It’s almost close to 30 years now that I’ve been involved with local media from my hometown in Kingsport and yesterday was a well-rounded day as the multi-tasking reached a new landmark. By the end of the day, I had created a newspaper ad for The Kingsport Times-News, recorded a radio commercial for WQUT and WRZK, shot digital video for a client for the web and created a new Internet site – all in an eight hour day from my desktop computer.
That’s a good thing I guess for a media junkie like me, but it was also a testament to how far the tools (hardware and software) have come as all of this work was accomplished from the desktop computer in my office.
I got in the office early and had to record a new radio commercial for the upcoming GoTriCities Sunset Rock Showcase. I used my Mac G5, Garageband, a small mixer and a microphone to layer three soundtracks. I created a 30 second commercial in about an hour and emailed the mp3 file to the radio station before 10am. From there, I modified a half-page process color advertisement using InDesign and Photoshop and made a PDF and emailed it to The Kingsport Times-News.
After lunch, I came back to modify a new video for Mike Faulk using a Canon Mini DV camera, Imovie and Flash to create a nice little file that looks pretty good and before the end of the day, all of this material was on the Internet ready to publish for the world.
I guess its come full circle now and my media ego was thrilled to think how easy this has become. You still gotta have the know-how, but it’s all there for those who want to find out more.
Here’s a copy of the new radio commercial for the SunSet Rock Series. I’m no longer a DJ, but I still have fun playing with the toys.