Chet Garner loves to surround himself with passionate people and tell their stories to inspire the rest of the world. His Texan-based production company, Hogaboom Road, travels all across Texas. On their adventures, they document the exciting lives of passionate, everyday people.

“I like to tell the sort of stories I like to hear, stories about adventures that inspire others to go on adventures, stories about people who’ve followed their passions and have found a way to share it with the world,”  Chet Garner says. “People who are passionate about what they do make for the best stories.”

It takes a lot of hard work and remote collaboration to bring these stories to life. With Dell Precision workstations, Chet and Hogaboom Road gleefully take on projects all across the country and always serve up something we all find inspiration in.

Sharing the incredible stories of everyday people

Two things inspire Chet Garner: nature and dedicated, passionate people, working in their elements. “That sort of energy is exciting,” Garner says.

Throughout his time working on Hogaboom Road, Garner met many people and drew inspiration from every one of them. His journey started over a decade ago. His first project was The Daytripper. Hogaboom Road wasn’t a business yet, so Garner was just a passionate guy wanting to tell the stories that inspired him. However, after the show premiered, it proved to be a huge hit.

We started getting folks asking if we did other projects.” Garner reminisces. “I thought ‘Why not? We’ve got the cameras.’” After the show’s success, Garner decided to turn Hogaboom Road into a full-fledged production company. Hogaboom Road worked on a wide variety of projects, from documenting beekeeping at Round Rock Honey to working with the Texas Forest Service and Smokey the Bear himself.

“When Smokey Bear calls, you take the call,” Garner says. “Growing up as a scout and being an Eagle Scout, it was a dream come true to get to work with Smokey … But we had to keep a huge amount of honey backstage. That dude eats a LOT of honey.” Hopefully, Garner phoned Round Rock Honey for some help.

Separate, but together

Hogaboom Road works with a passionate in-house team and many hardworking freelancers. Seldom is everyone working under the same roof. To tell the stories they set out to tell, Hogaboom Road needs everyone to be on the same page and communicate remotely throughout the entire creative process.

“We edit exclusively with the Adobe Creative Cloud,” Garner says. “This has been a game-changer.  Everyone — in-house, and freelance — has the same programs and the same versions of programs. We don’t spend any time worrying about whether or not someone can open a file or has a program. If they have Adobe Creative Cloud, they’ve got it.”

Working with the Creative Cloud allows Hogaboom Road to work on an external hard drive and send files back and forth. During post-production, Garner’s editors make a rough cut and send it over to him. Once he gets it, he makes all the necessary changes to the edit and records a voice-over. He then sends it back to his editors to work the voice-over into the cut. The project will go back and forth between various parties a few times until it’s perfect.

Garner relies on the Creative Cloud because it keeps everyone at Hogaboom Road “focused on the creative work.”

Meeting tight deadlines with the Dell Precision workstation

Traveling all over Texas requires Hogaboom Roads to collaborate on projects remotely. The Dell Precision 5750 Mobile workstation makes it possible for Garner and his team to edit large video files no matter where they are.

“It’s given us a super-charged computer that we can literally take anywhere. We can ingest and start truly editing work while traveling,” Garner says. “One time we weren’t quite finished with an episode, but we had to hit the road to film the next one. My team literally edited in the car on the way and in the hotel room that night,” Garner says. The Precision workstations helped his team make the deadline with flying colors.

One of Hogaboom Road’s charms is its team’s tight bond. However, being a small business means they don’t have endless capital to invest into expensive workstations for everyone to use.

“We require a LOT out of our computers, but as a small business, we also need to be cost-conscious. I can spec out a Precision workstation to have supercar power, but for much cheaper.” For much less, Garner and his team utilize the workstation’s mobility, power, NVIDIA RTX GPU and big screen, which is a feature Garner always looks for in a workstation. He needs lots of workspaces to do the kind of work he does. Ultimately, the Dell Precision workstation is the right tool to get the job done.

“With the right tools, I can take any limits off of my own creativity,” Garner says. “We don’t have to wonder if we can pull something off.  We get to spend our effort coming up with the most creative ideas possible.”

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