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We belong to a great local association of video and imaging professionals, the Houston Professional Videographers Association. At our meeting last week we determined there were a few local companies and individuals that we had come in contact with (not in HPVA) that were less than honest in some of their dealings. For instance, in one case a rather large video company in Houston actually hired an ad agency to produce the eye-popping demo that you will see at Houston Bridal shows. The work done for you by this company will not look nearly as good. No, we’re not going to tell you who it is.

So how can you be sure the company you hire will do a great job for you? There are a few things to look for:

1. Ask to see a complete finished product. This can be on a DVD, on the web, or some other delivery device. It’s relatively “easy” to produce a 3 minute highlight that is entertaining and emotional. Highlights are important, but don’t base your purchasing decision off of just that. Ask to see a complete product.

2. Are they members of HPVA? I am not suggesting that videographers who are not members don’t do good work. I am reinforcing the fact that, as members of the association we are involved in learning and perfecting our craft. We are well-respected in the Houston video community.

3. Be sure to meet with the people who will actually be attending and filming your event. You don’t want to meet with and be sold by the owner of the company only to find out that two newbies will be filming your wedding, because they’ve scheduled 2-4 events on the same day. There’s nothing wrong with running multiple crews of shooters, but you should know this up front and you should be able to meet with the videographers who will actually be spending the day with you.

Can you think of any more? Add them to the comments below. Have a question about this? Email or call us today and we’ll be happy to discuss.

Click here for the latest article we wrote about shooting, editing, and delivering the DVD set for the 2009 Rick Springfield and Friends Cruise. It’s a little on the technical side but hey, that’s what we deal with sometimes. There are links to sample videos at the end of the article.

Christie McKnight interviews Rick Springfield and Richard Marx on the 2009 Rick Springfield and Friends Cruise

Well, WE weren’t on Oprah, but our work was. Rick Springfield was a surprise guest serenading two audience members on Monday’s show (“Jessie’s Girl”, of course). He talked about this year’s cruise and showed a short clip from the video we produced of last year’s cruise.

We got word that Rick will be on the Ellen DeGeneres show on October 30th; I wonder if they will show the clip on her show too?

Stay tuned…

We occasionally get calls for small corporate and training videos as well as web video advertisements. Do we do that type of work? Of course we do!

Here are two examples of work we did for YellowBook.com; the first is Ernie Smith & Sons Roofing in Santa Fe:

This is Brown AC & Heating in Pasadena:

Working with both companies, Ernie Smith & Sons and Brown AC & Heating was very smooth. These types of shoots usually take no more than an hour or two depending on your needs.

Give us a call and let us know how we can help you get YOUR message out.

We just delivered this promotional video to Rick and his team to be played before select concerts for the next few months – starting tonight in Milwaukee. This is just a taste of how much fun everyone had on the first cruise this past November, and there are things that happened on this cruise, with Rick and / or the other guests, that you cannot imagine. This year is shaping up to be even better. Rick and everyone involved with this are truly great to work with. If you’re a Rick Springfield fan, a Richard Marx fan, or a fan of the other guests & actors that will be appearing, this is an awesome thing to be a part of!

Sign up for the cruise sailing this November at RickSpringfield.com.

We got a very, very nice call out of the blue the other day. Our friend Kyle called to tell us about his success with making videos. A few years ago we helped Kyle with some of the ins and outs of a software program he was using called Vegas Movie Studio Platinum. We are certified in Vegas Pro, and VMSP is it’s little brother.

He used this software to make a college football recruitment video for his son. We found out that he’s also made some team videos highlighting several Clear Lake athletes. Some of these talented youngsters have gone on to receive partial or full athletic scholarships. Kyle attributes this in a large part to their recruitment videos. He said by us teaching him some of the concepts of Vegas Movie Studio, he’s been able to create more effective videos and change the lives of about a dozen local students who have received scholarships.

We appreciate the kind words, even though Kyle certainly did all the hard work. Congrats to you Kyle, and to your two sons (both of whom have received scholarships), and the students and families who have benefitted from the work you’ve done.

Gosh! We’re finally getting around to putting some up-to-date video samples on our website. For the foreseeable future they will all be appearing within these posts on our blog.

Here is a bride prep segment from Valerie’s & Chris’ wedding video; the event took place at the beautiful Ashton Gardens location in north Houston.

This video won First Place in School Event Video for 2008 in the Houston Professional Videographers Association. We were honored by the award and proud of working with the students, parents, and teachers from Santa Fe High School in producing this video.

For more information on the Shattered Dreams program, visit their website here.

We received a very nice note from Rick commenting on the DVD we produced while on board a cruise ship in November:

“Working with you David and Christie on the first cruise was amazing. I can’t believe the quality of what you did. Incredible. I didn’t even realize you were filming half the time and the dedication and time you put into the all night editing sessions should put you guys at the top of the heap. The whole DVD you made was musical, got what I thought were the best moments of the cruise and performances and the editing was seamless and highly professional. You both are brilliant at what you do. THESE GUYS ARE THE BEST!!!”

UPDATE JANUARY 10th, 2009: As promised, here are two clips from the DVD we produced for Rick & Company; the first is a montage from the opening night concert. We had four cameras rolling and two camera operators. There were many house PA issues that night which you can hear in this clip. Hey whaddaya expect, it was a full on rock concert taking place on a boat in the ocean! I really don’t think Carnival had done this before. But they got everything squared away for all performances after this.

This second clip is a montage of the rest of the DVD. It includes a little bit from the Lido deck concert (previously unreleased), a short bit from Rick’s and John Waite’s acoustic duo performance, a little bit from the Movie Night fun, a little from the Cozumel Beach Party, and a special ending note from Rick.

In all, the DVD was an hour and a half long and we produced nearly 700 copies while still on board the ship. In case you couldn’t tell, we had an absolute blast on this trip, as did everyone we came in contact with. In fact, I hear they are doing it again in 2009. Click Here for details on the second (annual?) Rick Springfield and Friends Cruise.

Click here to read a tutorial David wrote about the Color Correcting features of Sony Vegas, one of the software tools we use in our projects. The magazine has contacted us about doing a series of tutorials that are mostly on the technical side, so they may not appeal to the casual reader. But, there is at least an interesting picture of our cat Boots that was taken during the Hurricane Ike evacuation.  

When Grammy award winner, 80’s rocker, and General Hospital heartthrob Rick Springfield embarks on a 5-day Caribbean cruise November 13th out of Miami, David and Christie will be in tow – but not as cruise guests. Rick has hired McKnight Video to document the concerts taking place during his Carnival cruise in support of his latest CD Venus in Overdrive. Rick and his band will play host to 1,200 fans (the Rick Springfield and Friends Cruise sold out just weeks after it was announced).

Our friends Traci and Jill; Christie, Rick Springfield, and David

We were chosen specifically for our ability to film, edit, and deliver the finished DVD to hundreds of fans while still on board the ship. Though we have provided editing and pre-production support to Rick’s team in the past, we had no idea it would lead to this!

Here’s the scoop: we often produce InstantView productions at wedding receptions in the Houston and Galveston area. An InstantView, also known as a Same Day Edit, is where guests view a cinematic video highlight of the wedding that took place only hours before. In the course of working on the other videos, Rick and his team saw some of these that we’ve done and it started snowballing from there. We’re slated to produce a DVD of the three concerts and other fan events taking place during the cruise. We will be working around the clock to make this happen. We’ll pretty much have our whole stuido on board.

The limited edition DVD is expected to be close to two hours long and 600 – 1000 DVD’s will be delivered to Rick’s merchandising team on the final day of the cruise.

Here’s a commercial for Ford featuring Texas blues funk artist Hamilton Loomis. Hamilton hails from Galveston TX but travels and plays all over the USA in his Ford van. This piece has shots from all over the country; our shots are of course from Texas. You have to check this out, you won’t believe how many miles are on this van!

Here’s a bit of trivia: before venturing into video production, David played bass in Hamilton’s band from 1997 to 2001 and can be heard on the CDs All Fired Up and Live Highlights…logged a lot of miles in that van as well.

Thanks Ham, job very well done.

Hurricane Ike has thrown us a little off track & behind schedule, but the main thing is we’re still here! We now have Internet back to the office so these updates will occur more frequently. We were out of power for only six days. Or maybe seven. I lost count. I think Texas New Mexico Power and Comcast have done a great job in our area, and in the Greater Houston area overall. As of this morning there were still about 100,000 people without power. Yes, that is a lot of people but it’s a small percentage of what they started with. If you’re one of those without power and you (eventually) read this, we feel for you.

As we’ve said, we had some damage but it could have been much, much worse. Our editing workstations have been relocated to allow for drywall and carpet / flooring replacement in those rooms.

Thanks to everyone who has called, come by, or emailed. One step at a time, one step at a time…

Well it could be a whole lot worse. Like many folks around the Houston – Gulf Coast area we lost fences & trees. Some roof damage. Carpet damage as well due to water but we did not have any internal contents damaged. We still have no power and no business phone, very limited email / internet (I’m posting this from an external location). If you’ve been trying to reach us by phone, the best alternative is to email us at the email address on the Contact page and we’ll reply as soon as possible.

The main things is, Christie, Dad, the kitties, and I are all safe, as I said it could be a whole lot worse. But my gosh, what a mess.

- David

Kudos to Rick Springfield on his new hit record, “Venus in Overdrive” – here’s the abbreviated press release:

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
AUGUST 6, 2008

RICK SPRINGFIELD HAS HIS HIGHEST CHART DEBUT IN OVER 20 YEARS WITH “VENUS IN OVERDRIVE,” HIS LATEST RELEASE

Grammy® winner Rick Springfield has secured his highest chart debut position in more than 20 years with his latest album, Venus in Overdrive. Coming in at No. 28 on the Billboard chart, Springfield’s first CD of all new material in almost 5 years is also his debut album on New Door Records/UMe.

The singer was highly visible last week with a string of national television appearances including: “Good Morning America,” “Live with Regis and Kelly,” “The Early Show,” “FOX and Friends,” “On the Record With Greta Van Susteren,” “Entertainment Tonight” and the week before street date re-airing of “Oprah.” Springfield also returned to “General Hospital” in the recurring role as Dr. Noah Drake, as well as the rock star Eli Love who performed the current single, “What’s Victoria’s Secret?”

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For more information visit Rick Springfield’s Website…and keep watching this space on McKnightVideo.com for related news…

We delivered two wedding projects and one civic project this weekend, as well as shot a wedding out of town Saturday – and made time to celebrate Dad’s 82nd birthday with family, friends, and neighbors.

We shot Brittany and Cody’s wedding in Spring; one project was delivered to Tomball, one in Texas City, and one shipped today to Colorado. Thank you Chris, Kevin, Beth, David, and Jenny. Making progress, whoo hoo!

If you are one of our wedding video customers, we want you to know we are working very hard to complete your video within 6 months from your wedding date. Depending on the specifics of the project, and the number of projects in our queue, some are taking longer than that. (You know who you are…)

Christie and I are taking a couple of months off this summer from shooting so that we can spend even more time editing some of these long-outstanding videos. (You know who you are…) In addition, we have raised prices and started being more selective about bookings for 2009 and beyond. For the foreseeable future we are going to shoot fewer weddings per month than what we did in 2007-2008.

The quality of experience we have with each couple is very important to us on the wedding day and beyond. Even if you don’t hear from us personally every week following the wedding, you can always check the Edit and Delivery Schedule page on this website to see exactly what we’re working on at any given time.

Eariler in May we had an email from a customer who had just received her video:

“I wanted you guys to know that Matt and I got the wedding videos. It is amazing, great, wonderful, grand. I am so happy to see it. It turned out better then we expected. We got it yesterday and I have watched it 3 times so far. I just wanted to thank you guys again for such a great job.”

So, for everyone who is waiting on your video, it will be worth it. Parents and family are especially prone to Not Liking to Wait. And we understand that, we really do. The only thing we know to do is reduce the number of projects we take on and raise our prices for future work, which we now have done.

(Note to future clients: we are just now getting to the average price points in the Houston area for the award-winning quality and style of work we do, so, we still won’t break your budget. We may even be cheaper than your chair covers.)

Last week we were very proud to be part of Santa Fe’s production of Shattered Dreams. This program involves the dramatization of an alcohol-related crash on or near a high school campus, complete with police and EMS response, emergency room treatment, family notifications, and the arrest and booking of the driver. Tuesday we filmed the crash scene drama, which was played out before the student body in real time. The next morning a wrap-up assembly was held featuring those who played roles in the previous day’s drama, including the “crash” victims, the drunk driver, their parents, and participating law enforcement and medical personnel.

In addition to the real time events of Tuesday and Wednesday, during the weeks prior we met several times with the students, their parents and sponsors, and filmed the additional scenes for the drama.

The final product is extremely moving and emotionally impactful. We entered a short clip from it in the bi-annual Houston Professional Videographer’s Association competion and was awarded a Distinguished Video award. As soon as we get an OK from the school sponsors we will upload the clip here.

For more information on the Shattered Dreams program, visit their website here.

Yes, this is not a misprint. We get calls and emails every week asking us to provide video services for weddings or events for this current season. With very few exceptions, we have no more availability in 2008. So, certainly, call or email to inquire but don’t be surprised if we’re not already booked.

And more importantly, if you are getting married in 2009, don’t wait too long to hire your videographer!

Here is a new heartfelt Christmas song from pop-rock star Rick Springfield. The song was co-written by Derek Hilland, and proceeds from the sales of the CD go to charity. For more information on the organizations, please visit – American Gold Star Mothers, who are mothers that have lost a son or daughter in service of our country: www.GoldStarMoms.com and Cherished Lives, a memorial website where soldiers’ families can create a free memorial website for their loved ones: www.CherishedLives.com.

We played a very small part in the making of this video and wanted to share it with our friends. We encourage you to buy the Christmas CD, available from RickSpringfield.com.