... Robert Knop, a producer-director at UC Davis' new Instructional Technology and Digital Media Center (ITDMC), for his outstanding public service announcement highlighting the campus' new Center for the Arts, slated to open late next year.

In May, Knop's sixty-second commercial won top honors in the Public Service Announcement category at the 29th annual Northern California Emmy Awards held in San Francisco. The Northern California competition is a regional version of the national television awards. Participants are judged out of state, with finalists reflecting "outstanding achievement" on a regional scale. This is the first Emmy ever to be won by UC Davis staff.

At the ceremony, when UC Davis' commercial was announced the winner, Knop says he went into shock. "At first it didn't register," Knop says. "Then I stood up and went 'YEAH!' I was overwhelmed. I didn't even write an acceptance speech."

Not only was the talent of the competition fierce, but the budgets of many of the competitors dwarfed that of UC Davis' entry. "Our commercial was produced for less than $5,000," says Knop. The competition featured entries with budgets up to 10 times that amount. More than 400 entries in the Public Service Announcement category were ultimately winnowed down to four. "I was honored just to be nominated," says Knop.

The announcement, which first aired on a local ABC station and later on PBS, was designed to tie into the arts center's print media campaign. Jan Conroy (director of UC Davis' Editorial Design unit) designed the center's logo, which Steve Oerding (Senior Artist in the ITDMC) used to create the animation for the piece. To illustrate the center's development and potential impact on the region, Knop starts the spot with a little girl walking into an open field holding a stick. Music begins and the girl becomes a conductor as a montage of live action clips from several arts-related performances and animated figures spell out the word "ARTS."

According to Virginia Kelsch, Associate Vice Chancellor-University Relations and director of the arts center's fundraising campaign, the announcement was designed to "create a climate for successful fundraising by creating excitement and momentum for the campaign. A lot of our donors told us they had seen it and liked it."

"I am thrilled Bob received an Emmy for this piece," Kelsch says. "I am so pleased we gave him a chance to show off his talents, and now the outside world recognizes it, too."

Knop's piece has also won two other awards in tough international and regional competition: a first place award in the Videographer Awards competition and a first place in the Communicator Awards competition.

"I would like the campus to see this award not just as a recognition of my accomplishment, but as yet another indication that there are a lot of talented people on this campus who do really good work," says Knop.

Knop recently edited the original 60-second spot down to a 30-second announcement. This new ad just won a first place Videographer award in the 2000 competition.