If I could show my freshman self what the Caravan Media Group’s (CMG) broadcasts look like now, I would have certainly been shocked.
As the club’s play-by-play announcer and senior member, I take pride in the fact that we started with beat up microphones and cameras but now have the ability and skill to use equipment that’s more modern.
CMG recently had its first broadcast of the year last Thursday when the varsity football team played the Hun School of Princeton at Barda-Dowling Stadium. In the past, most of CMG’s broadcasts were live streamed to YouTube from atop the roof of the school. However, things looked a little different last Thursday night as the game was live streamed from the pressbox.
By making the switch from the roof to the press box, we were able to take the feeds from select cameras around Barda-Dowling stadium and show them on the YouTube stream. Certain features such as audio from the officials, replay, and multiple camera angles led to a higher level quality stream and production.
“We could choose to go back on the roof if we wanted to,” said senior and software producer Leonard Siegal. “But just looking at the feedback we got for that first livestream made us realize it is one thousand times better having the extra camera angles and features. Every person I’ve talked to has said the stream looks phenomenal. Most of that is due to the ability we have to put those features on our livestream.”
After last week’s broadcast it feels as if our club is not looking back after making the switch to the press box, but one must always reflect on where they came from before progressing forward.
“At the first game I announced I went up on the roof, was given a headset, and just talked,” said senior color commentator Christos Dimas . “And the rest is history.”
During my sophomore year I asked other guys such as Siegal and Dimas if they wanted to join CMG, and I was met with positive responses. At the time we weren’t even thinking of adding replay and multiple camera angles, but after learning the ins and outs of what it takes to produce a live stream we knew it was time to up our game.
Stepping it up required not only student participation, but faculty guidance as well.
“I think that in general people love to talk about their hopes and dreams,” said CMG moderator Ms. Eleanore Menke. “I see them becoming manifested in this group through hard work and would love to see that continue.”
Without Ms. Menke it would be hard to even organize a live stream in the first place. As the club has taken multiple steps to improve in recent years, she has been there to guide the group in the right direction.
“She’s one of the hardest workers at the school,” said Dimas. “We would not be anything without her.”
The combination of Ms. Menke’s hopes to see CMG succeed along with a lot of student participation has led to huge improvements. As of right now the club has a majority of seniors, which creates an interesting dynamic as to how underclassmen will take over next year.
While guys like Dimas, Siegal, and myself won’t be here next year, we are determined to include new members and make them feel as if they can improve even further upon the changes we’ve brought to the group.
“I think we should aim to have a diverse group of members that give different perspectives in the future,” said freshman and new CMG member Bryce Daymond. “I also think we should expand on what [senior members] have done with the current broadcasts and podcasts.”
Bryce isn’t the only freshman that has become eager to get involved with the media at MC. In fact, he’s not only Daymond either.
“The media group would branch out more if we had different types of podcasts,” said Benjamin “Bishop” Daymond ’28. “Overall though my goal for the next four years is to make sure it grows.”
The Daymond brothers made their broadcasting debut earlier than any current member has. Last Thursday, they served as halftime reporters and, thanks to new equipment from the press box, were able to do a live segment on the field in which they recapped the first half.
“At some point we needed to get our feet wet,” said Bryce. “We needed to experience that just so we could improve.”
Improvement has been the name of the game for the past three years, and things look to be going in a positive direction for everyone in CMG. Personally, I’m extremely excited to see freshmen like Bryce and Bishop that are eager to grow the club even further beyond the point it’s already at.
I’m not the only one that feels this way as well.
“A year from now I want to log on to the Mount Carmel YouTube page and click on the first stream,” said Siegal. “I want to see these guys not only continue what we’ve done, but also improve it. These guys will make continual improvements in the future. We (current seniors) are not the end all be all for media group. We’re just the beginning.”
While guys like Dimas, Siegal, myself and other seniors in the group such as Diego Palma won’t be here to live stream a game or record a podcast a year from now, I can already tell the group will be in good hands.
Last week’s live stream was a huge improvement from broadcasts in the past, and was very fun to be a part of, but I hope it’s just the beginning of something even better.
“Whether people realize it or not,” says Dimas as he reflects on his time with CMG, “I still think it’s really cool to see the impact media group has had on our school.”
Check out our past and upcoming broadcasts: https://www.youtube.com/@CaravnBrodcstNet/streams
Thanks for reading and good night, Chicago.
