Tuesday « Kenny Smith | A remarkable thing happens …

Tuesday

IU / journalism / memories / photo / Tuesday / video — Comments Off
8
Nov 16

Election night coverage

Well, that was something.

Election night was a big deal in our new building on campus. We had live reports from the public television station, various political panels and all kinds of working student media. And, of course, on the big screen, we watched all of the national and international coverage. And at one point I looked up and I saw one of our students reporting on statewide television. That’s the young lady on the right:

She did a nice job, because she’s a talented reporter. We expect big things.

Elsewhere, the reporters at the IDS, the ridiculously successful campus newspaper, were planning tomorrow’s layout:

And in the newsroom they were waiting for numbers to roll in:

Meanwhile, over in a few of our production booths we had students doing a talk show on WIUX, the student radio station.

And of course my friends at IUS-TV had an election special tonight as well. You can see that right here:

The first election I covered, I was also in college. I wrote a story about the election of a new congressman — he would go on to become a two-term governor and when I interviewed him they were still whooping and hollering in the background — and a junior U.S. senator. That was a pretty great opportunity, and it set me off on a few great years of political news coverage. And me and my peers didn’t have the possibilities afforded to us to these young reporters. Imagine what they might do in the next 15 or 20 years.

cycling / football / history / IU / photo / Tuesday — Comments Off
18
Oct 16

Just some quick photos

USA Today’s little decorative badge is trying to capture the national mood. How do you think they’re fairing?

I pedaled my bike to campus this morning. Here’s a part of my route, a nice clean path with neat little trees and curves:

And the second part of the route, a slightly wider path, upon which you can go at least four wide:

I found this print today, the first Indiana football team:

They played one game, this week in 1887, in fact. They lost, to Franklin College. That was their season, a tournament to determine the state champion. IU was coached by Arthur Woodward, an economist. A future state attorney general was on the team. Six teams took part in what was the first version of something closely similar to modern football in the state. The Indianapolis Athletic Club invited Butler, DePauw, Franklin, Hanover, Indiana and Wabash to play the October and November series in Indy. Wabash won it all. You like to think some old men in the middle of the 20th century were still reminding each other how they got the job done back in the eighties.

IU / photo / television / Tuesday / video — Comments Off
11
Oct 16

We’re mass communicating here

I’ve shown you a bit of the television studio and control room that they’ve built in the new Media School building. I should also mention this fine little radio production booth:

It has windows on three sides, so it can be a fishbowl broadcast studio, and a podcast and production booth. There is an adjoining production booth on the other side of one of the windows. And still more of editing bays and production rooms being finished downstairs. This is one incredible facility IU has here. And they let me play with all the fancy toys in these rooms. It is a pretty charmed thing, really.

And tonight, we were back in the television studio. We do sports shows on Wednesday and Thursday. But on Tuesdays we do a news show and a pop culture, fashion, what’s happening kind of show. I’m sitting in a control room full of talented young people, and there’s plenty more talent in the studio next door:

Here’s that show now:

IU / photo / television / Tuesday — Comments Off
4
Oct 16

Tonight we were live, on tape, from the new studio

A long day in the office today and in the studio tonight, but here’s the view over our building and into the eastern sky:

I’m standing on the top floor of a parking deck there. My walk is exactly one block, and that’s not so bad.

This evening I gave office keys to the leadership team of the campus television station. It is an average-sized office, but they are big keys:

They would have been excited about that, but many of them got to go into the new studio for the first time tonight:

In the back of the control I offered the old Dana Carvey as John McLaughlin quote: Show show show here we go.

Going to be a great year.

IU / photo / Tuesday / video — Comments Off
27
Sep 16

Now open for bizy-ness

Today was the official grand opening of Franklin Hall. The president of the university spoke. Everyone wore their regalia. They conferred an honorary degree upon Fox broadcaster and IU alumnus Joe Buck. We put him on the big screen:

Buck is a funny guy, and thoughtful and was highly complimentary of the facility they’ve put together here. He should be. The place is nice. He said, and I’ll surely steal his line and quote him later, that he works in all the best studios in New York and L.A. and the broadcast setup here is as nice as any place he goes. He’s not wrong. They’ve built something really promising here. And, now, a quick glimpse of the studio that I shot today before we welcomed the open house tours:

This is Ken Beckley:

He is a journalism grad. He became a successful anchor in Indianapolis and then a business executive and now a well-regarded author. Very nice man. He and his wife, Audrey, who is also an IU grad, donated to the renovation of Franklin Hall and now the studio carries their name. This is the first time, I believe, that Mr. Beckley had seen the finished product. He was quite pleased. A friend of his asked him to go stand at the green screen. He said he never had before. But he enjoyed it. Even the old pros enjoy the novelty of the green screen.

And then, after the open house, and after I got to demonstrate the virtual reality set up in the video game lab downstairs — yes, we have all of that here, too, and it is equally incredible — we got to start doing some production training with the IUS-TV crew:

It was 6:30 on a Tuesday night and they walked in and stayed for about 90 minutes. People in student media can be some kind of devoted. That never fails to impress me.