Taylor Film Wins Award From Emmy Organization

A Taylor short film has won an Outstanding Student Production Award, known as the Crystal Pillar, from the National Association of Television Arts and Sciences, Lower Great Lakes Chapter. This is the regional branch of the organization that awards Emmys for television broadcasting. The win was announced at a ceremony in Cleveland, Ohio, last month.

Winning in the Student/Long Form category was the Taylor fiction project Rest of Your Life, produced by Shirley Irwin ’17, Hanson Reed ’16, David Stallard ’16 and A.J. Ablog ’16. The film is about a man who loses a good friend in a tragedy and has to deal with the grief.

“I am so honored and humbled that our film was recognized with this award. Thank you to my team members for all the hard work they put into the project. It was an honor to help create it," said Irwin, who served as the project's producer. Her teammates Reed and Ablog are actually second-time Crystal Pillar winners. Their documentary The Glassmakers: Exploring an Indiana Tradition won in 2016.

The Student/Long Form category had only two nominations and both were Taylor films, so Taylor was guaranteed to win at least one student award at the Emmy ceremony. The other Taylor nominee was The Kings, a comedy about three Elvis impersonators produced by students Max Romanowski ’16, Austin Yoder ’17, Jordan Avery ’16, Ryan Avery ’16, Nathan Tomcik ’16.

Both nominated films were final projects in the Narrative Filmmaking class taught by Assistant Professor John Bruner. “We’re thrilled to receive this honor from the Emmy organization," said Bruner, who served as executive producer for the projects while Media Engineer Joshua Taylor served as post-production supervisor.

This win represents the 43rd external recognition for student filmmakers in Taylor's Film and Media Production program during the 2016-2017 school year.