FIFA26 World Cup — Series

It’s hard to put into words the immense scope of this project. My producing Partner Annie, Production Manager Katie and I had worked very hard on a 60+ page pitch deck along with auxiliary materials in the hopes we would win this job along with our friends Michael Welsh and Jordan Alberino. When we got the call that the project had been awarded to us the excitement was real, but the work had only just begun.

Creating a series from scratch that had such a global reach was daunting, not to mention answering the needs of every host city we needed to feature. This meant that we basically had 30+ clients per city times 16, in addition to our true client, FIFA. In each city we filmed for a “City Montage” showcasing the best of each city, a “Character” piece which featured a celebrity who was the “face of that city”, and a 2-hour B-Roll stringout of all of our footage to be sent to a multitude of international broadcasters who would use the content in and around the 2026 World Cup game coverage.

As a core team, we began to build out the crews we would be spending the next year of our lives working with. The reality of the project meant that each crew member, including ourselves, would have multiple roles during production and post-production. Creative Directors were often also Camera Ops and Editors, which helped us keep continuity throughout the series and our crew footprint small. We also brought on a Post-Production Producer, Tamara Montgomery, to help carry the load. 

The goal was that though there was quite a bit of overlap between crews, at least some of us would get a trip off to curb potential burnout from weeks upon weeks of continuous travel. We worked closely with each FIFA host city to secure filming weeks and identify filming locations. Then there was the purchasing of flights, rental vehicles, lodging and coordination of all travel logistics for crew members. And once filming locations were approved we began the pain staking process of permitting and rights releasing for each location. We filmed at an average of 32 locations per city over the span of 4 days. More than 500+ locations total and 16 featured Celebrities.

On top of all of the layers of approvals and logistics, we also had to work with each celebrity’s representative to plan their involvement during the filming of each city. The biggest celebrity of all being the 2026 FIFA World Cup Trophy -- which had its own rule book for filming, travel schedule and security detail! 

I cannot begin to recount all the special things we got to see and what seems like a lifetime of experiences rolled into one year. But after 90 days of filming in 16 cities across North America; 3 in Mexico, 2 in Canada, 11 in the United States, we faithfully serviced our core FIFA Films clients, and facilitated partnerships with 16 Host City teams composed of 52 Sports Commissioners, Government officials, and Tourism board members, by producing 80 Edited Deliverables. 

I'm so incredibly proud of what we were able to accomplish and even more thankful for the outstanding team I got to do it with!