:: Earl Green - Freelance Television Writer / Producer ::

Several years in the planning and taking over a month of intensive editing, Phosphor Dot Fossils is a three-hour DVD documentary based upon the web site of the same name, which I’ve been writing and adding new material to since 1995. Tracing the history of video games from their inception as a mass-market item in the early 1970s, through the rise and fall of their mass-acceptance in the pre-Nintendo 1980s, Phosphor Dot Fossils features game footage, rare (and in many cases, extensively restored) commercials, and photos and mini-essays (in its unique everything-on-the-screen “video book” format) of extremely rare prototype games and hardware. I wrote every word, edited every second, composed every note of music, and embarked on an extensive DVD authoring project to create the disc’s extremely concise menu system. To date, despite this being a self-published project aimed at a small niche audience, over 200 copies have sold, with more orders always being taken. A follow-up, Phosphor Dot Fossils Level 2, is in the planning stages for early 2009, and I’m brainstorming possible further projects using a similar format. Phosphor Dot Fossils debuted at the OEGE live event sponsored by Oklahoma City Community College in April 2008.

Not a lot of production work on my part here; I was contacted by the producers of this History Channel show about using photos and video that they had seen in the video game history section of my web site, and I wound up providing them with quite a few options to choose from, including video of the game itself being played. The video of the one-of-a-kind Pong prototype was shot by me in August 2005 in San Francisco.

My first big freelance assignment was a biggie indeed - I stepped up from 30 second spots to editing and posting a 30 minute show; I started working on this immediately after leaving 40/29, and had actually been contacted about it before I was even actively soliciting business as a freelancer. This was a pilot presentation for a local daytime news/public affairs show, hosted and produced by Lydia Joseph, who I had worked with at Fox 46 years ago, and shot by Kirsten Cutsinger, who I knew from KPOM (back when it was KPOM, before the relaunch of their newscast). Once the stories and intro material were shot, everything was my responsibility, from developing and implementing the graphic “look” of the show, to editing, and even doing the voice-overs for the show’s intro and bumpers. As of 2008, the show has not sold, so the pilot remains the only produced work on this project.

At long last, here I am, working for myself at GreenhouseFX.tv. A full list of the services offered is up, along with helpful, user-friendly explanations of some of the terms and technologies involved.

It seems like it’s taken whole dog years to get a web site up and running for my little video venture (I’ve been so busy actually doing the stuff that I haven’t had a chance to really promote it yet), but now it’s time to get this show on the road. Items that I produce under the GreenhouseFX.tv name will be on display over there rather than here, though this archive is being kept open for any projects I undertake outside of what GreenhouseFX.tv provides.

Stay tuned.

Two of my last topicals for 40/29, done on my last day; there was little or no footage for the “New Year’s Eve” story, so I decided to do one last big effects blow-out, just for the heck of it. (I promise never to do such a spot at 40/29 again.) The other topical was a case where I had good sound and decent video in advance, and decided to break away from the usual music and editing style we use on topicals. My last topical at 40/29 (not seen here) involved the execution of Saddam Hussein.

On the anniversary of the Pearl Harbor bombing, local survivor Herman E. Stout vividly recalls the events he witnessed while serving there.

I don’t do them too often, but when I do edit a news package, I tend to enjoy it. In this case, the idea to edit the whole piece on the Avid came out of a discussion with the videographer who shot the piece; as it was already going to be a “nats pack” (a package consisting entirely of “nats,” or “natural sound,” without any reporter voice tracks), why not just do it up a bit? By the time we were done with the package, we were both pretty happy with it.

By the way, it was my privelege and honor to help tell Mr. Stout’s story. And I don’t often say that about something I do at work. This package aired on December 7th on 40/29 News at Ten.

Though the promo for this sweeps story barely ran, this is a fun little piece about a different kind of full-contact sport. There wasn’t a lot of footage to go on, and I was given nothing but nat sound, but it still turned out to be a pretty energetic spot. The “spin/blur” transition between shots is neat, even if the theme from Batman was playing in the back of my head everytime I saw it.

With this spot, I had a specific look in mind, namely all those high-tech medical spots that ABC produces for its own news shows like 20/20. Really, footage-wise, we were a bit poor on this one since the story was still being shot - we’ve had that breast cancer animation and those same two shots of doctors looking at mammograms for years now - though I tried to disguise that fact by dropping some animated elements in there (which were actually distributed by ABC to their affiliates for use in their initial 2003 coverage of the Iraq war). I was fairly pleased with how this one turned out.

A wrap-up of our fairly extensive coverage of the 2006 election, which covered at least a couple hundred races, this is a fairly standard POP spot except for the fact that it was rolled out before everyone even left the building. (The other stations in the market didn’t have a POP on the air until around lunchtime the next day, while ours had been running all morning; I had prepared most of the graphic and animation elements the night before.) All of our talent that was out in the field shows up, along with the two Arkansas gubernatorial candidates and quite possibly the kitchen sink.

Just like we did during the last sweeps, 40/29 is once again checking school security. This time, though, we sent one of our producers (rather than recognizable on-air personalities) into various elementary school campuses with a hidden camera, and for much of the time, he got to just stroll through these schools, and even into heavily-populated areas like the cafeteria, unchallenged. Not surprisingly, that video makes up a lot of this spot. At the time I was editing, there seemed to be some genuine confusion as to whether or not our producer’s identity would be disguised on-camera, so with that in mind, I did show his face but tried to obscure it as best I could in case a different call was made before (or even after) the spot hit the air.

Election time means election coverage promos, and that means “make it look as stately and solid as the sign in front of a bank.” That’s actually a challenge I enjoy, trying to achieve something approaching a classy look like that. And it certainly was a challenge here: the spot was given to me as an already-written-and-shot piece that I needed to finish out, but the studio talent shoot was a static shot at the Fayetteville news desk. Since the background of that set happens to be blue, I decided to see just how good the Boris FX chromakey plug-in is. (Turns out it’s not bad - take a look! The only embarrassing artifact is that this had to be completed and aired on a timetable that didn’t allow for the kind of precision surgery that it would’ve taken to eliminate the news desk in the shot; as the only non-blue element in the scene, it’s just sort of incongruously floating in space.) No doubt a few more election coverage spots are lurking just around the corner…

Earlier in 2006, Springdale, Arkansas voters checked “yes” next to a handful of bond issues to create a new baseball stadium and minor league team for the city; eventually, the Wichita Wranglers were lured from Kansas to Arkansas to be Springdale’s new team. Needless to say, baseball was a big story for much of 2006, and this was just one of those stories, sitting down with the owner of the Kansas City Royals to discuss Springdale’s possible future as a “farm team” for the big leagues.

Produced in a very tight time frame, this was a special 10pm news open for the fifth anniversary of the September 11th attacks. The script was written by producer Robin Edie (and voiced by Craig Cannon), and I had about an hour to get everything together. (It was literally handed in at about 9:58.) I think it came out a little bit longer than anyone originally planned, but hopefully the effect was worth it.

After having used the previous open for something like three years, a new open for our Friday night football coverage was probably overdue. This is a major part of the station’s sports coverage, and a major sponsorship to boot, so it’s worth a little bit of extra effort. In what may be the ultimate expression of testosterone, there are few normal transitions in this open - but there are plenty of explosions! Click to see the video, along with a brief tutorial for fellow Avid editors out there, on how to blow stuff up real good in a digital kind of way. From a more straightforward video perspective, the football’s white stripes came out transparent; I think that was a goof in the graphics department, but I liked the stylized football. Besides, there’s an awesome montage running in the background, cut to the music bed, and the “open stripes” let you see more of it.

For our special preview show covering the first Arkansas Razorbacks football game of the season, which also happens to be a rematch with the USC Trojans (who spanked the Hogs by 70-odd points in their last meeting), I dipped into the archives a bit and basically borrowed my own spot from nearly 10 years ago - though I’ll admit that with the benefit of non-linear editing, cutting that previous spot on tape felt like an epic, heroic feat, while this one almost came across as anticlimactic. It’s a decent enough spot in its own right though.

Today marks my 17th anniversary of working in broadcasting. I am also 34 years old. I’ll let you work out the slightly depressing math there.

Having spent half my life in the local broadcasting business, however, I feel like I’m qualified to off you a little bit of advice, especially the youngsters out there (assuming any of them are reading this). And I think it’s fairly sound advice. (more…)

Not even eight months after our last “how to use coupons” story borrowed from another Hearst station comes this, a “how to use coupons” story borrowed from another Hearst station! Okay, maybe I’m sounding a little cynical. This package was at least well produced and had some sound that made for a good promo. Now you can look at it and judge for yourself - “free, free, free!” The best thing I came up with for this one may be the “coupon” end tag, complete with disclaimers and expiration date (which also happened to be the day the story was due to air).

The first new weather image spot to feature new Chief Meteorologist Drew Michaels (the previous spots had been refits of promos that were originally on the air during Charles Salser’s tenure), this was designed to be a bit of a tech-y looking spot, with Drew immersed in the weather graphics. (Actually, he was originally meant to be more immersed than he really was, but the original concept probably would’ve required an extra week of post, and it was more important to just get it on the air.) I liked what I was able to do with the spot though.