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Diving in Deep at Interface Media Group

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Ari Beser
Photo provided by Ari Beser

Below is a first person account from Dean's Intern Ari Beser on his internship with the Interface Media Group. This was originally published on the SOC Dean's Internship blog

How are you supposed to write about an internship you’ve had to sign multiple non-disclosure agreements to accept? The answer is, carefully. Interface Media Group, or IMG for short, is a commercial production company. We produce everything from advertisements for TV, radio, and the web, as well as interactive displays and exhibits for live experiences and museums.

IMG doesn’t pick sides, and works on political spots on both sides of the aisle with their in-house studio. They also edit and review content for air with clients like National Geographic, the Smithsonian Channel, and PBS. A team here recently completed all of the promotion material for Ken Burns’ PBS documentary series "The Vietnam War," including a documentary within the documentary, revealing the behind the scenes of the iconic director’s team’s process.

I was hired for the summer to shadow Jordana Well, Creative Director of Experience Design. Jordana has a finger in pretty much every department here at IMG, and now, so do I. Jordana’s primary role is to create media experiences, which can sometimes include videos– like the one at the Smithsonian National Museum of the American Indian, for example.

In my short time here at IMG, Jordana has thrown me “in the deep end,” as she likes to say. My first day I was informed I would produce an entire video for a client, and I saw it through to the very end, sitting in with the editors and audio technicians to make sure the look and the feel of the video stayed consistent with Jordana’s and my vision. At the same time, I began research and started to conceptualize a game that will be used in a new museum exhibit. Because Jordana’s projects often overlap, I was also asked to associate-produce (AP) a shoot for a national commercial for a medical association, and sat through the entire process of editing, audio design and mixing, and color correcting.

IMG promised me an atypical internship experience and they have delivered. I do not retrieve coffee or print papers for executives, though I did once order the catering for the entire cast and crew of our commercial shoot. My first day, Jordana remarked that she wanted me on real projects to do real work, “you are so much more than an intern,” she assured me, “you can handle this.” Her faith in my ability to accept challenges and take on real projects has been the most rewarding part of the job.

My NDA is binding about works in progress. However, once we the video is published, we are free to talk about it. To see what I’ve been working on watch the video I helped create for the Johns Hopkins Carey Business School.