Sunday, November 7, 2010

Hiring Local Visual Media Producers helped to win the Gubernatorial Election in Maine

In my last post I outlined who the five gubernatorial candidates hired to do their visual media production for their respective campaigns. Of the top three, Mitchell and Cutler hired out of state production companies and LePage stayed with local visual media producers.

As we now know, LePage won. Was this a win for local visual media producers? Only time will tell.

We can assume that Governor Elect LePage understands the impact of visual media production from his work as the general manager of Marden’s. Is there anyone in Maine who doesn’t know the Marden’s Lady (http://www.birdiegoogins.com/)?

On his YouTube channel his most popular video received over 20,000 views.
In short, local visual media production helped Governor Elect LePage win the election.

Visual media production can also help Maine win the battle for a healthier economic environment.

Maine currently has several terrific visual/new media programs at the Maine Media Workshops, The University of Maine and Southern Maine Community College. Most universities, colleges and community colleges in Maine offer some type of visual media training.

So what happens when those students graduate from these programs? In Maine, the opportunities are slim.

Maine has the geographic beauty and trained, hardworking visual media producers to attract more visual media production. Maine doesn’t have the infrastructure or the tax incentives to attract more visual media production.

How do we begin to fix this problem?

I would encourage Governor Elect Lepage to have someone on his staff reach into the Maine visual media community and collect intelligence and ideas on how we can build the visual media economy in Maine.

Two good places to start are the Film Commission and the Maine Film and Video Association. Go to them and ask them how we can improve the visual media economy in Maine, what they need in support to make their ideas work and what they are willing to do to implement their ideas.

I would also encourage Governor Elect LePage to reach out to the visual media students for their ideas. We can get them fired up and inspire them to work and live in Maine if they know that opportunities exist.

I’m also willing to put my time and effort into growing the Maine Visual Media economy. Contact me anytime Governor Elect Lepage, if you’d like my involvement cbonsey1@maine.rr.com .