Weekend warrior...with a camera

Kneeling down in the end zone, Evan Shaw filmed Mewelde Moore beating his chest in front of the camera after scoring a touchdown.

Now, Shaw sees that video he captured on major networks and in Sports Illustrated’s commercial for the Steelers’ Super Bowl XLIII win.

That’s nothing new for Shaw. He was in Houston in 2007 when Rod Bironas broke the NFL record for most field goals in a game. He sometimes sees his footage on ESPN. But he’s not cocky about it.

“I screwed up and it was dark, so it looks awful every time they show it,” Shaw said.

Blemishes such as that are not common. At just 26 years old, Shaw is already carving a niche for himself in the video production industry.

He shoots and edits video at Ohio University. He spends fall Sundays in NFL stadiums from St. Louis to Detroit. And just last year, he won an Emmy.

“I thought I had a chance but I didn’t think I would win. I was kind of just happy to be nominated. Then I got there and won and it was really cool, so hopefully I can continue to do that,” Shaw said.

The Ohio Valley Region of the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences awarded him the Emmy for Outstanding Sports Videography. His camerawork with the 2008 Ohio football team got him the award.

“I wouldn’t have won it if I didn’t have the access I do, because football lets me do whatever I want. Letting me in the locker room, they don’t have to do that. They don’t have to let me shoot behind their bench or get player reactions, and that’s the kind of stuff I think helps win,” Shaw said.

The Emmy award wasn’t even Shaw’s first. He had already won one as a student at Ohio University, while working with WOUB’s Gridiron Glory. It was the experience he gained with that student-run production that led him to bigger opportunities.

“From that, I got an internship with NFL Films. At the end of it, I had a reel from stuff I shot with Gridiron and I took it to them and said, hey, what can I do to get better?” Shaw said.

NFL Films didn’t just look at his work. It offered him a tryout.

“I wasn’t thinking I’d get a job. I just wanted the best in the world to critique it,” Shaw said.

His first tryout at getting a dream job did not go as he had hoped.

“I knew if I did well I’d get the job. But I got there and it was brutal. It was terrible. I was so scared and nervous. I had never been to an NFL game,” Shaw said.

He got yelled at but was given another chance. This time he performed well and got a job as a ground cinematographer, one that he still has today. But it’s not his only job.

During the fall, Shaw is a busy man. He works for both NFL Films and as Ohio’s Director of Multimedia Marketing. His schedule can be hectic.

“I usually work 60 to 70 hours a week here, and that’s without the NFL,” Shaw said.

Those hours go into a variety of different projects. Broadly, Shaw is responsible for the athletic department’s video production, in-game video board content, print material, such as posters and schedule cards, and overseeing the look of the website.

More specifically, his job goes a lot more in-depth. Shaw’s typical week starts with a Monday morning meeting. From there, him and Bobcats announcer Russ Eisenstein start to plan out the week ahead.

Each week there is a game preview, for which Shaw hands off a lot of responsibility to his interns. Mark Hug is one of them and has learned a lot from working with Shaw.

“After shooting football, I would come in and he would look over my footage with me and give tips on what I can do to improve. If I ever have a question, he will have the answer,” Hug said.

Shaw needs interns, such as Hug, because of the grind that his job with NFL Films creates. That really comes to a head on weekends.

Shaw shoots an Ohio game on Saturday but then has to leave right away to head to an NFL stadium. So, it’s his interns who create the basic post-game highlights for the website’s Bobcat TV.

Managing Ohio’s schedule, especially with Saturday night games, and his NFL schedule, can be difficult.

“It’s exhausting, especially because you work so hard during the week and get so jacked up for this game on Saturday, when OU plays, then that’s over and there’s no time to relax,” Shaw said.

It makes for long weekends that just meld into the next week.

“The worst are the drives home. You’ll get done with a Lions game, say three or four o’clock. It’s still a six-hour drive. You get home ten o’clock Sunday night after working that whole time, then Monday morning, 8:30, it starts all over again,” Shaw said.

Although the time commitment can be challenging, it’s a job he does because he loves it.

“This had been the job in college I said, man, if I could just get that job, that would be the job I wanted. It was perfect. I grew up here, my wife was from Ohio, I can go back and look through old videos and see myself cheering and stuff like that when I was a student,” Shaw said.

Shaw is now the one making the videos to get students and fans pumped up and cheering for the Bobcats. His perspective as an alum is an asset.

“It’s great because I always think what would I want as a fan, because I was a fan back when these things weren’t there and I’d always wish I could see a highlight,” Shaw said.

His favorite video he has made at Ohio, and one of the best received by Bobcat fans, is the Ohio-Miami basketball rivalry video, which has played before the game at the Convocation Center each of the past two years.

Incoming O-Zone president Courtney Cohen knows the value these videos bring to the atmosphere in the student section.

“I think the videos do a great job at getting the O-Zone pumped for any game. The Miami video this year was a great display of the history of the rivalry,” Cohen said.

Highlights of classic games, such as when Tommy Freeman hit the game-winning shot with under a second left in this year’s Battle of the Bricks, is a particularly valuable resource that Shaw helps facilitate.

“As fans, we watch the game as it’s happening, but there's something special about seeing the highlights again. I still get goose bumps every time I watch the Miami highlights from this year,” Cohen said.

Ohio Media Relations Director Jason Corriher has worked with Shaw for two years. He knows the exposure that Shaw’s work with the website brings to the program is invaluable.

“Our website traffic in the last two years has skyrocketed. Everybody likes video, to be able to see highlights, and some of the effects with slow motion from experiences with NFL Films that he’s been able to apply here,” Corriher said.

The moments that Shaw has been a part of with NFL Films have a profound effect on him both professionally and personally. Sitting in his office area, you look to the wall and see a frame with all of the NFL credentials from his first season with the outlet. In the center of that frame, is one with a big picture of Jerry Rice.

As a college senior, Shaw was the only videographer on the field in San Francisco to shoot Rice’s halftime ceremony. It was a “wow” moment that really allowed Shaw to appreciate his job. But still being a student, he ran into a problem.

“I ended up failing a class because I was in San Francisco and couldn’t get home in time for the final,” Shaw said.

He’s been an assistant to work at the Super Bowl, on NFL sidelines week in and week out. All of that experience affects how he does his job with the Bobcats.

“I try to tell things differently than most college websites do. I try to make it art and find the storylines in the game. I try to base the way I edit, the way I run an organization, everything I do here based off the NFL Films model because it’s the best,” Shaw said.

For him, it’s about continuing to cultivate his skills to be the best. Amidst the recognitions and positive feedback, Shaw remains humble.

“I’m pretty good but there are guys there who just blow me out of the water. So, my goal is to study them and get as good as them one day, and that will take 30 years,” Shaw said.