Courier Online is updated twice each week every Wednesday and Saturday afternoon. For the latest full content, you can purchase the Claremont Courier newspaper for 75 cents, or subscribe by calling (909) 621-4761.
Contact the COURIER:
1420 N. Claremont Blvd.
Suite 205B
Claremont, CA 91711
 |
|
COURIER photo/Gabriel Fenoy
|
| Claremont residents Don Pollock, bottom, and Shane Rorigues with their Bronze Telly Awards inside the University of La Verne television studio. |
The awards continue to pile up for Claremont residents Don Pollock and Shane Rodrigues, making 2008 a successful year for the duo.
The La Verne Community Television (LVTV) producers have received acclaim for their work, recently winning 2 Bronze Telly Awards, as well as a number of Pegasus Awards and a series of Western Access Video Excellence (WAVE) awards.
“It's been a good year and we’re happy about the award,” said Mr. Pollock, who is also a University of La Verne professor of communications and LVTV-3 station manager. “We usually do 2 big projects per year, but this year we did 4. There are countless hours that go into this.”
Mr. Pollock and Mr. Rodrigues co-produced the “Sara and Michael Abraham Profile” as well as “Temple Beth Israel: Celebrating 75 Years” to claim the 2 Telly awards. The Temple Beth Israel video also won a Pegasus award while the “Sara and Michael Abraham Profile” was given the Award of Excellence for Best Promotional Video by the Broadcast Education Association.
The project with Temple Beth Israel came about when the local synagogue in Pomona commemorated its 75th anniversary last year. According to Mr. Pollock, the celebration afforded the opportunity for a video to be done and turned into a venture that lasted a few months.
“They had a committee at the temple that wanted to commemorate the temple and we wanted to do a video on it,” Mr. Pollock recalled. “Ellen Berke was really helpful throughout the process. She really stepped up and made all the calls and helped us identify the people. We always have called her one of the producers on this project.”
Other awards the duo received this year include WAVE awards for the Best Professional Performing Arts Program (Bonita High School Pop Show) and Best Professional Educational Program (Leroy Haynes Center). Mr. Rodrigues also worked on a project with ULV Professor of Communications Mike Laponis on Pomona Valley Hospital, a video that earned a finalist standing in WAVE’s Best Professional Informational Program category.
While the names of Mr. Pollock and Mr. Rodrigues appear on the various awards, each production is the result of a team of workers who participate in the pre-production, production and post-production aspects of the projects.
“It is a whole departmental effort,” said Mr. Rodrigues, also ULV’s Radio/TV Department Operations Manager and adjunct instructor. “We have a lot of production days where we’ll use student staff.” (story continues below)
 |
|
COURIER photo/Gabriel Fenoy
|
| Claremont residents and La Verne Community Television producers Don Pollock, left, and Shane Rorigues inside the University of La Verne television control room. |
Mr. Laponis was a key 3rd member of many award-winning productions. The KULV Radio general manager has co-produced a variety of successful projects, with the most recent being the “Sarah and Michael Abraham Profile” and the “Leroy Haynes Center” entries.
The success of the trio is the result of each person’s ability to focus on their areas of expertise when collaborating on a project—something that comes naturally for the producers.
“We all have strengths in certain areas,” Mr. Laponis explained. “Don [Pollock] will be the writer, Shane [Rodrigues] will be the director of photography and I’m the audio guy that will also lend my producer skills. Many times, Shane and I will work together on editing as well.”
Mr. Rodrigues agrees.
“Each person brings his own talent and skill to the table,” he said. “Mike does the audio production and post production, I do camera, lighting and post production. Don does the writing, research and brings the vision. It’s a good trio and each person is designated a job for the production. It seems to work really well.”
The producers have seen ULV’s Radio/TV Department constantly evolving this decade. The department relocated from the Sports Science & Athletics Pavilion (then known as the “Supertents”) a few years ago and upgraded its equipment from analog to digital formats. Plans are in the works to eventually upgrade to high-definition technology.
Attracting a generation of students familiar with multimedia before entering college, Mr. Laponis believes consistently working on productions with his peers allows them to remain ahead of the technology curve as professors.
“Because of what we teach, this is our way to stay current,” he said. “For some professors, they participate in hard research. Our scholarly activity is a creative endeavor.”
Mr. Pollock and Mr. Rodrigues will continue to produce videos for LVTV and for non-broadcast use. According to Mr. Pollock, as an active public access channel, LVTV continues to be in high demand.
“We get calls every week from people that want us to do a show and for the bigger projects, we get calls every month,” he said. “In the meantime, we’re going to be working on projects that will highlight programs that are part of both the City of La Verne and the University of La Verne.”
—Landus Rigsby
