Alumni Network

Billy Higgins

ANNENBERG TV NEWS helped define and refine one of my biggest talents and passions – VIDEO/TV/FILM EDITING. In 2002, I was a Junior undergrad researching the TV news business for a screenplay (I was a USC Cinema major, not Journalism) and I happened upon Serena Cha and Willa Seidenberg at ATVN. I saw the Avid stations and thought, “Hmm, this could be fun.” After finding out that a working film editor in Hollywood got his start in TV news, I thought, “I’ll give ATVN a try during my senior year.” It ROCKED. I learned to edit video FASTER than ever and WITHOUT MERCY. 🙂

Smash cut to after I graduated and did a two year stint as a full time staffer at the Communication school director’s office at USC Annenberg, I found myself in the former Annenberg Digital Lab, teaching these editing techniques to many students that, today, have graduated on to grace the airwaves and internet video cyberspace today. Many of them wrote books, produce documentaries, and some of them went on TV to be on the news shows that I grew up watching in San Francisco and LA! – you know who you are 🙂 Eventually, in 2007, I was tasked with assisting Willa to build ANNENBERG RADIO NEWS, using ATVN as a model. My nine-year time at Annenberg (through working with ATVN and ARN and it’s students and faculty) was one of the most rewarding times of my life.

…it even landed me a job at THE WALL STREET JOURNAL. There I was, with no formal journalism training, working as a video journalist for the nation’s top newspaper. That was two exciting years. My claim to fame? A WSJ YouTube video about my dog that is still getting millions of views and comments (that’s another story…).

Now that I am doing corporate video production as a full-time job (and pursuing my passions on the side as an independent filmmaker), I just edited my first feature-length film (more on that to come). My time at ATVN contributed greatly to my amazing and rewarding career as a media production professional.

Current Job Title

Multimedia Production Designer

Company

Robert Half

Market Number

8

Location:

Clayton, California, United States


Year Graduated

2010

Degree / Major

Comm Management

Previous Jobs:

Multimedia Producer – Robert Half – San Ramon, CA
Multimedia Producer – The Wall Street Journal – San Francisco, CA
Production Supervisor – Annenberg Radio News – Los Angeles, CA
Digital Lab Coordinator – USC Annenberg – Los Angeles, CA
Logistics Coordinator – USC Annenberg – Los Angeles, CA


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