Seattle Director of Photography Wolfgang Isenhart gives his new HD Panasonic HPX300 camera the Rockin’ Reggae test– and survives to tell the story.

Rockin out to the Reggae beat proved no problem for the CMOS sensor in the HPX300. It was a little harder on Wolf's ears, though.

The P.A. was so loud I immediately had to stuff my ears full of tissue paper. I was setting up in the front row of a small theater in Seattle during the sound check. It was a reggae show so I was a little confused as to why the levels were in the Megadeath zone. The HPX300 was already working it’s full-size camera mojo: I had no problem getting right in the venue just by showing the camera to the security guard.

Setting it up on the tripod I was worried about the problems I had with another recent shoot of a concert. Using two Canon HV20s, I did a shoot in a smaller club. The hand held camera looked great but the camera I had the promoter’s girlfriend running on a tripod had problems. Every time the bass player hit a loud and low note, the CMOS sensor freaked out. The whole picture would go soft and looked terrible. Of course, I didn’t know this was happening until after the first band. Luckily she noticed that something wasn’t right and I backed up the tape and checked it. A small pile of napkins under each leg of the tripod fixed the problem but it was a bad sign from the otherwise unbelievable little camera.  So with that in mind I was expecting the new Panasonic to be better but I was expecting it to have at least some of the same issue.

“It must be a bad cord” I heard the sound guy say as my whole body was smacked with a blast of sound pressure from the painfully loud P.A. system. The camera clicked right into the sony tripod plate just like a real camera should. I snapped the Anton Bauer dionic 90 onto the back and smiled to myself that it would probably run all night on this one battery ( it did and actually captured all the footage onto my computer too). The first band was sound checking and the P.A. was still so loud that people were all walking around with fingers in their ears. Horrible to listen to but good for my little CMOS test. I zoomed in as far as the lens goes and looked for artifacts. The camera was right on the tripod and the whole venue was vibrating like a cheap hotel massage bed. The picture was tight, not a wobble or jelly vision to be seen. The guys at Panasonic are my heros. I knew the HPX300 was a step up from the little Canon camera but I was still expecting to see some of the CMOS issues.

The camera was set to record in the AVC-Intra 50 codec so we could capture the whole four hour set. I was a little worried about the noise and low light situation but I needed the extra recording time. The promoter had two other guys with Canon 5D MkII cameras shooting

High definition production work at our Seattle office begins with the HD Panasonic HPX300.

and we were planning to cut them all together for the concert. They were limited to 12 minutes of recording at 30 fps. I talked to them and they assured me that they didn’t need tripods. So, with that in mind, I decided to roll on everything just to make sure we had it covered. The menus in the HPX300 are pretty standard but it acts more like a computer than a camera. Switching from 720p to 1080p, the camera says “system mode complete” then asks you to turn off the power and reboot. I ran in 0 db gain because of the low light. So combining the lower bit rate of AVC-I 50 and the slightly higher gain of 0 db I was expecting to see some grain. I was also expecting the 5D to perform better in the low light.

The concert went off okay. The sound guy was smoking too much of the stash and never found the bad cord. It might sound okay if they remix the raw 24 track. All this aside, I had a good time and got to test out the new camera in a tough situation.

We got back to the shop and I collected the footage from the two 5D cameras. Their stuff looks cool but the CMOS issues are way more pronounced on the Canons. The hand held stuff only looks good when they are totally settled and not moving at all. It was nice looking video but the lenses had some weird flare and the hand held shooting was a bad idea. One of the guys had a mono pod and his footage looked better. The color was close to the Panasonic but changed a lot due to the lighting and flare from the backlights. They had some nice shallow depth but that also means that half of the footage was out of focus. Not sure if that is such a good idea for a live show. The flash banding and jelly vision were all more noticeable on the Canons.

The HPX300 footage looks solid as a rock. The AVC-I 50 and 0 db gain looks clean and nice. It’s a little unfair because I was on a tripod and moving nice and slow but the difference compared to the 5D was drastic. Panasonic has made the CMOS thing a non-issue as far as I am concerned. I was able to get a shallow depth of field by taking control of the iris and opening all the way up. The lens is sharp and has a nice zoom on it. If I zoomed all the way in and whip pan left and right I could see some skew of sharp lines but that was not noticeable in any of my actual shoot. The flash banding was visible but much better than the 5Ds. The AVC-I 50 codec is clean and sharp. The color and quality of the picture still amazes me. The lighting was bad and still it held up with some great looking pictures.

So far I have determined two things:  1) that sound guys from L.A. don’t necessarily know what they are doing and 2) that the HPX300 was the right choice.   Its 1080p video and Panasonic color are astounding. The features and ability to shoot almost any format of video out there as well as the super clean AVC-Intra codec make it worth every penny.   Now that I’m all set with a sweet camera, I just need to go buy a nice new pair of ear plugs!

As digital production moves away from video tape, post production work-flow and backup procedures become more important than ever.

It seems like it happened in the blink of an eye.   Tape is gone.  Gone with it is a “hold it in your hand” assurance that all the work that went into planning, lighting, directing and shooting your project is safe.

Enter: the completely digital production, from field acquisition to final delivery.  Ones and Zeros all the way.   While shooting directly to hard drive has many benefits, including a streamlined work flow that cuts down hours (and costs) in the edit suite, it also lays open your project to the potentially devastating loss of all that digital data.

I know someone who recently suffered through one such disaster.  The local producer/editor had just finished up a video project for a business client and was kicking back with the satisfied feeling of a job well done when– this is no joke– his DOG jumped up on the table and knocked over his media drive, sending it crashing to the floor.  The small, firewire hard drive held the only copies of his digital media.   And since his project was shot with a digital HD camera, there were no shoot tapes for backup.   His client’s entire project laid there, lifeless on the floor.   When he tried to fire up the drive again all he got was a sickening clicking sound, the worst sound ever known to man (at least to that man in that particular situation).

How to prevent this kind of disaster?  Redundant media storage. The solution can be as simple as copying all your media onto a second hard drive that sits on the shelf, just in case. Or, you can spend some money and integrate what is widely considered the safest solution: a RAID level 5 system.   A RAID (redundant array of independent discs) distributes data across multiple hard drives, but the array is seen by the computer as one single disk.  In a RAID5 if any single drive fails, the user simply removes the bad drive, replaces it with a new one and the RAID will rebuild itself, restoring all media that existed on that drive to its original state.  Voila.  One of the best side benefits:  producers and editors can sleep at night knowing their digital footage is safe from loss.

Our friend with the dog found out the hard way how painful it can be to lose digital media.  He had to go back to the very beginning and re-shoot footage for his project.

Wide Eye Productions uses the server based EVO media storage system by Digital Maxx. It offers 16 TB of redundant media storage to our three Final Cut Pro HD editing suites. The EVO can withstand up to two simultaneous hard drive failures without any loss of data.

Constantly repeating yourself in social settings may not be cool.  But redundancy in digital production is critical (did I say that before?).  Redundant storage protects your project from loss.  If you’re planning to produce any kind of movie– from a YouTube sizzle reel to a major motion picture– you’ll need to know that your production company has it.   Redundant media storage systems like the ones we have in place here at Wide Eye Productions offer peace of mind to our staff and our clients.    And our meticulous archiving system ensures the posterity of every completed project.

So next time you gather bids from a variety of production companies, make sure you ask what methods they use to backup and archive their digital media projects.   Ask them if they have a redundant media storage system, then ask them again.

Principal and Producer Jennifer Isenhart is a fourth generation entrepreneur.   She also happens to be the great grand daughter of one of the first cinematographers in the Pacific Northwest.

Media mogul Ted Turner says an entrepreneur is what you call yourself when you don’t have a job.  By that definition, I come from a long line of jobless people.  As far back as my great grandfather, my family members have created their own opportunities with fresh ideas and a lot of long, hard work.

My great grandfather moved from Wales to Wyoming in 1898.  Lewis Mortimer Lewis was his name.  He was just 11 years old when he moved to America, ready to take on a new world.  On that long voyage across the ocean, he carefully tended to his first business idea– one large box of live worms.  Upon landing in America, he immediately went to work farming Welsh worms and selling them to local fishermen.  I don’t know if they worked any better than American worms, but they launched my great grandfather into the world of business.

My great grandfather with his Bell & Howell Filmo camera. Circa 1930.

By the time my great grandfather Lewis was 20 years old he had put himself through college, graduated with a degree in business and purchased a private business college in Washington State.  Through his hard work and determination, the college grew and thrived and he became partner in another business college in Chicago.  By the time he was 30 years old, my great grandfather was a wealthy man.

But it wasn’t until the great depression hit that he found his true passion.  That’s when Lewis M. Lewis picked up a motion picture camera.  He was instantly hooked.

Roy Ash, co-founder of Littleton Industries says, “an entrepreneur tends to bite off a little more than he can chew hoping he’ll quickly learn how to chew it.”

That was my great grandfather. In the 1930’s, he taught himself how to be a cinematographer and set out around the Northwest selling film productions to businesses and government agencies.   He used a Bell & Howell Filmo movie camera and shot films for many of the newly created national parks.  He was the first cinematographer to shoot film footage of the recently opened Carlsbad Caverns National Park in New Mexico.  In the 1930’s, visitors to the park had to be lowered down hundreds of feet in a guano mining bucket– about the size of a whiskey barrel– to enter the caves.  That must have been an interesting ride down with two arms full of camera equipment.

Early visitors to the park were lowered down hundreds of feet in a guano mining bucket. Photo courtesy NPS.

Lewis M. Lewis excelled at nature photography and went on to sell his footage to the Walt Disney company for a nature series called, The Living Desert. Over the years, my great grandfather started and developed numerous other businesses, but photography always remained a passion throughout his life.

Nolan Bushnell, the founder of the Atari company says about entrepreneurs, “The true entrepreneur is a doer, not a dreamer.”

Both of my parents inherited the ‘doer’ gene.  One day in the basement of my great-grandfather’s house, my father stumbled upon a small treasure that would point his ambition toward a familiar course.  It was the old Bell & Howell Filmo camera.  My father didn’t know it yet, but that day in the basement marked the beginning of a 30 year career in film, then television, then video production.  Together with my mother (and a lot of hard work), they built a successful documentary and corporate production company in the Puget Sound area.

I grew up in and around television stations, camera equipment and editing bays.  I remember getting in trouble when I was a little girl for playing with my dad’s white editing gloves, the ones he wore when handling the film on the flat bed editing table in our basement.  I learned to splice and tape a film edit when I was in grade school.  So it just made sense when I went to college to chose a major in broadcast journalism.

Now it’s my turn to carry the entrepreneurial family torch.  Over the past 13 years, with long hours (and a lot of hard work), my husband and I have built a strong, creative production company that is innovative enough to thrive during these tough economic times.  When it comes to examining my own success, I like what the founder of The Body Shop, Anita Roddick has to say, “success… is not about money or status or fame, it’s about finding a livelihood that brings me joy and self-sufficiency and a sense of contributing to the world.”

For me, success is also a sense of contributing to and carrying on my own family legacy.  A legacy that appears to be alive and well.  This summer my 7 year old daughter Gwendolyn got to work with a business of her own.   In a single hour she pulled in more than seven dollars with a small stand selling peach ice tea.    That night, she informed me that selling ice tea in the hot sun is a lot of hard work.   I just had to smile.  I think our family legacy lies in good hands.

What’s cool is when a client, in this case our friend Sue Nass with the Idaho Department of Fish & Game, comes to us with an idea for a great campaign that encourages kids to get outside and play. To put away their Xboxes, turn off the television and shutdown their computers to get out and play in nature. What’s even cooler is when she commissions my wife, Idaho’s Singing Sweetheart, Belinda Bowler, to write a song for the campaign that will hopefully inspire our youth to play in the great outdoors. To go for a hike, or swim in a lake. And as time goes by, listening to music that could inspire the song, and discussing musical styles with Belinda to encourage her songwriting in a positive way makes for some happy listening at home, which is always cool.

Bindy records the theme song for "Be Outside" in the audio booth at Wide Eye Productions

And after months of creative gestation and fruitful dialogue about the kind of song Belinda could write, a day comes along when she’s ready to present her offering. Well, it’s incredibly cool when that offering is something completely unexpected, but everything you might have hoped for her in this endeavor. And when I make a scratch track of the song for Sue and her response is tears of joy, then I know that my wife Belinda has hit her mark and the song is going to work in every way Sue might have hoped for, which is always cool. And when I play it for my colleagues here at Wide Eye, and they love it, well of course that’s cool.  Click here to play the song

And when Sue sends me a script she’d like me to narrate that promotes and encourages kids to get off the couch and get out to play, well that’s cool too! Cause that’s the kind of encouragement we all need, and I’m happy to put a voice to that message, especially because I know it’ll be accompanied by my wife’s singing. So cool.  (Be Outside video news release)

What’s cool is when things come together, and they work. When in the creative process the unexpected happens and it makes everything a little better.

Andy at the helm, monitoring levels

What’s cool is when the company I work for gets me the tools I need to bring our audio booth firmly into the 21st century, providing me with a digital I/O box that delivers high fidelity recording to the work flow. And what’s cool is when all that gadgetry works as it did when it came time to do a polished recording of Belinda’s cool song.

Now I’ve had the opportunity to develop a skill set that allows me to be a pretty good audio engineer in the field. I know how to get a good recording. But I have to admit that something I’m lacking is the knowledge and experience of how best to manage a live 2 track musical recording through the post production work flow. It’s just the sort of thing we don’t do a whole lot of around here.

Rich Brotherton in the Studio, photo courtesy of No Depression magazine

But what’s cool is when I have a cousin, in this case Rich Brotherton who plays for Robert Earl Keen and produces albums for Robert and many other folks out of Nashville and Austin, that I can call upon for a tip or two. And when he generously offers up his advice, that is also cool. But what I love, and this is way cool, is when his love for Belinda and his enthusiasm for her song takes over and he asks that I send him the raw recordings so he can play with them. What’s even cooler is the simple way in which he tweaks the recording making them even livelier than they sounded originally. And what is most cool is that he couldn’t resist doing a bit of decorating himself by offering up an additional mix where he accompanies Belinda on the mandola. Exactly just the sort of light hearted playfulness the song Be Outside needed. That’s over the top way cool! It works, and it was completely unexpected.

Cool!

What else is cool is watching how all of these elements are coming together for Sue. She sent me a link to a cool looking website recently (Be Outside website) and there was my voice narrating along with Belinda’s song. Too cool! Can’t wait to see what the video is going to look like. I’m guessing that will also be cool!

Transcribing footage is not exactly glamourous, but a very necessary part of the production process

Over the last year, I’ve been transcribing tape for an independently-produced documentary film.  I’ve played, rewound, and fast-forwarded through more than 5,000 minutes of HD video footage–upwards of 87 hours–describing every shot and noting each word spoken while the camera rolled.  Lingo-laden professional interviews and lively conversations among family members, footage of sleepy suburban neighborhoods and kids riding the bus to school–it’s all there and it’s all been transcribed.

Considering that feature length films typically average between 80 and 210 minutes in length, that could mean that 95% of this footage may never be used.  Some of this video accumulates as the camera rolls, waiting for just the right light or to record a special moment, the worthy reward being a perfect shot…and the transcript will tell you exactly where to find it in those 87 hours of tape.

I’m not a military man, but I got to drive my first tank in 1980.   I crashed it.  The only bruise was to my ego, and the only loss was 100 feet of film.  Had they survived, the images would have been beautiful.  I took it pretty hard.  I don’t like losing beautiful images.

30 years have passed and I just drove a new, high-tech tank across Idaho last week.  This time the images survived.  And they are beautiful beyond description.

Tank number one was World War II era.  I was taking my first college photography course.  My professor handed me a Bell and Howell “Filmo” wind-up 16mm film camera and told me to go play with it.

A Bell & Howell "Filmo" like the one I crashed onto the tarmac.

It really was a tank.  Made of solid cast aluminum (or iron, for all I know), it was indestructible.  It was a 1940’s Army workhorse that had captured newsreels in European or Pacific Island trenches.  It had the amazing feature of undercranking or overcranking depending on the tension of the key-wound spring that drove the clock-like motor.  The downside, of course, was that the speed would change as the tension relaxed.  So it was part of the surprise to find out which of your footage was slo-mo or fast-mo!  Wind ‘er up like a little toy soldier and let her rip off 4 minutes per 100-foot load.  I was in love.

And it was the perfect size.  Palm-size if you had a big palm.  For me, it was hang-glider size.  First chance I got, I gaff taped that solid little tank to the wing of a friend’s prop-powered hang-glider.  It had a wide little lens and I knew I was finally going to share what it was to be a bird.  I wound the key and he took off.  Though watching from below, feet firmly on airport tarmac, I was on-air knowing that I was capturing 4 minutes of freedom.

I had thought about the design of bird wings for most of my life.  But I had never considered bird legs.  Turns out that they are engineered to absorb the shock of landing.  Gaff tape is strong, but part of its beauty is that it can also tear.  I don’t need to say much more.  Just picture glider wheels slamming runway and a little tank of a camera cart-wheeling forever down the tarmac.  And cart-wheeling with the camera was an unraveling spool of sun-exposed film.  A 100-foot ribbon of dreams twisting and swirling into a rat’s nest of nightmare.  The Filmo’s only weak spot was the lock on its magazine door.

Fast forward 30 years.  I was a little more careful with tank number two.  In fact, this time four of us babied it like a newborn.  This new tank is tough, but it’s also ultra-state-of-the-art, ultra-sophisticated, and ultra-high tech.  It doesn’t have a wind-up key.  It doesn’t have a magazine door.  It doesn’t even shoot film!  But the digital images it produces look incredibly like 35mm film.  That’s a good thing after passing through the age of video.

Bill shoots with the RED One, Sunrise at Stanley Lake, ID

The new tank is called the RED ONE.  It’s a digital cinema camera…not a film or video camera…and it’s helping to spark a revolution in the industry.  I’ll let you go to www.red.com/cameras/ for details straight from the maker.

I call it a tank because it’s a serious camera.  There is nothing plastic or prosumer about it.  With professional add-ons like rails, matt boxes, lenses, and monitors, it’s heavy.  You won’t “run and gun” with a fully loaded RED.  But it’s solid, and it seems to have all the engineering of an M1 Abrams.

Wide Eye Productions had the fortune of securing a contract with the State of Idaho to update Idaho tourism promotion assets to meet the mix of marketing opportunities that have exploded with the digital age.  The state wanted the best quality pictures possible to carry into the future, and the RED ONE camera fit the bill.  In rough terms, the RED doubles the resolution of high definition, so these new assets are meant to be viable through the next revolution of the digital age.

A still image from RED One footage - Sunrise at Stanley Lake

Enough technical, let’s get to the fun stuff.  Idaho is a gorgeous and diverse state, and it’s a pretty sweet gig to be chosen to document that beauty.  Tom, Andy, intern Will, and I were all pretty stoked when we set out for the central Sawtooth Mountains and their wealth of surrounding lakes.  A glowing mountain sunset was followed by a misty mountain morning, and we were off to the eastern edge of the state to capture the famous Henry’s Fork of the Snake River for some spectacular evening fly-fishing with a Grand Tetons backdrop.  Add in breathtaking Upper and Lower Mesa Falls and a variety of additional eastern Idaho stops, and you find that you just can’t stop shooting!  And because the RED ONE accepts prime lenses, we could achieve unbelievably shallow depths of field while buried in fields of wildflowers.

A still image from RED One footage - Mesa Falls

It’s a dreamy look that can’t be matched by anything other than expensive film.  It was shallow focus, golden light footage for a week, capping the trip with Shoshone Falls and Bruneau Dunes.  But we couldn’t stop ourselves.  With the RED ONE, we had to swing by Thousand Springs even though it wasn’t on our travel list.  We knew that a canoe in the crystal water that flows past a multitude of shoreline falls would be killer, and we weren’t going to let the chance slip by.  Lucky me!  I got to paddle the canoe while Andy, Will, and Tom manned the RED.

It was a great trip and we achieved great results.  And the good news is, we’re only half done!  Soon we’ll take the modern RED tank to northern Idaho to capture all if its beauty in ultra high definition.  And don’t forget Idaho’s beautiful winters.  I’m praying we get to make the loop when the snow flies too.

In 1980, when I saw that film come spiraling out of the old Bell and Howell “Filmo” tank, I felt a blow in the pit in my stomach that I thought would always linger.  Now I can let it go.  A more modern tank has provided the power to share dramatic images of a state I love.  And I didn’t lose a frame.  It doesn’t get any better than that.

A still from RED One footage - Henry's Fork of the Snake River

A still image from RED One footage - flowers near Grays Lake

Shoshone Falls

One of the first things I appreciated when I entered the motion picture business 20 years ago was the diversity of projects I was allowed to work on, from Pillsbury Dough Boy commercials, to Grateful Dead videos. The small but hip production company I worked for in San Francisco, Colossal (Pictures), had a great variety of unique projects come through their door. In my first year there I had the opportunity to work on a Wim Wenders film, “Until the End of the World”. Though, it was no smash success, one of the things I gleaned from the project was that these opportunities continued to open up new horizons to my experiences in life, and that a thorough exploration of life’s possibilities could be pursued through this profession. With that in mind the craft of film making took on an almost anthropological purpose. I considered the industry as a kind of cultural petrie dish, allowing for a secular study of life through the ubiquitous lens of the medium. God’s eye as it were, but without the politics of ethics.

In the years since I’ve had the opportunity to pursue a rich diversity of experiences through my chosen profession, from making a documentary about sex in Las Vegas with George Bush’s cousin, to working on Star Wars with the esteemed talents at Industrial Light & Magic. The kinds of stories we refer to as “guilty pleasures” when we’re tuned into the box and watching. But what the viewers at home don’t get to experience is the true-to-life inspiration that comes from engaging in the pursuit of these stories we get to tell.

Two jobs comes to mind of late. The first was back in March when our team at Wide Eye received a call from Bob Bates, a producer in LA who was in search of a crew to shoot an interview with renowned primatologist Dr. Jane Goodall for an upcoming women’s conference put on by Maria Shriver. Dr. Goodall was passing through town to promote global consciousness and local action in the name of preservation of our natural resources.  Bob knew that with her busy itinerary he may not have a better chance to sit down with her and speak again this year.  So he came to Boise and hired us to do the shooting.

We entered it into the calendar, and prepared for it in the same way we do all of our shoots. We paid little attention to Dr. Goodall’s celebrity status, and cautioned ourselves against great expectations. So when the day arrived, and the lights were set according to standards her assistant deemed adequate, we were prepared to acquire whatever Bob needed to gather. She only had a half-hour out of her very busy schedule.  We were determined to make Bob’s time with her as efficient as possible.

Dr. Jane Goodall sits down with our crew for an interview

At around 10:30 in the morning Dr. Goodall entered the room we’d set up for her carrying a stuffed monkey she calls,  “Mr. H.”  It’s unusual to see an adult woman carrying around a stuffed animal and at first impression I got the sense that Dr. Goodall, at 75 years old, might be slightly aloof, frail, and have some curious idiosyncrasies. However, when she sat down and began talking, regaling us with stories going back to her childhood, and early adult adventures in Africa, my judgmental sense of her changed to something closer to awe. It is rare in this day and age to hear anyone speak with the sense of conviction, and single minded devotion that Dr. Goodall shared with us. A sense of devotion and purpose that began in her childhood with her fascinations and observations of the animals on her farm. That curiosity and gift for observation lead her to Tanzania where she studied the Gombe chimps and was the first to witness behaviors, tool making, never before seen in species other than humans. For a woman in this male dominated field of study, it was more than just courage that earned her a Ph.D from Cambridge and the privilege to observe these primates. It was the only road she could follow to remain true to her convictions, her curiosities, and her sense of self. And it was her intuitive insight that allowed her to share the remarkable, emotional attributes of these primates. Observations and a sense of humanity rarely allowed in the field of science. Insights she continuously shares today with the global community about sensible topics such as preservation of natural resources. A tender, and sometimes contentious issue, that when confronted squarely as Dr. Goodall and her peers have been able to do, not only promotes healthier habitats, but also builds a consensus of consciousness that leads to better decision making by we humans who share this planet.

I am occasionally fortunate enough to be inspired by the subjects and the people we get to work with, but never before have I felt like applauding the interviewee as I wanted to do when Dr. Goodall was finished speaking with us. Though, the professional in me censored my exuberance, I did have the honor of thanking her when it was all said and done, saying simply, “That was delightful!”

And as for her stuffed chimpanzee, Mr. H has been traveling with Dr. Goodall since 1996, and he’s already been to over 50 countries and has been touched by more than 2 million people. He’s a kind of mascot for change and global awareness as I understand it. And should you want your own Mr. H, his junior can be purchased through the Jane Goodall Institute. A worthwhile investment when you consider that the money is going to help the Institute continue the good work of helping to take care of our planet. I’ll buy that for a dollar, or even $15.

Our CineAlta HD camera crew interviews Sally Maughan, the "bear mama" for a new series appearing on Animal Planet this fall.

It’s tough to compare anyone’s achievements to those of Dr. Goodall, but here in our own community another citizen takes a similar stand for the rights of animals, and she’s been doing so for the past 30 years. Sally Maughan, who runs Idaho Black Bear Rehabilitation, was the recent subject for an Animal Planet shoot here in town, and the good folks from Parthenon Entertainment in England who produce the show selected us as HD camera crew. We’ve had the opportunity to work with Sally in the past, but this was the first time for me to be able to get an in depth look at the remarkable work she’s doing to keep the black bear population healthy and alive throughout the inter-mountain west.

We started our shoot in April, and spent several days at her facility on the west end of town filming a group of 18 month old cubs being moved from pen to pen, and familiarizing themselves with their new surroundings. Tom was able to get closest to the bears with his camera, and at one point appeared to enter into a waltz with one of the little guys. We were also able to spend some quality time with the adorable 3 month old cubs that were penned up in Sally’s small bedroom. Though, it may sound unorthodox, I assure you, these cubs were getting the best of care, and it was out of convenience that Sally kept them close. Who really wants to head out into the cold of night every hour to feed hungry cubs? But for nearly 20 of the last 30 years that’s what Sally has done for her Black Bear friends.

DP Tom Hadzor does a dance with a curious juvenile black bear

The cubs generally come to her orphaned. Either momma bear has died from disease, or she’s been killed by hunters, or vehicular accident. The two 3 month old cubs we got to know appeared on a vets doorstep somewhere in Washington last January. No doubt a den had been raided and someone discovered the truly wild nature of these creatures and decided they’d be better off with professional care.

A pair of cubs at the Idaho Black Bear Rehabilitation Center.

Sally does the bottle feeding so they only identify with her as their foster mother.  I jokingly asked her if she had a bear costume, and she alluded to the fact that there have been times when it’s come in handy. With or without the costume, Sally looks the part. She’s short and well grounded the way a momma black bear might be. And she’s tough as nails, so it’s smart to stay on her good side.

She makes a point of keeping the bears as wild as when they arrived. She talks with them, but leaves them to their own devices throughout the day, monitoring them from a distance on closed circuit TV to insure they’re in good health. They eat a steady diet of dog food, apples, carrots and lettuce fed to them daily by John, a gentle guy fashioned as a goth punk rocker who is Sally’s main assistant.

They are kept healthy, monitored, and treated by Veterinarian Tim Murphy. And when it comes time to send them back to the wilds from whence they came, they’re off on the back of a flat bed truck in solid steel bear cages, chauffeured by fellow bear lovers, Terri and Larry Limberg.

This past week we were able to hook up with Sally’s bears again and head over to Washington to film their release. Sally has a great success rate with her bears, few rarely entering back into the folds of the human population. But to guarantee further success, the Washington Fish and Wildlife service maintains a consistent policy of making the bears last experience with humans the worst of their young lives. Tough love they call it, and upon release the bears are chased into the heart of the national forest by barking Karelian Bear Dogs with Fish and Wildlife officers firing blanks from their shotguns to scare them off. It appears at first to be almost a wild west show, but I’m sure it’s just the sort of “tough love” the bears need to keep them at a safe distance from human population.

As I look ahead at our calendar of events, it’s hard telling what sorts of adventures await us, but I can be assured it’ll likely be something different and unique, offering us a broad scope of experiences. And should we be lucky enough to work again with people as dedicated and caring as Sally Maughan and Dr. Jane Goodall, we can count ourselves as fortunate.

April 20th, 2009 The Idaho Advertising Federation held its annual Rocky Awards this weekend and Wide Eye Productions popped up several times.    In the Complete Campaign category our productions for the Avimor 2008 campaign, executed by Stoltz Marketing Group, contributed to a Silver Rocky.   Wide Eye Productions produced, shot and edited two long-form pieces for the Avimor campaign:  the Avimor sales video, and a three panel, high definition digital signage production for the Avimor sales office.   Thanks to Stoltz for giving us the opportunity to contribute to your success!

Also, in the Intereactive/Multimedia category, www.wideeye.tv was awarded a Silver Rocky. Yes, this very website you are now perusing is precious metal caliber!!  Balihoo Creative produced the site.  We, too, want to recognize and thank all the talented folks at Balihoo for their outstanding work:

Wide Eye Productions, Website
Concept:  Nicolet Laursen
Copy:  Jennifer Isenhart
Art Director:  Mel Mansfield
Photographer:  Wide Eye Productions
Production:  Nicolet Laursen

Visit the Idaho Ad Federation website for a complete list of 2009 Rocky Awards.

For some folks, the Wide Eye slogan takes a little explaining, for others, it’s just one more perk when you work with us.

In Fall of 2006, Wide Eye Productions Boise moved into our current office on Hays Street near downtown.  It’s a great old sandstone Victorian that, when we bought it, was in need of a lot of attention.  It had been a residential rental for 15 or more years.  From the look of things, the former landlord who lived far away in Oregon didn’t really care much about upkeep.

Wide Eye Productions, Boise

We bought the place in August and spent three months mostly cleaning, painting and refinishing floors, but also updating the wiring, installing data lines throughout the building and creating a server room for our media drives.  By November, the conversion to a modern video production facility with three state-of-the-art Final Cut Pro HD edit suites was complete and the building ready for our business.

One of the great things about placing a production office in an historic home is, well, the charm of the place.  We like to call it the ‘home office’ because it feels so comfortable.  That’s why it just made sense when Andy Lawless offered to bring down his custom-made keg-o-rator and add it to the long list of great reasons to work at Wide Eye.

The Keg-o-rator

At first glance, it’s not much to look at.  But stick around awhile (better yet, do a project with us) and you’ll soon appreciate the beauty of the dull brown old dorm fridge that now flows with freshly tapped micro-brews from the local brew pubs.   Since day one, we’ve (mostly) kept the keg full with everything from Table Rock Winter Cheer to Highlands Hollow Fiegwild.

So if you’re in need of some top notch production topped off with a frosty cold one– well, you’ve come to the right place.  And if you’re driving by on a summer Friday afternoon, you may just spot our entire television production team out on the front porch of the home office, sunning ourselves and enjoying the refreshing rewards of a well chosen career.

Andy Lawless returns from his seven week journey to Indonesia, documenting an archaeology dig in the Spice Islands for the project, “Life of Ruins”.

The ferry boat Kepal Taman Pelita

We are finished, at the end of the long haul home. We left Banda Sunday night March 8th aboard the Kapal Taman Pelita, a small passenger ferry with accommodations reminiscent of a slave ship. 100 humans stacked in a 12 x 18 two layer cabin, spread out on mats and cardboard. A few of us found greater comfort in the bow of the ship laying upon stacks of green bananas or in the small kole-kole (canoe) nestled among the bananas. There we drank some mansion house whiskey, smoked cigarettes for warmth, and adjusted our posture every minute or so, hoping to find some kind of comfort. Following the moon westward across the Banda Sea we made our way to Ambon. Within several minutes after leaving Banda, the waves of the Banda Sea were doing there work on our crew.

Tight quarters inside the Taman Pelita ferry boat

Most everyone sequestered among the slave quarters found themselves offering up their breakfast, lunch and dinner to the sea gods. One by one I could see them make their way to the rail, except for one student who awoke in a terrible shock at the rumbling of her innards and let the contents of her stomach fly into the lap of Laura, who somehow retained composure throughout. Amazingly by light of dawn, 14 hours into the journey, one hour from Ambon, all were smiles. Hell of a crew!

After 2 nights in Ambon packing and sorting the last of the artifacts we departed. Some of us flew off to Bali, others back home to Jogjakarta, while Peter and Emily worked out the details of bureaucracy and exit visas in Jakarta. On all of our minds was our unfortunate comrade, Sarah, already back in the States, hopefully experiencing restored vision to her infected eye.

Andy shoots above the harbor at Pulau Run

Now home again, it all seems a bit like a beautiful dream. Hard for the work, but pure from the sweat and the laughter. It is hard to say when we’ll have the chance to pass that way again, but already the distillation of the memories is building a life of its own that will surely pull us to those verdant shores again.

The archaeology was a great success. The bonds we formed on the expedition are the sort that we’ll carry through our lives. Many thanks to everyone for your help in the video and photographic efforts. Though the hard work of editing the content of our creation is yet to come, the elements of a delightful journal on the beautiful Banda Islands is ‘in the can’ as they say. I look forward to stitching together our story, “Life of Ruins” and sharing it with you all in the months to come.

Students gather around one of the dig sites in the Banda Islands

Sampai kita bertemu lagi, Selamat Hidup! Until we meet again, blessing on your life!

Banda Archaeology