Nick Bacon

Hey, I’m Johnny B, a Video Director for churches and non-profits. I haven’t been too active on this platform, but I’m hoping to change that! Over the last year, I’ve spent a big chunk of my time building an internal stock video library for the church I work for. Clip accessibility, speed, consistency, adaptability, and extended shelf life have already been huge wins. More than anything, though, it’s helped us feel ready for whatever 2026 throws at us, with a ton of usable content already in the tank. When footage is curated and color-ready like this, it becomes something teams, interns, volunteers – even a scrambling version of myself who was just asked to turn around a new idea in under a week 😆 — can actually use. The content is vetted and genuinely ready to go. And for peeps who are newer to production or new to the organization, it keeps the truly unusable shots out of reach. But there’s another layer I’ve been thinking about more lately... one that has a lot more to do with security, respect, and the responsibility church creatives have toward our congregants. As tools for recreating likeness and voice continue to evolve, it’s changed how I think (and maybe how we should all think) about archival practices, especially in spaces like churches where people are trusting us with their presence. Curation isn’t just about what’s easy to grab. It’s also about what should exist in the first place, and who should have access to it and this feels more important to me now, than ever before. Curious how others are thinking about this... Do you vibe with this approach? Do you handle this differently? I’d genuinely love to hear some input from this community.

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Super pumped for this! Digging in with two of my favorite folks (and showing how some of these tools empower creators).

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The first 3–5 seconds of your video determine everything. This is the hook. Without a strong hook, the rest of your video is wasted. The hook is the bridge. The hook is the door. The hook is the most critical part of your video. At Burn the Boats Productions, we’re known for creating compelling hooks that keep audiences watching, engaged, and ready to take action. If you’re going to invest time and energy in a video, focus it on the hook first — everything else flows from there. #VideoMarketing #MarketingStrategy #DigitalMarketingAgency #LeadGeneration #SocialMediaMarketing #MarketingDirectors #Founders #BusinessGrowth #AdvertisingStrategy #BurnTheBoats

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One of the most common issues I hear in voiceover demos isn’t performance. It’s sameness. Good voices. Well recorded. Competently produced. But not offering anything you couldn’t generate quickly with a template or an AI tool. When everything sounds fine, but nothing sounds intentional, there’s no reason to remember it. Most demo rebuilds aren’t about fixing talent. They’re about clarity, contrast, and making deliberate choices that give a listener a reason to care.

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OpenAI’s first feature film, Critterz, a $30 million AI-assisted animated project, is set to premiere at Cannes 2026. Produced in just nine months using GPT-5 and DALL·E, the film reimagines production timelines and budgets, posing an existential challenge to traditional studios like Pixar. With human voice actors and AI-driven design, Critterz could redefine what a “studio” is and reshape expectations for speed, cost, and creative control in animation. https://lnkd.in/gvHSscVu

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Microdramas did $11 billion last year. Most people in the screen industry still haven’t watched one. That gap between market reality and industry awareness is exactly why we built Microtone. There are now over 3,000 microdrama series scattered across dozens of apps — ReelShort, DramaBox, ShortMax, GoodShort, FlexTV, and more — each with its own walled garden, its own currency system, its own algorithm. If you want to find something good, you’re on your own. Microtone is a single place to browse, track, rate, and review all of it. Think Letterboxd, but for vertical series. Every listing links back to the platform where you can actually watch it. We’re a discovery layer, not a competitor. We built it because we couldn’t find it. And because when a format grows this fast — $14 billion projected by the end of this year — the audience needs tools that keep pace with the content. It’s live now. Go break it. Built by the Screenburn / Metrotone Studios team: myself, Katharina Gellein Viken, and Duncan JA Dick.

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🎬 Many people over-complicate what great directing takes... From mission-critical live production with zero margin for error to single-camera productions on location or in the studio. Here’s the playbook that helps me keep the chaos creative: 1️⃣ Lead with empathy, not equipment. If your talent feels safe, truth shows up on-screen. 2️⃣ Design the experience backwards. Start at the audience’s “aha!” moment and reverse-engineer every cue. 3️⃣ Decide fast, delegate faster. A slow “maybe” costs more than a wrong “yes” you can still pivot. 4️⃣ Make feedback friction-free. Keep the comms clear. Have enough monitors and use cloud tools in post. 5️⃣ Wrap the why around the how. Marketers and boards fund results, not gear lust. Translate frames to ROI. 🎯 Next week I’ll unpack how to write a bullet-proof video production brief that makes all this 10× easier. 👉 Over to you: Which rule saves your projects when the clock is running down? #Directing #CreativeLeadership #MarketingVideo #EdTech #HealthcareComms #Broadcast #VideoStrategy #videoproduction #spellbinder #spellbinderproductions

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Starting a new Orlando venue video series. Over the next few posts, we’ll be sharing FPV drone videos from different event locations around Orlando. The idea behind this series is simple: Photos can show how a venue looks. But video shows how the space feels. We capture venues from multiple angles — empty, staged, and with guests — so planners and clients can understand the layout, flow, scale, atmosphere, and event experience before visiting in person. For venues, this becomes a practical sales asset for websites, proposals, social media, and client follow-ups. DM to create one for your venue. #EventVenue #VenueMarketing #VenueVideo #FPVDroneVideo #EventPlanning #OrlandoEvents

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A few years ago, the advice was pretty consistent. Test everything. Optimize everything. Let the data tell you what works. And yeah… there’s a place for that. But then something like Liquid Death comes along. Canned water. Sold like a heavy metal brand. If you looked at that on paper, it probably doesn’t get made. No one’s pulling that out of a spreadsheet. But it works. And not just as a creative idea… it converts. Because it doesn't feel like marketing. It feels like a brand with a point of view. It's clear. It's different. It gives people something to latch onto immediately. You knew what it was. You knew if it was for you. And if it was, you were in. That’s what a lot of data-driven marketing misses. It tries to smooth everything out. Make it safe. Make it broadly appealing. But the stuff that actually works usually has some edge to it. Data can help you refine that. But it can’t create it. Originality gets attention. And that’s what actually matters. #BrandsThatBuild #BrandVoice #EverymanVoice #AudioMatters #VoiceOver #MGCreativeGroup #MGVoiceOver #Storyteller https://lnkd.in/ewWF9dAj

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Why Independent Films Are Leaving California - new video: https://lnkd.in/gTAAwNGD - California just doubled its film tax credits to $750 million annually, but there's a problem - While the state courts big-budget productions, thousands of independent filmmakers making movies under $1 million are being left out entirely, impacting the entry point for new directors, writers, & crews - Independent filmmaker & professor Jeff Deverett breaks down why this matters for the next generation of Hollywood talent & what California risks losing if it doesn't act - plus Post-Production Film Workers Don’t Want to Be Left Out of the Tax Credit Conversation - article: https://lnkd.in/g-vyY4BB

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The new and improved maps for The Columbia River Canoe Project! As some of you know, I’ve been working alongside an incredible team to bring Robert Lesters 1,300-mile canoe expedition from Butte, MT to the Pacific Ocean to life. As the film wraps up its festival circuit and we prepare to find it a permanent home we took the opportunity to mix in some upgrades. This latest version features the refined shaded relief mapping style I’ve developed over the past year, built using real USGS digital elevation models. The result: a fully accurate, scaled representation of the terrain that lets viewers better grasp the scope of the journey and track the paddlers’ location. What makes this map even more special is the use of date-accurate satellite imagery. The 3d model is built from over 100 different satellite photographs all taken during May and June 2023, the exact timeframe of the expedition.

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Welcome to my cheesy analogy mixed with a little tech geek thrown in! Recently I was on set explaining monitor calibration and color bars to a client and a PA. Somewhere between chroma values and broadcast standards, it clicked...If the monitors aren’t calibrated, you might be watching the same thing but interpreting different realities. One person sees contrast, another sees noise, another thinks it’s “fine.” Alignment doesn’t happen by accident. It’s engineered, crafted and takes a little time! Teams work the same way. You can give everyone the same goal, the same tools, even the same timeline, but without calibration, the output drifts. Language, expectations, standards, and intent all need tuning so the signal stays clean from start to finish. That’s how you get congruent results instead of creative static. We tell stories. We capture moments. We create content. We curate experiences. And yes, we’re technicians, because great results come from both art and calibration. Now...for anyone that really wanted some of the technical stuff...keep reading. Color bars are video test patterns used to calibrate display color accuracy, brightness, and contrast. The primary differences lie in saturation levels (100% vs. 75%), the inclusion of specialized calibration elements (like PLUGE for black levels), and their intended application (broadcast, consumer, or HDR, with SMPTE bars being the most common standard. Key Types of Color Bar Patterns: 75% Color Bars (Standard/SMPTE): The most common, representing 75% intensity, used for calibrating color (chroma) and tint. They include a PLUGE (Picture Lineup Generating Equipment) pattern in the lower-right, which helps set proper black levels. 100% Color Bars: Used for more intense color decoding, testing if a display can handle full-luminance colors without clipping. These are generally used in production environments rather than consumer TV calibration. SMPTE Engineering Guideline (EG) 1-1990: The standard, multi-component pattern featuring 75% bars, PLUGE for black levels, and white/blue squares to adjust color and tint using a blue-only mode. HDR/WCG Color Bars: Specialized bars that handle higher dynamic range and wider color gamuts, essential for calibrating modern displays. Gray Bars (8 or 16 Step): While not color bars, these are often included alongside them to adjust grayscale tracking, gamma, and brightness/ contrast. Key Differences in Usage: 75% vS 100%: 75% bars are standard, ensuring colors are not overly saturated for traditional broadcasting. 100% bars are used to test the maximum capabilities of a display. SMPTE vS Basic Bars: SMPTE includes extra, specific, and "sub-black" elements (PLUGE) that enable precise, quick calibration ot brightness, contrast, and color, which a simple 8-color row cannot do. Looking forward to your comments!)

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I didn't set out to become a Creative Operations expert. I set out to make films. But somewhere between managing 50+ person production crews on zero sleep, negotiating vendor contracts at 6am, and building shot schedules that had to flex in real time, I was learning something that had nothing to do with film. I was learning how to run operations. And I didn't even know it was a skill yet. Every production I ran was its own small business. Every role I played within someone else's project, I treated like a business engagement. Vacations? Project managed. Friendship plans? Calendared and coordinated. Tax season? My accountant gets a Google Drive so clean and organized, he's never once had to ask me a follow-up question. (Yes, really.) What I was building, in real time, without a fancy title or a formal framework, was a deep working knowledge of operational structure. The kind that comes from doing — not from reading about it. Here's what I've learned from years of running things that way: Structure isn't a personality flaw. It's a leadership skill. The people who keep saying "I'm just naturally organized" are underselling themselves. That instinct to create systems, to map things out, to think three steps ahead — that's operational intelligence. And in the creative industry, it's one of the most undervalued assets in the room. Creative directors, filmmakers, designers, brand managers — we are trained to execute on vision. But very few of us are trained to think about how we execute. The workflows. The handoffs. The version control. The approval cycles. The information architecture. For years, I watched creative teams burn out not because the work was too hard, but because the systems weren't built to support how they actually worked. They were borrowing systems from other industries, other teams, other eras of business — and then wondering why nothing fit. Creative operations isn't about fitting your team into a system. It's about building a system that fits your team. That distinction sounds simple. It is not. It requires someone who can sit at the intersection of creative thinking and operational logic — and translate between them fluently. That's what a decade of accidental training gave me. It gave me a Type A brain that lived inside a creative career long enough to understand both worlds without apologizing for either one. And when I finally put a name to what I'd been doing all along — that's when The Creative Bridge was born. Not to teach companies how to run their businesses. But to understand how they already run — and build the operational infrastructure that actually supports it. If you're a creative leader who's ever felt like your systems are working against you instead of for you, I'd love to talk. That's exactly the gap I built this for. Drop a comment or send me a message — I'm here for those conversations. #CreativeOperations #TheCreativeBridge

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As video editing increasingly prioritizes narrative structure, pacing, and context-aware assembly while motion graphics evolves into a system of real-time design, modular templates, and dynamic visual logic, where does true creative differentiation live—in the editor shaping the story, or in the motion designer engineering the visual language?

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The deluge of AI posts, demos, commentary, and panic is omnipresent. Every feed I open, every conversation at an event, someone is making predictions or asking where all of this goes. However, I haven’t seen a dramatic shift in the work I do every day… yet. We’re still finishing movies, TV shows, commercials, social content and even music videos. The pressure is still high. Timelines and budgets are tight. Clients still expect interactivity, precision, and care. But open LinkedIn, and it’s everywhere. AI in pre-production. AI in post. AI in shot design. AI doing it all with one person at the helm. AI panic. An AI flood. Everyone seems to be writing or at least thinking about it. Most of them aren’t wrong. The scroll has taken on a surreal edge. AI-remixed headshots. Family photos turned into Miyazaki dreamscapes. AI-generated action figures, complete with retro packaging. Podcasters as babies. And now, a wave of generative vloggers, from Bigfoot to Jesus to Greg the stormtrooper, and even a gorilla who needs a dentist. Most of it passes in seconds. But it leaves a residue. Mixed in with all of that is a rising tide of AI experts, consultants, and keynote speakers hawking frameworks and selling themselves. Alongside that is a quieter group of craftspeople experimenting. Testing tools. Rebuilding workflows. Chasing the vanguard, not for headlines, but to stay connected to the process they love. And still, the rooms I work in haven’t changed all that much. The director, DP, and agency creatives still want to tweak. I still hear that being in a grading environment is their favorite part of the process. There’s something about being in a dark room with smart collaborators, all focused on the scene. You offer a note. Someone builds on it. It’s not just additive. It becomes something else. One plus one equals three. The moment it comes together, along with a side of sushi and lattes, and someone still says, “Split the difference.” So, this post isn’t a case for or against anything. It’s just a note from the field. Our craft still carries weight. The tools are creeping in. Some of them will stick. Others won’t. But it’s clear to me now, there is a shift happening, whether we’re ready or not. I’ll be writing a few of these over the coming weeks. Not because I have a grand framework to sell, but because I think it might be useful to slow the scroll for a moment and sit with what’s changing. Thanks for reading. More soon. Billy

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It's official, some good news for Hollywood. The Writers Guild of America and the Hollywood Studios and Networks have agreed to a tentative four-year deal. Still needs membership approval, but WGA officially confirms tonight with few details so far... https://lnkd.in/gnJ5Z9qK

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Lately, I’ve been drawn to aerospace and defense storytelling. Working with teams like Albers Aerospace has been a reminder that precision here isn’t a metaphor. It’s responsibility. Decisions are real. The stakes are real. Learning a new sector forces you to slow down, listen harder, and earn context before you earn trust. What I’ve found inside these companies are deeply human stories: veteran-led teams, modern factories, quiet innovation, and a shared sense of mission. If you’re building in aerospace or defense and thinking about how to tell that story with clarity and respect, I’d love to keep learning alongside you. Watch the video we created for them below. Client: Albers Aerospace Agency: Satellite Film and Video Creative Director: Kuang Lee Cinematographer: James Drake Producers: Brady Aker Sarah Whitaker Editor: Jesse Keim

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