I have always enjoyed telling a good story sharing information, opinions, reflections, and visions on all sorts of subject matter.

And while many different topics interest me, nothing piques my interest and fuels my creativity like agriculture.

I see so many possibilities in the ways that video and audio can be used in tandem with traditional and social media distribution networks to grow content (yes, pun intended).

Over seven years ago, Erik Smith and I started Rural Roots Canada because we both wanted to tell stories from the agricultural community, using as many different forms of media as possible.   After seven years of telling unique and informative stories from the agricultural community than I can count, nothing much has changed.  We still enjoy informing and entertaining our viewers, listeners, and readers with stories of the great people working in this industry.

One of the stories, we haven’t shared is the story from the storyteller’s view.  This blog series will take you behind the camera, the audio recorder and the tablet and give you an idea of the stories from the Agriculture community, our clients and a look into things to come from RRC.

We hope our new series ‘Beyond the Story’ gives you some insight into our passion for agriculture and media.

Travel, Agriculture, and the Weather

Friday morning, Erik and I traveled out to Southern Cross Livestock near Madden, Alberta to shoot a commercial with one of our newest clients Leader Tours based out of Calgary.  (Thank-you to Graeme Finn for allowing us to film at his farm.)  Lawrence Rowley, the owner of Leader Tours, is the sponsor of our newest weather feature, which will roll in like a storm front this week.

Leader Tours is a company, which specializes in group agricultural tours to several different countries including, Australia, New Zealand, Brazil, Argentina, and Germany just to name a few.   For more on Leader Tours click here.

My three favourite things in life are travel, media, and agriculture.  When all three come together, it is a good day.

The over two-hour shoot included several different locations around the farm as we tried to find the best location, which would serve Lawrence and Leader Tours the best in getting across their message about their tour company.   Background, lighting, and sound just a few of the considerations we took into account.  After fine-tuning the wording of the commercial to fully explain and articulate the worldly experiences Leader Tours provides. It’s now off to post-production where Erik will take Lawrence’s message and combine it with pictures from various tours the company has led creating a story about Leader Tours.   Keep your eyes peeled for the Ad in our weather feature, on our social media platform and on Leader Tours social media platforms in the next week.

The weather may be one of the most talkable subjects on the planet.   Maybe one of the reasons it is the first ‘go to’ when starting a conversation with someone, whether it is someone you are meeting for the first time or you have known forever.  Very few, if any, are more affected by the weather than farmers.   As you all know first-hand, the weather can be the difference between a bumper crop and crop failure and it can also have an effect on your livestock.

Over the next couple of months, Rural Roots Canada will be keeping our eyes on the sky and bringing you stories from several different perspectives in an effort to tell weather stories that affect farmers and insight from experts on how to deal with it.  There’s no shortage in the types of weather-related stories to be done, so we will ‘weather the storm’ the best we can in bringing you the ones we do!

I am always up for talking about agriculture and media and how it can help businesses, so if you want to talk feel free to toss me an email at craig@ruralrootscanada.com.

Have a great one!