I work for WordPress VIP, a completely distributed company: all its employees work remotely. The isolation we often feel is even more pronounced in these isolated times caused by COVID-19, calling for unprecedented measures to ensure team morale.
Last Wednesday was my turn to host our team's weekly video call — and it was April Fool's… so I decided to treat my colleagues to a special opening.
(OKR = Objectives and Key Results; TAM = Technical Account Manager; DIO = Deal Is Official)
The idea came when a co-worker suggested we coordinate cosplay and Zoom virtual backgrounds for a Star Trek-themed conference call.
The next morning, as we prepared for the call, I began feeling inspired. I hopped into Final Cut Pro X and whipped together the above intro in about a half-hour, with another twenty minutes fine-tuning it. Assets included the opening credit sequence; an instrumental version of the opening theme song (which omits Stewart's narration), which then segues into the show's actual theme (which includes the sound effects); footage of the Enterprise D docking at a starbase; and the Crillee Bold Italic font.
If I'd had more time, I would've liked to replace the "Star Trek: The Next Generation" title with "WordPress: The VIP Generation"; I even had the Federation font ready for the occasion. But that sort of title is not a stock option in FCPX, and I had only an hour before the meeting in which to produce the entire video, so I went with the minimum viable product.
Despite that shortcoming, the intro was a big hit with my co-workers! It set a positive mood on a day when one was really needed, with the accompanying text chat including lots of "omg" and "LOL" and "holy ****". I'm glad to work for a company that enjoys such geeking out and appreciates it when their teammates do so — one co-worker even said, "This is like distilled essence of Ken."
On this First Contact Day, may we all live long and and prosper to better times!
(The video is shared here with permission of my team lead and all others who are named in the video.)
"distilled essence of Ken" – love it!
The thing that really blows me away is not that you created this video, but how quickly you created it! Less than an hour? To a content creation illiterate like me that's just insane!