The big news at New York Film Academy (NYFA) last week was the graduation of the Spring 2018 1-year Broadcast Journalism students. That’s them below, with members of the NYFA faculty. Congratulations to Clyde (third from left), Sharath (fourth from left), Idris (fifth from left), Braddany (sixth from left) and Hartnell (eighth from left). (Graduates reading this can identify the other photogenic folks in the picture.)
Afterwards, it was pizza and goodbyes… A bittersweet ending to an eventful nine months.
Before they left, the Spring students had one final surprise. They got the opportunity to work with NYFA camera instructor Daniel Hernandez on a New York Fashion Week shoot. How’s that for a “going away” gift? This is why it is important to study in New York. Opportunities like this just don’t present themselves in Madison, Wisconsin. (I still love you, Madison! I spent two years there. But it’s just not NYC.)
And who should be at the same New York Fashion Week event? NYFA Broadcast Journalism grad, model, and multimedia journalist Amanda Salvato. She posted on Facebook:
“Look who I met in the middle of #NYFA craziness!!! The person who taught me how to use a camera, lights and audio. If I am confident in what I do backstage it is because of all of his patience…”
If you ever wondered what it looks like when a killer storm is about to descend on a community, NYFA grad Marta Dhanis can tell you. A field producer with Fox News Channel, she was dispatched to North Carolina last week to await the arrival of Hurricane Florence. The only way you can accurately report a story is to be on the ground. Hurricane, tornado, and earthquake stories are probably the closest thing to war reporting. Stay safe, Marta…
On a completely different note, GloboNews in Brazil recently sent former Broadcast Journalism student Daniella Gemignani to cover a story on a bicycle. Now, bike riding is not a skill Daniella learned at NYFA. (Well, maybe she rented a bike at the stand across West Street from the school.) Here is how she put it:
“Live on GloboNews for the first time…there were three cameras, five minutes of link and a mad prayer not to hit on the floor. What a delicious challenge! What a wonderful team and how lucky for me to only have wild and generous people around! Ah, and most importantly, it was to call an amazing program that brought a more than necessary subject: bicycles as part of the solution for urban mobility.”
Then there is Genevieve Beyleveld, a grad who uses the skills she learned at NYFA to document what she terms “an absolutely ridiculous life.” As someone else has observed, “she’s one of those people who have turned an incredible gift for gab into a masterful marketing tool…
Her blog reads like a TV sitcom.” In other words, she figured out how to monetize her thoughts (including a new podcast). Now that’s an accomplishment! As Genevieve herself writes:
“What started almost two years ago as a silly idea, turned out to be the biggest challenge of my career. From not earning a cent to finally being able to support myself, is the most surreal feeling.”
She is also South African Foreign Correspondent for See My Africa – a television series which aims to dispel myths about Africa to the rest of the world. Cheers, Genevieve!