Waldorf University
FOREST CITY – Comm. seniors, Phillip Koolhoven and Carlos Ruiz, established the North Iowa Film Festival in 2014 2014 with the purpose of showcasing student work on the big screen.
The festival will take place May 2nd at 7:30pm at the Forest Theatre in Forest City, IA.
Happy Halloween from the Comm. Department!
FOREST CITY – Weekly live broadcasts have keep these students in high demand this semester. Check out their latest work below.
Jonathan Aguilar, a senior in the Communications Department, recently returned from his European study trip. Through Waldorf College, Aguilar has traveled to Alabama, Nashville, New Orleans, and LA. The study trip was his first time leaving the country. He explained, “I have never been overseas. This was my second time on an airplane.”
The group’s first stop was Rome, Italy. Aguilar noted a sharp contrast between the modern airport and ancient city it sits in, “Rome is in ruins, but it is still amazing.” While in Rome, the group visited the Coliseum as well as Vatican City to see the Sistine Chapel and St. Peter’s Basilica.
Next, the group stopped in Venice, Italy, where legends were confirmed. “You hear that there are no roads and people have to get around on boats. You think ‘NO WAY!’, but it’s true,” explained Aguilar.
Aguilar thought that the lack of cars made Venice quieter than a usual city. He enjoyed an outside concert in Piazza San Marco. The group continued on to see many more locations including Lake Como, Florence, and London, but what was most memorable to Aguilar was the Eiffel Tower.
“We just kept going back,” recalled Aguilar.
The group sat in grass and absorbed the surroundings while the Eiffel Tower illuminated the night sky.
The trip allowed Aguilar to build a closer relationship with his classmates. “We spend months of class time together, but we’re now actually friends.”
Super-senior Chris Parcher and junior Kyle Acker premiered their thriller, “Sam,” Thursday afternoon in the Multimedia Lab on campus.
The audience composed of students, staff, actors, and faculty experienced the culmination of the duo’s semester-long work.
Neither had extensive production experience. They knew the basics of shooting and editing from TV 1 class, but “learning how to put that all together and to tell a story with a character arc was a new process,” stated Parcher.
They also overcame many other obstacles. Parcher explained they had no budget and “relied heavily on the actors to bring props and clothing.”
Filming occurred according to their actors’ and business locations’ schedules. “At the bar, we had two hours to set up, shoot, and tear down,” said Parcher.
More time constraints became apparent as they test drove shooting digitally with Canon DSLRs. “In Hollywood, there is a 6-point shoot ratio. You shoot six times as much footage as you are actually going to use. For us, it 
was different.” Eventually, they found a system that worked best for them.
Mark Newcom, their professor and advisor for the project, thought “Chris and Kyle took ownership of this project from its inception. It’s a joy working with inspiring producers who have a passion for learning the improving their craft. This project sealed my acceptance of DSLR’s as a viable format for film production.”
For students currently working in film, Parcher has simple advice, “Do pre-production, really do pre-production. Again, we were told and didn’t do it.” He thinks shooting would have gone much faster if their shot list was completely full.
Acker advised, “Don’t be afraid to do something because you feel like you are going to mess up. In the industry, you have to be commercial and sell. As a student, you can put your stamp on it however you want.”
Acker is continuing to make films his senior year. Parcher is graduating this month and embarking on full-time work as a Webmaster for a company in Fertile, Iowa.
Forest City, IA Oct 20, 2010 — Waldorf College’s communications department has been undergoing several important changes this year. One important change leading into the 2010/2011 school year was the upgrade of automation for, KZOW, the college’s student-run radio station. After several years of using Scott Studios SS32 (Google SS32), the station replaced their windows-based professional-grade system with the apple based, Megaseg “Advanced DJ and Radio Automation App.”
The decision to upgrade to a different system took place in early August of 2010, after KZOW spent part of the summer off air. “[SS32] took a while to get used to,” Valerie Miller, Waldorf senior and Co-station manager of KZOW said, “[Megaseg] is much easier to teach people.” Student reactions have also been positive since changing over, “It just flows better…” Aaron Olson, a KZOW DJ, had to say about Megaseg in contrast to the SS32 system.
Since KZOW has had such a positive experience with Megaseg, it has caught the attention of another campus media. Waldorf College student-run TV station, Wal-TV, has looked into its capabilities. “Wal-TV was run from an iPod,” Tad Venzke, station manager of Wal-TV and Waldorf junior explained. “We are almost 100% music videos, 24 hours a day.” Looking to improve the experience of keeping the playlist current, Megaseg became a viable option. “The iPod process was very mundane… it was time consuming and tedious,” Venzke continued, “Megaseg is as simple as download, import, and it’s done… It’s an amazing opportunity”
This is the 2010 Study Trip to Europe led by Professor David Damm.
