“Video Business Very Personal”

In the Telegraph-Forum (Bucyrus/Crawford County ,Ohio), Slav Kandyba writes about a local business that records family memories for future generations:

With Jeff Smith’s fledgling Creative Image Productions, it’s not quite business — it’s personal.

When Smith’s mother, Ellen, died in January, he felt it was time to fulfill a plan 10 years in the making. With his brother Brian, the rural Bucyrian bought a digital camera and camcorders and set up a studio complete with a computer and video- and audio-editing software.

He uses these to capture stories of his own family members to pass on to descendants, and he wants to offer the same services to other area families. He likens the venture, called “Recollections,” to ESPN’s “SportsCentury” and FOX Sports’ “Beyond the Glory” — TV shows in which a particular athlete, game or moment is highlighted with a narrator reading from a script.

“I look at people in my family, lean back and listen to their stories,” Smith said. “We want someone in 20 years to pop in a DVD and say, ‘We captured mom.’ The core customer is the son or daughter.”

With businesses like this, as well as costs of video production coming down in general, there is almost no reason not to do this. This could become an important tool for future genealogists as well.

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