No portfolio of Greg Baldwin would be complete without an ode to my days of content production with the County of San Diego Department of Animal Services (known simply as DAS). I spent nearly a decade volunteering in the department’s three shelters located in Bonita, Carlsbad, and San Diego. During that time, I produced more than 100 videos designed to shine a spotlight on the shelters and the animals within them for adoption. The videos were intended to be funny, marketable, and informative. This video is what I’m calling my vision reel of that experience.
I started volunteering in 2011 as a dog walker at the Carlsbad shelter. I would typically visit once or twice a month and put in 5-10 hours. At some point, word got out that I had some skills with a camera, and thus the video program was born. As shelters typically struggle to escape an immeasurable aura of negativity (whether warranted or not), I knew that there was a need for some positive marketing. My goal was to create entertaining marketing videos that would highlight one of the shelter’s resident critters for adoption.
The results were simply fan-tabulous. The videos aided in finding animals homes, exiting them to rescues, and, in general, just creating some positivity and good will for the department.
What’s more is that this was a volunteer gig. People did occasionally wonder if I was being paid for each video I’d produce, but that was never the case (okay, I lied. The staff would occasionally pay me in donuts. Busted!). One video that went internationally viral actually generated a small treasure trove of rewards, but every dollar was donated back to the shelters. For me, this was true passion and it was something I cared about.
This video makes me proud.