A couple years ago I approached my Father-in-law about helping capture some visuals for his church, Salem Methodist Church Zionsville. I did this because I had visited their website and noticed how out-of-date and antiquated it was... Not just in the structure, but in the visuals. I had also noticed their Facebook page was as well lacking.

A few years back, Salem went through a name change, dropping United from the title. This caused some division in the church as you can imagine, and so over the years various volunteers transitioned out of the church, leaving roles they had held, vacant. Roles included: website management, Facebook page management, photography, etc. These were all things I thought I could help with, so I offered my services!

My Father-in-law agreed and got me connected to several former members who were kind enough to help me. Access was granted to their current website and Facebook page.

I began transitioning their website from its old system to a new, more user friendly system on Squarespace, which coincidentally Mediabuffproductions is hosted on. :) I also helped setup a Google Workspace for the church, which is a place that could host email addresses.

All along the way I had been making myself aquatinted with the churches history, congregation, beliefs, outreaches, cemetery and role in the community of Zionsville. This helped me build their online presence. I enjoy history, my day job is working at a place that recreates 1836 Indiana among other historic elements, so I appreciated learning more about the church which was built in 1834.

Building the online presence involved capturing footage and images of all their annual events, Sunday service, building and grounds. This took place over the course of almost 3 years.

I also took the time to note seasonal things, capturing footage and images of the church in the spring, summer, fall and winter. I put together this collage from various drone shots taken throughout the year at the same general height and location, making note to visit the church after it had snowed to get the perfect shot. I used the drone for many shots and angles of the church, cemetery and surrounding property.

I also captured images that could be used for promoting future events. So if I needed to capture a shot of the flagpole for the 4th of July, I would get that when I can, then use it on the website calendar and in a Facebook post. I did this throughout the year for as many events as I could document.

Capturing content throughout the year also gave me the idea to do what I really love to do, putting together a video showing off the church. This video required me to interview various demographics of church attendees. This included attendees that have been there a long time, attendees that are new and attendees of various ages. This part began in early 2023.

Throughout the process of updating the church website, we took its very long and wordy history and condensed it down some. Working with my Mother-in-Law, we cleaned up the lengthy version of the history and built a brief version. This all aided the video because it gave me insight into the story and how the video should flow. I had also been given a large amount of vintage and historic images from over the years to use on website, social and video projects.

All of that came together into a short video that I finally was able to put together after years of capturing footage of as many events as I could. I used this video on the website to give first time visitors a taste of Salem. A taste not just through images, but through hearing about it out of the mouth of attendees and seeing the church in action.

Along the way I have helped communicate analytics and stats from the website, social media campaigns and more to my Father-in-law, who is on the church board and can communicate that information to board members and beyond.

It’s been fun injecting new life into this almost 200 year old church through new visuals I’ve been able to capture. It’s also been fun helping a small church community, after cutting back on other church work.

Salem is a kind and caring little church nestled in the heart of Zionsville, IN. I’m excited to see how what I’ve done may help them.

- The Media Buff

Salem Methodist Church, Zionsville, IN