My Colostrum from George Sickler on Vimeo.

One thing I’ve come to expect as a video production professional: this job takes you to some unusual places, doing unusual things and meeting unusual people…and animals.

The good people at Dairy Tech, a dairy business here in Colorado, have been coming up with new and fun ways to promote their beneficial calf products! The last video we did for them (see last week’s blog) was a jingle combined with a humorous dialogue. It was a lot of work, but a lot of fun!

This shoot (see video above) also had it’s challenges, but they might not be the kind you’d expect.

When we arrived, we immediately knew that, because it was an outdoor shoot, we would have to either have cloud coverage (which is nature’s filter) or we would have to provide our own filter. We were prepared for either one. The sky was not cooperating with us – very bright, sunny day with no clouds – so, we improvised. A large pop up filter was attached to C-stands to lightly shade our “set”. We had to play around with the precise location of the filter to enable us to have a large enough area to include the subject, his seat, the calf, and the hay bales directly behind them. Once we placed the filter, set a mic on the subject, and set up the camera, we thought we were ready to go.

Bring in the calf….

The calf was not happy about being tied to the hay bale structure, but he was not hurt…just unhappy. He eventually settled down a bit….his mom did not. In fact, she was having NONE OF IT. It was slightly comical to watch my wife (and biz partner) walk in a semi-circle with the mama cow trying to keep her away from our set and her calf, while speaking soothing words to her. The Dairy Tech owner offered to handle her while we shot…so he stood by the mama and waved his hand in her face whenever she started to bellow, which helped a lot! Her interjections caused us to have to retake a few times, but eventually we got a few good takes! The human talent was, of course, adorable and confident, so I'm gonna attribute that to a successful shoot, as well.

Sometimes, our job (and probably yours, too) requires flexibility. And we can either use those situations as opportunities to complain, or opportunities to grow.

All in all, I think the shoot turned out well! What do you think?