Jasef's Web Show - Ticket to Cullman

[JasefWisener]

Well I've posted about this everywhere else, so I figure that I might as well here, too. So, here it goes.

For those of you that don't know, I've always had a strong interest in filmmaking. I've made a couple of short films, but they didn't really go anywhere. Then, at the end of the summer, a few friends and I decided to end our summer vacation from school doing something fun. So, we got out a camera and traveled around town, going to various tourist attractions and historical spots in the city and talking about them a la Travel Channel. We thought that we did a pretty good job with it, so I edited it together over the next couple of days and we released it on Youtube as Ticket to Cullman, the only web show dealing with the tourism of Cullman, AL.

We went a couple of days and didn't think about it, and then I randomly decided to see if anyone had watched it on Youtube. When I looked, we had over 350 views in two days. While that may not be much compared to many videos, it was pretty impressive for a small video about a hole-in-the-wall town. We were happy, so we left it a little longer. About a week later we checked again and we had topped 500 views. I also found out that the TV Production class at the high school had critiqued the show, the French class watched it for their citizenship lesson for the week, and it had been posted on the two message boards for the county. We had very positive feedback from the community, so we decided to make another episode and see what happened.

We made episode 2 of the show (and somehow managed to get free food at the featured restaurant), and things took off. Within a week of its release we were contacted by the local newspaper. They wanted to do a full front page story on us, complete with pictures. Needless to say, we accepted. Since then we've had a fair amount of success. We released a highly anticipated episode dealing with the county fair, and we also launched a spinoff show that focuses on local restaurants. We're currently in the stage of getting sponsors to buy commercials in the show and getting put on air on the community TV station. We're also in talks with the local newspaper to do weekly lifestyle episodes for pay. We're extremely pleased with the way that things are going, and we know that it's only going to get better.

Anyway, I wanted to post some links to the show and try to get some feedback from others. Check them out if you get a chance, and let me know what you think.

Fair Episode: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KVoTF0KnFpg
T2C Channel: http://www.youtube.com/user/Ticket2Cullman
Newspaper Article: http://cullmantimes.com/homepage/x20311 ... cturestory

[dotkel50]

Jasef,

I just watched your videos and i'm really impressed, they were really good. You should go to film school next year. I was hanging on street corners doing nothing when I was your age. Great job hon.

[JasefWisener]

Thanks for the complement!

[Maiandra]

That's awesome! It's great when someone is able to do something they enjoy and get some recognition for it.

I haven't had a chance to look at the videos yet, but I plan to.

[JasefWisener]

We recently got recognized by the city school board, and we have also released an Oktoberfest episode.

[AndreaDraco]

Congratulations Jasef!

I've only watched the first video, but this is really good! I'm really happy for you!

[JasefWisener]

New episodes!

Oktoberfest episode: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=11UOkFUvbNg

November episode: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q1ib9vaZNIo

Christmas episode: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=beRy0PIO4N0

Menu of Cullman 2: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oy2zVQ5ZYkg

[JasefWisener]

Where do I begin?

Since my last update, we started season 2 of the show. So far this season, we've released 4 episodes. We've also recently begun a new "series" called Ticket to Cullman Mini, where we take short (1-2 minute) clips from past shows and re-release them in a format that takes much less time to watch than a normal episode. If you feel like checking out my hometown, head over to the Ticket to Cullman YouTube page (http://www.youtube.com/user/Ticket2Cullman) or to our fan page on Facebook (http://www.facebook.com/#!/pages/Ticket ... 7270462122).