Authors

Animation sneak peek from the Authors team that highlights themes of collaboration, partnership and what it means to be in sync...some of our most important core company tenets. Check back next week to see it all come together.

The Kentucky Rural-Urban Exchange (RUX) is a creative leadership program designed to build confidence, grow social capital, and bridge divides to unite Kentuckians. Featured in CityLab, NPR’s 1A, the Christian Science Monitor, and ArtPlace AMERICA, RUX has become a national model for rural-urban interdependence. This year for Kentucky Gives Day - a statewide nonprofit fundraising event - the RUX Steering Committee felt uncomfortable asking people to donate during a time of ...uncertainty. So instead, they created a campaign to #HUGKY - Help Us Grow Kentucky. We made a short animation to aid their campaign that we hope inspires a smile and hugs across the state!

Are you finding that your connections are more genuine - and maybe even more creative - in quarantine? Authors animation Jedi, Jon-Paul Passalacqua, dug into this topic in our latest project. Stay tuned - project files coming soon! #stayconnected #yousunkmybattleship With - Chris Zachary and Ryan Berkey

Hi everyone. I miss you. I miss friends, family, co-workers, and clients. I miss occupying space together, standing shoulder to shoulder with my team on a video call so we all fit on the screen. I miss laughing together. I miss hugs. We’ve struggled to put something out there since the world turned upside down. How do we figure out the best way to market ourselves in this new era of existence? How do we talk about ourselves when everything is different? Do we stay silent and ...ride things out, or risk coming off as tone-deaf or being one of the endless emails from companies you didn’t know had your address before now? A bright spot during this time has been the news that we won a silver SF Addy for Spark AR featuring Johanna Jaskowska. We asked our editor Dana to cut together a quick promo for social. But what she saw in the footage this time around was completely different. She saw moments between Johanna and her friends that felt more powerful and poignant in a time of social distancing. It reminded me how much I just want to tell people I miss them and how much I miss the connection and electricity of touch. So here it is. A profound but ordinary peek into the power of friendship. We’re proud of winning an Addy, but we’re prouder of the work we create together and the relationships we’ve built with you. We’re here now, and we’ll still be here when this is over. I'm looking forward to the day we can be together again, laugh, fist bump, shake hands, and hug. Lots of hugs! With love from all of us at Authors, Ryan

Meet Author's newest star hire, Dana Laman. Dana is an accomplished Video Editor who, while technically a "new" employee, has been part of Authors' family since 2018 when she joined our Freelance team. Her work on Shutterfly and our Spark AR case studies (imagine taking hours of footage down to a 90 second feature) was so stellar, that we decided to make it permanent, and she has since seamlessly blended into our growing team. Dana comes from a diverse editorial background th...at includes documentary films screened in festivals around the country. Her favorite kind of projects to work on are observational portraits of delightful and surprising subjects. We are currently keeping Dana busy on short doc work for Facebook, and she will soon help us tackle a project for Microsoft. When Dana isn't working on Author's projects, you can find her editing two different feature documentaries. The first, called Dog Walk Home - https://dogwalkhomefilm.com/, spotlights the experiences of PTSD service dogs and military veterans, and the second features the 1990 International Trans-Antarctica Expedition; the longest ever dogsled traverse of Antarctica led by National Geographic polar explorer and climate change activist, Will Steger - www.afterantarctica.com. Welcome, Dana!

Congratulations to our very own Taylor Killough for making Louisville Magazine's 13 Best Stories from 2019 list for her (amazing!) feature, "Checking in on Chuck."

Our creative team is getting in the spirit! Can you guess which one of these characters will be in our Authors holiday card? Stay tuned...

We really enjoyed producing this video for Facebook highlighting key moments from their 2019 Flow by Workplace Global Leadership Summit. The nature of work is changing. As a distributed team, we know the importance of good company communication and how complicated it can be when your coworkers are all across the world. Flow 2019 brought together visionaries, founders and leading executives to share how Workplace by Facebook has empowered their teams to do their best work, and communicate clearly and efficiently, wherever they're located. - - - Director: Authors' Ross Thomas, Producer: Scott Wickman, AC: Dean Snodgrass, DP: Tyler McPherron

School of Motion recently gave Authors' Lead Creative, Chris Zachary, a nice shout out for his responsive grid setup that he created in After Effects. If you want to try it out for yourself, you can download the free project file at gum.co/acdtg.

We were happy to recently reconnect with filmmaker and producer, Mahesh Madhav. @madhavmj worked with us on our Intel "Davinci Meets Iris" project, which you can watch here https://authorsprojects.com/#/davinci-meets-iris/ and is currently a finalist in the New York Film Awards for his documentary @HowToBendConcrete. When asked in his interview to name 3 collaborators that he'd take with him to any other project, he gave an amazing shout out to Author's co-founder, Ros...s Thomas! Scroll down to read the segment. Let's just say he made Ross blush. Thanks, Mahesh and congratulations on this incredible recognition of your work! . . . . . . "Ross Thomas is a director and producer living in San Francisco, working for the Authors Projects. I had the privilege of being the talent on a corporate storytelling piece he directed. That project was my first exposure to professional video production, and Ross set the bar quite high indeed. I observed Ross organize and put together treatment in prep, and block out all the shots for the story. I experienced his directorial ability first-hand when he put me at ease and interacted with me as a friend would while having coffee. I didn’t even realize I was being directed, and Ross’ DP was able to capture the perfect sequence! After I got fooled once, I began to watch him closely to learn as much about directing as I could, right there on-set with the other on-camera talent. Ross’ involvement didn’t end with production; he was quite influential in post-production and I experienced how a director sees a project through to completion and delivery, ensuring their vision is manifested fully in the final product. In my few forays into the director’s chair, I try to embody what I learned through observing Ross, and attempt to exude his friendly demeanor to the people I direct to achieve authentic and natural performances." See more

We are finally coming down from that #blendfest19 high, and are putting some of our key takeaways to work. Keep reading for more... 1. Projects no longer have one 16x9 video as a deliverable. Producing social cuts, reframed versions, and alternate media assets can be a smart way to up-sell to create more value for clients and for your business. 2. We all do projects that won’t make it in the portfolio. Instead of viewing this as wasted time, find a way to learn new tech...niques or refine your processes. It’s only a waste if you make it a waste. 3. Looking to Behance, IG, and Vimeo can lead to recycling the same styles. Look for inspiration by immersing yourself in other arts, nature, history, books, movies or other things outside of the internet. Non-derivative inspiration brings interesting and fresh results. 4. Into the Spider-Verse was more than an artistic phenomenon. Every animation and design decision was driven by individual character psychology and the overall story of the movie. By applying the same thinking to client work, our storytelling value will increase. Technique for technique’s sake can make for some flashy but boring media. 5. Blend #blendfest #top5 #creativedesign #process #inspiration

Back to work after two great days at Blend 2019. The #Blendfest19 community was incredibly inspiring (more on that later) but even better was the time we got to spend together as a team reflecting on our work and collaborating about the future of Authors. We will be sharing some exciting brand related news in the coming weeks...stay tuned! #ooto #blendfest #authorsprojects

Breaking bread with one another creates and empowers community. When designing the new look for The Big Table 502, we went through multiple iterations of how we represent people and food. Are the people holding food? Do we make food look like people? Are the people made of food?