Video, Motion Graphics and Animation

Video Direction, Editing, and Animation

I first dabbled with video editing during what I'd call "the AMV era," when people were editing animes and video game cut scenes to go with songs. My first full-length anime music video was the song "It's the End of the World as we Know It (and I Feel Fine)" by REM with cut scenes I took off of the Windows 95 discs for Final Fantasy VII on a Windows XP computer. I don't remember how I figured out how to rip all those cut scenes off the game disc like that, but I do remember the song being a bit ironic but also perfect for the plot to that game!

I also learned more "serious" film making using 8mm black and white film stock and ideas inspired by German Expressionist and Surrealist movies from the early 20th century! However, I was encouraged more towards being in front of the camera instead of working in production roles, even when I was taking classes on how to use the camera. I joined SAG-AFTRA because this came so naturally to me.

Ironically, the film sets closing in NYC in 2020 indirectly lead to me getting more into the behind-the-camera side of things again while reinventing my career, and I felt like I had never left off on the things I originally played around with in Windows Movie Maker-- except now I had much more sophisticated tools to work with, and more consistent output!

I am Proud

This is a video I made for the Student Success Center at Southeast Technical College. It's a digitized, animated version of notes that people write about their academic, professional, and personal achievements.

They Came from the Kitchen Sink

The concept for this video was a day in the life of an inanimate object. I chose a pair of Halloween-themed salad forks that I found at a dollar store to make an Addams Family-inspired campy horror comedy short. At the beginning of the video, there's a thumping noise-- that is from one of the first recordings ever made.

Reel Life

Low-budget reality show parody (like that doesn't already describe the entire genre-- it tends to be a parody of itself!)

The Dashing Pirate

An exclusive interview with Sioux Falls' local legend, the Dashing Pirate! It be an arrrrrr-rated film, matey!

Just a Shadow

Lyric video of a section of the song "Just a Shadow" by Big Country. This video is one of my first experiements with using AI images. I found the AI results to be less beautiful than what I would have drawn or painted myself, but also very eerie in an uncanny valley way. I ended up liking the "uncanny valley" effect so much that I integrated a lot of AI use into my art installation "Out of Lockstep."

Kinetic Typography- Featuring Jay Bhattacharya

Dr. Jay Bhattacharya is an interesting subject to me because he was portrayed as so unhinged and "dangerous" in 2020-2022, but when I met him in person, he not only sounded level-headed, he had a very warm personality. He said things that were difficult to hear but resonated with my own life experiences.