Welcoming a New Governor with Events and Video

Welcoming a New Governor with Events and Video

As part of the celebration of 35 years of MessageMakers, we're telling the stories of 35 great projects throughout our history. This is one of them.

In 2010, Michigan selected a new governor (as well as a slate of other state officials), and as the year ticked to a close, the inaugural committee went looking for support for the inauguration event and ball on New Year's Day 2011. MessageMakers was selected to plan, develop and produce the inauguration ceremony and to provide technical support for the inaugural reception that evening.

The specs provided were minimal: “We want to have the ceremony on the Capitol steps and to be media-friendly, with staging, viewing, sound and seating for 1,000 or more attendees.” An outdoor inauguration in January in Michigan posed a variety of challenges: weather, viewing angle, etc.

3D drawings guided stage design and construction as we plotted out the program's overall flow, scripting of individual elements, audio production, and the technical interface needed for radio and TV broadcasters. On site, our staff set up the whole show and directed it cue to cue.

Check out a video of the event planning and production process here.

Thankfully, the weather was clear, if a bit cold. But in the midst of the inauguration, a new wrinkle arose: the fighter jets scheduled to fly over were running several minutes late for their scheduled cue in this very tight program. A quick last-minute change covered up the issue flawlessly.

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Meanwhile, MessageMakers videographers captured footage of the inaugural events, rushed it back to our post-production facilities in Old Town, and set to editing. Within four hours, original footage from the event had been combined with archive and broadcast footage, reviewed by the client, and finalized for showing at the inaugural ball that night at East Lansing’s Wharton Center.

The final feature, “The Promise of Michigan,” captured the theme and spirit of the inauguration for those who may not have been able to attend, while also serving as a reminder of the vision of the administration for the term ahead.

Governor Rick Snyder saw the video for the first time as it introduced his speech that night, and he had kind words for this production as an example of the “power of Michigan” he had discussed in his speech at the inauguration.

“They already built this video in the last few hours – so go for it, guys! We’ve got our video guys here. You deserve a big shout out. That was outstanding!”

“The Promise of Michigan” also won an Addy Award for its quality.