Autumn camping and hiking near Kenosha Pass, Colorado.
Full day experience.
Please enjoy a mystical aspen grove in the Colorado mountains during the most beautiful, colorful time of year.
A Different Way
Over the course of a nearly sleepless week (as I was employed full time while making this film) I wrote, acted, edited and finished this film, with help from Neil Kirkpatrick, who provided the beautiful soundtrack. It’s a harrowing science fiction tale that takes place after the end of the world.
This entire video was generated using RunwayML’s Gen-2 text-to-video capability, with assist from the Gen-1 model, Midjourney’s generative images, Voice.ai’s voice changing tools, and Speechify’s text to speech narration for the news voices in different languages.
Gen-2 was released about a week before I made this. Immediately I spent hours experimenting, and ultimately was able to sculpt a story which leaned on the strengths of the generative model. It’s actually a story I’ve been toying with for a few years, but the release of Gen-2 and other AI tools has made it all the more poignant.
As far as I know this is one of the first films made using almost entirely AI techniques. In contradiction to the public view, I think it opens up opportunities for creativity, instead of replacing creatives. What I’ve done this past week would have been impossible the week before. Without access to large amounts of money and cutting edge technology, the average person could previously only dream of making a film like this by themselves. But now it is at our fingertips.
One of my passions is keeping up with current technological trends, and this is a great example of that.
Foreward Podcast
Foreward is an audio drama written and directed by Taylor Fraser. It chronicles a community’s story after the tragedy of a school shooting. It has amassed thousands of views from across the world, and reached the top 1% of all podcasts.
Spencer joined Forrest Lotterhos as an audio editor for this project.
You can listen to the story in full on your favorite streaming service.
Twitch channel: bopili
I ran a Twitch channel which from 2018 until 2021 amassed 2000 followers and over 45,000 hours watched. Originally created to record games for later as keepsakes, consistency and production quality allowed my channel to thrive. I truly enjoyed entertaining people during the pandemic while playing PUBG. The only reason I stopped was because I no longer enjoyed playing solo games in PUBG, and these were the basis for my content. I am constantly trying to think of opportunities where I can resume live-streaming outside of gaming, but have yet to find a path forward.
I edited this video as a retrospective of my journey through 10,000 hours of playing this game. It includes clips of many of my favorite and most memorable moments. For more, you can still find many longer clips and full games at twitch.tv/bopili
Blackwater Drifters
Still one of my larger and more ambitious projects to date, Blackwater Drifters is the culmination of a multi year documentary process. Nick Caiazza and Joe Zimmermann both quit their jobs and kayaked over 3800 miles on the Missouri-Mississippi river system, the longest waterway in North America, completely human powered. Through their journey, people along the river, and the words of leading water scientists, we explore how human activity effects our water, and indeed what it means to live in this highly connected world.
I edited both the film and the trailer, did animation for the map sequences, and designed the posters and key art. The greatest challenge of this film was working through hundreds of hours of footage taken from the trip, and the interviews taken later, to tell a story about not just the trip itself, but ultimately a story about the river and it health.
You can now watch the whole film here: https://vimeo.com/231933631
Final Polish.
Final Polish is a short film by Paul Kelly staring Judith Roberts (Eraserhead, Orange is the New Black). I edited the film, creating the final look and rhythm, and managed the post production process.
The main challenge of this film was that it was shot entirely on an iPhone, so I had to spend a lot of time reworking the footage to make it look cinematic.
Music composed by Neil Kirkpatrick
PEEA:
Project Elijah Empowering Autism.
I edited and did the motion graphics for this video. PEEA is a non-profit which organizes community events for the families of autistic children. They are based in west Philadelphia, but have a reach into dozens of states across the US. Please visit the organization and get involved at peea.org
Hello Ghana
I visited Ghana about two years ago with my friend Molly Frederick’s organization, which at the time focused on supporting several orphanages. While volunteering I shot several hours of video. However, because I didn’t bring multiple battery chargers, I was unable to shoot many planned interviews when a power surge fried my only charger. There was nowhere in the area to purchase a replacement and I was unable to repair it.
This was a great learning experience for me. Not just to see another culture, but also to learn about being prepared for video shoots, and how to plan for the unexpected in remote locations.
In addition to shooting and editing, I also composed the music.
Garden of Eden trailer.
I edited this trailer for Imani Dennison’s short film: Garden of Eden. The film oversold the house at it’s premiere and has been accepted to Cannes Film Festival. The trailer garnered several thousand views on Facebook in less than a week.
Animation reel, 2017.
This reel includes some of my early animation projects, as well an animated map sequence from Blackwater Drifters that illustrates the journey the two kayakers took along the longest continuous waterway in North America.