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Last Thursday I had the pleasure of being invited by California State University, Fullerton Professor Carolyn Coal to help assist her advanced COMM 415T class with editing a student commercial for the award winning retail toy product “Grow-A-Head TM“.
Grow-A-Head TM was arranged by Prof. Coal this semester for a student project. They are a specialty retail product that grows grass on the head of pre-designed knit characters placed in a desktop size vase; just add water. You can stylize designs based on your characters appearance. Their product line includes Original, Holiday, Halloween, Bugs, Friends, Sports, Marine Life, and Wildlife characters; all included with personalized greetings for fun gifts and toys.

Prof. Coal separates her class into two groups, “Agency and Production”. Throughout the semester, students in the “agency” will create a 60 second TV commercial that fits what the client asked for – in this case Grow-A-Head TM, based on an initial fact finding meeting. They will then pitch multiple strategies and storyboards back to the client in a presentation.

After client approval, the agency works with the other half of the class – the “production company”, to develop story boards, concepts and strategy. Students then arrange a cast, location and necessary gear to film the commercial on a weekend (8-12 hour shoot).

My participation took place in the last step – editing. The “production company” worked diligently to log and capture the footage from the shoot and start making edits based on storyboards submitted from the “agency”. I guided the student’s creative decision making with edits, music selection and answered technical questions. I was impressed by their ability to push the limits of the technology they were using, especially since they are advertising students, not film majors. Most of them have little to no experience editing on Mac Computers. They were becoming self taught experts on Final Cut Pro with a little help from me!

This class is great because of the hands-on creative experience and real world Client-Agency-Production relationship. I was impressed by the exceptional ambition that this group of students have. This is no small rinky-dinky class project; they are meeting the expectations of a real client. I feel they over delivered.

These skills are important in that they fulfill the vision of what Prof. Coal is teaching; showing students how vendors, clients and agencies work synergistically and effectively to produce an end result. Although not all students become film editors, this real world environment provides the opportunity for them to learn the lingo and bring their creative concepts full circle in a mock Agency setting.

Grow-A-Head TM will benefit from this student project by having the opportunity to meet great students, experience fresh creative ideas and receive quality work from advertising students. I hope more students from CSUF have the opportunity to enroll in this class and receive this kind of experience through the Communications Department.

Orange Label Art + Advertising will continue to visit CSUF in the future. Employees Kimberly Amoroso, Meagan Guerra, and I are graduates of the school. Orange Label’s Principals are also graduates of CSUF. Rochelle Reiter, Vice President, is a MBA graduate, Wes Phillips, CEO, holds a BA and President Ian Crockett who is also a part time professor at the school holds a BA. We recognize the importance of meeting advertising students and helping them understand the industry, answering their questions and most importantly helping them jumpstart their careers.