Sunny TV Network

What I built

Live production setup — vMix + Panasonic PTZ cameras

Graphics package — lower thirds, overlays, on-screen branding

AI reel system — 30+ short-form reels from every episode

Original ad production — concept, camera, and edit, in house

Ongoing technical direction — keeping it all running as the channel grows

Sunny TV is Davey Hartzel's hyperlocal channel for St. Augustine: community news, local stories, the stuff that actually happens here. I came on early, before there was a real workflow or a single piece of content out the door. The job was never one thing. It was helping turn an idea and a pile of gear into a channel that ships every day.

Getting it off the ground. A lot of the early work was sitting next to Davey on the creative calls: what should this look like, what's the tone, what are we actually making. I helped shape the production side and those first creative decisions, then started kickstarting the social presence so the work had somewhere to live and an audience to find it.

The technical build. I set up the livestream and the gear from the ground up, running live production through vMix with Panasonic PTZ cameras so we could cover multiple angles without a full crew on every camera. I built the graphics package too: the lower thirds, overlays, and on-screen branding that make it read like a real channel instead of a webcam. That whole rig is still what we run on, and I keep it maintained.

The reel system. Davey shoots around two hours of footage a day. On its own, that's a mountain nobody has time to cut down. So I built an AI system that takes that daily footage and turns it into 30+ reels per episode. It changed the math completely. Instead of one or two clips trickling out, Sunny TV has a steady stream of short-form content from every shoot, without anyone living in the edit bay to get it. The part I'm proudest of.

Original ads, start to finish. I shot and edited all of Sunny TV's original ads. Concept, camera, and edit in house, so they match the look and feel of everything else on the channel.

Where it stands. I'm still on as Technical Director, keeping all of it running and adding to it as the channel grows: the livestream, the gear, the graphics, the reel system.

Why Sunny TV is the example. Most people who do this do one slice of it. A camera op who can't edit. An editor who's never run live. A social person who's never touched a switcher. Sunny TV is the whole picture in one place: creative direction, live production, gear and graphics, an AI system built specifically for them, original ad production, and someone who actually stays. That range is the point.

Reels & shorts the system produces

A few cut straight from daily episodes by the AI reel system. The full feed lives at youtube.com/@SunnyTVNetwork/shorts.

Melanie Smashes, Marries, and Ghosts (3K views) — youtube.com/shorts/RB7rJxcjmBo

Pregnant With My Boss's Son (2.8K views) — youtube.com/shorts/VLEZZzFySdU

Mars: Ancient Life Found? (1.8K views) — youtube.com/shorts/nr7Z9QBwhbQ

Pepsi Origin: Guess the 1893 Name (1.3K views) — youtube.com/shorts/S0dnQrTMFEw

Halle Berry's Menopause Truth (1.2K views) — youtube.com/shorts/dfty7q0BJTc

Airport Nightmare: Powder to Slime (1.1K views) — youtube.com/shorts/dsCtcYuBs68