Photo Essay, Rough Draft

At this desk, I became strangely obsessed with the San Diego Business Journal. When I first arrived at Bob Hoffman Video Productions, I was assigned a desk, the front desk. It is the first thing you see when you enter the building, not to mention it was right across the way from my mentor's office. My mentor told me that this desk would be mine for the next three weeks, so when assigned tasks, I would sit in the chair behind desk number one and work quietly and diligently.

Once a few hours passed and people began going out for lunch, I decided it was time that I eat too, so I unpacked my lunch and ate at that desk. Feeling a bit bored, I started flipping through the "San Diego Business Journal's Book of Lists". As I ate my lunch, I started getting more and more drawn into the magazine, my brain getting filled with a bit more knowledge with each page. Richest people in San Diego, top radio stations, colleges and universities with the highest student enrollment of 2008, it was all so fascinating!

I continued to eat my lunch and read the business journal everyday for the rest of internship.

After a couple of days, I was assigned the task of making the company's Valentine's Day mailer. Unfortunately, my first desk didn't have Photoshop on it, so I bid farewell to the business journal and came to desk number two. I worked on the V. Day mailer for around a week and a half with few interruptions. One day, however, I had just finished a draft of the mailer that was being sent to the print shop, so I found myself having nothing to do. One of the employees, (who was like a second mentor) noticed my lack of doing anything, and brought me the "Pink Bag of Wonders", (left side of image). Inside the bag were hundreds of slides, (the things they used before digital cameras) that a client had brought in.

I sat in great concentration, carefully lifting each slide by the corner, so I wouldn't smudge it. I looked at each image closely, searching for a number or a word somewhere in the picture so that I could finally figure out which side of the picture was up. Out of hundreds of slides, you would think at least one of the would have a word written on it somewhere. After an hour or two of searching, I discovered a picture taken in what appeared to be France that had a poster with words in it. Finally, I was able to continue cleaning and scanning the slides.

Although it was difficult looking at an image that was only an inch big, it was amazing too. Each time I lifted a slide up to the light, I went some place new. Several photos were from Egypt, France made multiple appearances and so did the Middle East and certain parts of Asia. "What an amazing life this person has had" I thought as I carefully lifted one of the slides and blasted it with "Dust-Off, Compressed Air in a Can".

After I completed my world travels, I was sent to computer number three. I had just finished making the Valentine's Day mailer, so my mentor decided to test my skills at (film) editing. But, once again, computer number one didn't have any editing programs on it, and neither did computer number two. So, I was moved to computer/desk number three. I only spent one day at this desk because it technically belonged to one of the film editors, (who happened to be out sick the day I used his office). On that day, my main memories were of looking through six hours worth of wedding videos, trying to use a yoga ball as a chair, and reading about the top banks in San Diego.

Once the owner of desk number three got better, I migrated again, this time to desk number four. The video that I had been working on at #3 was a promotional video for a hotel. They wanted to show more brides and grooms why they should get married there, so I was editing together footage of three weddings that were held there. I had spent the entire day at #3 sifting through footage, so I could just edit edit edit and computer number four.

In my search for the perfect music for the video, I ended up listening to about ten hours worth of Jack Johnson, Michael Buble and strange bag-pipe music.

I didn't actually work at this computer personally. But it was interesting to watch the daily process that went on at this computer. The guy that worked at this computer, (the same one that gave me the "Pink Bag of Wonders") was in charge of making labels for DVDs and burning DVDs. I always found it interesting how the machines that put the labels on the disks worked and how the burning of the disks worked, since it wasn't like putting a blank DVD into your computer and clicking "Burn". There was an entire process that led up to the burning of a disk. Somebody had to create a label for all of the disks as well, so more than anything it was interesting to watch.

Computer number four was right next to this computer. As I worked on my film, I remember watching the machines working, burning disks, making labels, the ultimate multi-tasker. I had experianced working in almost every part of the business while at Bob Hoffman Video Productions, except for that area. Burning disks at computer number five. That's probably why it intrigued me so much, because it was the one area that I knew nothing about.