In Sheryl Brakey’s home office hangs a Rand McNally World Map with a blaze of small orange dots—each denoting her worldwide travels, from the Seven Seas to Tibet.

Along the way, this Fair Oaks Ranch resident fused a passion for filming and journaling her travels with lifelong interest in biology and technology. “From the very beginning, people loved my videos, and I began to realize I had a knack for editing,” says Brakey, who took up the skill later in life, after a trip with her husband to China, Nepal and Tibet. She formed SJB Productions, specializing in educational undersea films and international travelogues available on video and DVD.

She promotes her educational videography and her presentation skills to Texas libraries, public schools and home school associations. “I love to give presentations to youngsters, because their curiosity is so wonderful,” she says. “I bring shark’s jaws and let them feel the teeth, plus shells and other curiosities from around the world. This show-and-tell approach instantly sparks their excitement.”

Pushing boundaries
Brakey’s path of adventure might seem unlikely for someone raised on a dairy farm in upstate New York. “Growing up, I didn’t know anyone who traveled or even went to college,” says Brakey. “Most girls in my peer group got married right out of high school, and became stay-at-home moms.” Brakey had other ideas.
By the time she was 12, she had four firm goals. “I wanted to parachute jump, fly an airplane, scuba dive and ride a horse,” she says. She has achieved them all. She also got a degree in biology from the Rochester Institute of Technology and had a successful career in medical technology and general aviation. Add to those accomplishments a pilot’s license, helicopter certification and scuba-diving license, along with a master’s degree in business. And for Brakey, that was just the first act.

Upon ‘retiring,’ she earned a second master’s, in international relations. Then she and her husband, Bob, a retired senior vice president of USAA, spent two years in the Peace Corps, assigned to Chile. That experience whetted their appetites to see more of the world. Since then, the two have traveled to more than 70 countries.
That trip to China, Nepal and Tibet piqued her interest in editing. “When we returned, I realized I had made every mistake that you can make with a camcorder and that if I didn’t learn how to edit the video footage I had taken, I would never look at it again,” she says. After purchasing some basic video editing software, Brakey taught herself how to edit and was soon creating videos that did more than record family vacations. They told intriguing stories.

Brakey expanded her repertoire by filming the couple’s diving adventures. Only three to five minutes long, these mini-productions soon won first place in diving video competitions. Amid coral flower gardens, Brakey’s keen eye found and filmed colorful sea fans, sponges, anemone, sea turtles, angelfish, shark, barracuda and other aquatic marvels. As people began asking if they could buy these small video vignettes, she combined them all to create a 48-minute production called “Wonders of the Sea.” “It’s still my top seller,” she says. Next came “Dive Adventures” and then a series of land travelogues, the latest of which is “Exploring India.” “That country was a tough one for me because I’m not a huge fan of curry,” Brakey says, laughing. To date, she has chronicled 24 adventures on video.

Travel plans
When it comes to planning their trips, Brakey  gives her husband the credit. “He researches the places we are going to visit, plans our itinerary and makes all the reservations. Once we have arrived, he carries the bags. All I have to do is ask him every day, ‘Where are we going and what should I wear?’”

The Brakeys become animated recalling their off-the-beaten-path travails. In remote parts of China, they often had no running water or toilet facilities. In Tibet, food was hard to come by, and the two discovered the blend of ground barley and yak cheese that Brakey refers to as a “Tibetan Energy Bar.” In La Paz, Bolivia, shots rang out from local political rebels marking what the proprietor politely referred to as “the afternoon disturbance.” Promising it would subside within minutes, the shopkeeper simply locked the door and closed the shutters while Brakey continued shopping for an Alpaca sweater.

Sometimes, the two travel abroad with tour agencies, but when it comes to planning diving trips they make their own arrangements. “For new divers,” says Brakey, “the Caribbean seems exciting, but I prefer places like Southeast Asia, the Red Sea and the Pacific. Once you’ve dived in places like Fiji, Papua and the Galapagos Islands, you realize that there is really no comparison. The marine life in remote dive sites is much more colorful and plentiful.”

Back on solid ground, a tour of the couple’s Hill Country home reveals treasures from their travels. “I have added to the economy of many countries,” quips Brakey. Proudly displayed are a treasure trove of spectacular items—distinctive artwork of marine life from Yap, Chile, Thailand, Fiji and Vietnam, a papyrus fresco from Egypt, jade from China, puppets from Bali, a carved Komodo Dragon from Komodo Island and more.
And in the home office is that mundane map, waiting for another orange dot.

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Bonus Material: Sheryl Brakey's 10 Ways To Create Great Video

1. Don’t skimp when it comes to purchasing a high-capacity hard drive for your computer, Videos require a great deal of storage capacity. Consider having at least two hard drives to avoid crashes and frustration, and put all video on the second hard drive.
2. Use a video software editing program suitable for the novice. Brakey recommends a beginning software package available from Pinnacle Systems or even Windows Moviemaker, available on Windows XP.
3. Plan your storyline by the video you have taken. For example, if you are creating a video of your child’s birthday party, highlights might include guests arriving, games being played, blowing out the candles on the cake and gifts being opened, with a final shot of guests departing. Remember to shoot each highlight both close-up and at a distance.
4. Shoot storylines for travelogues in chronological order. But nature videos may require collecting suitable shots over a lengthy period of time, depending upon the cooperation of the animals.
5. Shoot enough footage. The average duration of Brakey’s shots are usually at least ten seconds long. Shots can be shortened later if desired.
6. Arrange or “lay out” the video footage you have gathered on the software’s timeline or storyboard. Add titles, transitions, narration and music.
7. “Render” the video according to the editing software’s instructions. It will reshuffle your shot selections, titles and transitions into the storyline order you have pre-selected.
8. Save a master copy. You can save the finished video to a tape on your camcorder and keep it as a master, or you can save it to a DVD.
9. Think ahead to future projects, filing and categorizing any footage that may be useful later. Eventually you will have a useful archive.
10. Educate yourself further. She recommends Video Maker Magazine as a great resource for beginners.

To learn more, visit www.sjbroductions.com and click “Video Tips.”