[pdx, bloggage] KATU Blogger Meetup, The Incriminating Evidence

931. The KATU Blogger Meetup was something I approached with some trepidation, for a few reasons:

1. While I can wax gregarious, I start out as painfully shy (another blogger described it as "shy writers meeting shy writers." That blogger (whoever you were) had our number...or at least mine).
2. No matter how you dress me up, I'm fuggly. There, I've said it; I feel better. I'd never be an anchor. I have a face, as they say, for radio.

But, after me and The Wife™ got there, we found a whole group of fine and very nice people. Being a 3rd-shifter, I rarely get the chance to attend any other meetups, so I came in as an unknown quantity. But, after a while, I found some people to talk to (and finally actually met dieselboi, who spotted me in e-vite) and was rather warmly received by everyone.

I'm glad I went. It was a real positive experience, not only getting to see the inside of a TV studio building that gave me a lot of the broadcasts on which I was raised, but just seeing what was where and getting an idea of how a television station works (a lifelong desire of mine), but getting to know the IRL faces of the people I read regularly (I already mentioned a few; I was able to thank LynnS at Oregon Media Insiders for the fine job she does).

Very few people looked like I thought they would, FWIW.

And now, the pictures:

We arrived during the 6:30 News broadcast, so we chatted and chewed on some very nice snacks in what turned out to be the adjacent studio. When the report was over, the talent came over to meet us.


We've always liked Rod Hill's style, from when he was over at KPTV (until just after it was Foxified) and now. Well, people, that's the way he really is in person. He walked straight up to us and just picked up talking to us, asking me very good questions about how I do what I do and how I keep track of who visits, stuff like that.

Also, Rod's unflappable, when The Wife™ caused my glass of Drop Top Amber Ale (very good, acutally–see how KATU treated us?) to tip, she was dismayed, I rather panicked, but Rod? Cool as a cucumber.

Debora Knapp also came over to say hi to everyone:


She was also very affable. I talked to her twice, along with some of the KATU execs who showed up.

I just missed meeting Steve Dunn, but he was working the room too. Tall. That man is very tall.

After that, they let us loose in the studio (there was apparently a breaking interview that delayed us. Everyone was very cool about this):


This is the view of the News set, the anchor desk, from an angle behind. When something ephemeral gets real, the overwhelming feeling is something like I had here: gosh, It's just a bit of furniture, isn't it. So, yeah, I was all country-mouse about it, but I won't lie–in some ways, I am quite unsophisticated. It was fascinating as hell to see it up close.

This moment was a personal favorite of mine:


That's The Mighty Lelo and dieselboi, from a POV behind the anchor desk. Those cameras are both bigger and smaller than I thought (the actual camera port is quite smaller than I expected) and they can be moved from a remote console. The Wife™, a quondam Dr. Who fan, termed this "going Dalek" (there were little flashing green lights on the base of them. Very SF.

One thing you hear over and over from us hoipolloi who finally get to visit the world of media is how different it all looks in person. Well, it may be a trite thing to say, but it's true. The news set is actually at the opposing corner of the studio...from the AM Northwest set. Now the studio room itself isn't that small a room, but when you consider what they do with it, it seems much smaller than one would assume.

Here's an angle on the AM Northwest set, from behind the anchor desk:


And here's the view of the news set from the back corner of the AM Northwest set:


See? Small! As it happens, a curtain is drawn across the news set to screen it out for reverse-angle audience shots during AMNW. If you ever catch yourself watching that show (which I do occasionally because I like Dave Anderson) and you see that curtain behind the audience, now you know; the news set is behind it. The chairs themselves are on large rolly-carts that were stowed to stage right and stage left. As far as the kitchen set of AMNW, it's astoundingly close to hand at the left (from the audience's view).

Whilst crawling about the AMNW set, I noticed this door:


Ever wonder what it looked like back there? So did I (I found the stone-wall stucco strangely humorous), so I peeked around:


Yep, that's pretty much it. One more illusion destroyed...but you didn't really think there was really a forest back there, didja? If you did, go over to The Drudge Report please–there is nothing further for you at this blog.

A couple more pics of things that fascinated me:


There is a lot more room behind the anchor desk than I thought. And you didn't really think they had a view of Mount Hood, didja? If so, to Drudge with you. Seriously, dude. Go.

Here's where the weather is reported...the weather wall...


If you peep the video monitor immediately right of the cutie in the red mini, you'll see that the green wall is replaced by the graphics. This is called chroma-key, and all that is is when the color (chroma) is subtracted out and the image is combined in on the technical end. This is why you never see the weather person wearing green. And, yes, it was smaller than you'd think at home.

For those who always wondered, this is why the weathermanorwoman never looks at the map they're describing–they're watching themselves in the monitors directly to the left and the right of the wall.

The Party's over...

Me and The Wife™ were actually the last people to leave. This was because we talked quite a bit with some station personnel, who had the most interesting stories to tell. For the "busman's" view of the way the station worked, I want to personally thank Mike Sutton, one of the station engineers: Mike, you gave us memories that will last a lifetime, and you, like the rest of the KATU staff, were just fine and nice people.


And here's one of our favorite newsies, Scott Moore, of the Portland Mercury, hot off the game of 4-square they were playing across Sandy Blvd (sadly, me and The Wife™ were too busy to see them there. But they posted fun stuff about it at Blogtown). Behind him: the esteemable Nothstine, of P3. I enjoyed meeting them both. Scott in particular was a howl...

I'll gather up my swag and post piccies in an entry or two. I didn't put every picture up, if you want to get a look at my fuggly self and all the best pictures I took, go to this link to my Photobucket sub-album.

Brian Westbrook (who was apparently the media-blogger liaison between KATU and usn's) has a recap, pixs, and link list at his blog here.

Another good roundup can be found at Silicon Florist, here.

We had a great time. Thanks, KATU!

KATU-Portland Blogger Meetup, 29 August 2007
(It's a big one folks-630 KiB)
Above Photo copyright Brian Westbrook

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