This Wearable Tech Has Real Value – It Might Help Save Your Life!

It takes time and planning to produce a quality promo video. You need a top quality director who understands lighting and equipment and a hard working crew and finally a strong editor who pulls it all together. Having worked in front & behind the camera, I understand how much work goes into even what feels like the smallest projects (even though they’re huge). I understand Mr. Vorhies had unique business timeline challenges prior to creating his video, and fortunately for him it all worked out. The bottom line is, certain things can’t be do it yourself (DIY). When you cut corners, they can and sometimes will come back to bite. This is true with video. You really do need professional and battle-tested video production services if you want the best.

Zach Vorhies is the creator of the MMI3G for Audi & Volkswagen, a former Google employee, and the creator of Zackees, a glove with a battery inside that lights up the glove. The goal is to help protect cyclists, joggers and wheeled athletes by letting cars see them better. They’re like blinkers, but on your hands. He spoke with my friend and popular blogger, Alex Yong earlier this week. This is the first of many upcoming guest bloggers I will be hosting on my blog!  This is their interview, continued from TechMania411.net.

Alex Yong: What are some interesting things that happened en route to the Zackees Gloves Kickstarter campaign?

Zach Vorhies: With our Kickstarter video, the production process was a lot of stop and go. We were working on trying to get an awesome video since July. The problem we were having was that we couldn’t be taken seriously because we didn’t have a finalized glove. Nobody wanted to make plans far in advance.  I tried to get my friend and roommate to do the video, but delays in getting the gloves finalized derailed that. He eventually got hired full-time at a startup, so that meant resetting and trying to find another videographer. As you can imagine, we ran into problems.  I’ve never done true video production, so I didn’t know what I was doing and I didn’t know how to ask the right questions or set the right expectations. On top of that, production had a limited time to make the video.  The funny thing is, we actually had another Kickstarter video that we knew we could repurpose before we scrapped it for good. There was a serious problem with the speed of it, and we didn’t like the artistic direction either.  We repurposed the flawed video as a way to shop around for another director – to show them what we wanted, only professionally done.

Another interesting point was that someone with creative say in the project tried to persuade us to attempt to link Zackees gloves to Google Glass somehow. My response to him was to explain that a feature like that would be very costly. On top of that, it targets a very small minority of the population. Most people aren’t going to use it. Yes, it could generate some beneficial media attention, but the product experience centers around augmenting gloves with lights to keep you safe. And part of that experience is having batteries that last a long time. If we add Google Glass support, then our battery story goes from months to days. It might be viable in the future - when Bluetooth low energy mode is common and cheap.

Alex Yong: What did you study in school? What did your family say when they learned you were a Google employee?

Zach Vorhies: I’m a graduate from the University of Oregon, triple major with majors in Computer Science, Mathematics and Psychology. My family was ecstatic to learn that I was hired to work at Google. It’s sorta like hitting the jackpot. Great job security and wonderful pay. The projects that are available to work on are very interesting, not to mention the benefits I’m sure you’ve heard of, like the food. When I left Google to concentrate on the Zackees turn signal gloves, I resigned on good terms. In fact, my relationship was so good that I told my superiors in private I was going to leave a few months in advance. This gave Google a lot of time to start finding redundancy for my position.  I feel it’s important to do the right thing, even though in a previous job, I tried to do something similar, but was promptly fired!  So where you work is a big factor.

Alex Yong: How do you cope with all that’s going on with the Zackees Kickstarter campaign? Do you look to other young companies for inspiration?

Zach Vorhies: I meditate. I think about this project all the time.  Sometimes I need to get away from it all and just be by myself. Meditation for me is sort of a daydream but with my eyes closed. If they were open I would appear to be fixed on something. In reality I can go really deep into myself. My eyes are open, but I’m looking inward during the process, if that makes any sense. Right now I’m inspired by the guys at Pebble. They’re definitely trailblazers in the crowdfunding scene. If you look at their project on Kicktraq.com, their numbers are insane. It’s hard to appreciate how well they did, until you try to launch a Kickstarter yourself.  Zackees did $12,000 in one day and we pat ourselves on the back. The Pebble made $500,000 in one day.

Alex Yong: You’ve been terrific to interview, Zach. Thank you for your time and best wishes to you and your company!

Thank you so much for guest posting on our blog today, Alex. I look forward to having you visit us again sometime soon!