Mosaic Spotlight: Cass Taylor
The lack of access to creative technology tools is one of the main reasons inner-city students don’t get a shot at pursuing creative technology careers.However, that barrier won’t be a problem for the students participating in Mosaic Mobile this year, thanks to Cass Taylor, Creative Producer at Adobe.Mosaic Mobile is an annual mobile film contest where students create, shoot, edit, and upload an entire short film using only their mobile device.This year, Adobe is gifting all Mosaic Mobile participants with free licenses for Premiere Rush, Adobe’s mobile video editing app. Adobe Premiere Rush is a “user-friendly, very powerful tool for students to unleash their creativity,” said Cass, who runs multiple student programs with Adobe.The 2020 Mosaic Mobile finalists films will be screened at the 2020 Mosaic Event, an immersive event for high school students that focuses on digital media education, experiential learning, and career exploration.Due to the global COVID-19 pandemic, this year’s Mosaic Event is going virtual. The event will be broadcast globally from 9 - 11:30 a.m. on Wednesday, November 4, from Celebration Cinema North in Grand Rapids, Michigan.
“Not everyone has laptops and iPads to edit with, so Premiere Rush will give students high-quality editing software easily accessible on their phones,” Cass said. “With that technological barrier eliminated, everybody’s on the same playing field now.”“They all got free licenses for the next three months. The first two months is for them to create their mobile films, and then the last month is for them to continue creating,” he said. “I’m really big about creatives speaking with their creative voice. I want these young students to feel confident in doing that and making something they envision become real.”
Cass was the kind of student who spent hours drawing comic book characters. After a coach encouraged him to pursue an artistic career, he went to art school and studied multiple styles of art, as well as computers.If you’re a high school interested in a creative career, Cass advises dabbling in all types of creative activity.“You don’t know if you’re a photographer, oil painter, videographer…you just don’t know,” he said. “Put your hands in everything until you find that love, but you’ve got to create. If you don’t create, you never know.”