Behind the scenes of Fox 8 News

A few months ago, my family and I attended a fundraising event called Mocktail and at this event we got the opportunity to enter raffles. One of the raffles we entered and won was for an opportunity to get a backstage tour of Fox 8 News in Cleveland. This past Friday we finally took advantage of it and attended the tour.

The tour was run by a nice man named Jeremy who works in the building. While we were there we got to see all the different departments, offices, sets and everything that goes into producing the our local news. Not only did we get to do all of that, but we also got to meet some of the newscasters and reporters.

When we first arrived at the building I was taken aback by how simple and plain the building was. It was a white building that resembled a warehouse and had a big satellite out front that had the Fox 8 News logo on it.

After entering the building I was a little let down by how simple the building was. It looked like an average office building which threw us off because we expected to walk into a more glamorous environment. However, they did have posters of all the Fox shows hung on the walls which was really interesting to see.

When we got to the set we were surprised to see that all the sets were in one small room. In one corner there was the green screen, in the other there was the famous red couch and there was also the Fox 8 News desk in the center of the room. The sets were nice, but up close it was easy to see all the flaws including the scratched up desk and the worn out blue carpet.

While it was plain it was very exciting and cool to see everything up close. One of the most surprising and interesting things that we learned on the tour was that the reporters record their own footage. I always thought that they would go outside with a cameraman, but in reality they write their own material and then head outside with an ipad and record themselves.

Also, the newscasters are also the only people in the room when they are on air. I was under the impression that there was a director and multiple cameraman with them, but in reality they were on their own. They did have earpieces in that allowed them to communicate with the producers who were placed on a different floor and would help them manage their time. The producers would also control what pops up on the screen for the newscasters to read.

To go along with getting to see how everything is run, we got to meet some of the people too. Some of the people we met was Stefani Schaefer, Kristi Capel, Wayne Dawson and many more. All of the newscasters, reporters and workers were all extremely nice and welcoming.

Overall, I thoroughly enjoyed this experience and thought it was very interesting to see exactly how things were run. It was cool to be able to meet everyone and to say that I was there. I also enjoyed being able to see the set from a different perspective. If the opportunity arises for anyone, I would definitely recommend that they take it.