At Fort Hays State University on Feb. 15, the Kansas Scholastic Press Association (KSPA) hosted a Winter Workshop for high school journalism students from this area of the state to participate in, and 14 Hays High School students attended the event.

There were four different workshop sessions to choose from, including “Finding the Best Angle,” “Mastering Multimedia Storytelling,” “Learning to Shoot Video” and “Designing Infographics.”

In the first workshop, students learned about improving photography composition and taking quality photos. They practiced their skills around the FHSU campus and later critiqued their fellow students. This workshop was taught by a former photographer for the University of Kansas Athletics, Jeff Jacobsen.

“[Students are learning] how to work better with their cameras, how to understand the importance of things like backgrounds, angles, light, all these different aspects,” Jacobsen said.

The second workshop option, “Mastering Multimedia Storytelling,” taught students to use different forms of media to build a story. Students used interviews, photos and videos to create a written story, a photo gallery and a short video. The multimedia workshop was taught by Hays High journalism teacher Jessica Augustine, Tiger Media Network director Nick Schwien and Tiger Media Network news and sports director Russ Heitmann.

In the third workshop, “Learning to Shoot Video,” students worked in groups and filmed silent videos that told different stories. They were instructed by George Taylor from KWCH in Wichita, who discussed techniques for successful video shooting and editing.

“I chose this workshop because I thought it’d be interesting to learn about video, like taking videos, video editing and the basics,” junior Reagan Bates said.

Finally, the fourth workshop session, “Designing Infographics,” focused on creating and organizing infographics. For the project section of the workshop session, students mapped out and produced their own infographics.

“The idea is to give students hands-on practice with doing video or photo or design and actually doing the stuff rather than just sitting and listening to us,” KSPA executive director Eric Thomas said.

26ddixon@usd489.com