Welcome to Alumni Live: The Podcast.

These are conversations with Grand Valley State University film and video

graduates about the industry, the film, video, major and alumni profiles.

Today we're continuing our series on the GVTV GVBN history.

The last episode we talked to Jillian about how she founded it.

Definitely recommend going back to listen to that.

She was a great guest with great information.

Today we're picking it up with, some people from

generation 1.5, generation two.

Of course, this was my generation here at Grand Valley Television, so I'll be

giving some of my experiences as well as talking to some all star guests.

We have President John Tremblay of GVBN GVTV.

Hey John.

Hey Randy, how are you doing?

Very good.

I'm super excited to talk

Oh, for sure.

Got Adam Burl, former finance officer of Grand Valley Television.

Hey, Adam.

It is fantastic to be here.

Of course we've got, Jon Sessions, man, the legend, Sesh.

Welcome to the show.

Former Producer and Equipment Manager of GVTV.

Always a pleasure to talk to you, Randy, and wonderful to see everyone.

Yeah, yeah, this is gonna be real fun catching up.

Super excited to have all you.

And of course this wouldn't be complete without Steven Bellantini,

the glue of GVTV, sitting here talking about animations, producing.

Welcome to the show, Steven.

Thank you for having me.

That was a, very kind introduction.

Also very nice to see all of you.

I feel like most of the stories we're gonna tell, uh, involve

Steven Bellantini in some way.

So I'm really happy that you're here.

Let's Let's jump right into it.

So, last episode, we were talking to Jillian about the founding of GVBN, all

of the, trials, tribulations, the highs, the lows of all that, and she is, uh,

handing it off to President Tremblay here.

John, tell us where we are in history, talking around

2006, 2008, what's going on?

So around 2006, I think I was the first Special Events Coordinator and

I had just gotten into, I mean, we were really dabbling in everything.

We were trying to get into sports, but there were a lot of issues with

that and what we were allowed to do.

I think we mostly wound up covering like what we could with student senate.

And early politics stuff, just things that kind of made sense around the

Allendale area, but nothing big or major, just whatever fit into students'

broadcast curriculum, journalism classes.

We didn't have consistent membership and we really needed to get that locked down.

So that was my big push in 2008 when I really took the reins.

And Jill had talked a lot about Operation Proto Hawk, which was how she had kind

of brought me in, was just, you should be here, you'd be great in this space.

GVTV's gonna teach you a lot, or GVBN at the time.

And we had a lot of professor buy-in, which was true.

And it did give access to a lot professors.

So that first Laker Late Night or Student Life Night or whatever it was,

where freshmen were getting around.

I don't remember where Adam Burl was at, but he was somewhere,

he was walking around her.

I don't know what it was, but his energy really caught me.

And I was like, this guy's joining GVBN, he's eager, I wanted that energy

to come this way 'cause I, I knew there was gonna be a lot of value there.

Adam, I see that big smile.

You got, pick up that story from your perspective.

Walking around Laker Life Night, what tables are you seeing

and what drew you to GVBN?

Campus Life Night, which is interesting because I think these days they

host it in one of the parking lots because it gets so big now.

But back in 2008, it was in the Fieldhouse.

And I remember coming there and I'm like, I have no idea what I wanna do

in my life or school or anything like that, but I really want to join the TV

station and the radio station because I want to do stuff with my voice and

I wanna be a voice actor if I can.

Found a ragtag group of people with a sign that said GVTV/GVBN, and I

was like, is it two organizations?

The mystery, because we were in the transitional period at that point.

Instantly I said, yeah, I have to be there.

And so many years later I cherish every experience that I had from John

pulling me in in the first conversation and then weeks down the line saying

like, Hey, do you think you might want to be an E-board member one day?

And like inspiring me in the leadership to, having Steven stand

up in the middle of a meeting and saying, I had a dream about Animorphs

and I need to tell everyone.

To seeing you, Randy, interacting with each other barely at all until

finally our second semester, we met in the lunch line at Kleiner

and had turkey sandwiches together.

And then Jon Sessions the magic man himself pulling out all of the equipment.

I remember Randy getting skewered in his car by so many pieces of

equipment, 'cause we had to pack it all in this little hatchback.

It's all the experiences that you wanna have in college, all into one.

You wanna have the inspiring, defining your best friend, the characters that come

outta the woodwork that are gonna be like a cool and incredible people and teach

you things like that was such an exciting part of my experience being a freshman

all the way through my senior year.

That is so cool that to hear it from that perspective.

To that point, Adam, I mean when you guys were making "Jeff and Mike Write

a Comic Book" years later, I'd already graduated and I got called back twice

to help you guys troubleshoot stuff just 'cause I happened to be in the area and

that was the way we utilize our resources.

So it taught us right away not to be afraid to ask for help.

Utilize your social networks for sure.

And problem solve on your feet 'cause there's no budget.

Bob Stoll won't give us the money.

Yeah.

I love this idea of like, we're just, talking about how we got into it.

Steven, I, wanna talk to you about how did you find GVTV, GVBN?

Do you remember your first couple days, as part of the organization?

I didn't come to the organization through Campus Life Night.

There was some kind of event at the Alumni House was where

I first encountered the group.

I don't even remember who specifically I talked to, but I was like,

oh, well I'd better join this.

I, I think I remember that event too.

Yeah.

I'm here to learn about how to make video and it kind of seems like it's gonna be

a while before I can get into an actual class that teaches me any of these things.

So a group is perfect.

That was one of the ways we were fighting to be relevant, in Grand Valley, was

through the special events e-board position and what is a special event.

And so talking at the Alumni House, because we were a group in an

organization that wanted to be talked about as an asset at Grand Valley,

similar to the Lanthorn and the Whale and these other institutions.

We wanted to show that we at least served purpose as an archival institution and

we could showcase the alumni experience, Greek life as it was appropriate,

and other aspects of campus life.

That's why we were there.

That would've been myself, probably Jillian Austin, Aliya Vukovich, and Randy.

And depending on when Jenna, who's one of the girls that ran the news team

for a minute, 'cause there were like three or four girls that came to us

and really wanted to be a broadcast unit and did actually go on to be quite

successful, doing some campus journalism.

John actually, I got involved by, uh, being part of the sports show.

I was basically videotaping a lot of basketball games and several

other sporting events, and that's how I got involved at GVTV.

Oh, that is super interesting.

Sesh.

Yeah.

Stormy and Normy.

What is Stormy and Normy?

It was our first, equipment guy, and another guy that was in

broadcasting with me wanted to do all the sports stuff for GVBN.

They had a sporting group and I think they had a class with you.

Right Sessions?

Probably, yeah.

But I was brought as an alternative camera operator, that's I got involved in GVTV.

You had experience in the equipment room didn't you, because you showed

me how to use all of the video

I came from Washtenaw Community College.

That's what it was.

Okay.

I knew that you had a community college experience before you came to GVBN

that was relevant to what we needed.

Yeah.

And also I'm kind of like a super senior so I'm kinda an

anomaly so to speak coming in.

I believe Jedi Master was the term that we used for you.

There's also very funny story related to Randy about that one,

Yeah, I mean, hey, let's get into that because I think that leads us into,

talking about, uh, mentorship really well.

So Sessions, when I graduated, what did you present me with?

Uh, a lightsaber.

uh, yeah, you, you taught me everything I knew about lighting and more so

I, I always appreciated that Jon.

Kind of backtracking a little bit Randy, I got involved, through the sports program,

but also it was that same Campus Life Night where I ran into John Manning in

the booth and talking to him and all that.

I kind of got worked in, I was a transfer student from a community

college and wanted to get involved in the film program, but I wasn't

gonna happen for at least a year.

So I wanted to be involved in a group and make a name for myself.

I think that's a great message for current GVTV students because going

to events is, it sounds like how most of us got into the organization and,

obviously had a lot of love through it throughout our tenure there.

Yeah.

Hey, I wanna talk more about Operation Proto Hawk, mostly because it's

super fun to talk about and say.

President Tremblay, tell us more about, Operation Proto Hawk

and how did that involve us?

So we were really struggling with membership retention early on, and we

identified that as an area of opportunity.

People would start shows and walk off, mostly because they didn't have crew to

support the creative idea that they had.

It wouldn't justify the extra effort of regular classes.

So that was the goal, was to find enthusiastic people that would want

to take on something ridiculous and people who maybe wanted to find a a

direction and, and to give 'em one.

'Cause one thing that Jill and I had gotten really good at early

on was standardizing a process and training others to bring people in.

'Cause we had to, and we had to offer something that was

supplemental to the classroom.

What's gonna reduce student effort to get them to wanna be

a part of this organization.

We got that piece down and we had people coming to us to learn

more about cameras or Final Cut.

We had two amazing young, talented editors, Ryan and Lyle.

Right.

We wanted people that would really see that opportunity and, and

jump on it and help that grow.

So that's what we were looking for was that enthusiasm.

And so in that first conversation with Adam, when I'm asking him

questions about what is it?

What is it that you wanna do?

And he doesn't really know, but what he's telling me is that he's

thinking about it and he wants to explore it, and it's amorphous.

And that's where broadcasting, it's like, well, here's a creative process that you

can really add yourself to any level.

In fact, I even suggested to Adam go into finance at one time because

he seemed to have a business mind.

And I was like, look, if you want to cut your teeth on

that, we really need help here.

Run our books, help us with the financing, and help us come up

with a plan that helps incentivize people more than just a pizza party.

Yeah, no, and we're gonna definitely talk more about Adam's experience, as

Finance Officer, but if, you wouldn't mind indulging my experience for a second.

So I also, uh, I don't know if it was that, Student Life Night where

I, met everybody at Campus Life Night, but I knew I wanted to join,

an organization, make sure I could start making stuff as soon as I could.

And so starting, I was just sitting in the back at that, we had like a cool

classroom that we were in in Lake Ontario.

We the galactic senate or something.

Oh yeah,

But I was sitting in the background and I told myself I'm not gonna jump right in

'cause I knew from being in high school I have a propensity to like take stuff over.

And so somehow, after one of those where I was just sitting back, you

came up to me and said, Hey, why don't you participate a little bit more?

You even told me you liked my energy, which that moment meant a lot to me,

and really did help me embrace all the moves of my career, since then.

So I, I really do appreciate you giving me that green light in the beginning to

say like, actually jump in some more.

Don't worry about being a freshman.

Get in there and start participating.

Of course, now I've learned that there is a, shadowy government behind all this with

operation Proto Hawk trying to get us, uh,

It wasn't that nefarious.

It is just the propaganda

arm.

of a.

Well, there was an agenda.

Sure.

I mean, I'm not gonna lie, like there was a utility that needed to happen,

but it was all for mutual benefit.

Right?

And that's, I think what, what this is all about is what can we do to

grow ourselves and have a good time.

With you, was that your first meeting, Randy?

Or I think you've been to a couple, right?

I think it had been, yeah, to a couple.

And, and I made an effort to sit and not like jump in on stuff.

But you introduced yourself in the beginning of every meeting.

I remember that distinctly.

And I remember that you said that you were always like, this is a great meeting, and

had like really good feedback after the fact, but you were kind of a wallflower

and I needed help with special events.

And that was immediately, again, that enthusiasm, that ability

to put yourself out there, show interest, is what I responded to.

And it was like, Hey, you know what I'm gonna give this guy a chance,

I found myself in broadcasting.

I mean, I was yelling in the hallway in high school and my guidance

counselor later told me that I'd have a good voice for radio, no direction.

I just picked a major 'cause it was the thing to do.

It was early two thousands, go to college and get a career.

That was the American Promise.

And so we all took on amazing amounts of student debt under the guise that

we would get good corporate jobs when it was over and they weren't there.

But regardless, we had a great time in the interim and we learned a lot

of vital things that I know that I've applied throughout the job

market, regardless of broadcasting.

Again, those were the skills that I learned.

This guy wants to be there.

This guy needs a purpose.

We need to incorporate him.

And how do you build a member of that team?

I learned the most about leadership through my roles at GVBN.

It was accidental encounters like that, what to me, just seemed

like basic level empowerment.

There's curiosity.

I've got nothing to lose.

Why not engage with that?

That is super cool and, even if it didn't seem like it was any big moment for you,

like it was a life forming event for me.

I'm really grateful to hear that though.

Thank you.

And I am forever grateful that you, uh, took that chance, on me and on Adam.

No, that means a lot.

Yeah.

Thanks.

Um, Steven, breakdown what a meeting was like in that time period.

How many people are there?

What are some of the issues discussed?

What did a GVTV meeting look like in 2008 to 2012?

Ah, geez.

It was not a large group of people.

We pretty much had the same rotation.

You would occasionally have some new people show up, but there

was discussion of how, how are we doing on shows getting made.

It was always Producers reporting about progress of shows.

We were always talking about new ideas and trying to bring new life to stuff.

That's right.

Yeah.

So, so we would go through business.

There was a lot of, you know, updates for the organization.

Adam giving a lot of updates on the finance.

Adam, you wanna, take a little bit, tell us what you saw from your perspective.

If we're going at like 2008, 2009 area, just for background, Randy

and I are freshman, first semester.

We were just part of the organization, and then we got elected to E-board in

second semester of our freshman year.

So things changed for us pretty quickly on seeing how the organization would run.

And honestly, it was with us at the beginning with John telling us, Hey

guys, like we have a lot of structural issues that we need to solve.

We need to get people to be able to show up to shoots.

We're finally getting our membership up, but we need to get people

to buy in and say like, Hey, we want to produce new shows.

We want to produce shows of decent amount of quality, and we wanna give

people the opportunity to be able to work on film and broadcasting sets.

A lot of what we were talking about there was how do we get

people to come to the shoots?

It's a volunteer organization.

There's very little skin that everybody has in the game.

And so seeing how we get people excited about that and want to show up to that,

I think is a really important part of trying to learn how to grow everything.

When you're really, really early in an organization that's not the number

one thing that you're thinking about, like you're thinking about have people

build relationships with each other.

I think that for me is the thing that stuck out is that it was so much of

like trying to build friendships at the beginning and talk about people being

excited about film and video and I am probably the only person here who did not

take any film or broadcasting classes.

I think the things that inspired me most too were the shows that

started getting made in our sophomore year in 2009, 2010, that really

started producing a lot of content.

So shows like Random-ish, which had existed before we got there,

which is essentially a sketch show.

Hear all about the history of Randomish last episode.

And we had one show that created a whole ton of episodes named Lahar.

Lahar was, for me, it was a college student's magnum opus.

It was absolutely incredible, and Steven should obviously talk about his

show that was made 95%, 100% by him.

It was truly a, a work of art.

Well, and this is the reason I originally asked Steven , what were those meetings

like, 'cause one of the things that stands out to me, of course, there was the boring

business stuff, but something to look forward to every time we had a meeting was

the new episode of Lahar that Steven made because every single one was entertaining,

educational, hilarious, fun, heartfelt.

So, Steven, tell us a little bit about your show on GVTV.

We had a small event where people could pitch shows that they

wanted to make for the station.

And I had a very brief pilot that I had made where I was trying to do a,

"this week in history" premise, but in the style of Zero Punctuation by

Yahtzee Croshaw, which no longer exists.

It's now called, Fully Ramblomatic.

But I had helped Michael Perpupchuck with a animation of a Millie

the Flower that Failed cartoon,

Yes.

which never did wind up getting entirely finished.

But as a result of helping with that, I had gotten my feet wet

with Adobe Flash, which is now Adobe Animate and I no longer use.

But being able to use that software and being able to put together clippings of

photos together with drawings together with text to try and present a rapid

fire nonfiction program, even though it was short, I was over ambitiously

thinking I can do this every week.

And that was probably not a good thing to take on.

'cause making even a three to four minute animation every

week is a huge amount of work.

And later on I, I wound up with a few people helping with the

show, which was invaluable.

But every week I wound up having to pull all-nighters just to get a usually

rather cut down version of the show done, exported, and printed a tape to turn in.

But it seemed to really connect with people and I'm glad to know that.

Randy, can I turn into interviewer here real quick?

Take the floor Adam Burl?

Oh boy.

Steven, I was so inspired by your show because it was so overly ambitious.

It was insane.

If you look at the level of work that we were outputting at that time

compared to yours, it was insane the amount of content that you put

out in such a small amount of time.

And I think having that ambition is like a really incredible thing.

But also to hear this side of the story of like you're pulling

all-nighters every week, obviously not an incredibly healthy thing to do.

So having that kind of ambition is something that I think is like

something really great and fun.

And if you're a healthy sub 25-year-old, pulling an all-nighter

every once in a while to make your dreams come true, might be worth it.

As you grow later into life, you realize that maybe those things don't

matter in that same kind of way.

But to think that this guy was outputting stuff that was legitimately

hilarious wasn't just like, haha, I made this with my friends and I think

it's funny because it's like a joke.

This is something that to me, if it you punched up the audio quality

or something like that, a little bit is like broadcast worthy.

These were real things that we were outputting that personally inspired me

to say, yeah, we can make even better stuff than we're making right now.

And drove me to further into the organization because we are saying like,

if we can go and have this guy in our org, imagine the type of people that we

can bring in in the future and the things that we can create from here on out.

And that was such a shining star of the highlights of something

that we could go and create.

So Steven, I just wanted to go and say that because I've been thinking

about this ever since I knew that I'd be talking to you for weeks now.

And I was really excited and I'm happy that I got to say it to you.

That's so kind of you to say.

For, audio listeners there, Steven is beet red right now.

You can't prove anything.

Oh, I wanna pile on.

So Steven, do you remember Robot Book Club?

Oh my God, yes.

That was a joint venture between you and Michael Percupcheck

Because I remember vividly you and Michael propping this at one of our pitch

nights in the basement of Kirkhof Center, Area 51 or whatever they called it.

Yes, yes, yes, yes.

You give this long pitch, that's completely disjointed, and Michael's

just standing there like a tree, cause you're both tall, lanky guys.

It's looking like the number 11.

Michael says nothing the entire pitch.

Steven does the whole thing, and then all Michael does is walk over to the

wall and slowly lower the projector.

Steve hits the button, Robot Book Club plays over him for a solid 10 seconds

before he realizes that he's in the image.

Moves over and I'm on the ground laughing.

It's the funniest thing I've seen since Master Shake and Meatwad.

I mean, the whole thing about these robots learning to read, one being made

by basically a Halliburton subcompany that only knows how to kill and blows

everything up at the end of every episode.

It was episodic, but also, uh, formulaic.

It was brilliant.

And to see these two guys who I'd never heard of before, I mean, there were people

at the film and video school who had tried to get internships with Disney and do

things, and instantly they're going, oh God, these guys are coming up in class.

What are we doing?

Incredible.

Let's talk about the equipment that we were using a little bit, Steven.

Um, just 'cause we were talking about animation there.

Tell us, what was your process for those animations?

Part of the reason that I was doing a weekly

show was because my equipment budget was, I have a computer and it has flash on it.

That was my setup.

Adam referred to the audio quality earlier, that's because I was

recording it on the crappy desk mic.

The only time that I interacted with actual GVTV equipment to make the show

was for the final turn in of the tape.

When you say turning of the tape, you're physically turning in a tape?

Oh, yeah.

I had to hand it to the Producer.

I didn't always quite make the deadline, but I, I always got there

the, the day that it had to be there.

Nice.

Now Sessions, we're talking about equipment, you were the Equipment Manager.

Tell us what was the load out of cameras we had?

What was our mic set up?

Tell us, what we were using at that time.

Well first off, the organization still in its kind of growing phase,

there were some struggles and they've definitely grown since.

But you know, it really taught me first and foremost as a Producer

to be resourceful of what I have and actually work with other

people to bring things together.

That's really helped me out my career working in ad agencies and

also working in film industry.

But taking it back to me, I believe we had one XL2, a couple Sonys, like a 3 ccd

and GL2s, Then, one Ari Light Kit, some Smith Victor portrait kit, and several

different types of, Sony Wireless mics.

And I think, a couple shotgun mics.

So a pretty decent setup up for what it was.

You know, it's a small broadcast station, but there's enough there for

reasonably two to three shows at once.

They're able to go shoot whatever they need to.

So XL2s and GL2s, what were those, you know, for kids coming up today?

Describe those cameras for us.

Oh, back in the day, those were game changers.

Well, the XL2 could shoot 24 P, so that was essentially film frame rate.

But for MiniDV, which was a groundbreaking thing, GL2s could shoot 30 p give or take.

And they were good for events, but for like high-end cinematic

shows, the XL2 was where it was at.

It was shiny, it had the

Yeah.

on it, like it looked like a movie camera.

One thing I was able to bring immediately to the game was my own XL2, which I

ended up contributing to shows I was on.

Yeah, you carried that with you and you guys made that a pain in the butt

for sign outs, because once Sessions told you guys that the XL2 was the

game changer in what everyone wanted for cinematic shooting anybody who was

doing anything they deemed cinematic wanted that for the whole dang week.

Well, I was able to provide an extra asset to that, John.

And what did that cost you?

I mean like as far as time in our organization, 'cause I remember you

were a hot commodity with that XL2.

I basically ended up working with Randy.

I brought in my own cinematic player to it, and I was able to

be Randy's cinematographer and produce three really good episodes.

I wanna make a point, we've talked about special events, but you know, we filmed

Barack Obama in 2008 when he was in Grand Rapids and we had that on the station.

That was because we could only get press passes to Obama's,

if you remember correctly.

We got a lot of flack for that about what we might have to

do as far as, uh, equal time.

Do we have to show McCain at the time and why didn't we go

to McCain when he was there.

And the issue was, as you remember Sessions, we did try to get both press

passes and the only ones we could get it from was the Obama campaign.

And we put it on because it was a student creation.

And there was a lot of fights that we had from filming that.

Which I understand why that was seen as a political thing.

But we weren't trying to push an agenda.

We were trying to show that we could document history, that we could document

events, that we could go to live events and we could make them viable and

again, bring value to the university.

But then also we had conversations around what is art with students

and what is worth broadcasting?

And those were some cool like, oh, this reality TV show,

we don't wanna support that.

That's just too close to this MTV garbage.

But then at the same time, we did the zen filmmaking thing and got a bunch of

flack for that because it was unscripted and it was a complete art thing.

But then the guy we were parodying and making fun of, Scott Shaw, winds

up writing to our organization and wanting to come speak at the university.

I mean, he rejected him, but that was a

hilarious thing too.

Scott Shaw reached out to us, this guy who had made Max Hell Goes to

Frogtown or been a part of that, you know, watches what we do and says,

man, like these guys are getting it.

I mean, I don't want to necessarily speak to him, but we were having a lot of

really good conversations with people in the industry and faculty that pushed the

needle and said, no, we have a spot here.

President Tremblay, why don't you talk a little bit about the landscape of GVTV,

GVBN in terms of programming lineup and then also, some of those events,

you know, what is a year of GVBN like?

Steven had a good point when he brought up, he had to return in a physical tape.

We were recording on mini DV and you had to cut a cassette, edit it, and

get it to the vice President who was in charge of programming to upload it

onto the Leviathan, which I don't even know what that machine really was.

It was our monitor server system.

We called this thing the Leviathan, and it ran all of our programming.

And one of the things that the university wanted to see from us was structure.

The Lanthorn had editorials that had a whole, this is what

we cover, this is what we do.

The Whale had programming, they could play certain songs, they had shows.

GVBN was a closed circuit TV station and we were really fighting for relevance.

So coming into 2008, we had a really significant budget meeting that

would've made a make or break for us.

And Adam, I remember you helping me with that budget a lot, having to go to student

life and student Senate to pitch that.

And that's what got us to get the studio built downstairs in the

Kirkof Center next to the office.

That was just basically a cubicle center that we've been renting from

Student Life Center before that.

Which again, we had to pay rent for.

And that's something that people don't think about.

But even as a student life organization, we're thinking about what do we

owe the college back to exist?

Because we're grant funded to exist, we have to show the

college that we have value.

That was my pitch for Special Events and how we could make ourselves

relevant and show ourselves to capture what was appropriate on campus to

archive for prosperity, but also give students a place to create and

express above and beyond the classroom.

And I wanted to do more of a student showcase thing, but some of the

professors kind of balked at that idea too, for a variety of reasons.

But yeah, that was the thing there that we were looking at is what stays

relevant and what meets a need and what's gonna draw in the student body.

We're taking a short break to tell you about the Chuck

Peterson Memorial Fellowship.

The fellowship was established by Chuck Peterson's family and friends to assist

the upper level students in the film and video program at gvsu, who are working

on creative projects that support the nonprofit sector in their community.

Kyle Macciome, May the 2020 recipient of that fellowship describes the

benefits of the support he received.

When going through this fellowship, there are three separate parts

of yourself that I think get to experience a lot of development.

The first is as a student, because this is a learning process.

You get to learn how to work with a client on your own independently,

out in the world, away from the classroom, like you would in

something like producing for clients.

And the second one would be as a video maker, as a video producer, as someone

who has respect for the work that they're doing and wants to improve on

themselves and produce a final product that can be used out in the real world.

And then the third one would be as a citizen.

You know, you're not making video for an entertainment value or for some

kind of commercial purpose, it's for a non-profit it's for a direct benefit

in your community and being a citizen of that community, understanding how

you can directly impact and improve it, is a really valuable experience that

I think the fellowship teaches you to be as, as a student, as a filmmaker

and as a citizen, all three of those things are directly a part of this

process that you get to learn and ask yourself, how do I want to be seen?

And how do I want to act as these three roles?

For more information and to donate to the scholarship, visit the link in

the description now back to the show.

What was the process of getting shows on the air?

Like where did the shows come from?

The ideas for those who green lit them.

That all came about through meetings.

What did people want to work on first and foremost, and that's what

you remember the meetings were.

And that's why it was all about friendship building.

We had to know what the organization would work for and what would

it, what would it support.

And then once we had an idea of what kind of shows we wanted to do with

our modest budget, we would host these pretty cool parties down in

Kirkoff Center called Pitch Night, which would be a pseudo formal event,

and we would host it strategically to make sure that we had as many people

in the Kirkoff Center as possible.

Plus, we had a pretty good reputation at that time, 'cause stuff like Robot

Book Club would premiere and people wanted to be in those seats to see

what we were gonna bring to the table.

So it would start with, again, the organization kind of thinking, what

shows do we want to even entertain?

And once we had that framework in mind, we'd host the pitch night.

People like Steven and whomever with whatever shows would come on board

and basically say, this is what we wanna do and this is what we're

already have to make it happen.

And if we thought as the executive board that there was enough buy-in,

the way we ran it was kind of like the America's Got Talent or American

Idol, you know, like we're gonna buzz 'em in, we're gonna approve 'em.

We tried to make it as funny as possible, and we got good

talent to come into these events.

Quarter Life was a heck of an endeavor that Phil and I did to rent out a

record store for a day and a half.

And it was the most miserable and fun experience I've ever

had outside of the Peace Corps.

We had so many good ideas the issue wasn't where to find it, it

was how do we get it on the air?

How do we take this idea and package it?

And that's what I really liked about my conversations with Adam

early on, and Jon Sessions too.

When I talked to Sessions, in charge of the equipment on the e-board, he'd

wanna bring in conversations about how do we make sure we have enough

equipment or people know how to use it, don't break it, standardized training.

Adam and I are talking about how do we standardize, show process, how do

we standardize Producer relationships?

Adam really impressed me with a lot of the thoughts that he had that I

wasn't thinking about as a leader.

And I didn't realize I was a leader until I think you and Adam and Jon

kind of told me one day like, no dude.

that's what President means.

I wanna also talk about Premier Nights, what were those?

People have made shows right now, right?

We've got Lahar on the air, Special Events on the air, Question Mark, Random-ish,

So Premier Night, we're debuting the first episode of every show

that we have for the season.

And that was so exciting because everybody's dressing up.

We're renting out a room, we're decorating the crap out of it.

We're have a good time.

And really it's like a celebration of everything that we've worked

hard on throughout the year.

And it's something to draw more people in.

I remember Premier NIght, for us, was not only a celebration of all

the things that we'd accomplished, but it was also a recruiting event.

Like it was something that could generate interest and you could bring your friends

to, and folks would see something.

If I'm a broadcasting student and I see like Special Events, it'd be

like, oh, I want to go and do that.

That's the kind of thing that's gonna draw somebody in.

And it's also the kind of thing where like when you, and this is something

that I had learned really late in life and it's something that I still

struggle with today, but when you produce something, especially if you're really

smart, you're a really high achiever, if you produce something, sometimes

you'll just feel relieved that it's done.

And you forget to be proud of it.

And I've done that a lot in my life and some of the few moments in our lives

where we get to celebrate these things that we've done, and worked so hard on

especially when you're just starting out.

Like be proud of every little step that you make because it's so

important to build that confidence and to keep that, thirst for like,

I want to build something better.

I wanna be proud of even more things to be able to look back on this

and see that as a stepping stone.

That, is beautifully said, and I, I do want to jump in there just a second to

I.

Jeff and Mike Write a Comic Book real quick.

'Cause I feel like you're talking about that confidence, that quality that we

were trying to bring, Jeff and Mike Write a Comic Book had a lot of that.

That was a show that I was brought in as one of the, actors, they

cast me as Frenemy, a guy who was a friend that they love to hate.

But, John Tremblay was directing the first of those episodes and at some

point, I don't know if I was giving suggestions or something, but again,

you gave me that green light and you said, why don't you take a shot at

directing this next scene or something.

And then eventually you, stepped back to continue being President

of the organization and I was able to, take over directing that show.

We had, musicians come in and record scores to the show, right?

Whether it was a, a person with a ukulele, just strumming

along to the vibe of the scene.

We did custom animations for each of the comic books and, had Leah, animate

the stuff that, Frenemies character was talking about because she was able

to do a fun colored pencil crayon kind of thing for Frenemie's personality.

We had other animators, animate for Mike, other animators, animate for

Jeff as they were pitching their comic book ideas throughout the show.

And, that was something where that's a really expensive show if you tried

to make that in, in the real world.

And the fact that we were able to do something like that, at GVTV

was just really, really cool.

And it was just massively creative and massively, high quality.

I actually took out a small student loan just to get good equipment

for us to actually light that show.

No, wait, hold on.

What?

And I built a lifelong relationship with Dave Lowing at Lowing

Light and Grip because of that.

Dave Lowing is an alumni.

His son Matt, is a great business partner of mine when it comes to

renting out gear and helped out far in my career and that show alone

helped build my career the most.

Building contacts in the area.

There was a website that you and I would go to all the time to look at equipment.

B&H

You got me on the phone with Dave Lowing.

That was one of the first times I had a big boy sales call, was talking with Dave

about could we rent equipment cheaper?

Which I didn't know that was your student loan money, but we had come

into some money that we needed.

Yeah, I didn't realize you put yourself into debt for our show Sessions.

My folks pretty much paid for my schooling, so it was fine.

I remember being on the phone with Dave because of you, negotiating,

a lower rate on hours for camera equipment and lighting.

Yeah.

And, Dave also offers, if you're a Grand Valley student, he

accepts Grand Valley's Insurance.

So Grand Valley students could rent equipment from him.

Well now we're just pitching Dave Lowing's business

I'm trying to educate more Grand Valley students about that great thing.

Students just know, uh, rentals are reduced rate with your student

tuition, your insurance is covered.

Hey, that's a lesson, they need to know.

I mean that's what we're doing, teach more and more about what's happening

for local vendors in the area.

Well, and that story too, where Adam was talking in the beginning about

me getting skewered by equipment as we're driving in John's Pontiac vibe.

all of that, it was like full of Dave Lowing's equipment.

So thanks for doing that Ses.

I, I didn't realize, uh, that, that is so generous.

Needed to make it happen.

Speaking of finances, Adam Burl, Finance Officer at GVTV, bring us into some

of those meetings, especially around getting that studio, some new equipment.

What was it like pitching to, the student senate, deans, things like that.

take us into the rooms where it happened.

I remember having to talk to the Director of Student Life at the

time, and arranging everything.

At that time too, we were working with Nick Monticelli someone who's

at the very least a really great advocate for the TV show, and maybe

he was the advisor, I don't remember.

Nick was a former GVSU student and is now a big, news reporter.

But he was also really helpful in being able to get us like a studio environment,

and push for that kind of thing to be able to create, both things for, news

shows and game shows and things like that.

And just be able to have something where we could go and shoot.

I remember at the latter end of my sophomore year, I joined the Student

Senate and really got to see how all of the financial allocations worked.

And luckily for me, I got to be on the Senate Resources Committee,

which essentially acted as like HR slash watchdogs for the Senate.

And of course, you have all of your shadow dealings of what's going on and

they're like, you know, Adam, if, uh, if you look the other way, we can go

and give the TV station a huge budget.

And I'm like, absolutely.

This is all fake.

That's not, that's not true but everything up until the shadow dealings was,

correct, but it really gave me something on how do they make decisions about how

you should allocate funding for people

So what was important to them?

They're saying what raises the profile of the university and what

contributes to student growth.

Those are the two things that we're looking for.

With most student organizations, you're not necessarily looking to

raise the profile of the university.

With media groups like the radio station and the newspaper and the TV station,

it's something where this could be a potential recruiting tool for us.

So we were really working to go and build that budget up and say, What we want to

do is, team up with the newspaper and the radio station to look and try to share

some of these assets amongst each other.

And so we started the conversations of the inter student organization

cooperation to try and push for that.

We would go and say like, Hey, we're going to be able to cooperate more on these

kinds of things and if you can give us a larger budget, this is gonna allow us to

raise the whole university up and we're going to be able to, do a lot with that.

And we didn't quite get to all those ambitious things that we talked

about, but, it allowed us to get a much larger budget to be able to

buy a lot of equipment and get the funding to build out that TV studio.

To that point, Adam, we had a lot of really good conversations about

what the university wanted to see as far as what would add value

and be the best use of funding.

And like you said, we had that strategic idea right away to like,

bring in the Lanthorn and bring in the Whale, let others use this

space, including the university.

But that was even interesting in terms of negotiation and being new to it.

Because when Adam and I brought that idea, the question we got met with

from Bob Stoll and others was, why are students the best steward of this?

Then why wouldn't we just roll this into the communication university?

Should this become part of the college formally?

And I wasn't opposed to that, but my question was, what

department does it sit with then?

Your broadcast department was at that time one professor.

Communications, Film and Video was a relatively small part of it and they

already had a working functional studio.

So what were we gonna offer except for a broadcast space, which would've

been more appropriate for the Lanthorn and the Whale because our studio was

gonna be more up to date than what they were working with, though different.

Sessions had helped us spec out, he wanted to make sure that it was

strategic because as students we caught wind of what the university

might do in taking what we built and just making it part of the curriculum.

And that wasn't necessarily something we didn't wanna see, but it was

like, we're not getting paid what professors get paid to do this.

And Kim

Roberts was a big advocate for us to stay as a student creative space.

So it was interesting.

But I did really appreciate the nuance that Sessions added to it and

said like, if we make it just this way and make everything XLR input,

it's gonna be a lot harder for him to multipurpose it outside of a video space.

Sessions you wanna talk to that?, The strategic decisions you were making

and then also, you were instrumental in launching the Student Senate show

that I believe was part of that, trade deal with the university.

Yeah.

And also on a side note, Randy, that's actually how we met.

Ah, tell me about that.

Yeah.

You were, uh, just this young whipper snapper of a producer, uh, had a show

and you needed someone help you out.

I forgot how many shows we made, it was like six or so.

For the student senate, that sounds about right.

Yeah.

yeah, We were covering different

issues.

And it was Randy basically being the host and I was operating everything else.

I had, multiple guests and, we did like a small talk show.

It was beautiful.

Let's pivot a little bit.

I wanna talk about, the value that those experiences have.

We've kind of all talked about them a little bit throughout our stories.

Let's connect it to some of the work you're doing now, Steven.

I didn't anticipate that I was gonna spend the next, like, decades of my

life continuing to do nonfiction stuff, but it turns out I'm really enjoying

just explaining things to people in the form of mostly, animations.

So that's what I've wound up doing.

I, I started doing, science communication for a, science center

in Grand Rapids that has since closed down, and now I'm working for myself

making a show about paleontology.

If you want to check it out, it's, Your Dinosaurs Are Wrong on YouTube.

The inability to accurately scope what is a good amount of

work to take on for myself, is something I still struggle with.

But I like to think I've gotten better since I was in school.

Were there, skills in GVTV that you specifically feel

like are helping you now?

I think The main thing that I took from.

GVTV was just that if you want to inform someone, if you want to try to get a

point across you can't ignore that.

You, you need them to pay attention to you first, and if

I.

you want them to pay attention to you, you need to be entertaining.

And I think you've been doing that very well for many years.

I love your show on YouTube, by the way.

Oh, thank you.

Sessions, same kind of thing.

How was that influencing your professional life today?

Well, I ended up doing, two summer films after I worked with GVTV.

From there I worked in the film industry.

I think I have like 45 IMDb credits with various reality shows, short

films to medium sized feature films.

I worked over at WoodTV8 for a bit, and, from there I, worked in advertising,

won multiple Tellies, Addy Awards.

Gosh, I even won a, Diamond Award for a credit union advertising, doing

cinematography, producing, and editing.

The biggest thing I can say to sum everything up is that basically GVTV

taught me to, first and foremost bring people from multiple disciplines and

it's like a beautiful orchestra, bring all those talents together and make

a wonderful piece of music.'Cause in the end, that's what show business is.

You have to use multiple resources, good or bad and make it work.

That is beautifully said.

President Tremblay,, I wanna change the question a little bit for you.

You kind of alluded to some of the internal politics that we had to navigate.

What were some of the biggest lessons you've learned about dealing with

people, and egos, and personalities.

What were some of the, navigating affairs of the heart that you had to, learn

and, and how is that helping you today?

The biggest ego I had to learn how to throttle with my own.

'Cause that's where a lot of the fight came from, right?

Most of what we're guilty of on some level...

I'm gonna dispute that

Yeah, John I never thought you had an ego man.

To be brutally honest with you.

I appreciate that.

I just, I know that there were people on the organization that very much did

think that it was the John Tremblay show and that I was trying to drive an agenda.

The issue I was having was that we had enough of those personalities and

they were driving away really good talent and scaring people off, and I

realized really, I can't throw the baby out with the bathwater with people.

I don't feel like as an early leader, I was careful with my really strong,

pushy, creative types and I was quick to be protective of my Randys, Adams,

Johns, and Stevens, and see what they were willing to give and not want to let

people in that would exploit that energy.

Because again, I wanted it to be sustainable and grow.

And this is a universal point in life of just working with different

and difficult personality types.

But what I thought was potentially toxic traits were actually traits I just

didn't know at the time how to manage.

And that's something that, having looked back at my time at GVBN, I d

efinitely learned how to work with diverse groups and develop talent, but

I didn't learn, and I'm still learning how to build cohesion within a team when

you have strong personalities that want to drive an initiative that's not in

the best interest of the organization.

It's interesting because even though I haven't formally held leadership positions

in any of the jobs that I've held, having that same skillset, knowing how

to mitigate softly, instead of the way that I maybe did when I was a, you know,

sub 25-year-old young male who had all the privilege of being able to be angry

in spaces where some of my peers did not.

I've learned a, a softer touch is often better for team cohesion.

That's incredible.

Before I turn to you, Adam, if, you don't mind me, giving one

of my own answers real quick.

I literally have the job that I do now because, the resume that GVTV gave me.

My career path was, GVTV, and then when I was a sophomore, I got a professional

job at, WGVU, the on campus PBS station.

At that event that, Steven you mentioned, uh, it was at the Alumni

House I sat at a table with Phil Lane, who's the, VP of Programming there.

And we were just kind of talking about, you know, like, what

are some of the stuff you do?

And I, listed off all these shows I made and things like that.

And Phil was like, "Oh man, sounds like you got a lot of great

experience, too bad you're a senior.

Because we have people come in and leave so quickly at the PBS station."

And I was like, "Well, actually I'm just a sophomore and I've just done all

of this work at GVTV." So then I not only, worked there through the end of

my, college years, right, so the next three years, but I continued on past

that, And then my wife and I started a production company, Wrinkle Creative.

And then, work now at Detroit PBS as an engineer, which is a crazy thing

to say because none of my trajectory seems like it was engineering.

But looking back at all those stories whether it was figuring out how to make

animations and record music for Jeff and Mike, or following in President

Tremblay's footsteps for Special Events, plugging into a malt box at

an event trying to get all that audio from a press conference or something.

Working with Sessions to manage an equipment room.

Steven, you'll be happy to hear that I just made a video game to

help encourage people to clean their lenses before they go out on a shoot.

Excellent.

So, you know, that thing of knowing to get people to pay attention

you have to be entertaining,

All of that is stuff that I learned at GVTV, and I'm just so grateful

that, not only was that at Grand Valley, but it was with all of you,

and that we were able to, forge these memories and connections that we still

are able to use and hang out today.

Randy, I just wanna say, actually you helped me open up the door at PBS Detroit.

Yeah,

I was super happy to have you.

In fact, you and I just worked our first job together this past weekend.

I wanna turn to Adam Burl.

Before I ask you a question, I want to share, my heart with you that

you have been just one of the best friends that I've ever had, and I am

so glad that, we were able to meet.

Like you said, not only eating those turkey sandwiches, but I ordered my turkey

sandwich with hummus on it and you had to turn around and see who ordered that.

And from that moment on, we had lunch and continued to,

hang out, well into our lives.

We were in each other's weddings and, and everything.

So, super big fan of you, personally.

However, professionally, you also are an inspiring person.

You, uh, through your time at Grand valley Television, you made incredible

deals, brought together so many people.

Team building has been part of your ethos forever, and I've learned a

lot about building a team from you.

So the question I, I wanna ask you as, uh, you are not only a communications

major, but also philosophy major.

So wrap us all up here, philosophically, using whatever big words you wanna pull

into it and plant the flag on what was the second generation of GVTV about?

I mean, the number one thing that I did is build relationships with some people

that lasted for the rest of my life.

And you being in my wedding and me being in yours, like, that's the biggest thing,

And learning to figure out what I was capable of, like Steven, and what I should

be orienting myself towards is so big.

Later on in life I've become a leader and being someone just to identify

and say like, "Hey are you interested in leadership?" and giving people an

opportunity and giving them the confidence to go and think of that is a really

big thing that was important to me.

And John, pulled that in and there were some other folks too

that really contributed to that.

It was really important to go and, and have those moments

and have people raise you up.

And, when you're a leader, it's really important to, be able to

continue to pass that down to folks.

To John's point too, navigating relationships with individuals,

especially like you said, strong personalities or even strong desires,

people are confused about what the thing is that they're chasing.

So the story of the end of me and Randy's relationship with GVTV was

there was different understandings about how the TV station would go.

And some of it just became a social club, which in some cases is a fine way to go.

But being able to build friends and having ambitions was definitely something that

me and Randy had oriented ourselves to.

And for me, some of the folks at the top were looking to go and

essentially put something like President on their resume or something.

Putting president on your resume is not gonna be able to help you make movies.

What's gonna help you make movies is that you start making movies.

What's gonna help you report the news is that you start reporting the news.

What's gonna help you make a TV show is that you start making a TV show.

That's what you have to do.

You just have to start doing stuff.

You have to make something, you have to do something that's important.

And for me, my big thing was I wanted to help shape an organization.

I didn't wanna make movies.

I didn't wanna report the news.

I wanted to do a little voice acting 'cause I thought it was fun.

Like John said, the organizational parts were the things that

were so interesting to me.

Like, how can we go and shape this thing to make something excellent?

How can we go and produce things and create something that's not only a

great place to meet people, to make friends, but also to be able to create

great work, and to build a career off of and create professional relationships.

And for a while I think that was something that we struggled with

but I think that it's awesome to see that the organization has evolved

so much more since we've been there.

And for me, I enjoy every single story that I have there.

Like meeting every single character and being brought up and being put down

and just having those experiences and sticking with it for as long as you can.

And then knowing when this isn't for me anymore and I'm gonna go on to the next

stage of my life, because every job that you have there's gonna be a next thing.

There's only one job that's gonna be the last job of your life and it's

probably not the one that you have first or second or third or fourth.

So knowing when to finally step away too, was a really big thing

that I think a lot of people don't know about when to talk about.

And obviously it's something that you're not thinking a lot of the

time when you're 21 years old, but it's something that you and me had

to learn pretty early how to do.

So it was really, really important in development of so much of my understanding

of the world in a really poignant way.

That is beautiful.

And that message of transition I think is exactly what this

whole series is gonna be about.

Like, as we transition now to the third generation, we did train and we

did try to pass the torch to the next group, So, Special Events, I trained

up not just one person but a team of people to eventually take it over.

Steven, I know you were mentoring animators by the time you left.

So as we end up here, I, I wanna think about what do we wanna see for the next.

20 years of GVTV.

We are hitting the 20th anniversary right now.

What do we wanna see going forward?

Use the tools you have and really let your imagination and people around

you help you create something great.

And just learn how to work together as a team 'cause ultimately, that's

what's gonna make it happen for you, and that's really gonna help you in

your future endeavors beyond GVTV.

Beautiful.

Steven Bellini next 20 years.

What advice do you have for the upcoming youngins?

Oh, well, not to belabor the point, but the way that you learn

how to do this is by doing it.

So when in doubt, do a lot of work.

Don't work yourself to death though, that was a bad decision.

Work life balance, like you said is something I'm still

learning about to this day.

Adam Burl, next 20 years, uh, advice you have for incoming generations?

Don't listen to too much advice.

Now that means something.

As somebody who's given too much advice, don't listen to too much advice.

Make your own path for sure.

Do something great.

Make sure that you're doing stuff that's making the world better.

I'm gonna take an opportunity here to give my advice here for the next 20 years.

I'm, I'm gonna say, Don't be afraid to make mistakes.

Sometimes you will delete whole projects, which happened to me, and you will figure

out how to not do that in the future.

But, this is the time to experiment and make great stuff, whatever it is.

President Temblay, what advice do you have, sitting here in the year 2025?

I think it's funny 'cause you're calling me President Tremblay, and that's

probably the highest title I've ever held and I held it when I was the youngest.

I probably could have been, but that speaks to something, right?

And so to that point I'd say that I wanna echo what each of you

has said with a bit of a caveat.

So to Steven's point, you're only going to do something by doing it.

That's absolutely right.

If you wanna be a filmmaker, make films.

You wanna make podcasts, make podcasts.

Just do it.

Anything anybody else was doing, they were just a person at one point too

with probably little to no experience.

You are not unique.

Everyone was alone at the stage that you're alone in.

Just jump but don't follow anybody else's path.

Do it your own way.

Like Adam and John said, and even Randy.

To that point, I mean, the only reason that we're all

here is because of a vision.

And it wasn't my vision, it was Jill's vision originally, but it was a collective

vision that came about with GVTV.

And it was, how do we make, we didn't know what they were yet, but

how do we make a bunch of Radams?

Jill and I were best friends the whole time we were there.

We were inseparable.

But then you guys were so inseparable because of the space that we had to

build relationships and build people that you guys, we monikered "Radam".

It was Adam and Randy.

And it's so pleasant to me to hear that you guys were at each other's weddings,

because that was the space that I was trying to build beyond anything.

A space of collaboration, equity, and exploration in all of that.

You know, I wanted people to feel like their time was worth something,

that it was valued and that they had achieved something beautiful

beyond themselves out of that.

And so as long as it's being done with that kind of vision,

that's what I wanna see for GVTV.

I wanna see a space where we can continue to build these kinds

of relationships, because that's probably worth more than any of it.

Is what you can carry on from the experience and translate

into life as Adam says.

Beautifully said.

This has been so much fun catching up with y'all.

Sessions.

Steven, John, Adam, thank you so much for being here.

And, I would never trade the time that we had together for anything.

I am so glad that we got to share that.

And hey, let's hang out sometime.

For sure

Absolutely.

Yeah, totally.

Thank you for listening to this episode of Alumni Live, the Podcast.

Tune into our podcast feed to see more of the GVTV story and lots

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