New digital technology gives film students freedom to create

By Robert Carr

C & G Staff Writer

Thanks to successful technology fund-raising and bond issues, new digital video technology has arrived as a teaching tool at many school districts in Michigan, including both Berkley and Ferndale high schools.

Just a few years ago, students in high school film classes would spend hours of valuable class time to create a short piece to put on air, a process not much faster than film-splicing required a couple decades earlier.

Fortunately, times have changed. Students now zip around campus with new hand-held digital cameras about as big as a paperback book, and can drag-and-drop footage and sound on high-storage computers so fast that a 15-minute newscast takes about that long to produce.

“It’s just so much quicker than it used to be, and much higher quality,” said James Henry, an 18-year-old student from Berkley High School. “We can now do effects just like the professionals use, and it takes about five minutes to do.”

Students at Berkley recently went completely digital for the first time for their annual Film Festival, held April 2 and April 6 in the school’s auditorium. Students exhibited their new skills in a production of various skits that lasted more than an hour.

“The new digital cameras and computer editing stations are expanding student capabilities and creativity,” said Caye Matthews, a journalism teacher at the school.

The day before, Berkley film students scrambled on the many computerized editing stations to finish their pieces. One student, 18-year-old Alex Grossfeld from Huntington Woods, worked across two computer screens on the final master product. Mindy Herford, 17, said the new technology is similar to the way new software made Web page design available to the masses.

“Digital editing is so simple now,” Herford said. “It’s so self-explanatory; like if it says ‘title,’ you just put in the title.”

Most Stressed Award went to Mara Oswald, a 17-year-old from Berkley. As producer, she had the job of basically prodding, herding and cajoling fellow students to get their projects done.

“OK, people really need to check their titles for spelling,” she reminded her classmates as they tried to make final edits and checks for their pieces.

All of the students said they love the class, mostly for the creativity awarded to them and the hands-on training.

“We basically get to create the way we want to. If we can think of something, we can go and film it and put the concept together,” said 18-year-old Andrew Appel of Huntington Woods.

At Ferndale High, not only do the digital film classes provide outlets for expression, the administration hires them out for school functions.

Science teacher Al Bancroft, who says running the video class is his “sandbox,” puts his students to work as the district’s news team. They film and edit broadcasts for sports teams, graduations, concerts and even Board of Education meetings.

“This class operates as a job shop,” said Bancroft while sitting in the narrow broadcast studio control room at Ferndale High. “Generally, the freshman come in knowing nothing about video, and when they get out, about half the class ends up doing something in broadcasting. A few of my students now work at stations like WJLB.”

Ferndale began converting to digital in the last five years, allowing students to learn equipment now used at most television and radio stations, Bancroft said.

Jessica Clark, 17, said after attending Bancroft’s class for two years, she plans on majoring in film and video at Grand Valley State University.

“It’s a lot of fun here,” said Clark, a Ferndale resident. “You get to play with expensive machines. The equipment is very easy. If I don’t like a particular clip, I can just hit delete, and it’s gone. Or if I want to clip another piece of audio on, I just move it over with a cursor. It takes just a few minutes.”

Grace Patti, a 15-year-old from Pleasant Ridge, said film class is better than just sitting at a desk all day.

“It’s different than other classes, you get to try what you want. It’s like a computer class and a science class all in one,” Patti said.
                You can reach Robert Carr at rcarr@candgnews.com