Technology is a wonderful thing.
This is a little 30 second spot Simon Lono generated for his municipal campaign. It focuses on the Duckworth Street water main break, which started over a week ago and remains unfixed. A new browser window should open and the vid will play using Windows Media Player.
When Lono took the clips using his digital still camera, the leak was a burbling little fountain. The idea of the vid was to contrast the water wastage inherent in the leaking main with the mayor's comments that the water problem in St. John's is due to people drowning their lawns every summer.
Yea verily, the mighty water main leak turned into a 15 foot geyser, so Lono is working on a second version of this video which will use the new geyser footage in the appropriate space.
Digital camera, plus a little freeware plus some time and energy and Lono managed to come up with a little video spot that while it isn't broadcast quality sure as hell will make an impact on the website.
It should also be circulated a bit through e-mails to people around town since the file is small enough to send as an attachment.
Keep an eye on the campaign to see what, if any impact this little story and the vid will have on the campaign. If nothing else, though, it sure cost a hell of a lot less than Ron Ellsworth Ward 4 campaign. The consensus among veteran campaigners is that Ellsworth will spend upwards of 45 large to get a job that pays about half that as an annual salary. One figure I heard today was that Ellsworth has dropped about $8,000 on bus sign advertising alone.
Wow.