Mike's Blog

Mercury Rising

noreply@blogger.com (Mike Kurtz) — Wed, 18 Jun 2008 19:34:00 +0000

What a huge honor. For the second year in a row, members of the Greater Dayton Advertising Association chose us as the "Best Video/Film/Post Production Company."
Awards are always nice, but this one is particularly gratifying because we were chosen by our clients. While most awards programs recognize a particular project's creativity, this one recognizes our quality productions and customer service over the long haul.

Raising RISE

noreply@blogger.com (Mike Kurtz) — Fri, 04 Apr 2008 13:47:00 +0000

Last week was the University of Dayton's RISE Forum, the world's largest student investment forum. It takes a bit of work to get the UD Arena ready for the event. We recorded about 11 hours of work and sped it up to this 30 second video.

Happyness is...

noreply@blogger.com (Mike Kurtz) — Fri, 04 Apr 2008 11:45:00 +0000

...the pursuit of an interview with Chris Gardner.

With the RISE Forum in the background, Nasdaq VP Maribel Aber interviews the man whose life was the inspiration for the movie The Pursuit of Happyness. We provided the equipment and crew for the interview.

Hermes Night

noreply@blogger.com (Mike Kurtz) — Sun, 17 Feb 2008 00:23:00 +0000

Last week was the Advertising Association Hermes Awards. It was a fun night, and the videos we put together for the show were a hit. You can see them here. No Hermes Heads for MPG this year, but 2 of our 3 entries won awards. We received a Silver Addy and a Bronze Addy.

Great Creative Happens Here

noreply@blogger.com (Mike Kurtz) — Thu, 31 Jan 2008 00:40:00 +0000

I like the theme of the Ad Association Hermes Awards this year – Great Creative Happens Here. The invitation came with a sticker and instructions to take a picture to be included in a video montage at the show. We took a couple snapshots to submit.

Character

noreply@blogger.com (Mike Kurtz) — Sun, 27 Jan 2008 00:16:00 +0000

I spent the day yesterday listening to people talk about the company where they love to work. Then I rushed home to make it to the Hamilton Chamber of Commerce Annual Dinner where Joe Nuxhall was honored for what he did and what he stood for.

The day reminded me about the importance of character. On our video shoot, we were working with producer Jeff Cutlip recording oral history interviews for Midmark’s 100th anniversary. The employees really love the company. They talk fondly about what the company has meant to their lives. And they talk about the character of the people they work with.

After the shoot, I checked in with Brian, our editor, who has been taking care of all of the projects while I have been out gallivanting with the video camera much of the week.

Then it was off to home to join my wife at the Hamilton Chamber Dinner (Kelli is plugged in to the Hamilton elite... I was just tagging along). In a moving speech, Joe Nuxhall’s son, Kim Nuxhall, thanked the community for all of the sympathy and support the Nuxhall family received. Nuxhall’s character was also lauded by Reds owner Bob Castellini and citizen of the year Tim Nichting — who led the Hamilton West Side All Stars to the Little League World Series.

Ad Industry

noreply@blogger.com (Mike Kurtz) — Sat, 19 Jan 2008 00:10:00 +0000

Every organization has a personality. It’s a reflection of the people who work there. I had the opportunity to visit a variety of ad industry organizations earlier this week as we videotaped segments for the Ad Association Hermes Awards Dinner.

Our first experience of an organization was the décor of the building as we walked in. We saw playful, creative environments as well as conservative, corporate environments. Often those conservative facades belied the personality of the creative groups who were able to function quite well within a larger organization of left-brain thinkers.

We went from the corporate-meets-cool offices of Hafenbrack to the lawyer-like, wood-ensconced board room of Excellence in Motivation, from fun and hip ad agency spaces to the design-house-meets-high-school environment of the School of Advertising Art. The common denominator was the creative work being done at all of these places. And some of that creativity will be on display through the videos at the Hermes Awards. See you there!

From Ugly to Awesome

noreply@blogger.com (Mike Kurtz) — Thu, 13 Dec 2007 02:53:00 +0000

In an earlier blog, I mentioned the Norwood 911 dispatch center that was getting a Miller-Valentine Extreme Office Makeover. Well, the renovation is complete, and we had some fun documenting the process. Check out the transformation here.

A Digression and A Confession

noreply@blogger.com (Mike Kurtz) — Thu, 06 Dec 2007 02:51:00 +0000

Allow me to digress from the topic of video for a moment. I have a confession to make. I’m just going to come right out and say it… I like Michael Jackson music. I didn't realize it until I heard an NPR story about the Thriller album, which was released 25 years ago. That was about the time I was learning AC/DC riffs on my new electric guitar. I did not like pop music… period. The "King of Pop" was not cool in my book.

But then came Beat It. I still remember the first time I heard that song. I was riding the bus to school, and a song came on the radio. Synthesized drums – hate it… wait, cool guitar riff… Oh, it’s Michael Jackson – hate it… wait, a guitar solo in a pop song?... whoah! that’s Eddie Van Halen!

Eddie Van Halen was my guitar idol, and I knew his distinctive sound right away. But how could this be? How could Eddie be playing with Michael Jackson? It was like Trump joining up with Rosie O’Donnell... It was like chocolate on your spaghetti… it just didn’t go together.

OK, I told myself, I like the guitar solo, but that’s it. I continued to profess my dislike of MJ his whole choreographed, staged, crotch-grabbing, "ooh"-ing, MTV persona. And how could anyone like that comically campy Thriller video? But, though I wouldn’t even admit it to myself, I secretly kinda liked his music.

We all know about Jackson’s spiral into weirdness and inappropriate behavior. His life turned into a freak show, and I forgot that he was once making fresh and exciting music. The NPR report reminded me about those days in the late 80s when, against my will, Billy Jean would get stuck in my head… Uh oh, now I’ve done it… Billy Jean is not my lover. She’s just a girl who says that I am the one… ooh!

Bring the Love Back

noreply@blogger.com (Mike Kurtz) — Sun, 04 Nov 2007 01:50:00 +0000

I saw this video on another blog. Good stuff. The needs and expectations of consumers (both B2C and B2B) are changing. Smart advertisers are evolving to meet those needs. Old school advertisers who want to keep the status quo will continue to struggle.

Celebration of Flyer Basketball

noreply@blogger.com (Mike Kurtz) — Tue, 16 Oct 2007 01:49:00 +0000

Last week, we helped produce "A Celebration of Flyer Basketball." More than 2,000 basketball fans joined many legendary Flyer players in celebrating the winning tradition at UD. We produced videos covering the modern era of UD basketball. We also wrote the script for emcee Jay Bilas, and we were in charge of the staging for the event.

This project combined two of my passions – video production and Flyer Basketball. What an honor it was to work with legendary coach Don Donoher. He is as classy as they come - humble, down-to-earth, nice guy with an amazing knowledge of the game.

Another guy I had the pleasure to meet was Don May. May might be the best player to ever play at UD, but you wouldn’t know it by talking to him. He was quick to deflect any praise to his coach and teammates.

I felt like I already knew Bucky Bockhorn, having listened to him on the radio for many years. And he is the same friendly, folksy personality in person that you hear on the radio. Bucky is UD’s Joe Nuxhall.

I don’t want to keep namedropping, but the list of classy people I worked with goes on – Larry Hansgen, Bucky Albers, Bill Uhl, Roosevelt Chapman, Brian Gregory. It was also a pleasure to meet ESPN’s Jay Bilas, who was a real pro as the emcee and also a very nice guy, even if he didn’t graduate from UD :-). I didn’t get to meet Bobby Knight, who was whisked in just before the event while we were busy making final preparations.

We had a short timeframe to produce the videos, given the scope of the project. But Brian worked his magic and we got them done with enough time to edit a cool intro montage that still gives me goose bumps when I see it. James Brothers and the folks in Athletics did a great job putting the event together, and it was a pleasure to play a part in such an extraordinary event!

Go Flyers!

Paneling

noreply@blogger.com (Mike Kurtz) — Sat, 21 Jul 2007 01:48:00 +0000

Today, I found myself on a panel of copywriting experts. I usually prefer to be behind the scenes. And I’m much more comfortable asking questions than I am sharing my ideas. But it was fun to spend an hour talking about copywriting with some of the area's best – Norm Vallone from MessageWorks, Jim Hausfeld from ClearChannel, and Robin Michaels from Sinclair Broadcasting. The panel was part of the Greater Dayton Advertising Association’s Professional Development series.

A Day at Great American Ballpark

noreply@blogger.com (Mike Kurtz) — Sun, 01 Jul 2007 01:47:00 +0000

Being a video producer means you sometimes get to go to interesting places where others might not have the opportunity to visit. Whether it’s a factory floor, the executive suite or backstage at the Schuster Center, my curious side revels in having special access by virtue of a video camera.

Today was one of those opportunities. We arrived at the home of the Cincinnati Reds and checked in with security at the press gate. The security folks were extremely friendly and helpful (this is not typical at other venues). We were at the stadium to videotape an interview with UD alumnus Rob Butcher, Director of Media Relations for the Reds. Rob was very accommodating, and the interview went great.

After the interview, we walked through the dugout and up to Rob’s office to get some video of him pretending to work (not that he doesn’t work there, but it’s kind of hard to get much work done with a camera in your face and the director saying, “OK, pick up the phone… look at your computer… now write something on that pad… now hang up the phone…”). We were too early to see any ball players, but I did enjoy seeing the facilities under the stadium.

I’m not one who is easily star-struck by athletes or executives or celebrities. I usually have a job to do, and my focus is on that. But I always enjoy the perks of seeing interesting places and meeting interesting people.

Life

noreply@blogger.com (Mike Kurtz) — Tue, 05 Jun 2007 01:47:00 +0000

Saturday night my 6-year-old son started complaining that his stomach was hurting. In typical dad fashion, I said, “Come on, you’re a tough guy; you’ll be OK.” But after a while, it became clear that he was in a lot of pain. The doctor sent us to the emergency room. Turns out the little guy had appendicitis. He had an appendectomy Sunday, and is doing well. In fact, as I write this on Monday, the hard part is trying to keep him from hopping back on his bike.

Times like these remind me about what is most important in my life. Achieving a healthy balance between work and home life is always difficult. Especially with a dual career family and a demanding job. I’ll admit, I’m a recovering workaholic (the recovering part might be debatable, but this is my blog, so I can write whatever I want). I demand a lot from myself and always try to exceed customer expectations. But I think the key to having a life outside of work is to focus on the high-priority tasks while at work and use my time efficiently. Then I can focus on what’s truly important to me – my family – when I’m not at work.

That doesn’t mean I always get it right, but spending a little time at Children’s Hospital reminded me about what I truly value in life.

Terabytes

noreply@blogger.com (Mike Kurtz) — Fri, 25 May 2007 01:44:00 +0000

I remember (back when I was a youngster) when we ordered two 9-gigabyte drives for our first non-linear edit system. It cost thousands of dollars. Back then if you would have asked me about a terabyte, I probably would have thought you were talking about some kind of dinosaur.

Fast forward to 2007. Our 500 Gig graphics drive was running out of room, so we just ordered a terabyte drive. And we paid much less than we did for that 9 gig drive ten years ago. Now we have over 4 terabytes of space on our two edit systems. Of course, that fills up quickly with uncompressed video.

But not to worry, we still have the original video on tape. Ah, videotape. That’s what we’ll be waxing nostalgic about in another 10 years.

Mercury Awards

noreply@blogger.com (Mike Kurtz) — Sat, 19 May 2007 01:43:00 +0000

Last night was a fun night for us. We went to the Greater Dayton Advertising Association Mercury Awards, and we were named the best Video/Film/Post Production Company. Over the years, we have won awards in creative competitions, but this award is a real honor because it is voted on by the people who are our customers. Thank you to all who nominated us.

Extreme Office Makeover in Norwood

noreply@blogger.com (Mike Kurtz) — Thu, 10 May 2007 01:40:00 +0000

It’s the Miller-Valentine Extreme Office Makeover! OK, this place is really a dump! The Norwood 911 Call Center is the winner of the Miller-Valentine Extreme Office Makeover. Nova Creative Group hired us to produce a video documenting the transformation. The final product will be an interactive presentation that will have video segments and a menu for navigation.

Today we videotaped the facility in its current form… and it wasn’t pretty. But Officer TA was a natural on camera, and a gracious host. We’ll post more about the transformation after it’s complete. You can also check out Dayton’s Extreme Office Makeover here.

We're back on Times Square!

noreply@blogger.com (Mike Kurtz) — Thu, 03 May 2007 01:32:00 +0000

OK, this is cool. You might have seen our New Year’s greeting, where we created a fake video playing on Times Square (click to view). But this time we had a video play on Times Square for real.

Yesterday, UD President Dr. Dan rang the closing bell at Nasdaq to celebrate the RISE Forum. As part of the closing celebration, we were able to produce a 30-second spot for the 7 story screen on the Nasdaq tower. The screen is the largest stationary video screen in the world. The one drawback is the windows that are located throughout the screen. So we designed the video so that the key information would be aligned between the windows. And we formatted the video so that it would best utilize the tall aspect ratio.

Justin Bayer, an old friend and current UD employee, happened to be in New York at the time, and got some pictures of the commercial running. He reports that it looked great. We’ll have to take his word for it because they had it partially covered with a graphic on their webcam. Since we don’t have good video footage of the commercial running, we created this mock-up of the video running on the tower.

RISE

noreply@blogger.com (Mike Kurtz) — Tue, 03 Apr 2007 01:29:00 +0000

Last week was the RISE Forum at the UD Arena. RISE is the University of Dayton Redefining Investment Strategy Education conference. Students from all over the world come to Dayton to hear some of Wall Street’s leading strategists talk about the economy.

It's a very impressive event, and we try to make it look impressive by turning a basketball arena into a first class venue for the keynote presentations. The event is shown on two large screens so that everyone has a good view of the speakers. The screens also show videos and animations that we prepare in advance. And we webcast the event live to schools around the world.

We work with a lot of great people on this event. David Sauer and his staff and students at the Davis Center do a great job attending to all of the details. I’m always impressed with the professionalism of the Davis Center students. Paula in UD’s Advancement Services does an incredible job organizing the event. And the folks from Markey’s Audio Visual help us take care of all of the staging and AV. It’s great to work with such a talented team on this impressive event.

UD grad Dr. Bob Froehlich moderates all of the keynote panel discussions. Dr. Bob is himself a Wall Street analyst, as well as an author and a frequent guest on financial TV shows. If he ever gets tired of his job as an analyst, maybe he should think about becoming a talk-show host. He does a great job of leading the discussion and keeping it entertaining. We're usually too busy running the show to hear much of what is said, but always learn a little about the financial world at RISE too.

Phoenix with WinWholesale

noreply@blogger.com (Mike Kurtz) — Thu, 29 Mar 2007 01:27:00 +0000

Just got back from Phoenix where we videotaped WinWholesale’s annual meetings. WinWholesale has to be the best company in Dayton that no one has heard of. Now we’re setting up for the RISE forum at the UD Arena. More on that later.

YWCA Women of Influence

noreply@blogger.com (Mike Kurtz) — Fri, 16 Mar 2007 01:23:00 +0000

Today we ran the AV for the YWCA Women of Influence Awards. WDTN made the videos. We created the show graphics and pushed the buttons (pay no attention to the man behind the curtain). This is always an inspirational event to be at – just to listen to the honorees.

Welcome

noreply@blogger.com (Mike Kurtz) — Sat, 03 Mar 2007 02:21:00 +0000

Welcome to Mike’s blog. I’ll be writing short notes about productions we’re working on. We have been busy, and we have been having a lot of fun. My plan is to use this blog to cover some of the highlights.