By Robert W. Dalton
It was closing in on 10 p.m. on the last Wednesday night in April, and Paul Vecchione ’10 was directing traffic on the field at Gibbs Stadium.
Vecchione wanted one more take with Dillon Droze ’24, a tight end on the Wofford football team. And one more. And one more. And, after he got the shot he wanted, one more just for safety.
Vecchione and a four-man crew from Starr Media, the production company he runs with his brother, Zach, and another partner, were on campus for three days to shoot a recruiting video for the Office of Admission.
“I didn’t want to miss a sign or not show a building in the right way,” Vecchione says. “There was so much at stake. I want to show the Wofford community what we can do, and show off how special Wofford is. Honestly, I was more nervous for this shoot than I get for a massive campaign with celebrities.”
That’s saying a lot, considering that Starr Media’s client list includes ESPN, Nike, Tommy Hilfiger and Spotify. In the weeks before the Wofford gig, Starr had shoots going on around the world – including a shoot for Netflix and a team in Monaco shooting Tommy Hilfiger — the man, not the brand.
Vecchione and his crew fanned out across campus, shooting scenes in Main Building, the Rosalind Sallenger Richardson Center for the Arts, the Chandler Center for Environmental Studies, the Roger Milliken Science Center and the Stewart H. Johnson Greek Village, among others. They also shot a scene at the urban garden in Spartanburg’s Northside Community and gathered footage from a variety of locations across town.
The “cast” consisted of faculty, staff and students. Eyon Brown ’21, an English major with a film and digital media concentration, from Columbia, S.C., got to see the production from both sides of the camera. In addition to appearing in a scene, he worked closely with the crew behind the scenes.
“I was just expecting to show up and carry some equipment and follow directions,” Brown said. “It was great to be a part of the video and do some voice over work. It also taught me a lot about videography and the nuances that go into it, like getting the proper lighting. I’m just glad I could contribute to a successful project.”
Lilly Hatton ’23, a biology major from Georgetown, Ind., is accustomed to being in the spotlight as a member of the women’s basketball team. She’s also no stranger to the stage, having played Maria in the Sound of Music in high school. But she admits to having a few butterflies as the crew shot her in a chemistry lab.
“I was a little nervous because I wanted to do a good job of representing what Wofford has to offer,” Hatton says. “I’m really excited for future students to see this video and see what is happening at Wofford, because there’s a lot to be excited about.”
Megan Tyler ’14, the director of admission, said she’s excited to have a new tool to showcase Wofford to prospective students.
“We were thrilled beyond measure to have Paul and Starr Media shoot our new admission video,” says Tyler. “Paul and his team have a beautiful way of capturing stunning visuals that speak to the human heart. To have such stellar professionals working with us to share what it means to join the Wofford community was a real gift.”
For Vecchione, the project represented a homecoming. He’d been on campus briefly once before since graduating, but this was his first extended visit.
“It was kind of surreal coming back,” he says. “It’s amazing how much it has grown, but it still has that Wofford charm.”
Vecchione earned bachelor’s degrees in business economics and Spanish. After graduation he landed a position as an analyst with the General Services Administration, the federal government’s logistics agency in Washington, D.C. But after spending time working more and more with his brother, he came to realize that Starr Media offered a way to spread his wings and make creativity a livelihood.
“After college I was doing some work to help my brother, and I kept getting more involved,” Vecchione says. “There came a day when he said he needed a partner and he wanted it to be me, and he gave me some time to make a decision. I went to Vietnam and Cambodia and wandered around for about a month to think about what I wanted to do, and here we are.”
Vecchione says he was humbled that his company was asked to produce Wofford’s new video.
“It’s just incredible,” he says. “If you had told me 10 years ago that I would be back here doing this I would have said you’re nuts. I believe we captured what I felt when I was a student here, and we’ll be proud to present it to current and future students.”