By Jaden Haly
Aspiring Journalist
JONESBORO, Ark. — Arkansas State University students will present their original documentaries at the fourth annual Creative Media Documentary Showcase, a final event that will highlight local stories and student filmmaking.
The showcase will take place April 29 from 3-6 p.m. at the Reng Student Union and is free and open to the public. The event typically draws between 50 and 100 attendees each year according to Galen Perkins.
The showcase serves as a final project for creative media students, allowing them to apply technical and storytelling skills while working on a student production team.
“Students get a chance to display their work in front of a much larger audience than just their peers, and gives them the opportunity to promote their most important client: themselves,” said Galen Perkins, instructor of creative media production.
The annual film event has grown into a recurring tradition that gives students the change to build their professional development skills and experience real-world scenarios surrounding their major. Students present their documentaries that will reflect both their creative vision and their ability to work as a team within a media-production environment.
This year’s films focus on a wide range of topics including documentaries that feature stories from the Arkansas Delta and the Arkansas State campus, with projects like “The Lockdown,” “Death in the Delta” and “Heralds of the Herald.” Each film explores a different issue that us relevant to the Arkansas or Arkansas State community, giving viewers a closer look at the people and experiences that shape the local region.
“I wanted to bring more awareness to The Herald student newspaper, especially since many students don’t even realize we have one here,” said Allie Carson, a student filmmaker for “Heralds of the Herald” who also serves as an editor on the newspaper.
Other members of the production team said the process required strong coordination and communication.
“As a team, we all had different roles, so we had to constantly coordinate and make sure everything stayed on track,” said Huarui Zhu, the film’s audio engineer and assistant editor.
This event also gives audiences the opportunity to engage with emerging filmmakers and gain insight into the creative process behind documentary production with Q&A after the presentation.