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I'm trying something new over on CHS.  I'm currently working on a story for them about the closure of Bailey Coy and the future of Bookstores in general in Capitol Hill and beyond.  Instead of just collecting all the interviews and b-roll and then editing it down to a 5-10 minute feature to show publicly... I'm going to be putting almost all of the content on CHS as I shoot it.  I put up my interview with owner Michael Wells a couple weeks ago, and I just put up some interviews and footage I shot at the wake last night.  I have some more interviews and shoots to go, which I'll also be posting, then eventually I'll be editing it together into a traditional longer form piece. Why am I doing this?  Well for one, putting together a video feature takes a lot a long time, but the blog format of CHS favors fast turnaround, short and to the point content.  Lately I've been kind of struggling to answer the question... Am I documentary director, or a video journalist?  I guess if I'm asking the question I must be somewhere in between.  So doing this kind of 'open reporting' allows me to be a part of the real-time journalistic conversation, but also lets me make the longer form, higher production value documentary shorts that I really love doing.  Also, with documentaries, there ends up being a ton of content that doesn't make the cut and is usually never seen.  This is a way of getting all that content out there for those that really want to get deeper into the subject. Posting the content like this will give viewers the chance to follow along with the story as I'm developing it, and I'm hoping that'll allow them to contribute ideas that can make it into the final documentary.   I'm hoping that viewers might suggest additional interviews to conduct, questions to ask, or even new ideas that could take the story in a whole new direction.

Some exciting news on the CHS front, we got our first CHS-V advertiser!  Healeo has been advertising on CHS for a while now, but they've decided to move their advertising specifically to my video series there. CHS-V is already building (and engaging) an audience by delivering timely, ground level video journalism and documentary-shorts focused on Capitol Hill.  I know that Capitol Hill is an attractive market for advertisers, so if hyperlocal ad-supported online video can work anywhere, it's here.  For ad supported video to work, obviously, I'm going to need to get views.  In this case that will often mean attracting viewers beyond just this neighborhood, and even beyond Seattle.  Lucky for me, Seattle and Capitol Hill specifically are centers for innovation and creative minded people, so I know finding topics with wide appeal won't be a problem.  Past episodes of CHS-V have already been featured on national and international blogs, and are regularly featured on various city-wide blogs, and even film festivals.  Any ad messages would be carried through all theses mediums. I'm still trying to figure out the best way to integrate the ads into the video. The only thing I know is, I DO NOT want pre-roll ads before every video.  If I'm not that interested in the video, pre-roll ads can be a deal breaker, and I'm sure I'm not the only one who feels that way.  This is my first shot at integrating ads into my work so I'm sure there'll be some trial and error but I'm hopeful that we can make this work. Below is the first video with the 'presented by Healeo' post-roll at the end.  Tomorrow, I plan on testing out a more prominent (but hopefully not intrusive) ad placement.