There were a number of things that made it so. I wanted to recap a few of the things that stuck out the most to me.

1. Cineplex Media & FilmAds
In April I was able to see a 6 month conversation and a 1 year idea come to fruition. FilmAds officially signed a partnership with Cinplex Media. The deal has opened tremendous doors for the 12 theatres that I work with. I’m very excited for each of the theatres I work with and the new theatres we’ll be signing up in 2012.

2. Fringe
Last December my friend Jason and I came up with the crazy idea to meet John Noble (Walter Bishop on Fox’s Fringe) and we started to go out and visit the Fringe film sets. You can also check out how we met Joshua Jackson and others here.

3. Dan Murphy Interview
Aside from some technical issues that were completely my fault. I had a lot of fun interviewing Dan Murphy of Sportsnet (all because I asked him if he’d be up for it through Twitter)
My friend Geoff Heith filmed the interview and afterwards we figured we’d head over to Rogers Arena and see if we could watch the Canucks practice… which we actually got to do.

4. Brent Butt Interview
After I got to meet cast members from Fringe, I moved on to a new fun project: trying to film a Canadian comedian legend… Brent Butt. It all started with a few twitter questions and then a blog post. Brent responded on Twitter saying he’d do the interview once he got enough Twitter followers… which over time he finally got. Thus the interview (with another technical glitch that I’ve learned never to make again)

5. The Valley Votes Interviews
For the municipal election in the Chilliwack area (Hope, Agassiz, Harrison & Chilliwack) I was asked by the Valley Votes team (run by the Chilliwack and District Real Estate Board) to interview candidates about important and pertinent things in the Chilliwack area. It was a great chance for me to sit down with influential people in the community and hear them out and share a bit about me as well. You can see all the interviews here.

6. 1Day Design
I get to work with a number small businesses all across BC and Alberta. With the way the economy has been going it’s proven tough for small businesses to do much in terms of marketing. Since I run a medium for businesses to market themselves, I wanted to give a simple option to get great advertising tools from – enter 1Day Design. As the 1Day Design site says “1Day Design is a service that is offered once a month. 1Day a month we create you a new website, logo, video or more. 1Day we design work for you at 1Price.”
The other side of 1Day Design is we give 50% of the money raised to charity. So far, we’ve given over $200 to charity and we’ve only been running for 2 months. It’s a start to something great!

7. Witness for the Prosecution
On my list for things to do for a while, was to have a role in a play. My actual goal was just to audition, but I guess I was good enough to play the part. Thanks to my friend and colleague Janet Carroll (the director) I was able to take on 3 roles (1 non-speaking) in the play “Witness for the Prosecution” by Agatha Christie. My main role was Thomas Clegg, a stuttering Englishman, nervous as anything because he’s taking the stand in court and he never does well with it. I thoroughly enjoyed the whole process and hope to do it again in the future.

8. Currency Marketing and The Living Young & Free Show
If you’ve ever spent any time on my blog, then you know I’ve spoken about Currency Marketing and LYFS. I have tried for a number of years to find a spot on their team. I really like the work they do and the people that work there. So in the spring of this year, I signed up for contract work with the Currency team and it’s been so much fun to work with them. A lot of what I do is literally behind the scenes. You wouldn’t really know what I’m doing unless I told you but a lot of what I do is film, direct and edit the Living Young Free Show (which is a bi-weekly show we produce) and I do a lot of coding/application entries for all their contests and spokespeople application entries. It can get really crazy, but is a lot fun… just check out their Christmas video we did:

9. My Family
After 2010 and the craziness and ups and downs we went through then, 2011 was a year of incredible time together. We got to go on a great 3 week road trip in the summer, in which we visited Salmon Arm, Nelson, Trail, Red Deer, Edmonton, Valemount and more (all while visiting some awesome friends, family and theatres!!!). We were also able to go to other great places through the year like Seattle, a weekend in the west end of Vancouver, a week at a beach house in Parksville (thanks to a special friend for letting use the last two places!) and camping in the Shuswap. It was a year for us to spend great time together, build new memories and start getting an idea of what the future is going to look like for us.

To all my blog readers, thanks for checking in and occasionally commenting. If anything, I do this blog for myself, but I love that you stop by and check out what’s happening.
Cheers,
Matthew A. Hawkins

• Video Invitation to Brent Butt
• Women I Work With Part 1
• Day 12 – Behind the Scenes

Running FilmAds I get the chance to work with businesses all across BC and now Alberta.
FilmAds offers local exposure in 12 theatres across Western Canada, as well as, production and design for ad creation. Local businesses typically work off of very tight budgets and don’t have a lot at the end of the month to put towards advertising, especially with a high quality ad. It’s one of those tricky things, because you need to advertise to get more attention to your business, but you also need the money to pay for it.

SO, I came up with 1Day Design. A way for local businesses to cash in on some quality design that is more than affordable.

How It Works:

1Day a month we offer 1Company 1Design (website, photo shoot, motion graphic ad, etc.) at 1Price ($100 on anything) that will be started and finished in 1Day (Oct 10). So for October we have 6 spots (6companies), 5 that are now available, where a company can sign up for 1piece of design work – logo design, video shoot, etc. Check the site out for more details – 1Day Design Website.

It’s a pay-low-take-as-is-and-run-with-it kind of idea.

You can sign up for it today!

Goals:

I’ve been talking with a number of people I know in the design world and they love the idea. They especially love where I want to take it.

My goal is to get small local businesses, that need a little boost, some quality design work and then offer the proceeds to a local charity. For the month of December we’ll be donating 50% to the local Salvation Army Food Bank. From there we’d like to look at getting involved with other local charities to offer a little financial help.

What I need from you, my faithful few, is to get the word about what we’re doing. Let people know their website doesn’t have to stay hidden in their mom’s basement anymore. Tell them that the logo their neighbours 15 year old kid did with a ripped off copy of Photoshop doesn’t have to make up the identity of their company. Tell people the Facebook profile pic they have for their business that shows off their iPhone in the mirror as well as their face, doesn’t have to be that way.
Simply, help me get the word out.

Cheers,

Matthew A. Hawkins

• 1Day Design: November
• 1Day November & Geoff Heith
• FilmAds September 2011 Monthly Report

I’m more privileged and honoured to work with some of the women I work with.
You see, a few weeks ago, I was thinking about all the work I do and who I get a chance to work with. I have a variety of things I do: educational biology shorts, credit union & financial marketing, school district information & communication, health & wellness videos and so on. I started to connect who most of the people are that I work with on these projects and I saw a pattern – strong, smart, beautiful, talented women. In case you missed Part 1. Or Part 2. Or Part 3.

_________________________________

Stacey Adamczyk

I met Stacey through my wife’s old childhood friend Aaron. Most of the time I have spent getting to know Stacey has been through online conversations via Facebook chat, Twitter, email or Skype. I actually think there was a time that Stacey and I met at a family wedding but both of us have forgotten if that actually happened or not.

Somehow Stacey and got connected about doing video work together. Stacey and Aaron had both mentioned how much they loved the SilverScreen Tots videos I had been creating and Stacey began asking about doing them in her hometown in Red Deer. We begin talking and coming up with various ways to promo the videos around town. That was when I began to see the entrepreneurial side of Stacey and just how hard she works for a living.

I am impressed with each of the women I have a privilege of working with closely. For some reason we have all connected well and we push each other to strive for our very best in our careers. Stacey is no exception. I have seen a drive and passion in Stacey that you don’t see very often. She is very, very determined.

Stacey owns and operates Clearview Design from just outside Red Deer, Alberta. She specializes in website design, but more specifically, precision marketing for small business owners. She’s been using a combination of social media, web presence and quality design to help her clients with their marketing needs. Aside from the work she does, Stacey is also an incredible networker. She understands the value of pounding the pavement and getting to know everyone and anyone you can. One phone call, one knock on the door, one email, one connection, they all can lead to a sale and Stacey is one of the best people at this that I have ever met.
(In fact I have a blog post coming up on a challenge that Stacey told me about during our visit to her new home in July – the post is called “21″)

When we were in Alberta this past summer I had the privilege of helping Stacey create an ad to show off just exactly what she does. Here’s the video:

Thank you Stacey for all hard work, challenges you’ve told me about and the chance to film you at work.
I look forward to the many more chances we’ll have to work together.

Matthew A. Hawkins

• Women I Work With Part 1
• Women I Work With Part 2
• Women I Work With Part 3

We stopped in near Red Deer to visit some friends for a few days, Aaron and Stacey Adamcyzk. You’ll read more about Stacey and her business really soon.

To celebrate Canada Day we went out and bought some fireworks on July 2nd. I was happy to find out you can still buy fireworks the day after.
It made for a really fun 20 minutes setting stuff on fire and scaring the cows in the nearby fields.
Enjoy!

• Women I Work With Part 4
• One Week – Movie Review
• Learning to Learn

I remember watching Game 7 of the Stanley Cup Finals in 1994. Madison Square Garden. I remember Bure chasing the puck for an icing with seconds to spare in the game they would soon lose. I remember the feeling of defeat. The feeling of doubt that we would never see this moment again. Well, here we are today. Here is Vancouver sitting at the threshold of something that will go down in history one way or the other. Another moment to believe the Stanley Cup will makes it home in Vancouver.

Since getting into video, one of the first things I started doing was making fan videos for the Canucks. It’s been a fun ride and one I’ll continue to take as life goes on.
I’ve had the amazing privilege, because of being a Canucks fan, to do some awesome things with it:
- interview Dan Murphy from Sportsnet (still wish I had audio fixed and that I did that interview in character)
- visited GM Place (now Rogers Arena) for a behind the scenes tour, days before Crosby showed up for the first time on the West Coast
- interviewed Clayton Imoo (after years of talking about doing a video together…again with the audio…)
- interview with Brent Butt (because I persisted or he relented or both and I wish I had my audio fixed for this too… sigh)
- got to be on CTV and GLOBAL News a number of times (mostly because my kids are cute)
- was on the Canucks centre ice screen throughout a whole season for the opening videos (only pieces of my stuff, but still amazing)

I’ve been lucky and I hope to keep doing my nutty stuff for them.
I compiled a few of my favorite Canuck fan moments into one video for you to enjoy.

• Donald Miller & Hockey
• Video Invitation to Brent Butt
• Remembrance Day

Hiccups was holding a contest on Facebook: Post your love for Hiccups via video!
My kind of contest…
It’s kind of my type of contest. I love entering video contests, but with much experience in the “your video wins with most views or is most popular because your friends don’t know any better” I haven’t really had much luck.
I do better in the whole “we appreciate quality and funniness” kind of contest.

So my buddy Geoff Heith and I put together this fun video (some details on the process of shooting this below).

A couple fun facts about our shoot:
- we ate lunch and talked about work, beer and food.
- to warm up for the shoot we watched a bunch of hiccups season 2 webisodes
- we didn’t write down a script, we spent more time setting up my office and the camera/light gear
- we started the first shots with different accents then what we ended up with, it was a progression of what you saw above
- I forgot to get people to like the video until Sunday night. I should have spent more time “campaigning”
- I was really hoping to win for 1 of 2 reasons – the swag or getting in with the crew of CTV & maybe even Brent Butt again

So there you have it.
Cheers,
Matthew A. Hawkins
Until the next time…

• My Dark Photos
• Edit Edit Away
• My Take on Buying New Gear

Anna Torv.

Set pictures below.

I’d like to point something out. If you go on set, be respectful. The crew was incredibly helpful but I think it was because I listened to their requests and didn’t get in their way. I asked them when was the best time for photos and I didn’t act like a jerk. When we met Josh, he was having lunch, so we waited – I wouldn’t like to be bugged while I ate lunch, so why would anyone else? Be respectful and treat people the way you’d like to be treated. It goes a long way.

Well I’m happy to say that today my adventure comes to a happy close. At least with Fringe.
I took my 3 year old with me again today on a fun trip to the big city (as he likes to call it).

We got word that Fringe was filming right near Canada Place so away we went.
When we first arrived near the set I saw Joshua Jackson and John Noble right away.
FINALLY my day had come.

They broke for lunch and John walked right past us and I asked for a picture with him and he said “Of course, just let me finish some work”. Fair enough. Oh and remember that.

Since they were breaking we took off to find a fountain for the 3 year old to check out and low and behold Joshua Jackson was eating his lunch 10 feet away. We hung out and took some fun pics and video of the fountain and when Josh was done his lunch, we asked for a few minutes. He signed a copy of one of my favorite, most meaningful movies I’ve ever watched and took a couple pictures with us. Really nice guy.

We went back to the set and watched the fun camaraderie of Josh and John with the crew and each other and a few rehearsals. The crew was amazing again and while John was about to start another rehearsal, he saw me and the three year old and said, “Oh there you are, let’s take that picture.” An amazing man and actor.

Thank you to the Fringe cast and crew. Keep watching fans so we can have a season 4!

Set pictures below.
Or on my Flickr stream

Oh. And comments ALWAYS welcome!

This looks like John Noble, but it’s the back of his stand ins head.

• Getting on the Fringe: A Fan’s Perspective
• Friday is Juice Day
• My Growing “Fame”

So here’s me being an extra. Not sure I would do it again, but it was an enjoyable experience. I want to be involved more behind the camera or something more in front, perhaps with some lines.
Here ya go:

Above I’m the guy walking away on the right… can’t see me in the Full Screen version.

I’m on the left with a camera. That was the same night my car got broken into after the shoot AND I got to talk with Jessica Alba for a few minutes.

My scene with Andy, just before he pushed me over.

There ya have it.

• Hangover II: Movie Review
• Unknown: Movie Review
• Bridesmaids: Movie Review

It all started as a joke… come to think of it, most things between me and my friend Jason start off that way. We became extras as a joke and ended being on a couple of cool shoots (Hot Rod, Fantastic Four 2) and I got to meet Jessica Alba.

*FRINGE Set Pictures below!!!

We began watching Fringe about a year ago and we like it. It’s a great show. I want to forewarn you now, it may seem like we’re crazy fans BUT I can assure we are not. After watching an episode around Christmas time and laughing at the antics and lines of Walter Bishop, played by the great John Noble, we said jokingly that it would be awesome to get our picture taken with him.

Let the adventure begin.

Since that point I have been on/around the set of Fringe a number of times. Trying to meet Mr. John Noble and Joshua Jackson. I’ve been to several locations, either by myself or with friends/family. The first place we went to was Pacific Central Train Station on a Friday night…

But no luck. No John, no Joshua and no Anna.

The closest I’ve come to meeting John was at UBC this week, when I had the chance to take my 3 year old son with me. The crew was awesome helping us try and meet John, but we missed him by a few minutes. Better luck next time right? Well guess again… almost.

Last night we headed down to Chinatown in Vancouver and walked around the set.
I felt bad for the cast and crew. Wet, cold and snow still on the ground, they were in for a long haul, working all day and into the wee hours of the night. For us, however, luck would shine it’s pretty little head our way, but first a few shots for you to check out… (sorry Geoff for screwing up your picture!) We did get to meet Anna Torv which was pretty darn cool, PLUS she was so nice to take some pictures with us!

More on my adventures with Fringe and whatever else we may come up with as it happens!

Now just to meet Mr. Noble and Mr. Jackson!

• Getting on the Fringe: Part 2
• My Growing “Fame”
• Friday is Juice Day

It was a great morning just meeting Dan, but shortly after that we were able to capture some footage inside Rogers Arena for a few minutes. Just goes to show you, anything is possible.

Thanks to Dan Murphy (@sportsnetmurph) and Geoff Heith for the great morning.
Question is now, will Dan keep following me on Twitter? I hope so.

• My Canucks Fan Journey
• Blog Recap
• My Year: 2011 Highlights