I am originally from Delaware, Ohio. I attended high school there, graduating from Buckeye Valley High School in 2010. I spent the following two years attending Ohio University as a Video Production major. In the spring of 2012, I would transfer and begin to attend The Ohio State University, where I would obtain my bachelor’s degree as a Film Studies major, with a special focus in Video Production.
During my time at Ohio State I would acquire a great deal of multimedia work experience. For three years I was employed by the College of Education and Human Ecology as a Student Multimedia Assistant for the Office of Educational Technology. My duties for this position consisted of the following:
– Using professional Canon and Sony camcorders, DSLR’s, and lapel microphones, to record live events such as guest lecturers and musical performances.
– Creating original content for the Office of Educational Technology, including commercials for study spaces they hosted, and video tutorials to be used as resources by students in college.
– Photographing faculty and staff for profile photos, and cleaning them up in Photoshop.
– Assisting teachers and students in editing and exporting their video projects.
– Transcribing, and captioning videos as a resource for the hearing impaired.
– Uploading videos to YouTube, and managing the overall quality of the YouTube site.
Over the past few years I’ve been dedicating a great deal of my personal time to producing video projects and further developing my skills through experience. The bulk of these experiences came in the form of live event recordings, primarily musical acts. My partner, Markus Kelley, and I would set up and shoot with as many cameras as we could operate, so as to give the finished product a more professional feel. Initially, I would sync the clips together by hand, but soon the multicam feature in Premiere Pro CC would make it possible to sync using audio automatically, streamlining the sync process. I’ve now used this method on multiple projects including:
– A 2-hour benefit concert at Marysville High School for a student with Leukemia.
– A 2-hour Agatha Christie high school play at Buckeye Valley high school.
– 20+ videos of musician performances done as freelance work for Now It’s Dark Magazine, a free publication that details Columbus nightlife.
– Multiple shows and a full album release party for singer/musician Morgan Treni.
– Various shows for local bands, including Friendly Faux and Coya Hill.
In addition to the experience I gained orchestrating multicam, live event recordings, I’ve gained experience producing other types of video as well.
During my time working for the Office of Educational Technology, I was the only student worker assigned with the responsibility of producing original video content. I would create two commercials to advertise for a study space our office oversees (an original and an updated version two years later), and two video tutorials for education students, one on how to use the Canon Vixia to record professional video, and another explaining how the first was made, detailing the storyboarding and scriptwriting process to demonstrate the importance of pre-production.
Obviously, being a Film Studies major, movies have always been a passion of mine. For the past three years, I have been a member of the Mid Ohio Filmmakers Association. Each year my partner and I have participated in at least one of their shootout contests. Last Summer, my short film “The Ballad of Thaniel Thornchild” would win “Best Cinematography” for the 3 Days of Comedy Chaos contest. Since our production crew only consisted of the actors and the man behind the camera, and I did all the editing myself, I’m extremely proud of the honor. What we lacked in manpower, we made up for with resourcefulness and creativity.
Michael Garrett Media 