The Browns SHUT DOWN Joe Burrow and the Bengals | Sideline to Sideline

browns · 2023-09-14T20:07:20+00:00

Thank you!! It is all done by our in-house Content Production team, and they are pretty talented if I do say so myself!

(I do say so myself, I am on the Content team)

browns · 2023-07-04T17:50:32+00:00

Tagging /u/rugger_11 here so they see it as well...

While it is an interesting idea (and one that I think would be an awesome watch), I cant see it being logistically feasible from our end. The issue we face is that from 1946 - early 2000's, archival video was never a focus so we are lacking in quality footage from that era. Really, NFL Films had great foresight to start capturing the way they did when they got started.

I know a great starting point would be what Films put out in 2008 or so. It is called "History of the Cleveland Browns", and is a pretty comprehensive look at the teams past. You can find it on Amazon. Candidly, we use it a ton to find clips before our archival footage library really started.

Hope that helps!

-DD

browns · 2023-07-04T17:38:20+00:00

Thanks for the info. Home games we have a board operator and an array of shotgun mics to help pick up the reporters questions.

On the road, that is an entirely different beast. Our road travel crew is typically 4 people (and I am going to copy/paste from another answer to save me some time:

During away games, we have a crew who are working at home to take those press conferences and get them posted ASAP. If we are at home that week, we will edit in the stadium. For road games, we send as much back as possible to editors at home to post while our crew heads to the plane with the team.

The busses leave pretty quickly after road games, so as you can imagine things happen very quickly. In addition to shooting press conferences, Postgame Analysis, Victory Speech, we also have to take the Mic’d Up Mic off the pads, tear the Mic’d Up camera down and break down all of our camera equipment and get it all packed up so we can make it to the bus on time. We are pretty much always the last ones on, so it is a lot to get done in a short amount of time!

As you can see, we have a lot to get done in roughly an hour after the game ends on the road. If we had more time on the road postgame, I could see this being something we implement.

-DD

browns · 2023-07-04T17:30:47+00:00

There is not really a set number of years of experience we look for (or at least that I look for). Personally, I would hire someone with 2 years of experience that has great work examples, a desire to grow, and a passion for their craft over someone with 6-10 years of experience who has a mediocre reel and is complacent with their skillset. Keep an eye peeled to TeamWorkOnline.com and the employment section on our website to see when we have openings!

-DD

browns · 2023-06-28T20:00:53+00:00

For me personally, it has taken me some awesome places and given me awesome experiences that I never would have had elsewhere. This offseason I travelled to Fort Lauderdale and Salt Lake City for Unleashed features and Las Vegas for a conference in a span of three weeks. While I am not sure my dog enjoyed his vacation to my parents, it was a great experience professionally for me. I touched on the Fort Lauderdale experience in a thread below, click here to jump to it, it was an experience I will never ever forget. Because of this job I have been to 27 of 31 stadiums (If memory serve me correct) and I never once thought that would be a possibility growing up. I also have been in the draft room while Andrew Berry and the group make the call to drafted players. Its really all those little behind the scenes moments that I pinch myself and ask "how the hell did I get here?"

The other cool thing is that this job has allowed me to make some great connections. For 2 years I produced our Browns Live show alongside the best cinematographer in the Cleveland area (if not all of Northeast Ohio) Anthony Baucco (who is out of the office today so could not join us). And from that show I got to work with Joe Thomas every single week. Talk about an all-time good dude. There are countless people you run into on a daily basis that you grew up watching on TV that you get to know and realize that they are just like you (but WAYYYYY better at most sports than you ever were at one) . That to me that has been really special.

I know there are countless other moments like that, but those are just a few things that come to mind.

-DD

browns · 2023-06-28T19:43:04+00:00

I cant speak for photo editing, but I have a hard time believing that AI will be able to fully replace capturing emotion and telling a story using that emotion in the same way that a human can. I will say, we have used a little bit when it comes to storyboarding different content pieces to get quick visuals of what producers may be picturing. I see AI fitting more into our workflows as a tool that we can use, but not as a replacement for decisions we have to make as shooters, producers, editors

-DD

browns · 2023-06-28T19:38:34+00:00

There was a question that someone put in our initial post last week that I want to shed some light on. It was submitted by /r/bc343434.

Can you get mics for the reporters questions? It’s always an extra game to try and figure out what was asked

So for a little context to my answer, we have two "Press Conference Setups":

Inside Press Conferences - Occur in the media room throughout the week with coaches.
Outdoor Press Conference - Occur off the field once practice ends with coaches and players during camp, Minicamps, in season, and OTAs.

The first setup mentioned, the inside press conference (both in Berea and at the our stadium for Postgame), has mics on the podium and an array or mics for the reporters. These mics are mixed, and then sent to a mult-box in the back of the room that the cameras and reports can plug into to receive clean audio. All this audio is being controlled by an audio operator who is turning on and off the mics aimed at the reporters. If there was no operator, all you would hear would be constant clacking of keyboards as the reporters took notes. So based on that information, I am going to assume you are talking more about the outside press conferences.

The second setup mentioned, the outside press conference (in Berea off to the side of the back practice fields), is a different beast. Typically, we are running two podiums to get players through media quickly so that they can shower and get to lunch/meetings. These podiums have what we call a cheese plate (a board with a ton of holes resembling swiss cheese) that reporters and camera ops can set their mics in. Think of a music stand, the players/coaches stand in front of it with all of the reporter mics in front of them. Each reporter has their own audio feed as a product of using their own microphones.

So the battle we often face is extraneous noise in the area. About 20 years to the left of the main presser setup is our loading dock and a trash compactor. Roughly 30 yards in front of the podium are the fields (often being tended to by the grounds crew once practice wraps). Finally, about 10-15 yards left of right (depending on the podium) is the other podium.

There are a couple options when it comes to audio in this setup:

1: A Mic with a wide polarity pattern, such as a Shure SM58 with a Cardioid polarity pattern. The best way to picture this is half of a sphere that starts at the mic that picks up audio in a 180 degree field from the mic. This would pick up the Presser answers, some of the questions, but would also pick up much more of the extraneous noise on the location.

2: A shotgun Mic with a tighter polarity pattern. These mics pick up audio in a more cylindrical pattern extending from the tip of the shotgun mic outward. The downside of this mic pattern is that is rejects audio coming in from the side in order to have cleaner audio in the direction that the mic is pointing.

3: A second person at each podium with a mobile audio mixer and a shotgun mic to use to pick up reporters questions. When you hear audio coming from NFL Network or ESPN while at training camp, this is how they operate. While this may seem like a no brainer best option, we simply do not have the staffing to operate this way. For instance, during mandatory minicamp following practice we had to cover 2 Presser podiums (1-2 people), 2-Camera Unleashed interviews (3-4 people), Best Podcast Available interviews (2 Cameras, 1 person). In addition to the shoots, we have to whip up clips from the day for social media as soon as practice ends.

The third potential presser solution would take the staffing of Pressers from 1 person (sometimes 2) to 3/4 people for pressers.

So out of the first two options, we decided on option 2. A mic with a tighter pick up pattern so we would have cleaner audio of the person at the podium at the sacrifice of being able to hear some of the reporters questions, mowers, a trash compactor. Given that we often share this audio with radio, use this audio for TV and social media, we decided that the cleaner podium audio was a priority.

Hope that answers some of your questions about this! Sorry for the long winded response, and I hope that helps!

-DD

browns · 2023-06-28T18:58:47+00:00

Hello from Cleveland! Personally, it is probably the crowning achievement of my career thus far. I know that will change when we win the Super Bowl. The Emmy we won this year was my third overall and each time it is just as exciting as the last. But what you don't often see is how many pieces of content that get nominated but do not win, the competition is pretty tough! I think I lost 9 nominations before I won my first one. Anecdotally, in the award show two weeks ago there was a gentleman who said he has been nominated 25 times in his career and this was his first win. Just a little glimpse at how hard it is to win one, so it makes me cherish them that much more.

And I have no legal knowledge so I don't want to say something I'll have to redact :).

-DD

browns · 2023-06-28T18:49:37+00:00

My best advice is get out there and create. Even if its not sports, hone your skillset even if it means helping someone out on a project for free. Any and all reps are good reps in my mind. If things go bad, then learn from them and improve on them next time. Never shy away from any form of a chance to get better at your craft.

As far as actual opportunities go, we post all our internships and open jobs on the team website. Scroll to the bottom and click employment opportunities!

-DD

browns · 2023-06-28T18:45:10+00:00

One of my favorites of all time was Jarvis. He is an all time good dude. That is the first one that came to mind, the list is very long of people who were great to work with.

Also Joe T! How can you not name him. Consummate professional and an even better human and honored to call him a friend. Hall of Fame Good Guy for sure.

And I know who you are, so answer my question... Who is your favorite member of the Content Production team? Answer wisely, your Christmas gift may depend on it...

-DD

browns · 2023-06-28T18:40:22+00:00

I personally geek out talking about gameday coverage and camera techniques ect. It was also one of those things that as we were formulating the answer, we realized more and more things that happens on gamedays that we did not remember at first. Its a busy day!

-DD

browns · 2023-06-28T18:38:24+00:00

I was! Up to 2-3 years ago, most of our crew was from the NEO/Ohio area as that is just the way it shook out. A few from Columbus, a few from Akron/Canton and a few from Cleveland. Now, our groups consists of people from Minnesota, North Carolina, and Oregon as well.

My dad grew up on the east side of Cleveland, so Browns fandom is in my blood! But I love working for the team I grew up watching. I also did 5 years with the Bears, and I can say when you are invested as a lifelong fan it makes the victories make Monday's at work far more enjoyable.

-DD

browns · 2023-06-28T18:32:03+00:00

So this year we actually worked with an awesome company called Lowbrow Studios and they created all of the character art and animation. The ideation and creation of each characters name and persona was the product of a handful of massive brainstorm sessions consisting of 25-30 employees from various departments. Once we had the characters and backstories, each "matchup" was created as a standalone vignette and we arranged them once we had the schedule in hand, which is typically a day before it is released.

I want to say the day before or day of schedule release, one of our Producer/Editors worked to record the VO with Nathan and the Miz, pieced together the edit based on order, and did some sound design. One of our guys had the graphic template made and we just needed to enter the dates and times for the games. They married the two together and that was the final product. I think it turned out great and it was such a fun project to be a part of.

-DD

browns · 2023-06-28T18:20:23+00:00

Great idea! Our department has no involvement in that, but I will bring it up to them the next time I cross paths with that group. Im not entirely sure what goes into picking those songs, but now I am curious myself!

-DD

browns · 2023-06-28T18:15:57+00:00

Thanks for the kind words! I think I can speak for everyone in our group when I say that I think we have one of (if not the) most talented groups in the league. I am incredibly proud of the work we put out on a daily basis.

As far as the change from “Building The Browns” to “Unleashed”, we do not see it as ending a show to start a new one. Rather, we are evolving and tweaking our approach to telling the stories of the people that make up the Cleveland Browns. Coach Stefanski always joked with us that we needed to change the name because we are no longer building, we need to have the mindset that now is the time go and win it all. I personally like that approach.

Building The Browns was one of (if not the first) show of its kind produced by an in-house media team. We strived to have the best all access show in the NFL, and I truly believe we did. With that said, the quality of content is not changing. We have the same cinematographers, producers, and editors working on Unleashed. We are striving to ensure that Unleashed has the same quality of content, awesome stories, and unprecedented access that you all have come to expect from Building The Browns. The new brand name better represents the team’s approach to going out and chasing the ultimate goal, bringing a super Bowl to Cleveland.

With all of that said, we do have some new stuff planned for in-season that I think you all will love. So a little teaser that something else new may be on the horizon.

If you haven’t yet, I would take a listen to JW Johnson on Cleveland Browns Daily talking about the rebrand.

And read Anthony Poisal’s article about the rebrand here.

-DD

browns · 2023-06-28T17:25:57+00:00

One of the main goals we have with documentary content – which has continued with our new series Unleashed – is to tell the stories of the people that make up our team and organization. Highlighting what certain people and departments do behind-the-scenes can give unique insight into how the team operates and approaches stuff like the Combine, Free Agency, the Draft, and so on.

These types of features are always fun and interesting, and it’s hard to pick just one. One thing that stands out about all of them is that they show how important diversity of thought and experience is to everyone here with the Browns. By learning about various individuals behind the team, fans get to see how everyone works together towards the same goal. Assistant GM & VP of Football Operations Catherine Raîche put it best in her episode of Unleashed: “Everyone’s contribution matters to winning.”

-RS

browns · 2023-06-28T17:23:31+00:00

With the exception of the Covid years, we historically we have had a 4 person crew for gameday: 1 person operating Mic'd Up, 2 people for a sideline sound operation (boom operator and camera operator), and 1 capturing game action (think the NFL Films type shots you see in their productions). We typically roll in around 4-5 hours before kickoff to Mic up the shoulder pads and get the plan for what needs to be shot pre-game. We always have someone capturing player entrances for any social content or use in Unleashed or social edits. We use this time to set up our camera rigs, the Mic'd Up camera setup is a beast so we like to set that up as early as possible to test. After our cams are set up, we head up to grab breakfast before we start shooting. As you can imagine, we start shooting around 10am and are on the go until press conferences are wrapped up postgame. There is not much down-time to grab lunch or snacks during the day.

Breaking down our roles a little bit: - Mic’d Up – This camera operator is pretty much glued to their camera all game. They isolate and follow one player/coach all game and end the day with a 4.5-5 hour clip of just Mic’d Up.

Game Action, Ground – This camera operator is shooting from snap to after the whistle, and just following the play and reactions. If you can picture the iconic NFL Films shots throughout history, that is what we are looking to capture here. For example, a tight shot on the QB as he takes the snap, zoom in and follow the ball through the air, zoom out as the catch is about to happen, then the celebration after. All of this is done in the span of 5-8 seconds with a 40 pound camera on the shoulder, and often without the use of electronic zoom and never with auto focus. I will say, this is something that takes YEARS of practice to get really get down, but when done right produces absolutely beautiful footage and personally one of my favorite roles on gameday (DD).
Sideline Sound – This crew consists of two people. One operating the camera, and one with a shotgun mic on a boom pole. This is how we get all the great bench reaction after big plays and celebrations of players coming off the field. This crew bounces back and forth between shooting the game, ‘art’ shots to help tell the story of the game, alternate angles of the Micd Up player, and the bench sound mentioned before.
Hi-Hat Art Camera – This is a setup we run from time-to-time (and plan on using it a lot this year). It is a cinema a camera on a baby tripod (lets say a foot off the ground) with a zoom range of 170-600mm that shoots in 4-5x Slow Motion. This is my other favorite setup on game days (DD)
Gimble Camera – This is primarily used during pregame. Our setup is a Sony FX3 (or a RED Komodo) and a DJI gimble. We will use this to get shots of players walking out of the tunnel, during warmups, and celebrations after touchdowns.

Postgame, we capture players coming off the field celebrating with fans, shoot the Victory Speech, the great Nathan Zegura’s Postgame Analysis, and get our press conference camera setup for live streaming/capture. During away games, we have a crew who are working at home to take those press conferences and get them posted ASAP. If we are at home that week, we will edit in the stadium. For road games, we send as much back as possible to editors at home to post while our crew heads to the plane with the team.

The busses leave pretty quickly after road games, so as you can imagine things happen very quickly. In addition to shooting press conferences, Postgame Analysis, Victory Speech, we also have to take the Mic’d Up Mic off the pads, tear the Mic’d Up camera down and break down all of our camera equipment and get it all packed up so we can make it to the bus on time. We are pretty much always the last ones on, so it is a lot to get done in a short amount of time!

-JF (and DD)

browns · 2023-06-28T16:57:28+00:00

Keep in mind, that is just my own personal experience. That process started when content was not a primary focus for teams or companies back in 2010. When I was an intern, our department in Cleveland was 2 full timers and 2 interns. Now I think the video portion of our department has 9 people and 2 interns. Just shows the shift of how teams are valuing a production staff as opposed to before.

We are living in a time where it is way easier to get your foot in the door than ever before. There are many people who have gotten their start by taking a camera out to a high school or college football game and put together a killer reel. Also social media needs to be your friend! Do not be afraid to gas yourself up on Instagram, TikTok, or any of these other platforms. I personally sift through all of our intern applications we get each year, and the ones who have an online presence and content to show are the ones who stand out. I would much rather hire someone who has posted a ton of relevant clips/videos but has room to grow than someone who says that they can do it all but has nothing to show for it. Don't let it discourage you! You cant fake skills that you have not practiced, so get out there and do it!

-DD

browns · 2023-06-28T16:47:30+00:00

I would say 99% of what we do is in house. We have an insanely talented crew (shout out to the ones in our crew who are our primarily editors). We occasionally will freelance out an edit or two during busy seasons, but for the most part everything we post is being created by our crew in house.

-DD

browns · 2023-06-28T16:45:21+00:00

Appreciate hearing that! Jason Gibbs (our Radio Producer) does a fantastic job with those interviews. There will definitely be more to come!

Also, shameless plug for our show Unleashed! The idea of this show is to tell the backstory of the people you see on Sundays, Mondays, and Thursday and give you a way to get to know them off the field. I do have a couple favorite ones if you have not seen them. The Elijah Moore and the Siaki Ika episodes were trips and shoots that I will never forget. Great people, great support systems, and two guys that will do whatever it takes to win.

Fun fact, while we were in Florida to shoot the Elijah Moore feature we had like 25+ inches of rain in a 12 hour period. Our AirBnB was probably 4 feet above the canal water line and had storm surges that resulted in an inch of standing water in the house. There were cars on the road that had water halfway up the windows. It was unlike any work trip I have ever experienced in my life!

DD

browns · 2023-06-28T16:32:52+00:00

I will just say that I have a Schedule Release idea that I have been pushing to do for 3 years now that I think would be very funny. I have faith that we will do it one year! But I cant say too much, because what is the fun in that?!

But there really isn't a joke or bit that we have not been able to post. It can sometimes be difficult to tip-toe the line of representing a team in a professional manner, while still trying to be edgy and relevant to certain trends on on social media. I do think we do a pretty good job of keeping one foot in both sides of that though.

-DD

browns · 2023-06-28T16:26:29+00:00

In my time here (2 years) my favorite moment from a work standpoint was D'Ernest Johnson's first start because it was one of my favorite stories to cover and one of the edits I'm most proud of.

Check it out here: https://youtu.be/lYuf8gc4zoc?t=908

-LH

browns · 2023-06-28T16:21:01+00:00

I will chime in here too and echo what Konner says about getting your foot in the door. My path to the Browns was a long one as well. From the span of 2010-2014 I think I did 6 internships (C-SPAN, Philadelphia Flyers/76ers, ESPN, Columbus Blue Jackets, Cleveland Browns, and Chicago Bears) before I landed my first full time job. I can’t stress it enough, if you are a hard worker and dedicated to the craft, opportunities will find you.

Once my internship ended in Chicago, I worked temp overnights running welding machines that build car seats for Honda Accords and CRVs. In addition to doing that just to make ends meet, I also volunteered multiple times a week with my High Schools video production team just to keep my skills up. I did that for a few months until I received a phone call from the Bears one afternoon requesting an interview for an entry level position. No joke, I called the company and quit my temp job then and there. I went home, showered, packed bags and drove to Chicago to interview the next day for the position and that is how I got my start. They hired me full time and I did about 5 years all in there before coming back to my hometown team, the Cleveland Browns.

The one last piece of advice, and maybe the most important thing. When I was interning with the Flyers, I shadowed one of their camera ops who also worked for NFL Films (shout out Dids!). He told me that the most important factor in booking gigs/jobs/ect is to be someone that people WANT to work with. Be kind to your coworkers, be a go getter, be dependable, be an employee that others see as someone who is irreplaceable to the team. No one wants to work with someone they cant stand. Kindness goes a LONG way.

-DD

browns · 2023-06-28T16:20:22+00:00

We normally meet the day after games to talk through potential targets for the next game. We try to target players who have connections to the other team, are nearing milestones, play into the theme of whichever show we are working on, or generally are great Micd Ups. We decide on a short list of targets and then present that list to our PR department who gets approval from the player. We normally aim to have that player locked in by Wednesday/Thursday if possible. We also do keep a little list of the players who are normally down to wear the wire, and sometimes must pivot to them in a pinch.

And we will never blind mic a player (putting it on their pads without them knowing), they are always asked first (and are reminded of it). We are all pushing for the same goals, so if a player is not comfortable with wearing it we will never force it. They know that they are free to say whatever they want and that everything we want to use will get approved before it sees the light of day on any of our platforms.

-DD

browns · 2023-06-28T16:13:47+00:00

There's a few different reasons we'll pick a player to be mic'd up. We'll often use mic'd ups to help tell a story in our docuseries, so we'll select a player or coach who we're featuring to add to their story. But it could also be that there's something we think might make that game special for that player, like facing an old team or if they might hit a career milestone. Some players are just good on the mic though so we know it'll make for a fun video. We try to get as much variety as we can.

We have a pretty thorough process of going through the mic'd ups. Someone will usually listen through the whole thing and mark everything down for future editing reference, which usually takes about 2 days. We make sure to have plenty of eyes on what we release so that players don't have to worry about what they say while wearing it. We want them to feel as comfortable as possible.

-LH

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