Chris Northcross Video Portfolio

A video I shot and edited for Detroit Public Radio’s...

Thu, 20 Dec 2012 11:30:00 -0500

A video I shot and edited for Detroit Public Radio’s series “Crossing The Lines.”

Edited with Final Cut Pro & Motion. Shot in 720p with a JVC GY HM100u camera.

Had some free time while visiting some friends in Chicago and...

Fri, 22 Jun 2012 07:57:01 -0400

Had some free time while visiting some friends in Chicago and came up with this fun little piece. I got a chance to explore two things that I haven’t used much historically in my work: MSG generators in Synthetik Studio Artist and Text as characters.

Not quite sure what I expected going in - I started with a blank slate, but I had fun making this and absolutely loved the music (Eclectek’s ‘Bonsai Intro’).

Second video I shot and edited for WDET’s website. This...

Fri, 06 Jan 2012 22:31:00 -0500

Second video I shot and edited for WDET’s website. This one was used to highlight the Music Head program the station puts on a few times a year.

(Edited on Final Cut Pro)

Fun little video I did for WDET following their recent pledge...

Sun, 06 Nov 2011 22:07:00 -0500

Fun little video I did for WDET following their recent pledge drive.

(edited on Final Cut Pro)

I frequently work with Synthetik Studio Artist which can best be...

Sun, 23 Jan 2011 00:00:00 -0500

I frequently work with Synthetik Studio Artist which can best be described as a visual synthesizer (somewhat analogous to the audio synthesizers musicians work with). Its an excellent platform for just experimenting and mucking up images and videos.

This particular piece came about from playing around with a rather pedestrian shot of a fish swimming along, minding its own business somewhere in the ocean.

My Favorite Neocon This is an excerpt from a film I’ve...

Wed, 01 Sep 2010 17:31:00 -0400

My Favorite Neocon

This is an excerpt from a film I’ve been editing called “My Favorite Neocon”. The director, Yael Luttwak, has been estranged from her father Edward for nearly 10 years.

They’re diametrically opposed idealogically- she is very liberal while he is noted as one of the more influential neoconservative writers during the 80’s & 90’s. Yael made the film as a way to attempt to understand and reconcile with her father and offered me a chance to work with her on my first feature.

In this scene, Edward visits a television studio to participate in an interview with Italian television (he speaks at least 6 different languages!) about the (then) upcoming American Presidential election.

This was a fun, but challenging project as it was shot in 3 different formats (1080i 29.97 HD, PAL - SD and NTSC 24p on three different cameras. Because of budget constraints, we didn’t have a assistant either. But the subject matter and the characters were really interesting and Yael was a great director to work with. Very positive learning experience for me.

(Edited on Final Cut Pro)

Luna I’m a big fan of ‘gunked up’...

Tue, 16 Mar 2010 16:15:00 -0400

Luna

I’m a big fan of ‘gunked up’ video—that is video that’s been processed in some way—usually radically. Eye candy of a sort. This particularly piece came about from footage of a slightly nervous young woman that I was interviewing. The raw footage was interesting but I think its somewhat hypnotic here.

(Created with Sythetik Studio Artist and Final Cut Pro)

Barbershop Shot during the 2007 primary season,...

Thu, 04 Mar 2010 13:59:00 -0500

Barbershop

Shot during the 2007 primary season, “Barbershop” was originally supposed to be a quick re-cap of an ‘Off The Record’ visit to a supporter’s shop in South Carolina. Senator Obama stopped in, met with supporters inside and then got back into the motorcade to head to his next event.

Due to time constraints, I wasn’t able to grab all of the footage I wanted but was able to go back the next day to shoot follow ups with Emerson Hunt, the shop’s owner. He offered up nothing but gold.

(Shot on Panasonic HVX200 and edited on Final Cut Pro)

Last Days of the Harlequin I’d worked around with the...

Mon, 01 Mar 2010 16:21:00 -0500

Last Days of the Harlequin

I’d worked around with the aesthetic look in Synthetik Studio Artist and when I applied it to President Bush’s farewell press conference I noticed an interesting effect—a harlequin like mask as he steps towards the podium.

Never one to look a gift horse in the mouth, I added music by the artist jiljax (through use of a creative commons license), played around with the timing, and arrived with this clip.

(Created with Synthetik Studio Artist and Final Cut Pro)

Wow! That’s Spooky! Lack of sleep promises to take you to...

Mon, 01 Mar 2010 13:50:00 -0500

Wow! That’s Spooky!

Lack of sleep promises to take you to very strange places as this video helps to highlight. I made Wow! That’s Spooky! with some friends for a 24 hour film festival in Chicago. We were given a theme (slumber party), a couple of elements that we had to include in the film and 24 hours to write, shoot, edit (and in our case, composite and animate) the whole film. Fortunately, our team was made up mostly of co-workers and we’d worked before on projects together in the past.

We wound up needing every advantage we could come up with as we got started an hour late and took a bit to come up with a plan of action. Some bleary twenty hours later, Wow! That’s Spooky! as born. It was received well by the audience and the judges wound up giving it the top award at the festival.

(Edited on Final Cut Pro and composited with After Effects)

Virg Bernero Announcement Video Mayor Bernero planned on...

Mon, 08 Feb 2010 14:26:00 -0500

Virg Bernero Announcement Video

Mayor Bernero planned on entering the Michigan gubernatorial race and needed to create a video to communicate with supporters, donors and the media both his intentions and reasons for running.

(Shot on Panasonic HVX200, edited on Final Cut Pro)

Jay-Z In Detroit Hip Hop Icon and entrepreneur Jay-Z hosted a...

Mon, 01 Feb 2010 12:02:00 -0500

Jay-Z In Detroit

Hip Hop Icon and entrepreneur Jay-Z hosted a rally in Detroit to help motivate voters to register before the deadline. We shot backstage and out in the crowd to cover it.

One of the obstacles of shooting the event was that video cameras were only allowed to record the first two minutes of the first four songs of the concert. To compensate, our team planted still photographers to shoot as many photos of the participants as possible. The result wound up being somewhat unconventional but effective.

(shot on Panasonic DVX100, Sony DCR HC28 handycam and Cannon Rebel D-SLR and edited with Final Cut Pro)

Forrest Whittaker In Detroit Actor Forrest Whittaker stopped...

Mon, 11 Jan 2010 17:53:00 -0500

Forrest Whittaker In Detroit

Actor Forrest Whittaker stopped into Obama’s Michigan campaign headquarters to meet with and motivate volunteers less than a month away from election day.

My favorite moment occurs around 48 seconds in. Mr. Whittaker has his arms out as he’s smiling at the camera. I was shooting him as he walked down a hall and as I was walking backwards, had no vision of the way behind me. In mid-sentence, I smacked into a wall. Hard. Mr. Whittaker took a half a second to smile and re-orient me and then, like the consummate professional he is, continued on with his impromptu speech.

(Shot on Panasonic DVX100 camera and edited with Final Cut Pro)

Obama’s 2002 Speech Against The War, Delivered By...

Fri, 08 Jan 2010 14:00:00 -0500

Obama’s 2002 Speech Against The War, Delivered By Supporters

On the 5 year anniversary of Barack Obama’s speech against the Iraq war, the campaign wanted to do a video that highlighted it. The only problem was only one partial clip of the speech existed.

The solution: film volunteers from around the country as they read portions of the speech and then combine them together to re-create the original speech. A fun, challenging project.

(Shot on Panasonic HVX200 and edited on Final Cut Pro)

This video was produced for the House Democratic Caucus. Sam...

Tue, 05 Jan 2010 23:28:00 -0500

This video was produced for the House Democratic Caucus. Sam Waterston visited the Capitol to promote the Fair Elections Act and sat down with me to talk about it. He wound up being one of the most gentle and charming celebrities I’ve ever had the pleasure of working with.

(shot with a canon XH-1A camera and edited with Premiere Pro)

Congressman Larson Speaks This video was one of a series of...

Tue, 05 Jan 2010 15:23:00 -0500

Congressman Larson Speaks

This video was one of a series of videos created for Congressman John Larson (CT). Three videos were shot and released on a weekly basis over the summer recess to allow the congressman to continue to update his constituents on the issues he felt were most pressing and top priorities on his agenda.

(shot on Canon XH-A1 camera and edited with Premiere Pro and After Effects).

John Melvin: Iraq Veteran I met John Melvin after he’d...

Mon, 04 Jan 2010 19:18:00 -0500

John Melvin: Iraq Veteran

I met John Melvin after he’d introduced former Carter administration National Security Advisor Zbigniew Brzezinski at a Obama campaign event in Clinton, IA. He was a veteran of the second Iraq war and had a jovial quality that I felt would transfer over to video well. I scheduled an interview with him the next day and came up with this video.

(Shot on Panasonic HVX200)

Covenant A 30 second spot created to highlight the book...

Fri, 01 Jan 2010 19:45:00 -0500

Covenant

A 30 second spot created to highlight the book “Covenant With Black America”. The spot started out as a raw shot of Mr. Glover on a green screen and it developed from there.

(Created with Final Cut Pro, After Effects and Photoshop)

Voter Registration: The Struggle in Mississippi This was another...

Fri, 01 Jan 2010 17:34:00 -0500

Voter Registration: The Struggle in Mississippi

This was another video that wound up becoming much more than it was initially planned. My partner Kate and I traveled to see Ms. Hilda Louise Casin in McComb, MS. Kate learned that Ms. Casin had created a museum—a shrine of sorts—to celebrate the accomplishments of african americans in Mississippi and across the country and we were going to interview her as to why she’d decided to do that.

Upon our arrival, we found out that Ms. Casin had invited an number of her friends and family over to meet with us. The interview took on the form of an informal discussion about the history of the neighborhood, the civil rights struggle (which all of the participants had lived through first hand) and the importance of Barack Obama and the upcoming election to them.

One of the most fascinating off-candidate shoots I participated in. It served as a touchstone for me later on when days seemed to roll into each other as to why the work I and my colleagues were doing was so amazingly important.

(Shot on Panasonic HVX200)

Word On The Street Shot three days after the announcement tour...

Fri, 01 Jan 2010 14:25:00 -0500

Word On The Street

Shot three days after the announcement tour started in Springfield. One of the objectives the campaign had early on was to establish Barack Obama as a candidate that voters could relate with. This video highlights a tour of main street businesses in Concord, NH and the public’s response to his presence.

(shot on Panasonic HVX200 and consumer handycam; edited on Final Cut Pro)