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The Editors Mailbox

Behind the scenes at a video workshop

Matthew Kenney, senior editor

4 users recommend

Another bench! But it's not a workbench. This was a fun project. Look for it to appear as a video workshop soon.

Matt Kenney

Lights, Camera, Mess. Shooting my latest video workshop in my own shop forced me to paint the walls and ceiling, and to give it a thorough cleaning. Of course, it was messy within 10 minutes of starting the shoot.

Gina Eide

The big payoff. Once nice thing about the video shoots is that someone other than me cleans my shop! Here it's videographer/producer Gary Junken.

Matt Kenney

Another bench! But it's not a workbench. This was a fun project. Look for it to appear as a video workshop soon.

Photo: Matt Kenney

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I've got a great job. I meet a lot of woodworkers, see a lot of beautiful furniture, and occassionally get to make a piece of furniture that shows up in the magazine (I made the aspen cabinet in this article). I had a fantastic time making my workbench for the video workshop series. In fact, I had such a good time that I agreed to do another video workshop. This time, I'm making a garden bench in Sipo (a cousin to mahogany that grows in Africa). The video workshop will premier on the website July 30, 2009.

But there is a lot of hard work. When things go well, it takes a few months to go from article proposal to print ready article. When things go less well, I've got only a few weeks to get it all done. And the video workshops are demanding. They require a lot of late nights and weekends in the shop, working under a tight deadline (I know many of you have this on a regular basis). And then there's the actual filming of the workshop. Building a piece of furniture while filming a video is tough. Not only do you need to keep track of what your making, you also need to keep track of what you're saying. And sometimes even when you nail it on the first take, the producer will make you do it a few more times, just in case (Thanks Gina!). Add to this the fact that many shooting days run 10 hours or more and you've got some exhausting work.

But the hardest part of making a video workshop is figuring out exactly what should be included and what shouldn't. Thankfully, web producer Gina Eide and videographer Gary Junken really know what they're doing. Even so, there's a lot of stopping and starting, talking and thinking. In the end, though, I think it all pays off. The workbench video series was really well done thanks to Gina and Gary's work (and the great work of Michael D., one of our video editors). I expect this new video workshop to be just as good. So give it a watch.

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Comments (1)

Tom writes: Yup, we have a great video staff. I can attest to the fact that the producers make the talent work really hard... But it's worth the effort, for sure.
Posted: 11:57 am on July 16th

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