Josh's Blog

Category Archive : Media Creation

New take on an old theme…

A new recording I made earlier today using my guitar and microphone in a corner of the bedroom. It is a variation on the end section of a tune called “The Window” that I wrote several years ago with my band at the time, 12 Gauge Strings.

If you care to hear the original check out this video on YouTube. The end section that this new recording takes its inspiration from begins at 3:20, right where you hear the “na na’s” start. This vid is also a bit of a blast from my past.

1,000,000 views

Almost eight years ago, I decided to bring a newly purchased camera along with me as I made my landscaping run. Little did I know that the resulting  video it would one day reach 1 million views…

I remember a long time ago my friend Jason R. told me that I would look back at my landscaping days as some of the best days of my life. While I am not ready to attest to the accuracy of that statement just yet, I am able to say that I look back at them with a growing amount of fondness and a bit of longing each and every year. It was a good chapter in my life. A simple read, but it had almost everything I needed in it.

I am super happy that I made and have this video to archive these special times. 

A few little facts about this video:
– I made it to test out a new video camera I had purchased. Canon HF500 I think it was… great camera.
– I did not tell the lawn client I was going to be filming
– I received a lot of strange looks from both client and neighbors while making it – particularly when I stood a 6 foot tripod on the cab of my truck to get an overhead shot.
– I did not storyboard the video. I just tried to shoot as many angles as possible.
– The intro music was an early variant of “Mirror and the Man”, which was later recorded by Copper Root.
– The end music was an incomplete diddly I had written a couple years prior.
– The Metallica song is Leper Messiah
The voiceover was added a week or two later while putting the footage together,
– The insect video playing on the computer monitor during the introduction was inspired by Jeffery Hurst, from an earlier video called, “Jeff likes Insects”. (Rest in Peace Jeff).
– The watercooler was used daily in my home all the way up to my move to London.
– I sent the finished video to the lawn client, who was a professor at UNT. She liked it so much she forwarded it to several of her fellow staff members.
– The first year after the vid was uploaded, it was barely noticed. However the following Spring – during lawn season – it started to get hits.
– The Chevy truck was totaled a few years later.
– The suzuki 2 stroke mower lasted several years after filming. When it finally went kaput, I took the piston out as a keepsake.
– A part 2 was partly filmed and never finished.
– Video earned $3770 in YouTube revenue
– The video typically spikes in views every Spring.