I have just completed a “company bio” for Jvillage Network in which a few of the key players talk about the challenges facing Jewish organizations as they try to engage their member base. Founder Yoram Samets, Jena Strong, and Mark Yaschik each give a unique perspective on what Jewish organizations need to engage their constituents in this age.
I shot this piece on a Sony Z5U in HD and two-point lighting with Lowell 750W Tota lights. I softened the lights with directional umbrellas. Sound was achieved with Sennheiser Evolution ew100 G3 wireless lav mics. Aside from a loud soda machine in the room I was pleased with sound coverage in the otherwise echo-prone room.
I continue to produce these short How-To Training videos for the Jvillage Network CMS (content management system), a web / membership engagement company that helps Jewish organizations. I used a screen – capture / voice-over tool called Camtasia and have been pleased with the results.
Excerpts from the June 20th, 2010 performance. Credits below.
When it comes to opera appreciation, I’m among the under-educated. However, the performance of Lucia di Lammermoor put on by the 2010 Green Mountain Opera Festival at the Barre Opera House on June 20th impressed me. While I may not understand the language of opera (Italian in this case), I found there were enough other elements to convey the story. Sure, there were supertitles (projected above the stage in English), but since I was videotaping the performance, I focused on the nuanced performances of the artists, the music, lighting, and set design. Perhaps it was the Scottish setting of Lucia di Lammermoor that had me intrigued. Really, it was the top-flight talent I witnessed on stage.
Rather than review the show here, I’d like to document the particular challenges of shooting opera. As I attended the dress rehearsal of Lucia, I recognized that the festival’s artistic director, Taras Kulish, had clearly assembled many talented individuals for the performance. With the available resources, I then set out to record an archive of the show that would do it justice.
For sound I consulted Jeff Cooper of CooperAV. He rented me a nice stereo pair of Nakamichi CP4 shotgun mics, which yielded very pleasant results. I flew them up about 8ft on a stand in the back of the house and directed them each just off center stage. I was concerned about bounce-back from the overhanging balcony, but at “Coop’s” suggestion I kept the mics 18 inches away from the ceiling. In the end, the acoustics of the Barre Opera House played a big role in the sound quality. Aside from a few bits of external traffic noise, the space was good for sound recording.
From the video highlight reel above, you can see I ran two cameras. The wide shot was a locked down Sony Z1U rented from Arnie Wetherhead of Wetherhead Productions. The principal camera was my Sony Z5U on a Miller Solo DV10. Both HDV cameras matched very well in post, as they required no color grading. The dramatic, beautiful theater lighting made for great images, but the low light in a few scenes prevented me from zooming in too much. The Z5U loses a few Fstops of light as I zoom, so I had to carefully watch those changes. Everything was shot manually, including the iris, zoom and focus, which each have a lens ring control on the Z5U (love that).
Garnett Bruce - Director
Leonardo Vordoni – Conductor
Adam Caughey (RA) – Normanno
Cameron Schutza (RA) – Arturo
Scott Ramsay – Edgardo
Gus Andreassen – Raimondo
Jordan Shanahan – Enrico
Nikki Einfeld – Lucia
Samantha Grenell-Zaidman – Alisa
Erik Kroncke – Raimondo cover
Michael Hamilton – chorus
Gary Eckhart - Set Designer
Jeff Bruckerhoff - Lighting Designer
Donna Sharpe - Stage Manager
Jennifer Williams – Asst Director
Ann McCosker - Costumes coordinator
Normand Couvrette – Wigs
Sondra Nottingham – Makeup
Tim Tavcar – Chorus Master
David Tinervia – Production Assistant
Kim Hopper - Volunteer Costumes Help
Renee Epstein
Chorus members:
Andrea Bangemann-Johnson
Dana Dean
Ann Fitch
Deborah Fontes
Federicka Velutini- Hoffman
Stefanie Weigand
Chloe Fairbanks
Dawn Fairbanks
Carol Kendrick
Felicity Swayze
Robert S. Emmons
William Pelton
Marvin Rogers
Peter DeFausse
Rick Rayfield
Jose Schmidt
Sandy Stephen
After several months of adjusting to fatherhood (and believe me I still am), I accepted a job to shoot and edit a promo for a new Gardener’s Supply Company product called MyGreens Light Garden. It was a great experience and the perfect shoot to get my feet wet again after more focused attention on my new daughter.
The idea was to create a 3 minute web promo that demonstrates how easy the product is to use. Fortunately, we had a great team to pull this off in a day. The Gardener’s Supply staff, led by Susan Romanoff, chose a good location at a model home in South Burlington. Susan, Lizzy, Ryan, Kate and others dressed the set quite nicely, transforming the otherwise fine kitchen into something a bit more lived in and welcoming. We were fortunate to have Fran Stoddard as the producer and talent, as she’s always a team player and understands both sides of the camera. Assisting me directly was Peregrine Productions‘ Vince Franke, who served as my Grip and Gaffer. His lighting suggestions saved the day at a few key points.
Though I’m woefully short on production stills, I can at least describe the gear we had in tow. I was quite psyched to have along my new Sony Z5U HDV Camera, which shoots a beautiful 1080i image and a stock 20X G lens with decent depth of field.
We laid 10 ft PVC pipe and a door dolly made by James Valastro Productions. The dolly performed well and gave us just enough movement to walk with Fran and engage the viewer. Mounted to the dolly platform was simple 16:9 LCD monitor for the client and dolly grip (Vince). It did the trick though I didn’t have an HDMI cable with me to view HD through it. Since the Z5U has HDMI output, I’ll be sure to bring that along next time. Fortunately, the Z5U has a super high rez on-board LCD monitor for sharp focus.
Sound was achieved with a wired Milli Mic, which saved us after our Evolution series Sennheisser picked up significant interference in all frequencies that we tried. It could be that WCAX-TV3 is nearby and caused the disturbance. At any rate, hard-wired was the way to go and Fran adjusted to some restricted movements.
Finally, the lighting was a mix of 420 and 220 Peppers with diffusion. But the hero light was a large array of diffused outdoor spot-fluorescent lights that covered a wide area of the kitchen. Balancing the light was a little tricky with daylight flooding in a bay window off camera, however the final image looked great. I did hardly any color grading in post, so we must have done something right. Vince noticed the product itself was throwing off unbalanced light on the “Greens” themselves, so he covered the bulb (which was hidden in most shots) with some 1/2 orange gel.
Overall, I was quite pleased and thank everyone involved for a solid showing.
Though long overdue, I’ve decided to post this video I completed back in June for The Stowe Inn. It was part of an advertising project initiated through a partnership with the online edition of The Stowe Reporter. They hired me to create a long and short format web ad for The Stowe Inn as a courtesy for all the advertisements that the inn has bought through the newspaper. The longer format (3 min) version is posted here.
My enjoyable task was to interview the owner Jed Lipsky, who was very accommodating. He gave me the full run of the building and grounds to capture the best of the Inn during a single day. The approach was to cover the architecture and charm of the place without the activity of people, though I’d have preferred a packed bar and dining room during that scene. It was a weekday lull during shooting, so I capitalized on the quiet simplicity, which will likely appeal to certain travelers. Jed says it best in the video when he talks about the authenticity of small town life in Stowe. If you’re looking for a slice of Vermont history along with your comfortable foliage season weekend up north, this little inn is quite the gem.
My gear was fairly minimal and included a Sony PD170, Sennheiser Wireless EW 100ENG G2 mic system, and Chimera softbox.
I was recently hired by the National Gardening Association to shoot, direct, and edit 2 more how-to videos in a series I started with them last summer. It’s been a thoroughly enjoyable process, especially as I’ve had the opportunity to work with gardening expert Charlie Nardozzi (guy who looks like a gardener in these production stills) who serves as the series writer and host. Charlie has the right blend of professionalism and humor with an ability to ad-lib the right content for the moment.
For lighting and grip work, I hired James Valastro, a production veteran with a keen eye for image and story. While I shot these latest two videos, I relied on James for extra punch on lighting Charlie, operating his home-made door dolly on 10ft PVC pipes, and providing a critical eye in our Sony CRT monitor. I could not have gotten the solid image results I got without James’ key assistance.
The camera I used was a Sony FX1 HDV. Despite some of the limitations of this camera (no XLR inputs! Had to use a Beachtek Dual XLR to mini adaptor) and shooting and editing on HDV (compressed files are still cumbersome), I like the image out of this rig. It was the same one I used on the Edmunds Middle School Career Carnival.
For audio we used a Sennheiser Evolution G2 100 Series – Camera Mountable UHF Lavalier Wireless System on the talent. We got clean sound except for a few spots in the greenhouse during Vegetable Seed Starting – after reshooting a few takes the radio frequency seemed to settle down. Had the budget allowed for a dedicated sound person, it would’ve been a bonus. I was just lucky to have James as an extra set of ears and eyes.
With these latest 2 in the series on their website, the National Gardening Association has requested a couple more and I hope to be shooting in early August. At the current time, the client is requesting that I don’t post these videos on my site. However, if you want to see Starting a Vegetable Garden (which are the production stills you see) and the other latest, Vegetable Seed Starting VIEW them at Garden.org.
I was asked by the good folks at The Stowe Reporter to edit a short slideshow using images they’ve compiled over 50 years of covering the news in Stowe, Vermont. Special thanks to Maria Archangelo and Marina Knight for choosing the best images.
This piece was commissioned by the Burlington School District in Vermont and highlights the intention and experiences of a new kind of career fair for students at Edmunds Middle School. I had a lot of fun collaborating with their students, teachers, Principal Bonnie Johnson-Aten, Superintendent Jeanne Collins, and Community Outreach Coordinator, Dov Stucker. Dov’s music is featured in the program as well.
I edited this trailer for a short documentary shot between 2000 – 2003. It was the most involved project I’ve ever worked on and the kind I’d like to do again if the budget allows. I mostly did this pro bono, though the good folks at The Richmond Land Trust did contribute what they could, considering that most funds were tied up in restoring the barn. You can see this barn off the north side of Interstate 89 between Richmond and Bolton, VT. Eventually, I’ll put the full version online, but at 14 minutes it could be cumbersome for consistent playback.
Shot, Written, and Edited by Adam Walker
Photos by Lou Borie
Narrated by Caro Thompson (full documentary version)
Music by Smokin’ Grass
