Portfolio

Jesse Keyes Portfolio
Jesse asked me to help him with the visual design of his new portfolio. He gave me these words as direction: “rubber stamp, black and white, tag-cloud, xerox copy, typography, light, airy” I took those cues and ran with it. I handled all the graphic elements of the site and tried to create a light airy feel to the site to emphasize Jesse’s skill as a webmaster.

Ultra Kawaii
From August 2007 to August 2009, I worked as an editor and co-host on an online video network about cute pets for Next New Networks. The videos were montages of user-created animal videos. We worked extensively to create the feel for the network and add a lot of flourishes to give it a unique style. I also worked at promoting the show throughout the online “cute community.” Our content was regularly featured on our distribution sights with an average of half a million views each month.

Save the Wild U.P. Video Contest – Grand Prize Winner
In June of 2007, the organization Save the Wild UP asked for people to make a video that talked about the risk of sulfide mining in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula. I entered the contest with a video showing an extreme example of how sulfuric acid can damage materials. My video was chosen as the winner.

Cyworld Video Tools Video/Screencast
I was asked to create a “fun and personal” video that gave an overview of the video tools that were being launched on cyworld.com. I took the viewer from idea to final product with a mixture of live-action-video and screencast. The video features the whole process of filming, uploading, importing, using effects, titles and effects, and publishing. The Client was very happy with the final product, and will use it to encourage Cyworld members to use the video section of the site.

Network2 Contest – Honorable Mention
I created this video for the Network 2 “How to watch Internet TV” contest. It won an honorable mention and a cash prize. In making this video, I tried to communicate the difference between “Internet TV” and traditional TV. I chose to hilight the portability of new media. Wish a series of short scenes, I entertained and communicated this simple idea which defines Internet TV.

Channel Frederator “There’s A Better Way” Promos
I was asked to make some short promos for the Channel Frederator podcast with the goal in mind of encouraging people to share the videos on their own sites. I came up with the “There’s a Better Way to Spread the Fred” campaign which features highly innefective ways to “Spread the Fred” juxtaposed against the easy method embedding the Frederator promo on your blog. The promos air in the following episodes: 71, 72, 73, 80

H&R Block “Super Sweet Refund Contest” seed video.
H&R Block used this video to promote their video contest on Youtube as part of their marketing campaign for their new TaxCut software. It was featured on the front page of Youtube to inspire people to make their own videos for the contest. Within a week, the video had over 1.5 million views, garnered 36 “honors” including most popular video of the week, and 75th most popular comedy video of all time. It has been “favorited” by over 900 people and continues to recieve comments on a daily basis.

Wandering West Michigan
Launched in November 2006, Wandering West Michigan is semi-weekly video blog that features videos highlighting local events, businesses, people, attractions, and other things of interest that make the west side of the “Great Lakes State” unique. It has been featured in the Grand Rapids Magazine and on local ABC affiliate WZZM’s “Take 5″ Program. The blog continues to explore the often passed-over parts of West Michigan. The site design reflects the water and sand of West Michigan as well as forming a easily recognizable “brand” with the logo and color scheme.

SXSW Mashup Showcase
In March 2006, I was asked by JD Lasica and Dave Toole of Outhink media to participate in a project for the South by SouthWest Interactive Festival. The project was a showcase of music video mashups created by a selected group of video bloggers. I created my video from archived footage from public domain video footage on archive.org. The mashups were shown at the SXSW festival along with live performances by the bands who created the music the mashups used.

Contributing Author: Videoblogging
One of the defining characteristics of the videoblogging community is education. This is clearly represented in the book Videoblogging by Jay Dedman and Josh Paul. The book, published in June 2006 by Wiley Publishing,featured many sections contributed by many videobloggers. I authored a section on the topic of re-vlogging (the method I utilize on my Josh Leo’s Picks vlog). I wrote a how-to section about using del.icio.us to re-vlog bookmarked videos. The method, that I helped to create is a streamlined way to bookmark and share videos with others.

Josh Leo’s Vlog
“Anything can be interesting, it is just a matter of how you wrap it.” is the mantra for my personal video blog. I use a documentary style and try to focus on a simple narrative for each video. I started it in March of 2005 and have made over 150 videos since then. The vlog has been featured Locally in the Grand Rapids Magazine, nationally in the New York Times and Wired Magazine, and internationally in the Berliner Newspaper. This video blog won two Vloggie Awards in 2006 in the Best Personal DiaryVlog category.

Josh Leo’s Picks
At the first “Vloggercue” in the summer of 2005, Bre Pettis asked me what is going to be important for the future of video blogs. My response: It’s a matter of filters, people becoming authorities on where to find good content and then linking to it. That is my goal with Josh Leo’s Picks. It is a repository for all the good videos that I find in the vlogosphere. I hope that it can be used as a resource for others and also a way to build community through “link love.”

Stone Farm
Stone Farm is an experimental videoblog. It features a mixture of abstract videos, artistic pieces, short clips, leftover footage from Josh Leo’s Vlog, and basically whatever else I feel compelled to post. Most videos are short, but they all have a unique style that is different than the rest of the content I usually produce. I chose the name “Stone Farm” both in reference to the film Pelle erobreren and because I enjoyed the idea of hard, inorganic objects growing into something more.

A Month in Germany
In August of 2005, I went on a trip to Germany, The Netherlands, and Belgium. I toured these countries for a full month with a friend who lives in Germany. The blog started as a travel journal, but has evolved into a multimedia experience of every trip of the day. Each day will be documented with video, photos, and a detailed description of the day’s events. To gain a better understanding for the future status of the blog, scroll down to the early entries.

Josh Leo’s Blog
Before I was a vlogger, I was a blogger. I started blogging regularly with Xanga when I lived in Anchorage Alaska for a summer. I used it as a way to keep my friends and family back home up to date with my adventures, and also used it as a way to record my adventures there. I enjoyed it so much that I kept doing it when I arrived home. I found my voice with blogging, and posted on a regular basis for a number of years. In 2005 I pretty much abandoned text-blogging and thrust myself into video, but in 2006, the blog was reborn. I still occaisonally post to my blog and indulge in my first love, text.

We Are The Media
In July of 2005, I met Bre Pettis. He told me about a new project he was starting called “We Are The Media.” It was a blog focused on grassroots media. I became excited about the idea of blogging about my new passion and quickly signed on. I worked with Bre and steered the blog to become a news site about what was happening in the growing vlogosphere (the only vlog-news blog at the time). I became assistant editor of WATM and spearheaded a number of projects such as the VlogCal (a calendar of vlog-related events throughout the country) Remix Month, and one of the first Speedvlogging competitions. I enjoyed writing for WATM, but as time progressed, other blogs came to fill the void that we had occupied for over a year and WATM fizzled out.