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I first began blogging here on the 23rd December 2006. I can barely believe that it's been two years. And so much has happened since then that I would never have imagined or envisioned. If anyone had told me that in a couple of years I would be drawing and living in French countryside I'd have laughed. Loud and long. But here I am ...

I need to thank everyone who has encouraged and inspired me, taken the time to drop by to comment, chat, motivate, and turn into amazing friends whom I hugely admire both personally and artistically. I live a blessed life and appreciate it, and all of you, daily. Hourly. By the second!

Cheers and a Happy New Year to every one of you wonderful, talented, inspiring artists/friends out there! May 2009 bring even more creative sunshine into our lives.

P.S.: My Thank You Blue mug design won me a "Today's Best" Award over at Zazzle :)

Hello again, and welcome back. October is a busy month for me, but I am currently waiting for an approval on some sketches. So while I wait over the weekend, I'm having lots of coffee, writing a blog entry, labeling/stamping my new mailer, and getting a little personal drawing done.

First, lets speak on the subject of promotion yet again. I received my next run of postcards yesterday, and I am very pleased with the quality. I have seen/used cards from many places, and cards from uprinting.com are comparable to anything else. This company is a little different, though. First, you can choose your delivery options: the longer you give them, the less it costs. Obvious, right? Well, with uprinting I went with 1000 color front/black back card (14pt, glossy) and a six-day turnaround for $86. Almost $20 less than my previous supplier, and almost $100 less than a certain popular west coast printer. I did a rough count,and I think there are even more cards than I ordered (around 1150). And the BONUS of uprinting: they will do custom pieces i.e. they will do non-typical printing sizes to meet your needs. Very cool; it really opens up the possibilities for unique marketing material next year. But for now, I'll be getting 1000 cards out on Monday. Wow, I am usually a week behind on these mailers.

And I guess I would still have been if the sketch approval I'm waiting on had come yesterday. Sadly, the art director was out of the office so I had to send the sketches to another designer who was not familiar with the project. The sketches were shown to the client who specifically liked one, but I could not get approval until it was signed off by somebody else...

So I get the weekend off (sort of). I try not to take any days off so I'm pushing through this mailer, updating lots of spreadsheets (taxes, deductions, income, client list, etc) and online images on the site and ispot, and trying to figure out how to push my artwork farther as I feel its getting a bit monotonous. My buddy, Scott Brundage, turned me onto the website of Frank Stockton who talks alot about pushing the style and trying new things while still satisfying the clients needs. So I think I'm going to play a little, maybe some holidays gifts!

I have also spoken with Nate about the November show, and it is being pushed back to January which is a bit of relief as I am feeling a little overwhelmed with work and social expectations (especially with the holidays coming up). Monday, I'll talk with Dan at OpenSpace to see when he will need prints for the December show. I'm wondering how this works as apparently its a "salon style" show with prints in acetate sleeves; I do not know if each sleeve will hold numerous prints for immediate sale or just a single print. If numerous are needed, that may be a large financial drain at the worse time (over the holidays). Eh, gotta spend money to make money!

And speaking making money, I provided artwork for the Boston Business Journal's 2008 Biotech insert yesterday. The art director contacted me after receiving an email promo that I had sent out at the beginning of October. The subject dealt with how the biotechnology industry has lost $5 billion since 2003. This was a project where the art director and editors had a concept they liked before contacting me. Normally, I do not like working that way, but it is a good concept that I thought I could make unique. They wanted various "biotech items" swirling in water that is heading down a drain. In terms of layout, the art director requested that the illustration be circular, and he provided a pdf of a temporary layout.
The sketches:

The first sketch was pretty straightforward. Various pills, syringes, test tubes, money swirling around. However, I felt this sketch lacked something so I decided to try to the old comic book technique of "moving the eye" in the second sketch.
Now this is more like it. I have always loved that moment in movies where the video camera gives the audience a split view of both above and below the water. In fact, I think I may want to explore this more. I was happy with this sketch, but I decided to try a concept outside of the art director's suggestion just to explore the possibilities:
This concept had potential, but it feels very "photo friendly." One thing I try to do with my illustrations is to make them "unphotographable." What I mean is that I do not like to provide an illustration that could easily be a photograph. So I was hesitant to show this sketch, but I was confident that it would not be chosen when shown with the other two.

The art director chose the "vortex" sketch, but there were a few concerns. He was afraid that the circular format was actually working against the image, and he wanted the surface of the water to be bursting out of the circle. After some discussion and layout testing, we actually decided to lose the circle completely and bleed the image behind all of the type elements.
The final:
The blue at the bottom and the black at the top bleed to top/bottom with the logo and text over them. I think it worked out well, and the art director seemed very happy! Here is a little jpeg I made with the temp pdf he sent:

I think we both felt that we took both the image and the design to a level higher than the initial concepts. He is sending me both a pdf and issue samples upon publication; I'm starting to accrue a library of published work on my bookshelf. Mom will approve.

So thats the week. Next week, I will (maybe) be doing a piece I am very excited about! Hopefully, the sketch will be approved with no revisions :)

Until next time, I bid you adieu.
Enjoy the Day,
Chris
chris-whetzel.com

Hello, friends. Much has happened since my last post. So let's hop to it!

This has already been posted on some blogs, and I was fortunate enough to be featured as Little Chimp's Society's "Editor's Pick" again. Very cool. This piece has really gotten my website ALOT of traffic from Sugar Frosted Goodness as well as Little Chimp Society. I added it to my ispot portfolio in hopes to bring in some work. Anyway, the SFWeekly assignment (which I had to turn down due to a full schedule) was a jetpack event in San Francisco. I sent a jpeg of the art director at SFWeekly just to remind him I'm alive, and he said "nice one" so that was cool. I have also decided to use this piece for October's promotional postcard.

The third sketch idea was a bit over the top, but fun. I wanted to work on the "woo" concept of the title. I try to do this with every assignment as my philosophy is that the title and image should work together. I was worried this would be too similar to the Filmy-Eyed piece already in my portfolio, but I was confident that the art director would favor one of the other sketches.

As was my assumption, the first sketch was chosen . The only correction needed was to add some ladies to the mix. No problem. After shooting some reference of the lovely Aliyah Gold all gussied up, I added in two figures, and the sketch was approved: I was a little concerned with this piece as it was getting very crowded, and I had never rendered such a large group in the timeframe I was being alotted for the commission. But you just sleep less and eat at your desk, right? Everything actually worked out quite well in terms of time management, and I finished up the rendering with a good amount of time to experiment with color. I worked on some great color combinations that do not work for THIS project, but they are filed away for when I do need them :)

On the subject of color: Lately, I have been submitting two versions of my final art from which the art director gets to choose a version. I like showing both a "loud" and "quiet" color theme, and I think this makes the experience more enjoyable for the art directors as they are more involved. So far, it seems to have gone over well. For this assignment, I submitted the following two images:

A close-up: The orange version was chosen. Apparently, I am commissioned for the "high visibility" quality of my work. I'm fine with that :) Nonetheless, I am trying to show that I can work in both striking and subdued color combinations so that I can be more versatile to meet the client's needs. The final art changed a bit from the original idea of "rock star" to more a "Jesus" type figure. Nonetheless, the central idea of getting the audience's attention is still the main gist of the image, so I'm happy with it. Hopefully, we don't get sued for using or alluding to Sony's or Dell's logos :) The art director seemed thrilled with the art as he passed on some contacts that may be interested in my work. Also, they are running a bio and photo of me in their "Contributors" section. Lovely!

Now, while working on this project, I got a phone call from a magazine art director for cover sketches that I am currently sketching with final art due on the 17th. Busy busy! I'll be posting the details and artwork along with another magazine cover I will be finishing on the 24th. Look for the post hopefully before Halloween along with a website update! Also, this month's mailer should be out on the 20th! I am trying out a new printer, so I'm excited to see how these cards turn out.

Today was a sketch day and also a family day as we visited Aliyah's grandparents for thier 61st wedding anniversary. I was kind of "under the gun" today as lots of folks were asking about what I do, how i do it, etc. It really felt good to be able to field their questions not as a "freelancer," but really as a small-business operator i.e. I am my product; I have to consistently sell me to make money. I have to always be looking for new clients, and I have to keep my current clients satisfied by providing my best artwork. I must be confident in what I provide, and not sell myself short by settling for low rates or deadlines that are not feasible. And most importantly, I must not waste time or be docile; I must consistently be doing SOMEthing that progresses the business that day. Simple, right? What surprised me most is how I didn't break out in a pouring sweat while answering these questions; I'm becoming more and more familiar with this way of life, and I'm proud to do what I do!

And that's that, folks. I'll share more as I'm sure there's more to learn :)

Thanks for stopping by!
-Chris

Something done to add drama to the portfolio:

Enjoy the Day,
Chris
chris-whetzel.com

Temptation is difficult to resist, especially when I'm tempted by such attractive morsels like the macaroons above, so brightly coloured and scrumptious looking. Fortunately I find them far too sweet for my taste and am happy to admire the way they look, draw them and leave them for others to enjoy.

I'm finally moved into my new quarters and hope that in a few months this will become my permanent home. Fingers crossed. In the meantime I am so loving being here and the settling down process is being helped along by the presence of a good friend, good food and beautiful surroundings. It's taken time away from blogging, commenting, getting inspired visiting other sites and, most important, drawing! But I refuse to get stressed over it as I know that soon enough it will be winter and I will have tons of time to concentrate on art and work.

Macaroons Card at zazzle

Wow, its been as while since my last post! Looking back, its odd that my last post was about a lull in the workflow. I certainly don’t feel like things have been moving slowly! To start things off, I’ll talk about some “business” aspects of the past month.

Taking advantage of the downtime, I implemented an income/collections/taxes tracking system. Basically, now I know roughly what I’ll need to pay in terms of federal taxes come April. I am keeping this estimated amount in its own savings account. In conjunction, I’ve also revamped my deduction-tracking technique so that its a lot simpler and easier to process come April.

Another administrative task I’ve been tackling as of late is collecting on invoices. I have learned that the end of the job is never the end of the job. Its can get pretty hairy and confusing. I’ve learned that folks process invoices immediately, at the end of the week, at the end of the month, or after publication. As such, I never know what going on with the invoice after the job so I have to email to follow-up. With the new system, its been easier though. Upon invoicing, I’ll now simply ask the client when they process their invoices so I can project a rough estimate of when I should be looking for a check. Then I can contact clients as needed after the date passes. I don’t know how other people feel about this or how they work, but I can get spacey on these matters when I’m concentrating on artwork. So instead of randomly hoping for checks when I open my mailbox, I am being more active and organized in collecting. Working in this manner, I now know where every invoice I have out stands in terms of processing and delivery. Sadly, some payments have been sent to my old address (long story) so I assume they will be forwarded by the always-punctual postal service.

What else has come up these past weeks? Ah, another thing taken into account since the last post was communication i.e, talking with other artists and illustrators. With Aliyah starting her graduate classes, it has been a very difficult solitude. Having just moved to the town of Beacon, I barely know anyone. After exhausting my trips to coffee shops and running errands, I have started posting on blogs to meet other artists. This also exposes me to a lot of new art. Recently, I was featured on thelittlechimpsociety.com as the “Editor’s Pick:”
Pretty cool. Also, that feature bumped up web traffic at chris-whetzel.com for a bit. I have been told that a lot of the members of that site are art directors so I see it as free promotion. Thanks to the guys at The Little Chimp Society! I look forward to posting more, and I tend to check out the blog every day or so. Similarly, I was invited to join sugarfrostedgoodness.com this week. I know that none of this is a big deal in terms of moneymaking, but I really feel that posting on these blogs as well as chris-whetzel.blogspot.com and theautumnsociety.blogspot.com really keep me motivated. As lame as it sounds, it fends off the lonelys :) And the bonus is that links from these sites increase chris-whetzel.com’s search engine ranking. Cool.

And the final thing I would like to say about blogs is to simply mention a helpful one: cedricohnstadt.wordpress.com. This blog is awesome for anyone freelancing. Its basically years and years of one guy’s experiences in the field. He also posts so many links that are illustration-business related. Great blog! One gem I found (of many) was the freelanceswitch.com podcast. Very cool. If you like the ICONIC podcasts, you may enjoy these. However, the Freelance Switch panel focuses on the BUSINESS of illustration by discussing a show-specific topic and answering questions about everything from contracts to etiquette to networking. And its all handled in a fun and light-hearted manner! This podcast also comes in handy when working long days alone and you just want to hear human voices! Its like being in a roundtable discussion!

Ah, discussion. I am jealous to hear Aliyah talk about class discussions. I miss it. I’m kind of disappointed that my friends and I never really got a collective together. I tried to establish “drink and draws” patterned after Dave Johnson’s group, but it never really took off. Its cool that Philly has The Autumn Society, but I’m in New York! Granted, I had a great artistic talk with Joe Game last week, but its not the same as sitting around looking at each other art, having crits, etc (and he totally guilted me for not blogging). However, I’m finding out that the artists in Beacon do meet; I just have to find out how to get involved. I was working at a coffee shop last night when a group formed next to me. Not really paying attention (I listen to my ipod when working outside the apartment), I noticed they were discussing art in between songs. Turns out they meet to just talk art, tell what they are doing, and pass on opportunities. This is awesome. I wanted to talk to someone in the group after the meeting, but I had to leave before they disbanded.

But hopefully, an opportunity to chat will present itself as I have been asked to take part in a show at that very coffee shop! After speaking with Nate (the manager) today, it seems the show will be November-ish. He really liked my drawings enough to ask a price on one! So it will be my “artsy” drawings as opposed to digital prints. He said he is still looking for illustrators who specifically have drawings to show. If you would like to be considered, drop me a line and I'll give him your website.

Striking off on a tangent, I was recently asked to attend the Baltimore Comic Con as part of The Autumn Society Collective. This was a great honor as I really respect the art of the other collective artists taking the trip: Joseph Game, Peter Wonsowski, and Craig Parillo. Good guys who make good art. What sucks is that I can’t go. Financially, I just don’t feel comfortable spending a lot of money to travel, for space, etc to promote to a field that probably can’t use my artwork. Plus I'll have a big expense thi smonth that I'll discuss later. I REALLY tried to rationalize going as I am a hardcore comic fan and I just wanted to be a fanboy for a weekend, but logical-me won the battle. Best of luck to the guys attending! Wish I could be there!

And so, being proud of my willpower, I have decided to commit to an ispot portfolio this month. I am worried about spending the money but its deductible, and I really think I’ll get some work from it. Dave Tabler at the ispot has been very accommodating with my hesitancy. It turns out they have a payment plan so that assuaged the fear a bit. And as a bonus, it turns out that ispot and Adbase have a deal where ispot members get a discount at Adbase. Cool. Next year, I hope to take advantage of it!

Another reason I decided to go for the ispot portfolio was that work picked up. August has been a super-busy month. It was sad to leave a personal piece unfinished to start new jobs, but I hope to have it done next week. Anyway, on to new work!

Ok, so the first commission came via email from Houston Press. This paper was a new addition to the mailing list so that was a good sign that the new card wasn’t such a bad image choice after all! The job was four spot illustrations for their “Best Of” issue due in a little over aweek. The budget was lower than I could afford, but we negotiated a budget that worked for both of us. Awesome. I can’t discuss the subject matter or post images until after publication on the 25th of September. But these were a lot of fun, and I think they add a little diversity to the portfolio. I’ll post them, sketches and all after the 25th.

Although fun, the period of working on them was a little crazy as while sketching them, I got a call from the art director of Retail Traffic who needed a quarter page spot by that Tuesday! Awesome, but the tight deadline was a little intimidating. Nevertheless, I knew I could do it so I accepted (just sleep less). He sent me a version of the article titled “Taking On Water.” It was about the California budget crisis and how its affecting the housing economy. It was an odd subject matter, but I enjoyed the challenge. Pushing back the Houston Press sketches, I ripped out these three sketches:
I like them all for different reasons. I assumed they would go with the first one of the house sinking on the chart, but he surprised me by choosing the house with the life preserver. I also like the "stormy weather" one, but we both agreed its more of a full-page image as everything is so small. The final:
This isn’t my greatest piece, but I like that it shows I can think outside of figurative work. Originally, I left off the “S.S. California,” but I was really happy that they asked me to put it back on the life preserver. I took this piece a little farther in terms of color as I want to push for more color in this graphic style.

One interesting aspect of this commission was that Retail Traffic is a magazine published by Penton Media, the same folks that commissioned the 10 portraits for Registered Rep a few posts back. My first return customer! Sort of. I worked with two different art directors but whatever. I count it.

So anyway, I finished the piece up on Tuesday. Prior to this, while doing the finish for Retail Traffic, I also finished and submitted sketches for the “Best Of” article. The art director really liked them, and we were set. However, the day I finished the Retail Traffic piece, the Houston Press art director called and asked if I could provide a cover in addition to the spot illustrations! Whoa! I told here there was no way I could have both done in four days. Then she explained that the spots were not needed until later in September and that the cover was for that week’s weekly paper. Now that I can do! On a sidenote, I have been becoming more relaxed with art directors, and it makes things more fun and light-hearted on both ends. Everything has been very laidback with everyone this month aside from getting work done. Its really kind of cool. So anyway, the spots got pushed back a week so that I could do this cover.

It is a portrait of Gary Kubiak, coach of the Houston Texans (football team). The idea was pretty simple: parody the popular Obama campaign poster using Kubiak instead. I was hesitant to do this as I like coming up with my own concepts, but I like paying rent so I agreed to do it. I was little worried about plagiarism, but my good buddy, Scott Brundage, said its not as he has seen this issue dealt with at his dayjob. I won’t show the sketches for this as there were like four versions with both the art director and myself photoshopping things, and they are really just messy sketches (not my usual rendered drawings). So anyway, here is the finish:
I like it. Initially, I wasn’t going to put it in my portfolio, but it really opened me up to using a palette without black and white. So I’ll keep it in there and add more pieces like it. What I really like about is that it’s a pretty good likeness in a totally non-existent pose i.e, I didn’t have direct reference to work from so I was making up lighting. I like jobs that challenge me and make me work harder. This one was a real test of my abilities! I never really thought my likenesses were good enough to market, but people seem to like them. As such, I’m trying to draw more popular figures in my non-commissioned works to get better at capturing a likeness. I have a list to work from!

However, there was one downside of this commission. Less than eight hours after taking the cover job, the art director at SFWeekly emailed me with a job for a half-page calendar illustration about a JETPACK EVENT! Arrrgh! I was so bummed to turn this down, but there was no way I could do both pieces as the turn around on the calendar was less than two days. We have a good, jovial relationship and he understood. Still, I hate turning anyone away. I think I’m still gonna do a jetpack piece just for fun and send it to him. I told him I might work it up for the portfolio, and he said its inspired him to break out his acrylics. Cool stuff.

And that’s all I got, folks. I just finished up the “Best Of” spots today, and they were approved. So the next post will probably feature those as well as the personal piece I am getting back to after almost a month. I don’t even remember where I was on it…Plus I stil lwant to do a particlular portrait and new drawings for the coffee shop show.

And maybe I’ll do something with this sketch I did while watching the DNC last week:

I like Obama. Good guy.

So who knows what next week holds? I'm sure I'll find something to occupy my time :)

Enjoy the Day,
Chris
chris-whetzel.com

Hello, again. Where to begin? Well, we can re-cap the last post with a screnshot of the Dolly Parton portrait on SFWeekly.com:

For now, I was very lucky to have found a bit of a time-passer this week. One night ( I think it was Monday), I was tired and bored so I was looking at our bookshelf for something to read. I remembered I had printed out PDFs of some art books years ago that I had only flipped through. I grabbed one titled "Creative Illustration" by Andrew Loomis and gave myself a bit of a re-fresher. Awesome. So much good stuff in that book and I'm only finished with Chapter 1. Its a goldmone of info, and you can't buy it at Borders or Barnes & Noble as its out of print (from like the 1940s). I have a couple Loomis books that I printed out years ago. ANYWAY, this brings me to my point: I happened across TWO Loomis books in an old shop called "Beacon Reads" along with what looks to be a pretty awesome book on pen-and- ink and another on cartooning and illustration:

Hello, all!

Today marks the three month anniversary of chris-whetzel.blogspot.com! Hooray! We're doing it! The goal is to keep this blog going strong for a whole year. I won't lie; its pretty tedious and often gets put on the back-burner, but its definitely keeping me working.

So whats new since the last post? Well, chris-whetzel.com is newly updated with two distinct portfolios. New images have been added to both portfolios as well as the News section being updated. The new Graphic vs. Linear division of artwork had paid off as it seems to help art directors. This became apparent after getting an email from the art director at SF Weekly where he requested a portrait in the "graphic style." Wonderful!

This portrait was to go with a music article on Dolly Parton who has started her own recording lable and will be performong in LA on the 5th. It was an interesting read, and the art director wanted me to specifically work from the excerpt "the biggest, brightest Dolly she can be." Sadly, since the commission was for an alt-weekly, the budget wasn't as high as I had hoped. But I really wanted to do a celebrity for the portfolio so I took the job after some negotiations. The lone sketch was approved:

So, yeah. A fun piece, a really easy-going art director, and a good addition to the portfolio. A three-pointer! *Swish!

The only bad thing was that this commission came through the day AFTER I had just sent my promo card files to the printer. Drat! This would have made a better one than my choice of the Crisis Magazine image a few posts back. Especially if I had colored it. Ah, well. Speaking of the cards, they just arrived. And I have to say: I am losing my patience with overnightprints.com. Many of the cards were off-center on multiple sides and text was right on the edge of a few even though I had stayed within the "safe area." Grrr. Its really frustrating and luckily I was able to trim some down and still use them. But really, its just more incentive to try the USPS print-and-mail service. Think thats gonna be the way I go for the Halloween mailer.

Another thing I'm considering for the future is using AdBase. We all know how awesome it is and I'm considering subscribing to that as opposed to the ispot. I can only do one right now, and I really can't decide. Decision, decisions. Hopefully, whichever I choose will fund the other. I think I'm going to wait for a bit as my list is freshly updated, and I should be fine for a spell. I want to see the response to this next mailer before I do anything. Don't want to spend money I don't have :)

And that's that. It promotion and drawing this week! Oh, and I'm still working in the spare time between jobs. Its a little harder with Aliyah being home all day, but I must be strong! That, and I'm just getting over a cold from last week so its been twice as hard to get cracking. Nonetheless, I managed to get out another "linear" piece for the site at the last week. Sorry I waited so long to post it:

I like it. The piece is for a community pork cook-off and fair, one of the options given to me to illustrate from Cleveland SCENE way back in May. Its nice to work in full-color as well as limited color. I think one makes the other better. And I think its a good subject to add to the portfolio as its not a typical theme.

All this with web updates, building a small site for my personal drawings, and re-building/updating Aliyah's site has kept me busy. It seems there is always something to do, even though there's nothing to do in this town :) Let's hope the mailer going out tomorrow brings in more work to occupy my time as well. Fingers are crossed!

Enjoy the Day and thanks for reading!
Chris

Howdy doo. Well, I just got back from an exhausting wedding weekend. It was a lot of fun though, and I even managed to get a little artwork in on Friday night. Currently, I am just happy to be back in my little corner studio working on the next piece. Sadly, after the current piece, I have to take another break for the move to Beacon, NY on the 8th and 9th of July. Throw in the 4th of July weekend, and time gets tight especially with all of the packing to be done. But it should all be worth it to be able to easily head into New York City on a whim or on business.

Speaking of the business, here are the sketches for the Crisis editorial mentioned in the last post. The article is about sexism and the oppression of females in rap music. The art director wanted a "I am woman, hear me roar"-type of illustration. So I decided to explore that as well as other avenues.

Sketches:



I actually did five sketches, but two were pretty lame so I didn't even show them. The art director like the "fist-in-yo'-face" sketch so that was that. I personally like the "spitting fire" sketch but was happy to do either. Perhaps I'll do another finish off of the unused sketch if I feel so inclined.

The Final Art:

This was a fun job. I am actually using this as my next mailer around July 15th (after the move and getting situated). Hopefully, it will arouse some interest. Also thinking of working on some likenesses for the portfolio before the end of the summer in this style as well as continuing to push the linear-style with new pieces. A newly updated www.chris-whetzel.com should be up by this Friday to coincide with the mailer.

And thats that. Back to work :)

Here's my designs for Mimiji Dolls at DontPanic, if u like it please click on the link below to vote for me!!

http://www.dontpaniconline.com/designbrief/entry/?id=2922

Scholastic is promoting the new Harry Potter book with a replica of the Knight Bus, which is touring around the country. Visitors to the Knight Bus can record a 30-second video about Harry Potter, and are given a password where they can view their video online. I think some of the videos are also going to be selected to be displayed on the web site.

David and I visited the Knight Bus during BEA and we each recorded a video. To have a chance to record a video, we stood in line in the broiling sun for over half an hour outside the Javits Center.

I just got the following email from Scholastic:

"We just found out that due to unfortunate technical problems, the sound did not record on any of the BEA videos which is why they are not uploaded."

So after waiting in line all that time in the heat, we have nothing to show for it. I didn't even get to see my son's video, because he didn't want me to watch while he recorded it. He thought he would be able to show it to me on the web site.

I understand that technical problems happen. They did offer to send my son a "care package" to make up for it, so they are doing what they can to rectify a bad situation. But it's still very disappointing.