It makes total sense for the folks at AMI-tv to follow up their cooking series Four Senses with Eyes for the Job. Aside from cooking, home renovations take up a lot of our time so why not launch a do-it-yourself series?
Debuting Friday at 8:30 p.m. ET on AMI-tv, Eyes for the Job is designed for viewers who are blind or low vision by having hosts Chris Judge and Rebekah Higgs describe what they’re doing while it’s being done. That’s evident in Episode 1 as the pair turn an old piano into a showstopper bar and tile the kitchen at Higgs’ home; they give a step-by-step description of exactly what they’re doing as they do it.
Shot and produced in Halifax by Clerisy Entertainment, the 13-episodes spotlight the skills of Higgs—an accomplished singer, songwriter and do-it-yourself mom—and Judge, who was born blind. That didn’t stop him from catching the DIY bug from his father.
“My father wasn’t trained carpenter, but he did it all of his life,” Judge says on the phone from Halifax. “As a kid, I was always getting in his way. I was out in his workshop putting my hands all over everything and asking him more questions than I’m sure he cared to answer.” Judge honed his skills in junior high by taking industrial arts, first embracing woodworking and then, as an adult, turning towards handyman jobs. Judge has always had an uncanny knack for being able to dismantle and rebuild things; he once shocked friends by putting together a barbecue grill just from feel.
Still, there were parts of Eyes for the Job that him pause: painting. As Judge, an assistive technology trainer at the Canadian National Institute for the Blind recalls, he wasn’t sure how a blind person could successfully paint walls to the standard a sighted person could. But with Higgs’ help, he not only learned how to do it but do it well.
Eyes for the Job isn’t just an excellent DIY series for its intended audience, it’s a fantastic renovation series period, something producer Dale Stevens strived for.
“What a great bar to set on this project, if we can make this not only for the audience at AMI but for anybody on any network,” Stevens says on the line from Dartmouth, NS. “I think we’ve created something that—regardless of what visual state you are—you’re going to watch this show and you’re going to like it.”
Eyes for the Job airs Fridays at 8:30 p.m. ET on AMI-tv.
Image courtesy of AMI.
