Santa Rosa Junior College graduate wins Emmy Award

Sam Freed is living his dream. A lifelong football fan, the Santa Rosa Junior College graduate spends his workdays making videos for the Las Vegas Raiders, one of which recently won an Emmy Award.

Freed received the award from the National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences, Pacific Southwest Chapter in the “Promotion — Long Form Promotional Spot” category for his role in producing a 3-minute, 15-second video about the team’s 2021 game schedule featuring Pro Football Hall of Famer Charles Woodson.

Born and raised in Santa Rosa, Freed developed a passion for filmmaking during his time at the junior college.

“When Sam was in the Digital Filmmaking Program at SRJC, he was highly motivated, very into camera and production. And he got along well with everyone in the class. Those are two great assets to have in a technical and collaborative field like production. I'm not surprised he's doing so well,” professor Brian Antonson said.

Through hands-on projects in which students were assigned different roles on production teams, Freed learned how to direct, edit and shoot films.

“I was able to learn each and every role in film production and have my hands on as many aspects of the project as possible … that’s the best way I learned,” Freed said.

After graduating in 2013 with an associate degree in Behavioral and Social Sciences, Freed worked as an intern at Atomic Video Productions in Emeryville, where Raiders were a frequent client.

Freed grew up watching and loving football. He’s a die-hard Denver Broncos fan, but his passion for filmmaking and football prompted him to reach out to the Raiders for a full-time job.

In 2018, he messaged Marcus Padilla, the Raiders’ director of broadcast, on LinkedIn and shared his portfolio of film work.

Within five minutes of sending his message, he received a phone call from Padilla. He was hired “immediately” to help with video production.

“That’s all it took,” Freed said. “When I started getting into filmmaking, my ultimate goal was to make it to the NFL in some shape or form, doing camera work. So landing a job with the Raiders was huge.”

Freed is now a cinematographer, editor, and producer on the Raiders’ Silver and Black Productions team, the team’s video production crew.

He, along with six other filmmakers, created the video that won the Emmy.

Freed remembered the June awards ceremony in Palm Springs as “nerve-wracking.”

His role was mainly shot design and storyboarding. He helped write the script, figure out the message and decide what imagery to include in the video. Filming took several days.

“Doing camera work is so fun to me, it's like not even working. So to call this my career is still — to me — so unbelievable. I love every day at work,” Freed said.

He also loves getting to hang out with NFL superstars.

“There's times where I can just sit down and have lunch with (the players) and talk about things other than football. I get to learn about them and develop a relationship with them,” Freed said.

To watch the video, go to bit.ly/3SMu7ug.