This is a grab bag of some other cuts/projects I love, but didn’t really fall into any specific category. Nonetheless, I felt I needed to represent them. These were all projects that made me appreciate the editing/animation/production process, and when I was genuinely able to express some creative ideas that felt right to me. When you find a cut you’re passionate about, it becomes a personal project, not a job.
The Story of Less | Triptent
I absolutely love this edit. Top 5 projects I’ve worked on to date. Creative direction came from Jeff DeGeorgia and Alex Irizarry, and we worked super closely together on this one. We brought in Matt Westrich - incredibly talented editor, motion graphics artist, director, BMXer - for the animation/motion graphics execution and he made it sing. We delivered the cut in 60fps, to reduce motion blur and give the visuals that super smooth/clean look, which I think works great here. Musically, we tried over 150 different tracks, roughly editing 60 of them to picture, and had some great options but nothing gave us the “immersion” we were looking for. I was cruising through instagram one morning, and a video caught my ear for just a split second - Tony Ann playing an Interstellar Theme/”Experience” (Ludovico Einaudi) hybrid, solo piano piece and it was a wrap after that. The piece fit like a glove and perfectly captured the feeling we were trying to hit. Cutting the track just right, so the moments of tension and intrigue were enhanced, was a labor of love, but so worth it in the end. Beautiful video, beautiful work. This is the way.
Creative Explore | Juice Press
We cut this edit as part of a pitch to Juice Press around 2015 or so. It was a cool little piece that was going to be used as a meeting opener, but I decided to take it a little further and add a whole sound treatment on my own time. Sound design is an awesome creative outlet, and super rewarding when the piece you are working with has great action cues. This particular edit allowed me to get abstract with some of the sounds, which made the whole cut feel surreal and almost like a fever dream. I love working with audio and this was one of the most rewarding projects for that, even though it was never actually used!
Creative Explore | Michael’s
This was another piece we made as part of a pitch. It wasn’t initially part of the RFP, but I decided to do it as an exploratory project in down time. Yves Pasquarelli and I collaborated on this little teaser, and I love how it came out. Yves is a genius - no real other way to say it. He set up a CG simulation for the ink and worked with the materials to get the ink super oozy and slick like we wanted, and then edited the cut together. I set up some sound design on top of that, and everything clicked together. I find the cadence of the ending SFX to be particularly satisfying here.
Far From Any Kohl’s
Too much down time is not a good thing. The right amount of down time, though, sometimes yields great, unintended results. Shane McGill and Emily Chao put this edit together, right around the time “True Detective” (season 1….the good stuff….) came out and was causing a stir. The titles you see throughout are names of Kohl’s Spring events from back then. My favorite part is probably the Keurig feature. I’ve watched this cut dozens of times at this point and I love it each time.
Kohl’s Cash Explores
We’ve done a looooot of Kohl’s Cash explores over the years. Most we’re in 2D formats, but I decided to work on a 3D explore in down time, just for fun. This is another short project that Yves Pasquarelli and I collaborated on and we came up with several different treatments. These three are a few of my favorite: the Kohl’s Cash “cannon” (#1), to the slick wrap around (#2), and “raining cash” (#3). I always wished we were able to use these more in actual spots, but the right opportunity never quite arose (or so I’m told).