This is one of the most successful packagings for a series that we’ve had in a long time. We handed out a playing card with the timeline in the video as a study guide. The classic images of bicycle playing cards and the four suits really adds a neat element. I feel like this bumper added excitement without hype and brought the logo and playing card to life. I’m looking forward to this series since I’ve been studying the books of Kings and Chronicles on my own for a while.