Our expertise is in creating compelling video content for our clients, producing many types of videos including documentary shorts, interviews, public service messages, video ads, animations and more. In-house production of voice overs and narrations, sound design and titling. Our familiarity with the non-profit sector makes NGOs the perfect clients for our productions.
W.J. McKay is a film maker, art director, branding expert and graphic designer.
Our relationship with Global Conservation began in 2017 when W.J. McKay attended a fund raiser being held near Stanford University in Palo Alto, California. It is there that McKay met Executive Director Jeff Morgan. We went on to create their YouTube channel and produce over forty mini-documentary films over the next five years. We continue to produce films and publications for Global Conservation.
We work with outstanding videographers from all over the world. This short film was produced by W.J. McKay Productions with the collaboration of noted Conservation Photojournalist Paul Hilton. McKay also narrates this journey into the Heart of Borneo.
Some of these films have also been shown on the big screen at major events attended by some of the world’s top scientists, prominent environmental activists and philanthropists. We produced this video titled “Stop Extinction” in collaboration with Dr. Gerardo Ceballos, one of the world’s foremost experts on the extinction of species. This was shown to a packed Cantor Center at the 2019 Saving the New Wild event at Stanford University.
We are also sometimes asked to shoot these films ourselves, requiring travel to locations abroad. In 2022 we were sent on a filming mission to Turneffe Atoll Marine Reserve in Belize. During that mission we followed young scientists to remote islands as they conducted a baseline population and wellness study on crocodiles. While on patrol with marine wardens from the Turneffe Atoll Sustainability Association, we apprehended illegal fishermen on a small boat.
We also interviewed over a dozen subjects at various locations in the reserve. Our subjects included scientists, marine wardens, NGO Directors and a local fisherman. This short film is also narrated by W.J. McKay.
Our relationship with the Anthropocene Institute began in 2018 when we interviewed Brendan Tougher at the Tiburon, California research facility. At the institute, Protected Seas is the group developing software and hardware solutions for the protection of marine environments around the planet.
They hired us to produce a short video introduction to their proprietary software called Navigator. We have since filmed at other California coastal locations and produced more videos for the Anthropocene Institute and Protected Seas.
Just as the COVID-19 pandemic was starting up in Asia, we produced this mini-documentary film “Crisis in the Cardamoms” working with celebrated Italian videographer Andrea Pistolesi. We also had the support and assistance of Dr. Suwanna Gauntlett and Wildlife Alliance in Cambodia. The timing of this production was foretelling as the origin of the disease became politicized over time.
One of the strong points of this short film is the use of Cambodian pop music. All the sound design work for W.J. McKay Productions is done in-house. Great sound design is essential to the success of any film on any subject of any length. Most video footage comes to us without any sound at all. We create realistic soundscapes for each clip as opposed to just running background effects throughout the film, as is often done by video producers.
Independent video producers have hired W.J. McKay Productions just for our sound design work. Young artists from a collective in San Francisco shot and edited this avant garde short film and came to us for the sound add-on and final edit. Musicians in the film actually recorded some of the background music at the home studio of W.J. McKay.
W.J. McKay has produced music videos for many years, and that skill set came in handy while working on this production titled “Stolen Flowers.”
As a veteran creative executive, my goal is to produce the absolute best content within your budget. I work with some of the finest photographers and writers around the world to help achieve that goal.
