On August 7th, Chad and I shot and edited a commercial for the Grain Belt Premium commercial contest. The concept we came up with was conceived in 2 weeks, shot in 5 hours and edited in 3 hours. I don't want to divulge any details at this point (the deadline for entries ends tomorrow), but it turned out great. If used properly, this concept could be a marketing monster for Grain Belt. The top 60 entries will be screened at the Oak Street Cinema on September 14 at 7:30 and 9:30 PM. 1st place wins $1,450 (it is the 145th anniversary of Schells Brewery) and a one-year supply of Grain Belt Premium. 2nd place wins $400, and 3rd place wins $145. The winners will also be screened at the Sound Unseen Film Festival which runs from October 7th-16.

We shot the spot using the Panasonic AG-DVX100a set in the 24pa mode in a letterboxed format. We used two 500 watt shoplights as our primary light source. The resulting images were fantastic. The audio was recorded in camera using a Sennheiser ME-40 shotgun microphone rented from the local IFP chapter. Both picture and sound was edited using Sony Vegas version 6 editing software on HAL 9000 (Chad's computer). The finished product was exported to a mini DV master and DVD.

A huge thank you goes out to Tommy Lonergan, our dedicated actor who brought the role to life, right there on the set. Thanks again Tommy.

Stay tuned for screen shots in the near future...