Once again privileged to create a dynamic book promotion video for Tremendous Life Books. This time author Mary Anne (Wihbey) Davis discusses her new book “The Sales Messenger.”

With Mary Anne located in Dallas, TX, a local crew did the taping and provided the video to us via ftp server. Toss in some color grading, graphics, book shots and music – voila!

We have multiple lens tubes for the source 4 ellipsoidal fixtures. This allows us to easily change the size of the beam without loosing any light output, resulting in a brighter light, with less energy consumed. Also pictured are color gels, which allow us to change to look of a light

The main camera for this shoot was a Sony EX1. This camera shoots full high definition video in a very portable form factor, allowing us to quickly change setup positions. Also pictured is the client video monitor, allowing clients to review footage as it’s being filmed.

Three source four pars shot through rosco grid cloth to soften the beams. We were fortunate enough to have a high ceiling with beams to be able to hang “theatrical style” fixtures as frontlight. We had two banks of these, one on each side of the set. Though we did face a challenge of getting a ladder on location to hang and get power to these lights.

PHFA – Counselor from Steve Kownacki, Final Focus Prod on Vimeo.

Last week we finished up a spot for PHFA. We actually shot 2 similar ads in the same location; each shot for each script was shot in an order that went something like this… Location 1, Line 1, Script 1; Location 1, Line 1, Script 2; Location 2, Line 2, Script 1; Location 2, Line 2, Script 2; and so on throughout the day. This eliminated repeated camera & lighting setups.

Keep in mind it was 27° that day at a location without electricity. What to do? Plan. We took along a super-quiet, power-filtered Honda generator to run the HMI lighting and the builder was kind enough to supply an awesome propane space heater that we ran between takes – not just to keep the donuts but to warm the air so the talent’s breath wasn’t so visible.

The Bowman Agency assisted in casting James Thompson. Thanks to McNaughton Homes for the location.

Final Focus Productions Fall 2010 from Steve Kownacki, Final Focus Prod on Vimeo.

We had a smidgen of time recently so we re-worked the showreel to include a couple new shots and a new piece of music. If you look at our prior demos, many of the same shots were used but with a different style of music, changes the whole impression of the shot.

Anywho, you can see just what greenscreening is all about.

Price Of Leadership from Steve Kownacki, Final Focus Prod on Vimeo.

Another great offering from Tremendous Life Books. In between the big projects that take weeks or months to complete, we can sneak in little gems like this that we shoot in 2 hours, 4 hours of editing and it’s on the web. Tracey was taped with a JVC HM-700, the book shots with a Canon 7D DSLR and the photos were scanned. The brochure opening up was a scan animated in After Effects.

12 Paradoxes of the Bible from Steve Kownacki, Final Focus Prod on Vimeo.

We were recently presented with a shaky video clip and a book and requested to create an online video for Tremendous Life Books. So we grabbed the DSLR and shot the book, added a few graphics and my editor and I supplied some VO. A few hours later… voilá!

The first step was to process the video to remove the shake; then clean up the audio as best we could; setup the book with some nifty lighting and get product shots; shoot Steve (hey! just get that thought out of your head.)… shoot Steve thumbing through the book; record Steve & Ryan reading the book quotes to break it up a bit; create some graphics and put it all together.  All together a little over 4 hours of work with proper planning.  Can’t stress enough about planning.

Aligning Forces for Quality from Steve Kownacki, Final Focus Prod on Vimeo.

We were fortunate to work with our pals at Suasion to create a video for Aligning Forces for Quality. They are a York county, PA-based group community leaders, consumers, physicians, nurses, employers and insurers who have come together to help improve health care quality in the community.

The video is a series of greenscreen interviews shot over 2 days in a conference room. Working from an outline that provided the direction of the video, Producer Megan asked the questions to elicit meaningful responses that could be whittled down from 4 hours to, yep, 11 minutes. Adding a bit of motion to the graphics, some cover shots, news footage and photographs, a pretty dynamic and informative video was developed. This video replaced a panel of individuals at a conference greatly reducing time on the agenda. Everything was shot HD, but final output was SD 4×3 for projection at the venue.

Thanks to my editor Ryan Mast for pulling out some quick tricks to liven things up.

Leaders Without Borders – Logo’d by FFP from Steve Kownacki, Final Focus Prod on Vimeo.

While a good percentage of our biz is full-scale production, we do a huge amount of re-purposing, modifying and otherwise manipulating video we obtain the rights to. (We’re an ethical bunch ’round here and don’t step on the toes of copyright holders.)

Anyway, Tracy from Tremendous Life Books (formerly know as Executive Books), GREAT source of quality motivational and leadership books BTW, called and had a video provided by the author that she had permission to post to TLB’s YouTube account – an FLV. We’ve got lots of nifty util software around to re-encode to an editable format, add the graphic here & there in a “like-it-was-meant-to-be-there-in-the-first-place” look and then get it properly encoded for wherever you need it to go. All with online approvals along the way.

So check out the book, check out Tremendous Life Books and have fabo day.

Oh yeah, we can produce that kinda stuff for ya too if you don’t have it already.

United Way – “Never Turn Our Backs” from Steve Kownacki, Final Focus Prod on Vimeo.

We were approached by the United Way of the Capital Region to create a TV commercial based upon a corporate giving video that was produced by the Rite Aid Corporation video department. While the video was very well done, the visuals and dialog didn’t quite work out to pull elements & create a TV ad.

So I worked with my writer and he extracted the concept of “never turning our backs” on the community and the concept of people in the logo t-shirts and finally doing actual projection onto the shirts. Through a few revisions (5) we came up with the final script and pulled visuals from our vast United Way library – we’ve been working with them for years.

The next step was how to pull it off. I’ll get some pix on Flicker soon, but we re-configured the teleprompter mounting bracket in order to mount a video projector directly above the DSLR camera on the same tripod. With this whole contraption on a dolly, video coming from a MACbook & Final Cut, we did many, many rehearsals to work on timing.

So it came down to this much time to make :30 seconds:
2 hr initial script mtg, an hour of re-writes, 3 hours of pre-production planning, 2 1-hour site visits, 3 hours to find and edit the projected clips, 1 hour to concept and mount the projector, 4 hours of location setup, 1 hour of rehearsals, 30 minutes of actual attempted takes, 30 minutes to record additional audio, and a day of editing more or less. Oh, plus the digital upload to Comcast.

Thanks to all of our volunteers that day that put up with me saying “OK, we’re gonna do it again, but this time…” What a bunch of troopers! THANKS!

“Behind the scenes video coming soon!”

Demo Reel July 2010 from Steve Kownacki, Final Focus Prod on Vimeo.

Tidied up the demo reel a little for July and want to thank Royal Benson for providing the music “Fire Fly”, check ‘em out at www.RoyalBensonMusic.com.

This one shows more color correction capabilities and shooting styles. No, I don’t do weddings; that was a clip from a commercial touting accessibility and thus the use of the interpreter. On that note, we can also produce subtitles and closed and open captions.

When you’re ready to produce a commercial, create a corporate communication piece or simply videotape a seminar, let me know. We can help you get it on the web, DVD or even your phone. And we make a great cup of coffee!