Well, we returned safely from a media gathering/creating venture for a ngo called Themba International. Jeff Johnson is the founder and was kind enough to take us along as he returned to his “home away from home” to continue researching eco friendly ways to help the people of South Africa. We traveled with a small media team who’s goal was to capture imagery and create multimedia that would tell the story of the South African people living in a township called Thembalethu. The stories, imagery and content are meant to challenge the viewer to “Consume with Conscience” and provide opportunities for the viewer to be about positive change in their communities in The States while impacting and providing jobs for communities in South Africa. While in country, we branded Themba, started working on some print collateral and the website, and scripted/produced several informational videos. Our media team was filled with outstanding individuals, Jeff’s vision for Themba is right on, and the people we connected and shared stories with were inspiring beyond words.

We got the 8 panel, duel disc (CD & DVD) project printed and complete! It was quite the undertaking, but the final product is sweet!!! People from our crew here at emote360 did everything from the Photography, Design, Video and Audio production for the entire piece. One of the main organizations we regularly help, World Relief NEXT, had the concept of the piece and we brought it to reality and packaged it all up for ‘em. The launch of the project (last weekend at The Tower Theater in Bend, OR) brought in almost 10K of purchases and donations for The Congo Benefit Project!!! PURCHASE YOUR BY CLICKING HERE!!! 100% of all monies used to purchase this piece will go back to local projects in The Congo.

We just returned from Ethiopia where we were able to help a rad ngo called Agar. Agar (which is the Ethiopian word for “helper”) does incredible work with the segments of society who cannot care for themselves. They do a lot of work with the elderly and just recently obtained a grant to become a rehabilitation/reintegration center for women who have been rescued out of sexual slavery. We’ll be using the imagery we captured while in Ethiopia to create print collateral and a website, as well as a brand package makeover!!! LOVE helping out ngos in this way! Here’s a few of our favorite images from our time in this amazing country filled with the most friendly and beautiful people.

Have you ever carried a heavy load and wondered just how long it was possible to continue moving forward, without falling backward? And at that point have you ever had someone come up and offer to take a great deal of that load on to their own shoulders, and even more so, say that the good Lord brought it to their attention to lend a hand to you? If not, you can imagine what an incredible blessing that would be.
Such is the case with Aaron, who is now lending his talents with administrative (and a whole lot more) to Emote360. With recent publications highlighting what Emote has done and hopes to do in the future as we continue to build our infrastructure, having someone like Aaron on board is imperative, and thankfully, the good Lord knew that. Everyone needs a Pratt. Thanks Pratt.

We wanted to briefly share a project that basically has our ENTIRE production team working around the clock to wrap up right now. It’s called The Congo Benefit Project. It’s a DVD and CD project that will be packaged in an 8 panel digi-pack case (above is one of the graphics we created for the packaging). There are six HD videos that retell the story of Congo and what’s currently happening to it’s people. It also includes a 15 song CD with various artist from around the country. It’ll be on sale this winter and all the proceeds go to benefit the people of Congo. Don’t know what’s happening in Congo? Find out by watching THIS VIDEO we produced earlier this year for World Relief NEXT. We’ll let you know when The Congo Benefit Project is avaliable for purchase and where you can find the product. What an amazing project to be involved in. Photography by Benjamin Edwards, design by Gary A Christenson, Copy by Matthew Smith, Video production by Beth Fischer, Audio Engineering and music production by Justin Lavik and Conor Miller. Printed with JC Nore.

The Harvest India video we shot and produced while in India early in 2009 is complete and shown on our website: CLICK HERE to visit our website, click on “Our Work”, then on “Videos”, and it’s the third one down. Shot in India, edited in Oregon. Travel Team: Mark Ellis, Peter Wiley, Gary Christenson. Post Production Team: Mark Ellis, Beth Fischer, Peter Wiley, Conor Miller and Gary Christenson. Enjoy

We are completely honored to be featured in PDN (Photo District News). They interviewed several professional photographers who are “giving back” for this months “Concerned Photographer” issue. We talked about emote360 and were even able to show some images from this year’s trips to Africa and India.

AND TO OUR SURPRISE, we also had a full page inspirational ad that friends in the photography industry created and sponsored for us (thanks to Kubota Image Tools, Azukabook, Lensbaby, VGallery, Doug Gordon and Silverback… you all are outstanding!!!).

The purpose of all the above news is to simply say, USE YOUR PASSION TO CHANGE THE WORLD. 

We are very pleased to announce that in conjunction with World Relief NEXT, we have won the “Come Clean 4 Congo” video contest held by The Enough Project and You Tube. Thank you, thank you, thank you for all your votes… and MOST OF ALL, for spreading the word about what is happening in DR Congo. A team from Oregon will be heading down to the Hollywood Film Festival to show this video and speak about the subject. Thanks again for your support, we couldn’t have done it without you.  VIEW THE VIDEO

We’ve spent the last several weeks working on a complete rebrand of The Elisha Foundation… new logo, new colors schemes, new textures, new photography, new business cards, envelopes, letterhead, 16 page brochure and a custom designed new website. They wanted their new “look & feel” to meet somewhere in the middle between “edgy” and “professional” - so here is our custom designed solution for their specific request. The Elisha Foundation is an outstanding organization that specializes in assisting families who have children with special needs. They are literally some of the most loving and caring people we have ever encountered. More information can be found on their new website: www.theelishafoundation.org

World Relief NEXT, in partnership with Emote360, created a video for the “Enough Project Video Contest” (sponsored by YouTube and Enough). A trio of celebrity judges narrowed all the entries down to three finalists and we’re honored to be one of the top three. Now it’s up to YOU, the public, to choose the best video. Our video is titled “LIFE SHOULD BE FREE”. Of course we’d love the votes, however, the important thing is that people watch the videos and learn about what’s happening in Congo. 

If you are on Twitter and/or Facebook, please encourage your network of friends to VOTE in the “Enough Project Video Contest” here: http://www.youtube.com/enoughproject

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Video credits: Produced by: emote360, DP/Directed by: Benjamin Edwards, Post/Graphics by: Elizabeth Fischer, Audio/Music Composition by: Conor Miller, Written by: Matthew Smith, On Screen: Micah Bournes, All additional footage and pictures (DR Congo/Rwanda/Burundi) by: Elizabeth Fischer and Benjamin Edwards

ENOUGH FINAL ENTRY from emote360 on Vimeo.

Composed for the ENOUGH PROJECT VIDEO ENTRY: http://www.enoughproject.org/

WHAT’S YOUR CAUSE? from emote360 on Vimeo.

Client: WR/NEXT

Production: emote360

Music Credits: Above the Golden State

WORLD RELIEF CONGO from emote360 on Vimeo.

Got the new CONGO video up that we produced and presented this weekend for World Relief NEXT. A massive shout-out to Ben & Beth for not only capturing all the imagery while in DRC, but also slicing all the photos up in Photoshop and learning Motion (a program) to put it all together. Truly a powerful video that pretty much sums up what we do around here at emote360 - create outstanding media for outstanding non-profits.

We helped Forward Edge International (a stellar Pacific Northwest based nonprofit organization) revamp their logo. We cleaned things up, gave them a more usable typeface and created a modern version of their brand-mark (as they wanted to keep the same “presence” of their compass-like icon). Overall, we really enjoyed working with FEI and look forward to future project with them. This “Re-Branding” project was completed in record breaking time. The fine folks at FEI are quite decisive and easy to work with, making this project very affordable and the turnaround time was almost nothing. We love our great clients!!!

Lets take a look at another emote360 project on the other side of the globe: INDIA. Here’s a documentary of our Documentary Trip to India (to create multimedia for an organization called Harvest India).