Jim DeVincentis has been my business partner and Executive Producer at Przyborski Productions for the past 28 years. We started the company together in 1988. Every agency person and client we’ve worked with calls him “Jimmy D” or just “D”.
This past weekend, Kent State University asked D to give the commencement address for graduates of the College of Mass Communications and Information, College of Business Administration and College of Applied Engineering, Sustainability and Technology. D also serves on the National Athletic Development Council for Kent State and is featured in their Athletic Hall of Fame.
Jimmy’s daughters, Dina DeVincentis and Maria DeVincentis were part of the 7,000+ Convocation Center crowd. Dina graduated in 2011 and Maria graduated that same day.
We’re now calling “D” the honorary “Doctor D”.
The Penguins won their first Stanley Cup in 1991. Back then, KDKA-TV broadcast many of the team’s games. The station needed footage of featured players for use in on-air promotions as well as open & close “bumpers” of the telecast.
Przyborski Productions was contacted by Drew Moniot, KDKA’s Creative Development Manager to shoot a stylized video of the team’s players. Drew’s original concept was to capture the action and interaction inside the Penguin’s locker room, between periods of play. The video would be a rough, tough, stylized look at team members preparing to hit the ice for the game’s final period. Our player-liaison, Phil Bourque helped us plan specific action cutaways that were unique to each player. Tinsy Labrie, former Marketing Director of the Pittsburgh Penguins, scheduled the shoot on a team “personal day”, so players had to be assured that their on-camera segment would take no longer than 30 minutes to film. Makeup stylist, Patti Bell enjoyed creating a realistic, hot, sweaty look for each guy. We never had more than two Penguins on-set at a time, so uniformed extras filled-in the foreground and background.
I shot all the footage on Kodak 5298 stock using my Arri 35BL4 and Zeiss Super-Speed lenses. Everything was shot from a Fisher 10 crab dolly. Film processing was handled by Producer’s Color in Detroit. The stylized “blue-bleach” treatment and enhanced grain were added to the locker room footage during the 35mm film-to-tape transfer at Postique in Detroit. After the winning ’91 season, we filmed our Stanley Cup scenes after-hours at KDKA, then transferred it as clean 35mm.
Consider yourself lucky if you’re not familiar with the pesky stinkbug.
These insects have migrated to portions of the US from China. They multiply by the millions and destroy crops such as apples, tomatoes and virtually all other fruit that they stumble upon.
They don’t bite or sting, they just irritate everyone they’re near. In the fall and winter, they hide inside your home. When you least expect it, they appear on a wall, a couch, table, your bed or whatever. During cold months, you might come upon 2 or 3 stinkbugs every day!
My son, John and I have been having fun exploring unique methods of killing these worthless bugs.
All across the country, traveling carnivals setup shop outside hundreds of small towns and cities. Within a day or so, workers transform an open field on the outskirts of town, into a midway with rides, games and lots of junk food. Where else can you enjoy chocolate funnel cakes and deep-fried ice cream?
For many residents, a trip to the carnival’s an annual tradition. For the $5 admission, you can spend all day and night cruising the fair grounds. There’s groups of girls checking out the guys and catching up on mid-summer gossip. As day slowly dissolves to night, young lovers stroll the midway hand-in-hand.
At a Midwest carnival, tractor and truck pulls are very popular. A powerful truck or tractor drags a weighted sled down a dirt track. It’s not a sophisticated sport, but it’s fun to watch and very loud! The owner of the winning entry gets a prize, but more importantly, all his friends know he drives of the most powerful truck in town.
I shot this video to capture moments from a hot, humid July day, at the fairgrounds, just outside Butler, Pennsylvania.
Church’s Chicken has over 1700 locations in 22 countries. In Puerto Rico they’re arguably the most popular chicken restaurants with over 70 units.
For years, the late Pittsburgh based food stylist Shui Ziegler and her husband have created the food stylings for Church’s in-store menus as well as broadcast and print promotions. Przyborski Productions was brought on-board to work with Shui & Zig to create the introductory TV spot for Church’s new “Breakfast Pockets” (or in Spanish, “Pockets Desayuno”.)
Przyborski shot the digital commercial in John Sanderson’s studio, located in Pittsburgh’s strip district. Felipe Flores, Church’s VP of Marketing, asked Glenn to create a warm, golden, morning feel to the scenes, emphasizing the product’s natural ingredients.
Everything was shot on the RED “Epic” camera system, primarily using Glenn’s Canon lenses. For the extremely tight macro scenes of bacon and sausage, the unique Innovision “Probe II” snorkel lens was employed. Glenn feels the greatest feature of the Epic is its ability to shoot at almost any frame rate up to 300fps. The falling tortillas were shot at 240fps.
The commercial was edited and mixed by the Kamikaze Group in Guaynabo, Puerto Rico. They also created the original music track. The ad is currently airing in HD throughout Puerto Rico. In case you’re hungry, the closest Church’s Chicken to Pittsburgh is in Akron, Ohio.
Usually, I’m shooting nice things… like attractive people eating food while smiling. This project was completely different.
John Brabender (BrabenderCox) is one of the country’s top political media consultants. For over 10 years, he and I have worked together on many successful TV campaigns. John rarely thinks anywhere near the box, much less inside it.
John gave us less than a week to put together this project. Fortunately, I remembered scouting an old abandoned manufacturing building in Pittsburgh for a previous TV campaign. My producer and production coordinator, Judy Gurchak and I re-scouted the location and it was still available.
I set up most of the shots to take advantage of a wall of windows that lined the North side of the building. This became my primary light source, supplemented with 1200 and 2500 watt HMI’s. We used smoke machines to add atmosphere and distance to the scenes.
Growing up in Florida, I hate shooting in freezing cold weather. For the entire shoot day, our set temperature was less than 50ºF. We couldn’t use heaters because they quickly dissipated the smoke. Our shoot day was overcast and snowy, so we knew we would loose useable window light by 4:30PM.
I used a motorized, 7′ slider for the marching feet scenes and all ground level camera angles. This slider can smoothly move 25 pounds of camera.
I photographed everything with a RED Epic M using the standard set of RED primes including the 300mm telephoto. Every scene (except the fall) was shot at 30fps for playback at 23.98.
Thad Christian at Pittsburgh’s Phenomenom Post did an amazing job editing and grading the 90 second spot in less than 2 days including numerous effect shots. Michael Goodis handled original sound design. Steve Parys worked his butt off as my assistant director. Without the talents of gaffer, Ted Wiegand and scenic designer, Rich Schutte none of this would have been possible in such a short amount of time.
My former business partner and TV commercial director, Paul Hartwick passed away at UPMC Hospital Sunday afternoon 9-22-13.
Paul and I met while working at Television Production Center (TPC) in Pittsburgh. He had previously worked as an ad agency producer at Ketchum and W.B. Doner which gave him the ability to relate to art directors and writers. In 1975, Hartwick convinced me that we could make a living by starting a commercial production company.
We founded Hartwick/Przyborski Productions in 1975 and operated the company through 1987. During that period “H/P” produced literally hundreds of broadcast advertising commercials for clients and ad agencies across the U.S. We worked separately on most projects and as a team on major productions, especially those from our New York office. Many Pittsburgh crew people got their first film production experience with Hartwick/Przyborski and/or TPC.
Back in the mid-70’s most film projects were actually edited on film. Then a print from the lab was transferred to videotape for TV station distribution. Kodak credited Paul and me as pioneers for shooting 35mm film specifically for editorial on videotape.
Paul Hartwick was an instrument rated, multi-engine pilot and an avid outdoorsman. He loved the woods, hunting, guns, and civil war re-enactments. Years ago, he dropped out of the commercial production business and moved to the Allegheny Forrest near Bradford, PA. Unfortunately, My last contact with Paul was over 10 years ago.
Paul Hartwick is survived by His wife, Mary and daughters, Jennifer & Justi.
Director, Glenn Przyborski and artist, Burton Morris
Burton Morris has created major works for CocaCola, The Academy Awards, Heinz, the Olympics, Absolut Vodka and hundreds of other corporations. Although he’s an internationally famous artist, Burton Morris’ is also one of the nicest guys you’ll ever meet.
He just completed a fun project for Eat ‘n Park Restaurants. Burton created his own original art to celebrate the 25th anniversary of “Smiley,” Eat ‘n Park’s corporate cookie icon. This summer, Burton Morris’ original artwork will adorn t-shirts, coffee mugs and other items that are sold in Eat ‘n Park’s chain of over 80 restaurants.
Sorry, I can’t reveal Burton’s original “Smiley” artwork, ’till it’s unveiled in June!… stay tuned!
A few years ago, Glenn Przyborski directed and photographed a multi-part series titled, “Moving Numbers.” The show is a humorous, behind-the-scenes look at a dysfunctional political campaign. Against all odds, candidate, Bob Sanders wants to be the U.S. Senator from Pennsylvania. “MN” has the look and feel of spontaneous reality, ala “The Office”, yet every line is scripted. The cast is from LA, NYC and Pittsburgh.
John Brabender (of BrabenderCox) created the series based on events and characters that he’s observed (and worked for) in dozens of real political campaigns.
Post-production was handled by Thad Christian and his talented staff at Pittsburgh’s Phenomenon Post.
