Digital Storytelling for $400

By Ella Harrison

This is the best TV show to do a spoof of for Lab #19.

What is Jeopardy!?!

Correct! Jeopardy! is a show that allowed my group creative freedom with a structured starting point. While watching Jalen Slawson’s TV Spoof of Love Island, my mind drifted to other reality TV shows my group and I could do. Jeopardy! is my childhood best friend’s favorite show so naturally it was one of the first ideas I had.

Jace, Hannah, and I during filming. Logan worked the camera. Courtesy: Logan Coffee

I pitched the idea to my group members Logan Coffee, Hannah Farr, and Jace Gravitt. They were all on board with the idea, so we got to work immediately creating a short storyboard for our show, Jeoparty! Jace and I worked on creating the categories for the questions and the questions we wanted to use in the show.

While we worked on that, Hannah and Logan

went to find the best place to shoot.

One nice thing about this TV show is that the format is the same every night. We did not have to come up with ideas about the scene, we just had to find somewhere that had a podium for our very own Alex Trebek, Jace Gravitt, to host the show. We needed a screen and then two areas for our contestants to “compete.” Thankfully, the Modern Language Center was open and had everything we needed.

Logan got the camera and tripod from the lab, and we headed up to film. We reorganized the room a bit so we could have natural light on our faces and not behind us. Jace pulled up the PowerPoint he made of the Jeopardy! slides onto the projector. Hannah and I created our own little podiums featuring our names and money values on white boards. Logan set up the tripod, camera, and microphone.

We shot the spoof in order for the most part. Following the storyboard, we made sure we got the variety of shots for the lab. The hardest one was probably the sequence shot. We shot a sequence of Jace walking into the “show” but Hannah and I had to be super still so we looked the same in the wide shot and the medium shot. It took us about an hour to shoot everything.

On Sunday, our group got together to edit our shots. We went to the Media Lab and worked together on ideas for post-production. Jace and Logan really took charge on most of the editing, and then Hannah and I wrapped it up.

Fictional storytelling allows the producer’s creative voice to shine. In documentary storytelling, your project is bound more by facts and what the person has experienced. With this, we were able to shoot exactly what we wanted, and we did not have to worry about not getting a good soundbite.

One thing I learned from this lab is the importance of having a team, especially in fictional storytelling. I noticed that when one person suggested an idea, the next person usually bounced back with something even better. I think it is specifically easy to get stuck in a rut with creative work, so having team members ensures we get the best content. I prefer working on projects alone, but this was a good reminder that group work can be beneficial if done correctly.

Watch our TV Spoof here!