As the owner of McNabb Storytelling, Bryce McNabb is an Emmy Award-winning filmmaker, and a presenter at this year’s Capture Summit, presented by Church Production. While he doesn’t work for a church, he often shares his gift of storytelling with his home church, GateCity in Atlanta, as well as with corporations and charity organizations that hire him to produce brand films and testimonial videos.
“Over the years, I’ve developed my proprietary Storytelligent system to help my clients discover their unique value, their brand’s core identity, and give them a strategic framework to tell their story in a meaningful way,” McNabb explains on his website https://mcnabbstorytelling.com/.
CP learns more about him in this Five Minutes.
“My love for filmmaking started with Legos.”
CPM: How did you first become interested in video/filmmaking?
McNabb: My love for filmmaking started with Legos. I built sets throughout my childhood and by the time I got to middle school, the technology class had two stations where you could play with Legos (one station taught pneumatics and the other robotics). To me, that was the best thing ever. In high school, that elective became media studies. And that's where I learned video and had my first introduction to photography. From then on, I was hooked. I hijacked my family camcorder and became the kid who made films for every class project.
CPM: When did you realize this art was going to be more than a hobby for you?
McNabb: Probably by the time I was a junior in high school I knew this is what I wanted to do. I benefited from the fact that I never saw this as a hobby. I can remember three times I made a video outside of school for fun. Granted, making videos has always been fun for me, but I always made them for class projects to receive a grade. I suppose I naturally conditioned myself from the beginning to create something that served a purpose. So, I went to college knowing I wanted to study filmmaking in hopes of making a career out of it.
The moment I got saved, my life—including my career—intersected with my faith forever. I regard my role as filmmaker as a spiritual calling.
CPM: How did your filmmaking intersect with the Church?
McNabb: It takes me an hour to fully answer this question (laughs), so let me try to condense this down. The moment I got saved, my life—including my career—intersected with my faith forever. I regard my role as filmmaker as a spiritual calling.
I believe films/videos are a powerful medium that, when leveraged to their full extent, can have a significant spiritual impact on the viewer. Just look at the word I used there to describe it: "medium.” In our daily language, we use words like "medium,” "channel,” "movie magic,” to describe films. We even place television screens on altars in our living rooms and arrange our furniture and the flow of our homes based on our television. To see this, yet ignore it, is to deny my calling.
“I love working with people and I don't thrive in situations where I'm working "for" people and treated as a button-pusher or an extra set of hands.”
CPM: Tell us about the decision to start your own storytelling business.
McNabb: Short answer: I'm a terrible employee. I'm far more valuable to others as a business owner. God designed me as a natural leader with a need for autonomy. It's difficult for me to just sit in a corner and be creative. I get bored easily, so while I love being creative. I also love selling, marketing, coming up with content strategy, the relationships I have with my clients, etc. I love working with people and I don't thrive in situations where I'm working "for" people and treated as a button-pusher or an extra set of hands. I'm not valuable in that situation.
CPM: Any favorite gear?
McNabb: I try to hit a sweet spot between quality, budget, size/weight, and usability. As a documentary filmmaker, I am often a solo-operator or running with a skeleton crew, and so I need to carry my entire kit on me, and I need to be fast. I'm a longtime user of Panasonic's GH line. I've had the GH5 since it came out and have been shooting on the GH5s with a 0.64x Speed Booster and Canon 24-105 for the past year, and [I’m] pretty happy with that combo. With the dual native ISO, I can just ride the ISO for the day and not worry about the footage becoming noisy and unusable.
I also started using V-mount batteries this year and am using the Moman 99wh battery. It's really tiny and can go for about six hours or so. For audio, I use the Sennheiser AVX system. It's just about idiot-proof and the receiver is basically an antenna you plug into an XLR input. And for lighting, I favor COB LEDs with Bowens mount. I recently had to fly out to Vegas for a shoot and picked up the Aputure Amaran 60d. This light fits in my hand and weighs nothing, so it's perfect for a travel kit.
And this is a bit random, but I've also been impressed with my audio interface, the Behringer U-Phoria UMC204HD. It's a two-input XLR to USB interface for my computer. Nothing fancy, but the preamps are remarkable. I'm able to drive my [Shure] SM58 (very gain-hungry dynamic) without the use of a FetHead [mic pre-amp], and the signal is clean.
CPM: What have been some of your all-time favorite stories to tell?
McNabb: Recently, I loved the Open the Gates film I created with GateCity. The leadership really pushed me to be creative and bold, and I'm proud of how it turned out. It was a full-circle moment where I felt I was truly stepping into my calling.
And one of my most significant stories was #stopthestigma that I made for NC State [University] while working at StoryDriven [video production company in North Carolina]. The film was created with their counseling center to encourage safe conversations about suicide, to make it less difficult and awkward. So, if a student needed help, if they were considering harming themselves, they wouldn’t feel isolated and might actually have an opportunity to get support. And three brave survivors actually shared their stories with us. It was a powerful project to be a part of. Not only did that film win a regional Emmy, God used the experience to teach me about the spiritual office of a filmmaker. You're essentially a gatekeeper, especially when it comes to editing documentary. You decide what goes on screen, what passes through that gate. And with the topic of suicide, you get into some very emotionally heavy and spiritually dark territory. I remember my business partner checked on my progress and found me laid out on the floor completely wrecked. There's a lot of material that didn't make the film for that reason.
“Over the years, I’ve developed my proprietary Storytelligent system to help my clients discover their unique value, their brand’s core identity, and give them a strategic framework to tell their story in a meaningful way.”
Reach Bryce at McNabbstorytelling.com.
