Florida State University School of Communication student Anne Marie Lindemann has gotten a jumpstart on a career producing digital stories for media outlets by creating video shorts for the University’s student-run college radio station WVFS-89.7FM (V89).
Lindemann, who is double majoring in media production and political science, was inspired by a project she worked on in Dr. Patrick Merle’s Political Communication and Campaigning class.
“I had just finished a project for Dr. Merle’s class where we had to interview someone in the political realm,” Lindemann said. “I had interviewed someone from National Public Radio and it was really exciting and I told him about it.”
Ultimately, Lindemann dreams of producing videos for the New York Times website, but Dr. Merle encouraged her to start putting her ideas into action sooner than later.
“(The New York Times) video presence is huge and he told me exactly what I need to do to make working for them happen,” Lindemann said. “I needed to start telling the stories of people on campus and take the initiative and start imitating the New York Times.”
Lindemann had been working at V89 since her first semester and thought the videos might be a nice addition to the station’s website.
“The news department doesn’t have videos because it is a radio station, but why not?” Lindemann said. “NPR has videos, so why shouldn’t we?”
After presenting the idea to Dr. Michelle Laurents, V89’s faculty program director, Lindemann began producing videos with fellow students, Melissa Newman (News Department Director) and Patricia Clemente (Chief Anchor), who both have their sights set on becoming on-air news reporters.
“V89 Shorts is an avenue for us to highlight the station, university, and community through quick and interesting glimpses of everything from special events to behind the scenes operations,” Dr. Laurents said. “Our aim is to provide exposure for those featured and quality information for our audience, while at the same time increasing the depth of experience for our website visitors and allowing for station staff to gain more hands on training opportunities in multimedia production.”
During the fall semester, Lindemann produced videos on special interest topics varying from FSU President Eric Barron’s state of the university address to the Grind House, a student-run coffee house on campus. Her goal is to produce a video story on a weekly basis during the upcoming spring semester.
Currently, the video shorts can be viewed on V89’s YouTube channel and are being promoted through the radio station’s social networks like Twitter and Facebook. In early 2014, V89 will be launching a new website and Lindemann’s digital stories will be a prominent feature.
“We’re very excited about Anne Marie’s initiative and quality work, and look forward to featuring her videos on the new WVFS website,” Dr. Laurents said.
To designate a donation to support the WVFS program, visit give.cci.fsu.edu and specify Fund #6684.