About Us

Established on December 30, 2011 in a suburban apartment near Chicago — Willowbrook, Illinois.

Our mission is to make video abundant and part of everyday life. We simplify video production — making professional video more accessible to the world.

Founding Team Members

Two brothers who love film, and a self-taught website developer. Designing a video production company for the modern, web-connected world.

Frank Romano III

Sales & Co-Founder

Graphics & Design / Animation

Corey Olson

CEO & Co-Founder

Web Developer / Programmer

Nick Romano

Operations & Co-Founder

Videographer / Cinematographer

Stay honest. Focus on the content.

The Story Behind Vanilla Video.

History

Content matters most.

The story began when a friend desired to film his wedding. With limited funds, he soon discovered video was not an option — and sadly, he was unable to film his wedding. We asked ourselves: why is nobody servicing his needs? His family should be able to reflect back on those moments and vows. Their children should be able to enjoy family history.

We noticed that most videographers cares more about making money, or improving their portfolio, than helping a family capture history. We thought everybody should be able to afford video — so we set out to create Vanilla Video and liberate raw footage for all.

Guided by the idea that everybody should be able to access their history, we pushed ourselves to reinvent videography as a service. Our goals were predictable pricing, fast turnaround time, bullet-proof reliability and easy online ordering. We simply wanted the ability to have someone show up, film something, and deliver the raw video for our own personal collections without all the pre-production, meetings and planning.

After months of designs and concepts we came to an unlikely, but revolutionary, conclusion about video production — editing is arbitrary. In fact, editing might even be undesirable for some projects, like events and weddings. Since editing could always be done sometime in the future, the raw footage became the focal point — the idea of Vanilla Video was born.

Building on this assumption, we built Vanilla Video into what it is today. How amazing it is that anyone can now get raw footage, delivered online to your own personal account. Easily hire our videographers online without any major planning. Perfect for so many use-cases.

Vanilla Video

Raw footage is important.

By default, Vanilla Video provides all the raw footage — at no extra charge. People should retain the ability to re-use and re-mix the unedited video. We believe introspection plays an important role in our lives and legacy. Our goal is to make and preserve video for posterity.

Classic Style

Popular with everyone.

Vanilla Video is for more than personal events. Customers choose our video production services thanks to our laid back, no-nonsense approach. Even Fortune 500 companies consistently choose Vanilla Video. Part of our signature is a low-key editing style that is stylistically professional, subtle and timeless. Instead of trend-of-the-year shooting and editing, our team aims to capture video in classic fashion, and minimize artistic risk.

With over 4,000 projects completed, Vanilla Video is one of the most trusted videographers in the United States.