The MX GP series has moved on to Latvia. Below are two of the four videos produced on the weekend for Freecaster.tv. The first video shows some of the action and lifestlye from Saturday. The music at the start was recorded at a famous Medieval restaurant in Riga which we visited on Friday night.

The second video is a race round up of the MX2 category with interviews and action from the top three riders in their class.

Video put together for Freecaster.tv from the MX GP in Teutschenthal, Germany. Shows the action, and lifestyle from day 1 of the event. Shot and edited within one day.

Top Irish downhill mountain biker Ben Reid travels the world racing on two wheels. He relies on getting media coverage for his sponsors to earn his living, and part of his marketing plan is his web site. Honcho Designs set Ben Reid Racing up with a custom WordPress theme to tie in with all his other branding.

It was important for team manager Alistar Beckett to be able to update the site with ease while on the road, whilst having all the features of a powerful site. Support was built in for search engine optimisation, web analytics, video & photo content, and Google calendars.

There is also a mailing list database system built into the site which automatically updates subscribers when new content is published.  Check out their adventures at the Just Reid site

Honcho Designs was at round 3 of the Nissan UCI Mountain Bike World Cup in Andorra to produce videos for factory teams Specialized and Santa Cruz.  The two teams have the best riders on the scene, with Santa Cruz Syndicate rider Steve Peat claiming victory at the weekend, and also setting the world record for the most World Cup wins ever.  Specialized rider Sam Hill was nearly two seconds up at the split before crashing hard near the top of the course.

The riders were not the only ones who had to go fast.  The videos which were shot on a Sony EX1 camera were, edited, and uploaded to the team sites one day after the weekend.

To see more of what happened at the weekend check out Specialized and Santa Cruz Bikes

Voluntary Service Bureau held the Creative Extremists event at Stormont Hotel, Belfast. The strapline for the event was ‘fighting for the common good’ and it had some high profile speakers in attendance including the Lord mayor of Belfast, and the MP David Blunkett.

Honcho Designs Looked after the branding of the event including logo creation, email shot, stage branding design, content for the stage projection screen, and video coverage.

Round 3 of the motocross GP series took place near Istanbul in Turkey at the weekend.  Check out one of the videos produced for Freecaster.tv. Belgian Cameraman Tim Van Goethem was out with his Sony EX1 hooked up to a Letus 35mm adaptor to get some sweet footage.

The motocross season has just kicked off and Kawasaki decided to go down the route of a video production to promote their 2009 teams.  Belgian producer Mike Van Cleven commissioned Andy Yoong from Honcho Designs to help shoot and edit the videos.

[Show as slideshow]

The video was shot over a period of days in the south of France on a hired track and studio. Four videos were produced, one for each of the three teams, and one for the 2009 press team presentation.  Kawasaki found this method to be a huge success after having thousands of views online within hours of being released.

Check out the Kawasaki motocross website for more information.

Intro/lifestyle video for the set-up day of the first round of the 2009 Motox GP in Faenza Italy.  Video and edit by Andy Yoong – Honcho Designs

Saturday Practice and qualifying sessions.  Camera by Tim Van Goethan / Andy Yoong.  Edit by Andy Yoong

Honcho Designs is producing an Irish downhill mountain bike film called Break the Cycle.  We just recently came back from a session with Top World Cup rider Ben Reid.  The video is part of a marketing campaign for the film.  We release a short teaser video of each session to keep interest.

The video content is a great way to keep interest in the official site of the film and encourage more visitors and subscribers.  The videos can also be embedded on any site, further increasing their reach.  They all link back to the film website.  Teaser videos have helped to give the film exposure to over 100,000 people in a short space of time.

Blick Shared Studios in Belfast have organised the Lizard lounge event in conjunction with Pinkfly PR which will feature DJ’s Joe Lindsay and Sofakid.  They came to Honcho Designs to design the event logo and promotinoal materials including flyers, poster and eamil invitations.  Be sure to resrve your ticket by emailing lizardlounge@blickstudios.org.  Tickets £8/£5 for Blick members. 28th February ’09, 9pm – Late

Another WordPress theme designed and developed for the Northern Ireland Optometric Society. WordPress is an open source content management and blogging system which allows novices to update content on their web site with ease. All hosting, email, and domain registration was taken care of.

Various plug-ins can be added to the wordpress system to add a wide range of functionality and tailer the site to your needs including – adding photo and video content, posting content to social websites (e.g facebook), subscriber database and mailing list etc.

Another event covered for freecaster.tv.  All shot edited and distributed on the web with one day at the mx international race in Valence in the south of France

‘Colin Ross Rides Cavehill’ was entered into Irelands Wee Adventure Film Festival (WAFF) 2009 which was held in the Sugar Club, Dublin on 13 February.  The WAFF which began in 2008 is organised by John Connolly and is a celebration of adventure sports.  This years festival featured 12 films,  our video came in second (people’s choice), and first was a BASE jumping video ‘Birdman to BASE’ by Niall Hanley and Kieran Ryan.

Höoptedoodle films contacted Honcho Designs to colour correct and grade their latest documentary “Prods and Pom-Poms”.  Directed by Ben Jones & Paul Hutchinson, Prods and Pom-Poms tells the story of a group of cheerleaders from the Sandy Row area of Belfast as they prepare for the St.Patricks day parade, and an event in Glasgow.

Since the documentary was shot across a period of time there was the inevitable colour shift in some scenes, so the main goal was to achieve consistency across different clips.  A slight grade was added to increase contrast and then a special de-interlace method was used to give a more film like look.

Prods and Pom-Poms recently screened at a private viewing at Queens Film Theatre and recieved a very positive response on both the content and the overall quality of the finished production.

Find out more about grading services here

Voluntary Service Bureau wanted a video that they could put on their website to show the work of their volunteers and to encourage more people to sign up and offer their time to others.  See more in the Video Portfolio section