Since 2013/2014 XBOP services have been utilised in the production and operation of numerous events. When asked what area/skill is the XBOP speciality my general response is simply that I am a “jack of all trades”. I have decided to structure the content as a series, each article posted constituting an event showcase and reflection.
. The following is a chronological list of events starting from 2014 where I have had the privilege of being a part of the organisation and planning of these events:
- General Introduction (this article)
- Review: Christians 20/30 Great Gatsby Ball, held 26 July 2014
- Review: Operation Christmas Child (OCC) – Surge Packing Party held 30 July 2014
- Case Study #1: Friend’s Wedding held 9 August 2014
- Case Study #2: Bucks Party Surprise held 30 August 2014
- Case Study #3: Birthday Party Surprise held 3 September 2014
- Case Study #4: Friend’s Wedding held 13 September 2014
- Case Study #5: Christians 20/30 Music Festival held 4 October 2014
- Case Study #6: OCC – UCC Packing Party held 14 November, 2014
- Case Study #7: Friend’s Wedding held 15 November, 2014
- Case Study #8: Friend’s Proposal Surprise held 4 January 2015
- Case Study #9: Friend’s Wedding held 11 July 2015
- Case Study #10: OCC – Young Adults Packing Party held 29 July 2015
- Case Study #11: Friend’s Wedding held 22 August 2015
- Case Study #12: Friend’s Wedding held 26 September 2015
- Case Study #13: Christians 20/30 OCC Charity Program held 9, 10 & 17 October 2015
- Friend’s Proposal Surprise held 3 January 2016
For this first introductory article of the series, I will cover all the other occasions that are not identified in the list above as “events”.
Sunday services at church are a prime example, as are the various social lunches that require what I consider to be a minimal amount of effort when compared to everything else. The third type of activity involves the managing of general cell group operations – which is not just looking at the weekly gatherings but also taking a longer term approach to planning for a month-quarter ahead.
For a decade now I have been serving in church as a vocalist on the worship team. My role in the worship team has always been more than a humble vocalist given my roots and musical foundation in playing the piano. Even though my involvement in the worship team has not involved playing the piano/keyboard, examples like event #5 above, which was held on Saturday 13 September (the most recent given the September time of writing this article) demonstrated and reminded a large number of church friends that I can actually play. During the reception various friends thanked me and praised me for playing and supporting our church’s worship director and his wife. Indeed, it was a great privilege to be able play alongside friends who I consider to me the very best within my church in terms of worship/music talent – our worship director can play guitar, drums and sing. The influence of my worship director goes beyond just the performance aspects of worship; we are in agreement on the vision for the church specific to worship it is a holistic and integrated lifestyle that is part of our identity.
During the middle of 2015, as part of supporting the worship team growth, which aligns with the church’s second service expansion, I have stepped into a role of leading and supporting the Technical Projection Crew, which is made up of the volunteers who run the computers as part of delivering and managing a Sunday service. Whilst there is a technical knowledge and teaching component to the role, I also liken it to a small/life group leadership role in that the crew is in one sense a small version of a cell/life group and I see the importance of building up relationships first since it is this aspect of the team building that will ensure our ability to operate with greater efficiency.
As part of being one of four leaders in my life group, we collective share the responsibility of managing the roster of hosts, bible study, worship and other aspects for a cell group night. It is under this umbrella role that other events are not listed above, but get grouped here as part of the event management and coordination work. Planning ahead for events like cell member baptisms and birthdays, particularly surprise parties are all part of this, and the details extend right down to the detail of organising cards and gifts.
For the list of events above, all mentions of “video” as a specific skill for an event really refers to the delivery of video production/content as part of the event itself, and not the skill of filming. This invariably means use of ProPresenter to delivery the content, which is also a regular feature of cell group meetings and the delivery of worship – I support our voluntary worship leaders by downloading their selected song/music videos and having the videos loaded on my MacBook. Alternatively, if I am supporting worship by playing the piano, I would ensure that the song lyrics and a background are set-up, and thus parallel the church delivery in a home cell group setting.
Video production as a subset within event production refers to the hobby of video editing that I have dabbled in. For video editing I utilize iMovie which gets the job done with minimal fuss. My proximity to the worship director and his weekly announcement video filming and editing has over time also allowed me various opportunities to see into the video production world. Access to hardware equipment and also software along with tips for learning the trade have been benefits extended to myself and other enthusiasts within the church community. The extent to which XBOP has video production experience is largely at the amateur end of the spectrum.
Publications and printing is also another general skill-set where I have a wide spectrum of experience. For more information on this skill area and the list of publications, please view the page Publications & Print Media.
It is very timely that I commence this series of posts, each tied to a specific event from 2014 – it also prompts me to update content in the Creative set of pages and integrate them better. I was asked at the most recent wedding if I charged to play at weddings and my answer was “no” because up until now, I have only ever played and provided my music/video services to friends within a church/wedding environment. However, if requests did start to be made from acquaintances and people outside my immediate network, including a church/Christian context it would only be fair for me to charge. Further, the operation and use of Clayton Church as a venue for a wedding is available to church members at a considerable discount compared to commercial venues. As part of the hiring cost, the church also offers compensation to the resource(s) engaged to operate the A/V equipment, simply to acknowledge the sacrifice required from the volunteers. The compensation also makes more sense if the operator is not already invited to the wedding, is more of a stranger to the wedding party/group and has been asked to give up a Saturday morning or afternoon. To date, I have been approached a handful of times to help out in this capacity with the offer of payment. In this way, the services described here and throughout this new series are definitely can be monetized but I have not pursued this avenue yet…
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