Thomas Williamson is a college senior at Bridgewater State College.  He is an English major with a Communications minor.  He is 21 and lives in the Boston area.

Black Turtle Media: What kind of background do you have in video and film production?

Tom: I actually have a pretty limited background in it.  I’ve only taken two classes, television production and videography.  But I’ve been interested in the field for a while.  I’ve pretty much always wanted to do movies and stuff like that.  I just got the motivation with the last class I had taken, videography, to do more videos.

Black Turtle Media: Do you do take any film classes in high school or did you begin in college?

Tom: I’ve pretty much just started in college.  I wanted to do it since before high school but I’ve never really been able to. 

Black Turtle Media: How did you get the idea for your Al Gore video?

Tom: Al Gore was pretty much the first name that popped into my head when I saw the Decision 2008 category.  I’m not too familiar with the political stuff that’s going on right now and I figured, you can’t go wrong with Al Gore. 

Black Turtle Media: How did you go about putting together the video?

Tom: It was actually pretty simple.  I used a fifty dollar editing program called PowerDirector.  And I used a cheap nine dollar microphone. I just put together the clips and stuff like that.  The production music I had available through class and I applied it to this video. 

Black Turtle Media: How long did it take to edit everything together?

Tom: I had it all done in a day, pretty much.  I had just found out about the contest two days before the due date.  I thought about it and just went out and did it.

Black Turtle Media: How did you find out about the Decision 2008 contest?

Tom: I came across a website called Vidopp.com which has a listing of contests.  I visited the site because I’m interested in creating videos and movies. 

Black Turtle Media: What advice would you give to other people looking to create winning videos?

Tom: Pretty much, just keep trying.  Come up with great new ideas, do what you like, and eventually you’ll find the right audience and go from there. 

Black Turtle Media: How did it feel when you found out you won the contest?

Tom: It feels great, I was really surprised.   I’m pretty speechless about the whole thing and I’m really excited at the same time. 

Black Turtle Media: Do you plan on producing future videos?

Tom: I do.  I don’t know. I’m going to keep looking into video contests.  I have a few ideas about what I’m going to do next and at some point I’ll enter the next contest.