Well it's kinda like.....

One of my classroom pleas is for students to be prepared to capture TV moments.  Now I have a pretty terse useful definition of what constitutes a TV moment.  But a student  a week ago legitimately asks, "but WHAT IS a TV moment?."

Well I've discovered it is a lot easier to define by example than by phrase.  The piece up above should help.

As Peggy and I were driving through a lush conifer forest in southern Oregon we spy this perfectly maintained and freshly painted ocean fishing boat.  It is no where near any water, let alone any salt walter. 

Well that's a TV moment because that JUST is not right.  I shirked my TV reporter duty.  What I should have done?  I should have parked the car, walked up the drive to the home closest to the boat, tapped on the door, and when a person appears, boldly ask "what's up with the boat?"

I can guarantee you there is a story to be told. THIS is a TV moment.

Jim Weis and I were up in Erie Colorado one year doing a story on a 20th Century town behind the time. Erie was still refusing to pave it's streets.   The story alone is a TV moment, but we almost missed some incredible support TV moment video. 

(Send the kids from the room.)

Turning a corner and heading right into Jim's frame is a rusted old pickup truck that has to be 80 years old.  That alone would help support a story about a town refusing to join the 20th century.  But the REAL TV moment was in the back of the truck.  It was a DEAD HORSE lying on its back with it's leg's and hooves shooting skyward.

Without referring directly to the video?  Imagine how many lines you could come up with to support the story using THAT TV moment.  For taste reasons we only used about three seconds of the shot, but that was all we needed.  And NO, I did not say, "don't beat a dead horse."

There are just SOME pictures (video in this case) and SOME sound that BELONG on TV.

To get them there you need to be ready to capture T.V. moments.

That's all I've got to say today....