Skip to content Episode 8 with the Advent Experience team Mar 26 · 44 min ...more
Episode 8 with the Advent Experience team
March 26, 2026 · 44 min
In this episode of From the Hangar, three members of MAF’s marketing and communication teams join Nathan to discuss the creation of the Advent Experience. Video producer Lem Malabuyo, marketing coordinator Amanda Charlton, writer Natalie Holsten, and Nathan give a behind-the-scenes look at how the Advent box came to be and some of their favorite parts of this year’s project.
Series From the Hangar
Bringing help, hope and healing through aviation so that isolated people can experience Jesus's love.
March 26, 2026 · 44 min · From the Hangar
In this episode of From the Hangar, three members of MAF’s marketing and communication teams join Nathan to discuss the creation of the Advent Experience. Video producer Lem Malabuyo, marketing coordinator Amanda Charlton, writer Natalie Holsten, and Nathan give a behind-the-scenes look at how the Advent box came to be and some of their favorite parts of this year’s project. ...more Show the full description Show less In this episode of From the Hangar, three members of MAF’s marketing and communication teams join Nathan to discuss the creation of the Advent Experience. Video producer Lem Malabuyo, marketing coordinator Amanda Charlton, writer Natalie Holsten, and Nathan give a behind-the-scenes look at how the Advent box came to be and some of their favorite parts of this year’s project.
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In this video 0:00 Introducing the Advent Experience Team and Vision10:01 Infusing MAF Culture and Global Gifts into Advent21:42 Devotionals, Design, and Production Challenges30:28 Team Reflections on Impact and Joy
Introducing the Advent Experience Team and Vision 0:14 Hello, and welcome, to episode 8, the final full episode of From the Hanger. And I don't know about you, but it feels like just yesterday that we were, starting this podcast. And, yeah, it just seems like this0:26 year has already flown by. So welcome to December. Welcome to, a really fun episode. And I say that I think about every episode that I've been a part of. I think I say the words super excited,0:39 about every single episode. But I am super excited, about today's episode because I get to be alongside, 3 of my coworkers and team members. Today's episode, we're gonna, be chatting a little bit about a0:50 project that's really close to my heart, and really close, to a lot of the people, hopefully, all of us, on camera or behind the mic, because this was a project that, we were able to just kind of1:02 create from the ground up. We're talking about the Advent experience. And if this is your first time hearing about it, you're gonna get the chance to learn a little bit about what it is, why we decided to do it, and and1:12 what the purpose and our heart behind it is. And if you maybe already have 1 of the books or maybe this is your second time purchasing it, you'll get to hear a little bit more of the backstory behind, why we decided to1:23 do this project. So before I even get started, I wanna introduce, the 3 of these people and and some of the people that actually are not behind the camera, or behind the mic. And so over here, all the way,
1:35 furthest from me is Amanda Charlton. Amanda is our project manager, gift shop coordinator. She makes a lot of things happen. And and for this project specifically, she helped obviously with, like, the whole creation of
1:46 this project, but also, so many of the logistics of making sure that we have shipping tape and packing tape so that boxes look good and all of the project, management side of things of keeping me on track, which
1:57 sometimes might not be the easiest thing in the world. And then on top of that, she helped resource, all the items and the gifts, that we actually package within each of, each of the boxes. And so we'll get a chance to
2:08 hear from that. Next to her is, Lem Malabuyo. Lem is our photographer, videographer here, at headquarters along with, a person that's actually behind the cameras today, Colin. Normally behind the camera,
2:20 but this time he gets a chance to be in front of it. And, yeah. So he took some photos for us, did some videos for this project as well along with Colin. And, yeah, I get it's a chance to to present this project in a
2:30 really beautiful way, that I think, does a great job of of explaining kind of the heart behind it. And then to my right is Natalie Holston. Natalie is 1 of our writers on our communications team, and she, resourced
2:42 and fought with probably a lot of people to try to get 25 different devotional writers, for this year, and and that's on top of 25 from last year. On top of that, helped write a lot of, the different
2:54 content that we have and and some of the, contemplating the rest of the light things that that we'll talk about more, as we get into this episode. And before we even open it up to these 3 as they're all looking at me,
3:04 like, can we get going? I do wanna highlight a couple of people, that are not actually in front of a camera or behind the mic because this project does not happen without, a lot more people than than just the 4 of us. So
3:16 along with that, with with Natalie, there are some writers on the team that that helped that make this project run. So Jen Wolf, Kim Van Veen, Diana Gibney helped with this. Kevin Mills helped with this. Brad Hoagland.
3:28 We had some phenomenal writers that that, helped write content and also 25 different staff members that helped make a devotional book actually a devotional book and that you're not reading a devotion for me, which is a
3:39 good thing. I already mentioned Colin Colin Lorenz. Yikes. Words are hard. And, he is currently acting like he's gonna come in front of the in front of the camera. But, he was along with Lem in
3:51 just helping make this project happen, making it show up photo photography and videography is just beautiful, making it, just a great, great, visual asset. And then we have some designers that are
4:03 also a part of this team. So Justin Stryker, and McKenna Casseldean, are 2 of our designers, and then we also had Stephanie Greenlee, who helped design this project. And, the thing that I love about this project is that
4:14 it's all custom. Like, everything that you see, is designed specifically with this project in mind, whether it's, a font choice that we decide that we decided on or, in this case, we had ornaments and and patterns. Those
4:24 were all custom things that that we had. On top of that, we had some directors that allowed us some free reign to make this project happen. So Tracy Worry and Brad Hoglund, were really, really great and pretty
4:36 instrumental in that. So with that, after a long introduction, I think the longest introduction I've had, so far, thanks Thanks for being here, you guys. Thanks for thanks for coming to hang.
4:45 Yeah. Thanks. And also yeah. Nice job on that introduction. That is the longest you've done on this podcast.
4:51 By a long shot. I mean and you know this because you've been behind the camera, and you're probably sitting there like, goodness. Keep it going. Yeah. No.
4:58 It's cool it's cool to be here. Thanks for having us kinda, like, come on here and, I don't know, promote a product we we put together. It sounds kinda weird to say it that way. But yeah. No. It's really cool.
5:10 Yeah. Absolutely. Well, thanks for thanks for coming to hang. I Yeah.
5:13 It's a little surreal, like, now that it's done because it you know, way back early this year when we started, it just feels so huge. And how are we gonna get there? And then it's really neat to see how everybody
5:24 contributed and, yeah, now it's done.
5:27 Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I wanna ask you actually. We're just gonna get it started off. You the 3 here, were all a part of, the, really, the
5:39 the conception of this idea. Do you mind explaining just a little bit of, like, the heart behind why we decided to do an Advent at all? Like, we're an aviation nonprofit. Like, what why did we decide to do this? If you
5:51 don't mind me asking you? Yeah.
5:52 Well, I
5:52 feel like on the marketing team, we're always thinking about how to further the ministry. And, this really took, like, more of a step back of, like, how can we bless,
6:05 our donors, and especially during a season of busy, a season where we're typically working on campaigns and fundraising, and just really bringing it back to how can we connect with people and provide them
6:16 something, that's really just focused on them becoming closer to Jesus. It wasn't for any benefit of any of us or organization or anything, but really just to impact people's,
6:29 connection with Jesus specifically during this time of the year.
6:35 I love that. I think, you pointed out a really interesting point that that I think is really important and, just the fact of, like, you know, we wanted to make it like, we wanted to give somebody something. Right? And
6:45 and we have such, an incredible base of donors and supporters and and just, like, genuine family and friends of MAF that, yeah, like, we didn't we're not trying to make money off of this project. We're not trying
6:57 to, make this massive profit by any means. We just wanted to hopefully bless people, and that does mean that they're giving us some money. But hopefully, we're giving them something that that's worth that money. So yeah.
7:06 I I love that. Lem, do you mind explaining actually how this project even started? Because, I say that because, I think it was myself and Justin, and, I think
7:18 you were also a part of this because there was this, coffee roaster called Onyx. Like, let's just get into it.
7:23 Okay. So Justin Stryker, who is the the senior graphic designer, he he's also a huge coffee evangelist, you could say, coffee connoisseur.
7:33 Cheers to that.
7:34 So there is this coffee roaster out in Arkansas called Onyx, and he loves that coffee. And they came out it was, like, 2 years ago, they came out with a advent calendar, like, coffee themed
7:46 advent calendar. And so he orders this thing, and it wasn't cheap. It was, you know, like, it was it was I sold the price on the other thing, and I'm, like, really? For coffee? But then I brought I you know, you divide
7:57 you divide it out and you you think about each cup, and you're like, okay. That's actually not that bad. But anyway, it shows up, and he brings it into the office. And it's this pretty elegant box that you
8:09 open up and, you know, you you go through each pocket, and it's it's very thought out, well designed. Everything about it was just incredible. So he's showing this to you and me,
8:21 and who he has long since converted to also being coffee evangelists. So we all love coffee. And he he shows this thing to us, and we're all blown
8:33 away. And it made us realize that, you know, what if we what if we did this, but we turned people towards Jesus rather than towards coffee? Right? What if we created something
8:45 that was really thought out, really well planned, but, you know, was something that we could kind of just help people experience and elevate their themselves, closer
8:57 to Jesus during a time when we're anticipating his coming. Right? Mhmm. Whether that's looking back towards his birth or looking towards the future when he finally comes.
9:08 Mhmm.
9:08 So it's a season of of anticipation. Right? So how can we do this in a thoughtful way? And like Amanda said, like, we we want to we are a group of creatives that just really want to do
9:20 this. And I remember when David Holston would talk about the airplanes. Right? Like, we are all about aviation, but ultimately, it's a tool to bring people closer to Jesus. And
9:32 so we all have a skill set. We all have tools to help talk about MAF. What if we use that as a way to talk about Jesus in a really thoughtful way? And so I think that was that was
9:43 kind of what got the ball rolling on what if we seriously did this. Mhmm. Like, we created an Advent experience, with the marketing team and the communications team to create something really, really
9:55 elegant for people to understand and and use, during the Advent season. Yeah. So
Infusing MAF Culture and Global Gifts into Advent
10:01 Yeah. I love that. I I it's so fun to, like, revisit, like, the whole purpose of this project. Right? This is our second year in doing it, and to go back to, like, that beginning stages. And, Natalie, I'm gonna
10:13 put you on the spot because you may not remember this. But, we do a creative meeting every other Friday. And at 1 of the creative meetings, I wanna say it was in middle of December, maybe early January. We're sitting at
10:25 another local coffee shop because we have a problem. But I I brought up this idea because, yeah, Lem and Justin and I were all were all chatting about this. And I brought up this idea of an advent. And I wanna
10:37 say, you and Janelle, who is a former writer on our team that was massive in our in our first year, You guys both kinda looked at me and was like, I love that idea. I I don't know if you remember that at all.
10:50 What what about this project is something that you're like, absolutely, that's something that we should be doing.
10:55 Yeah. Well, I mean, I just I love Christmas. I love Advent. I love things that can help guide you, you know. Because like somebody said already, like, Christmas can just be chaotic and busy. And,
11:07 to have something to kind of help, you know, focus your attention on Christ as we go into that season, I love the idea of that. And, I feel like, you know, I and I think Janelle and I were just thinking, oh, we've
11:19 got people that we could tap to write. We've got we serve in awesome places around the world where we could resource some gifts. And, yeah. It was easy to get excited about this idea for sure.
11:30 Yeah. Yeah. Just a little backstory on this whole process. 1 of the things that we really wanted to do and and integrate into this, project is, some MAF culture. And
11:42 so handful of years ago, we'd we started actually doing something called first day. And it's essentially, a a space for staff every first working Wednesday of the month, to be able to take a step back. And,
11:54 there's some structure to it. So it's a a kind of a corporate Sabbath, if you will. There's a time where, we get to hear from, speakers or hear, kind of like a a chapel or a sermon, depending on on the the
12:06 the month, I guess. On top of that, there's a lot of community building and, times that we can just be together with coworkers. And part of that structure, actually comes from other places. But there's a
12:18 structure of, these 4 kind of main themes of stop, contemplate, rest, and delight. And how do we stop before we kind of go into, the studying of Jesus or or the cont or the the the
12:29 yeah. Studying or or you get the idea. I'm stumbling over words. And then you you contemplate. So you read through scripture. You you, go through a study, and and you contemplate kinda what that means for,
12:41 the world as a whole, for your life as a whole, your your spiritual formation. You you rest in that as well. So you take a minute and you don't move on to the next thing. You you stop and you actually, like, rest in that
12:52 moment. So, whether that's a prompt of a prayer or, a prompt of a 5 minutes of quiet time or whatever it is. And then you delight because the lord wants us to delight in things as well. And so 1 of the things that I love
13:04 about this project is we get a chance to kinda bring that into, into this whole thing. Right? And, in the book, we actually, last year went through, a theme that was contemplate
13:16 rest to light. An Advent experience was the name of it, and we wanted to kinda introduce that that piece of it. And this year, we decided on going with the first day theme of our year, which is eyes on Jesus. And to
13:27 bring it back to, the reminder of everything that we do, we wanna fix our eyes on Jesus, who's the author and perfecter of our of our faith. And, I love that we get to bring that kind of a culture into also, like, this
13:39 wonderful season of Advent. And I know that, like, you guys are all, like, Christmas people. I mean, I don't know how you couldn't be. I mean, I'm not a winter person by any means. And if you read any of the emails that
13:49 I sent you, you will be very aware that I like the summer. But you will also know that, like, man, Christmas, how as a believer, how can you not love, love Christmas? And so part of Christmas, in the American culture
14:01 is gifts. Right? That's not a shock. And part of, children's advent calendars like, 1 of the things that we wanted to, like, emulate was, like, this, like, popping out of a piece of candy, and you've countdown to 25
14:13 25 days of Christmas. And so, Amanda, I'm gonna bring you into this because, 1 of the things that we do is find gifts, and we and we have those come out every week. And, can you explain, like, how we decided on
14:25 gifts this year and and what those gifts without ruining them, are like, are and and what the the vibe of them are?
14:31 Yeah. This conversation is making me, like, reminisce to early 20 22 of just, like, all the things that we talked through, as a team
14:43 of, like, what does this look like, and what audience are we writing to or creating this experience for. And it specifically bring me back to the, like, this
14:55 isn't just for families. This isn't just for, children. This is this is for the young adult who's out on their own. This is for the widow. This is for the married couple. This is for the
15:07 family with their children. I love that. I love, like, just going back to that. Because now it's just like what we do. Right? We love to to to create this experience each year. But, yeah. I don't know. It's just, like,
15:18 sweet for me to remember things that we we really just, like, got together and brainstormed about. But, an element of that was that that delight and surprise of of a gift.
15:31 And, yeah, I think traditionally, we all know what that looks like for a child. It's a little pop out chocolate. And for an adult, it's a book. And so merging, that and creating something that was exciting for adults as
15:43 well, we landed on doing a weekly gift. And so, just incorporated what we do even with our our gift shop as we source a lot of gifts that,
15:55 come from different parts, of the world. Programs that we work in, where people who work there work with other ministries. So it's either, you
16:07 know, being made, by a ministry or we're purchasing it from the local market there just to support the community there. This year, something different we did was we reached into some
16:19 restricted access countries to, just give some variety. But, yeah, we're we're super thoughtful about bringing a lot of ideas to the table and then fleshing them out. And and we did that again
16:31 this year. So you'll you'll find a variety of of different things, and they look different than last year. And and, next year, if we do another experience, they'll they'll look different again. And, yeah, I can't tell
16:42 you what's what's in there. But every week, we, we plan for families to open open that box and and be surprised at at what we've found for this year.
16:53 Yeah. Yeah. I, I
16:55 was just gonna add, I've got 2, like, I don't wanna give anything away because, yep, maybe you haven't opened it yet. But 1 of the items was made here in our hanger. And I think that's super cool. Mhmm. Made by EMEA
17:07 volunteers. And then the other thing that I don't know the story a story just from the resourcing part of things was, from 1 of their, restricted access countries.
17:19 1 of our staff members there, she had a, you know, a ministry going that was helping women, but it was kind of dying out. And she was trying to think of how can I get it going again, and then our order came in? Right?
17:30 And she was just praying about, like, I don't know how to keep this going, and I really wanna help these women. And then our order came, for this item, and that really got it going again. And she was super encouraged by
17:41 that. So it was just neat a neat way to be involved, yeah, with these different partners we have in different countries. And, yeah, just need to see how God is even using this Advent
17:53 experience in somebody else's life in another country.
17:55 Mhmm. That's awesome. Yeah. I I think when you think about, like, the Advent experience as a whole and and we call it an Advent experience because it's more than just a devotional book, and it's more than just a a couple
18:06 of gifts. Like, we really do hope that, when you get the box, and that's not a shock that it's in a box, that's custom made that Justin I think he's probably at his home with, like,
18:18 rulers and, like, cutting out pieces of cardboard. I mean, if you saw the the, like, craft and the, like, commitment to excellence in in building this box and then working with a a company to actually make it made, but
18:29 we want this, like, experience of, like, when you open up the flaps of the box and you get to see, the book, how it's laid out, and and this card that says, like, welcome to your admin experience. Like, we want you to,
18:38 like, be surprised. And and I was talking to my wife about this. She has, I'm gonna say the toxic trait of, looking up a concert set list before the concert.
18:50 And some of you guys are like, oh, yeah. I absolutely do that. Some of you guys are like, absolutely not. I'm an absolutely not kind of a person.
18:55 Wait. Wait. Wait. You probably never peeked at your Christmas gifts as a kid.
18:58 Oh, no. 100 percent did that. Oh, absolutely. Woah. There's a line. I've I'll cross that line. But we were talking about this, a while ago because she was heading off to a concert. And, and I think that there's just
19:10 something so beautiful about being surprised. And and as adults especially, like, we don't get an opportunity to really be surprised all that much. And we honestly kind of come up with, like, this intolerance to being
19:20 surprised. And there's this, like, fear of, like, not knowing what's coming. And, 1 of the things that I just absolutely love about this project is, the surprises that you open up these little these little tabs that are
19:32 hiding a gift under it. And if you wanna open them up, maybe you already have, you get to see them all. But also, hopefully, you still get that same surprise of, like, I don't know what this is gonna be, and I don't know
19:41 what to expect here. All I know is that it's gonna be good. And I I love that about, like, the items. But then also then you get that backstory of a ministry was potentially saved for a little bit longer and and
19:53 supporting, people a little bit longer because we just happened to decide to do it from that country instead of a different program. And Mhmm. I will say for next year, I don't know what other programs we
20:05 have on the list because I think we've tapped out a lot of them, but we'll figure that out.
20:09 Oh, no. We got a running list
20:10 of ideas as somebody who is not a gift peeker that I realized some people have received their box and opened all the flaps.
20:17 I just Yeah. I'm curious to know, like, if people have, like, I I don't I mean, we know what they are because we're working on it. But I'm like, would I have the restraint? I don't know. Like, I might just open them up
20:28 then close them up again.
20:29 I mean, they're it would be hard not to.
20:31 Right? Punches out all the chocolate.
20:32 Oh, 100 percent. But then you're disappointed on, like, day 22 when you're like, man, I could really use a piece of chocolate. It's like, I ate it on day 1. Yeah, man. Well, if you ordered 1, I would love to hear. Like,
20:42 if you just wanna put in the comments, like
20:44 Yeah. I opened them all.
20:45 Yeah. Maybe I opened them all or maybe I didn't. I mean, I don't know. I don't know. I don't know if you wanna explain that about yourself, but what are you gonna do? And or you can be, somebody that rips off a box lid
20:55 entirely. You know? It's just everybody experiences this thing.
20:58 Part of the experience. Nathan's talking about my wife who, opened up the lid on the first on December first, opens it up, and then closes it. And now December second opens it up, and then just, like, rips off the lid
21:09 completely. It goes, yeah. I'm I'm done reopening this. I'm just gonna leave it open and exposed for the rest of the month. And I'm like, okay.
21:17 And the ironic part is that you told me that and then I went over to my parents' house and my parents did the exact same thing. Oh, really? I do not understand how much effort this took to figure out this box.
21:25 I'll just say that as she was ripping it, like, she was ripping my heart.
21:30 Yeah. A little bit of you ripped as well.
21:31 I was just we did so much work on that box. And by we, I mean I mean Justin.
21:39 Yeah. And by Justin did a great job.
Devotionals, Design, and Production Challenges
21:42 Natalie, part of the part of the main challenges are the devotional book. Right? And and from the start, we said that we wanted this to be a space where, our staff from all
21:55 walks of life, whether they're at headquarters, whether they're alumni, whether they're, spouses or or on the field, have a chance to have a voice in this. Because we wanted people to be able to share stories and and to
22:04 share their encouragement. And this year, you headed up that whole process of finding 25 different writers, editing those things, all that. Can you just talk to me about that process? Because
22:16 Yes.
22:16 A lot.
22:17 Yeah. It was. It was really overwhelming at first. I thought it would be perhaps not as hard as it ended up being. But, thankfully, many of our staff write regular prayer letters. So we we kind of already know,
22:28 like, who perhaps has a way with words or, seems to include good stories or whatever in their newsletter. So, we you know, that helps us to kind of identify who might enjoy writing
22:40 a devotional. And so but we definitely wanted to be intentional about, getting a cross section of MAF. So, men, women, staff who serve on the field, staff at
22:52 headquarters. We've got, pilots, mechanics, teachers, moms, you know, we've got the gamut. And then also, some of our national staff. That's people who live and are from the
23:04 countries where we serve. So we've got, Mozambique represented, Indonesia, you know, different countries like that. So, you know, some people, you know, we would ask, would you wanna be a writer this
23:16 year? And, you know, just because of time or whatever reason, they couldn't do it. So it did take some time to kind of finally hone down those 25 writers. And then, you know, we gave each person a theme, to
23:27 to and a scripture to write from. And then and then it was, yeah, quite a process to get those first drafts back and then start editing because that's just painful sometimes to I'm not I mean, the writing was
23:39 great, but, like, just, you know, the back and forth was like, are you okay with this? Like, you know, you know, to make it, you know, readable. And and we had a word limit. That can be a challenge too, just trying to
23:50 keep it within a word limit. But I will say there are some of these devotionals are, funny. I feel like they it's just the gamut of emotions from, yeah, humor to fear
24:01 to anxiety to, joy, like, and all of them point to Jesus. And that's what I love about them. And, 24 of the writers are new this year, you know, weren't in
24:13 last year's book. We had 1 repeat writer, and that was Annabelle Cowher, which if you're familiar with her story, she and Ryan. So she wrote it while he was still incarcerated in Mozambique.
24:25 So, and I'm probably not supposed to have favorites, but hers is 1 of my favorites. Just it's just so, it's very moving. So Yeah. So yeah. It was really it it was intimidating, overwhelming at
24:37 times, but such a neat process to go through and get to know some of our staff in a different way.
24:41 Yeah. Absolutely. 1 of the things I wanna just highlight about this whole project and and about the the team that makes this happen. We get this project started in January, and it's a long winded
24:53 process. And and the first year that we started it, we started in January and then went all the way through, up until we were packing in November, the boxes and shipping them out. And again, this will that will be
25:01 probably about the same this year as well. And, and so, yeah, when Natalie's talking about, like, Annabelle's writing, a devotion when Ryan is still incarcerated, which he's no longer incarcerated,
25:14 it just shows, like, the the commitment for this team. There's a lot of really hard work that's work that's done and in very, like, kind of phases. Like, at sometimes, it's really heavy for 1 person, and
25:26 then once that person's load lightens, it gets heavy for the next person. And, the fact that, I'm bragging. This is an MAF podcast. Sue me. I'm gonna brag about the team. But the fact that that, this
25:38 team does that, on top of all of the other business and all of the other fundraising that we have to do and writing that we have to do and videos and and photos and,
25:49 all
25:49 of the gift shop sourcing that you have to do on top of, getting these gifts. Like, I just wanna highlight this team and and the people that are obviously not represented on on screen or behind the mic as well because,
25:59 this is not an easy project by any means. And and Yeah.
26:02 It's hard to think about Christmas in July. But sometimes, if I would sit down to edit, I'm like, alright. I need the Christmas music. Like, I need to get in the mood.
26:09 I think I did that actually, like, the first 1 of the first, first meetings that we did, last year. And it was, like, January or February. So at this point, we're tapped on Christmas music. Right? Like, the last thing we
26:18 wanna hear is, like, Mariah Carey, which I think I did start with that. It's a classic. But the last thing you wanna hear
26:25 defend her.
26:25 Yeah. I think. But yeah. Like, just to just to start thinking about Christmas when yeah. It's May and you're excited about spring and summer and psych. I'm gonna put you into winter because
26:37 that's where we need to be. And so, I wanna go to you because, taking photos and videos, for this project is, something that often I think can be
26:48 overlooked because it's not necessarily as prevalent throughout the whole process. Right? Like like, a lot of it is more on the marketing side so that people understand what they're getting. And that's very different
26:59 from the normal photos that you take. You're normally, if you're on the field, you're taking photos of people and airplanes and and the work that's being done. Yeah. Can you explain just your process of, like, going
27:09 product photography instead of people? Yeah.
27:12 Yeah. It's very different. It's very different where yeah. I'm doing a lot of run and gunning out out in the field and kind of just accepting accepting the elements as they are where yeah. When you
27:24 photograph studio stuff, you have the control. Right? So things will look a lot more clean. You can you can do a lot more. So, yeah, we we kinda, like, talked about, like, doing product photography,
27:36 with these items, and the box too. So it was a lot of, well, what can we photograph? What should we not photograph? And so yeah. So you won't see a lot of the actual items, obviously, because we
27:48 don't wanna we don't want to get it out of the way. But, yeah, I think a lot of a lot of this stuff is preplanned, kind of waiting for the items to come in or waiting for that box to come in.
28:00 And so what does that look like to to plan something, and then once it comes in to just, like, go head on into it?
28:07 So it's
28:08 a lot of it's very back loaded, I would say. You know, we're just sitting around waiting for these things to come in, and then, I don't know, September, October comes in, and it's like, alright. Let's go. We got, like, a
28:18 month to get these shots. And so but what we wanted to do is, make things something that looks really I I say the word elegant again. Something that looks really enticing to and to
28:30 elevate those items to something that, you really want. Yeah. You look at the price tag of this this box in this Advent box, and it's not, you know, it's not your affordable 15 dollar,
28:42 20 dollar thing. Right? It's it's a little pricier. And that is it's it's intentional in the sense that we want to make sure that, you know, what you what you pay for
28:54 is something that we really we wanna present something that looks like what you paid for. So with the photography that we want things to look really, really clean and really, really nice and elegant. So
29:06 yeah. I love that.
29:08 I think that, I'm gonna I feel like I say I love that a lot in this episode because I I love this project, news flash. But I think that yeah, just the the way that photos,
29:20 can enhance an experience. Right? And and the challenge of not showing everything because we obviously have, surprises in there. And we have things that we don't wanna share with everybody. And so, like, to to find that
29:31 balance of what do you show and what do you not. I love that. You you and Colin did a great job with that.
29:37 And then with I didn't even mention video, but I think some of the video that he did for this too is not necessarily showing off product, but more showing off
29:49 the the emotion that this can evoke in someone who's going through the experience too. So, yeah, me and Colin were talking about this. Like, what if we did some some shots that was more like lifestyle, you
30:01 know, like opening up the box. Oops. Sorry. Opening up the box, in these, like, really warm, really inviting environments, that you find yourself in when during Christmas season, you know,
30:13 which is also you know, you talk about, like, doing this in May or, you know, it's hard to to think about that stuff when it's summer and
30:19 Mhmm.
30:19 You know, it's 90 degrees outside and you're in short t shirts and but, yeah, we want for video, we want something that would do something like that. Mhmm. Yeah. SoShow more
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