Entering its fifth season as a program, the Redwood TV crew has made significant changes that distinguish the show from years past, including new hosts, gear, and additions to the cast.
The most apparent switch is the selection of two new hosts, seniors Kendra Loo and Jamie Solis, who are replacing last year’s hosts, Eric Ahern and Bailey Osborn.
“So far, [Loo and Solis] have been working together really nicely,” said junior Garet Jatsek, one of the show’s producers. “We’ve gotten really lucky the past two years.”
In regard to her co-host, Loo said, “I am a little bit more goofy than he is, but it works really well because he has a lot of great ideas.”
In the past, the hosts of Redwood TV have been chosen by the crew of the show and Leadership teachers David Plescia and Jennifer Madden. However, this year, according to Jatsek, it was Madden and Plescia who chose the anchors.
“We try to select two students that are a good match. We try and just mix it up, there isn’t a specific thing that the hosts did to be selected,” said Plescia, “They’re two great kids that are involved, that was the reason we chose them.”
Loo hopes that she can bring fresh ideas and more vibrancy to the show. In particular, she wants to feature different clubs, interests, and sports teams on the show, and bring back the Redwood Munchies segment from the 2013-14 season.
“I think that we could involve a larger part of the student body and highlight what is going on around Redwood,” Loo said.
Adding more footage of various activities and sports teams appearing on the show was something that Redwood TV cast was hoping to accomplish last year as well, but this year the show is making it one of their primary goals.
In order to attain this goal, the crew plans to put in more hours filming to obtain additional raw footage for the show.
According to Jatsek, getting additional content of sports and clubs will add several hours to the filming process.
“Right now we’ve spent every single lunch interviewing students for content as well as after school,” Jatsek said. “Sports and events like the BTSD take upward of three hours to film.”
According to Jatsek depending on the episode, it takes about six or seven hours.
Filming, however, is only a portion of the work that is put into each video. According to Jatsek, before an episode is ready for broadcast, it must go through nearly nine or ten hours of editing.
In addition to more total time spent making each video, the crew is equipped with higher quality gear for the new season.
“This year’s camera has far better quality than last year’s, which we either had to borrow from the film focus class or bring ourselves,”Jatsek said.
The program received $12,000 from donations made by parents in the 2014-2015 school year to purchase cameras and whatever other equipment the crew may need.
“Since [Redwood TV] got new gear, I think we’re all pretty excited to see the improvement in video quality,” Loo said.
In addition to the production crew of last year consisting of seniors Annie Forsman and Kimberly Vela, juniors Garet Jatsek and Sam Slade, there are two new producers, sophomores Jack Green and Emma Ross, in this year’s group.
The cast hopes that the new producers can bring a creative and comedic aspect to the set which will carry into the show.
