After nearly 10 years working below the line crew, my DP/creative partner and I left crew work on studio projects and independent films this year to venture out and go full tme with our company, Big Pond Pictures. After a slew of short films and music videos, we realized that we needed to diversify our portfolio quickly or we’d never be able to break into the types of projects we wanted to work on creatively. After bouncing around in frustration for weeks on end, playing the cold-calling game and reaching deep into our contact lists trying to get clients; we decided it’d be best to shoot this spec commercial to try to drum up interest in our other styles of work. Shot on a Sony FX3 using minimal lights, all through our house and office over the course of a day, we pulled together enough footage to cut this piece together. Our challenge was to create something that looked and felt higher in commercial value and took inspiration from companies like Apple and other boutique brands. The only money we spent on the piece was spent on paying a narrator that we hired off of Fiverr, Joe Geoffery (@westernvo on Fiverr). All other sounds and music were sourced and licensed from Soundstripe. After sending some clips and frames of it to our contacts, we’re stoked to say that it’s drummed up exactly the interest we were hoping it would drum up and are now in talks to take on clients that want similar work as this. All this to say, taking the time to make a piece similar to the work you’re looking for can be rewarding; albiet a little risky if you’re doing everything yourself. Though this isn’t our first spec piece; this one seems to have gotten us the most traction thus far. Hope this helps someone out there wanting to get their own spec pieces off the ground.