telling good stories. together.

Who I Am

Hi! I'm Daniel Gertson, the founder of Eight Spots Media. For almost two decades, I've been living in the world of communications. From news to nonprofits, I've been helping tell stories in a wide variety of ways... and loving it all.

I grew up in Houston, Texas, and graduated from Texas A&M University with a degree in journalism. I specialied in photojournalism which helped me develop a passion for visual storytelling. I was doing all still photography back then, but I loved the creativity that comes with taking in a scene and caputring it on film (literally back then). It's a fascinating challenge to immerse yourself in a scene and pick out the people and moments that make it special — and then figuring out how to capture them in interesting and compelling ways.

After college, I started working in local, TV news, first in Bryan/College Station and then in San Antonio . I began as a photographer shooting video for stories. I shot everything: "hard" news, interviews, feature pacakges, and even some sports. Eventually, I moved in to producing, which allowed me to work with everyone — reporters, photographers, anchors, editors, and the production team — to create informative and interesting local newscasts. The planning and teamwork required to pull that off multiple times a day, every day is incredible and so much fun.

I then had the incredible opportunity to use my visual and producing experience to tell stories at a large church based in San Antonio. Over my 10 years there, I got to meet and work with amazing people to share stories of positive change in our communities. I worked with production teams at seven campuses (including one international campus) to create engaging services every week that reflected a corporate, organization-wide message while allowing for localized expression that reflects the community around each campus.

I also led the video production team at the church, where we created everything you can imagine: series intro videos, illustrations, announcements, lyric videos, and even teaching curriculum. The scrappy but excellent way we made videos was a constant challenge and joy. Not to mention all the excitement and fun we had along the way.

On the side, I also did freelance work — live streaming concerts, producing videos, weddings — and helping local nonprofits with their communications strategies and publicity for events.