1 min & 9 seconds

This was my first attempt at creating a commercial from the ground up.
 

I had recently started New Season Detailing and reached the point where friends and family were no longer enough—I needed to start introducing the business to people who didn't already know me. Social media posts and before-and-after photos were one part of that, but I wanted to see whether I could use my background in video editing and storytelling to create something more ambitious.
 

My first instinct was obvious: film myself detailing a vehicle. But that didn't feel like enough. Anyone could show someone cleaning a car. I wanted the commercial to communicate why the business existed in the first place.
 

The name New Season Detailing came from a transition in my own life. I had left the routine of a 9-to-5 job to try building something for myself. That gave me the story: the end of one season and the beginning of another.
 

For the first time, I approached a video like a production. Instead of simply turning on a camera and talking, I had to think about individual shots, locations, sequencing, continuity, B-roll, visual transitions and what each image needed to communicate.

I filmed the repetitive morning routine of getting ready for work, traveled back to my former workplace on a Sunday to capture exterior shots, and experimented with different camera positions—including placing the camera low behind a trailer to capture only my legs approaching the building. Because I couldn't film inside, I used welding B-roll to imply the transition into the workday.

From there, I began looking for ways to communicate the internal transition visually. A quiet moment overlooking the landscape became an opportunity to briefly flash forward to detailing. Later, a phone became a visual bridge between the old routine and the new business, transitioning from sitting outside my former workplace to arriving at what appears to be a customer's home.
 

The detailing itself doesn't arrive until later. By then, the viewer has seen the reason behind the business rather than simply the service being performed.
 

The ending brings the story back to where it started. Sitting outside my former workplace, I put the phone down and drive away. The camera remains behind as the car disappears onto the road, leaving the old workplace in frame before the New Season Detailing logo appears.
 

The original cut ran approximately 2 minutes and 14 seconds, and the project taught me another important part of production: shooting an idea and communicating it efficiently are two different challenges. I had captured far more material than the commercial ultimately needed. Reviewing the assembled edit helped me recognize which moments could be implied rather than shown and eventually led me to create a much shorter version.
 

The project became an early lesson in shot planning, visual sequencing, editing for time, and building a story around a business rather than simply showing what the business does.