Unused Dining Commons Video

This is an unused video for a dining commons on Penn State main campus that I had pitched to my client in late 2010.


The previous concept was to use a popular chef from the dining common and to give him the Jib Jab treatment as he made puns about eating at the common.

Given the assignment I was told we needed to keep the previously recorded audio track of Stew, the popular chef from the dining common, but that I was allowed to update the concept. I choose to switch from a Jib Jab style to the use of a puppet.

Working with a puppet had a lot of challenges, mostly in syncing the old audio to match the puppets mouth. The solution I was hoping for was to record both puppet movements and a new audio track at the same time but was told keeping the old project audio was a must.

Given the limitations I was very pleased with the way the video turned out. Although the concept was approved internally, it was eventually dropped from the project and replaced by a more traditional tour concept.

NACUFS wrapped

Last week I wrapped on shooting the NACUFS footage and while I wait on customer approval here's one more look at it.

NACUFS Invitation Continued

Here's a look at a few more stills from my current project.

NACUFS Invitation

My current project at work is an invitation for next years NACUFS conference being held at Penn State. The concept comes from the California Tourism commercials.

New Banner - Process

Before I began working on a new banner, I had to decide on an image that would reflect my work and the personality of my work and thought process.

Towards the end of August I had done a small animation to learn After Effects. The result was an animation of a bird astronaut climbing into the mouth of a human astronaut and flying the astronaut head towards a distant planet. My favorite shot that I had worked on was a close up of the bird in his helmet flying towards the surface of the planet, with the surface being reflected on his vizor as he got closer.

Knowing this was my image I brought it into Photoshop added text and began to play.




My first banner was the basic set up. Bringing in my elements to understand how they would play together.



Having converted the image to black and white, I began laying the text over the image. This resulted in the look of cutting the letters out of the bird image.



I then used the text as a cut out, removing it from the image and laying the image textured text to the right of the bird. I achieved the look I had hoped for but didn't care for the repetition of my name.



I reversed the cut out to make a mirrored image of my name, creating a more interesting interplay between the image and the text.

Return of the Blog

It's about that time when I make my glorious return to the interwebs and begin posting current, future and past projects. I'll also be posting anything that inspires me, whether it's print, web or video.

So enjoy the new banner and keep checking back to the blog for more images and videos.

-aumantm