The following is an interview conducted with Titan TV’s social media team, consisting of Andrew Santos and Carissa Harris.

Kemdi: 

Can you state your names, your majors, and then your positions here? 

Andrew:

My name is Andrew Santos. I am a senior CTVA major and I am the social media manager at Titan TV but I believe my title is social media and marketing manager. 


Carissa:

I’m Carissa Harris. I’m a social media marketing intern. I’m a senior and I’m a communication entertainment and tourism major. 


Kemdi: 

Can you explain what made you decide on your major as opposed to other majors that you may have been considering?

Andrew:

At my first college, I originally went in as a photography major, because I wanted to be like a wildlife photographer. 
However, in doing so, I took my very first film class and I learned what a director of photography is. That sort of swayed my interest in everything and ever since then, I’ve been on this track of pursuing a career as a DP in the film industry.

Carissa:

I had kind of a lot that I wanted to do, so I came to CSUF as a freshman undeclared and I thought I wanted to do nursing. That’s actually what struck me to want to go to college in the first place because I didn’t want to go to college. I took a biology class and realized I was awful at science and math, which I knew, but I thought maybe that would change. 
Then I just took University 100 and learned about different majors and I started learning about COMM. I thought it was pretty interesting. and I thought, oh, magazines are cool and all these other things. I took courses that kind of did that, so I was part of Tusk, and I liked that. I just love social media. 
I pursued it all on my own and COMM Entertainment Tourism really captures all of that. It’s like doing whatever I want. 

Kemdi:

How did you come to be involved with Titan TV? What has your experience been like? 

Andrew:

So at my dream college at Mnt. SAC, um I was pretty heavily involved with extracurriculars as well as in the educational program. 
So I did my version of Titan Sports Network. So I was filming a lot of things for the school already. 
And that was also a part of the I was the ICC rep for the Photography Club. I was chairman, one of the chairmen of the filmmakers club at Mnt. SAC. So when I was looking to transfer, I was hoping there was a version of that at any of the schools I was looking at. 
So when I knew that I was sort of looking at Fullerton as the place I was going to transfer to. The first thing I looked up was CSUF film stuff and one of the first things that popped up was Titan TV. I learned that there were positions here, which is nice because the stuff that I was doing didn’t work like a paid position, so it was nice to have that. I did all my research beforehand. 
I got accepted to Cal State Fullerton, uh,  did a tour and I got through all the people that worked here before I even was accepted. That’s where I met Jeffrey and then I applied even before starting the first week of school here. Since then I’ve had a position starting a freelance camera up and then carried on now doing social media for a year for two semesters and a half. 

Carissa:

I just started as an intern. I heard about the internship through the orientation, and I just kind of knew in general about Titan Comm internships because my friend had one at Titan Radio. And I discovered Titan TV through my courses. We went to the studio before for Comm Week. and then at the Newport Beach Film Festival, I met some people there as well and it just struck my interest. I saw there were social media marketing internships which was just what I wanted to do. 

Kemdi: 

What would you guys say are the highs and lows of your job?

Andrew:

I think there are two difficult parts of the job. One is that there isn’t someone who has had this position before me. When I joined, they hadn’t had a social media coordinator in years. 
So it’s not like I could follow a structure to know if I was doing good or bad. So what we’ve been doing now, is creating that for whoever takes on this position next.  So that’s been difficult. Two would be the fact that it is just the two of us. I know that usually for other companies or bigger groups it’s usually a larger number of people doing it, whether it be the creative side or the technical side. And I think that’s part of the reason why we got picked for this position because we both offer both of those qualities despite it being a pretty intense workflow. 
But not being said, I think uh they picked good people for their job because we work well together. And the highs, I mean, it’s we have almost like unlimited creativity power to make and do whatever we want, as well as we are also kind of like in charge of doing other events that aren’t just production. I mean, we went bowling last semester. 
We just did our coffee thing. I think that allowing students who are part of this organization to have fun is also really rewarding because some people really just need a little break and to know that we are in charge of that and make that happen for people. And it’s great to like, yeah, just to share all the happiness that comes from being a part of this organization. 


Carissa: 

I’d say that we kind of are like, in a way, the outreach to let other people know. Titan TV exists and also just bridging the connections, you know, and social relations between everyone since we just had a social event and I have experience in that. So we did that and I feel fine. 
I think it’s a weakness or just the worst part. Yeah, just like creating structure, but that’s how it is with a majority of communications jobs and social media marketing in general. It’s just so broad. 
You know, that’s just our job in general. You have to make everything. like you get in what you put out.

Kemdi:

You guys are both seniors. You’re going to be graduating after this semester. What do you hope to do after college in terms of, you know, that first year afterward, do you have any plans? 
And then where do you hope to see yourself, let’s say, five, or ten years from now? 

Andrew:

I hope to start my hopefully long career in the film industry. I’ve been applying to all these summer internships, so hopefully one of those hits. If not, I’ll still continue to work, whether it be being a photographer for my short films, or my friend’s short films. I always love doing a summer project. 
I’ve done that every single year since starting college, so I’m looking forward to that. I don’t mind working all those little jobs to work my way up. I’m feeling pretty confident in my ability, so I’m not going to stop till I get where I want. 
In five, or ten years from now, hopefully, I will have broken into the industry by then and maybe cemented a name for myself or at least have a path or goal to where I want to get to. But just because I’m graduating, it doesn’t mean that I’m going to never stop learning. I think uh uh I’m prepared to learn in a new way outside of the education system. Technology is always changing, so our jobs kind of have to stay up with everything. 

Carissa:

I’m looking forward to finally finishing school because I did take a fifth year and I was beating myself up about that, but I’m proud because I’ll be the first woman in my family to graduate, so it’s a big step for me. I want to be in social media or just any fun job like PR or marketing as well would be cool with me. I want to work for beauty companies or any type of online store for clothing. 
I like stuff like that. I want to continue doing my own social media content, so I hope I just keep getting better at that, get better resources, and learn how to use cameras. 

Kemdi:

And then the final question, what advice do you guys have for those uh trying to pursue similar career paths to yours? 

Andrew:

At least for me, I think uh it’s good to diversify yourself. There could be an argument for sure that like, what does social media have to do with being a good DP? I would say there are so many things I’ve learned filming things for social media and putting my twist on things, you know, something I’ve told her before. 
I think we’re the only organization on campus that runs a social media account that films on a camera. I think every other organization films on their phone and it’s clear that they copy-paste the videos that they post on TikTok and then reuse them for the thing. That’s not how we do it. 
We do like really high-quality videos, whether it’s the actual embeddedness of it or just how the workflow that we do is really at a different quality than everyone else. That’s something to learn about because whether I’m exporting for an Instagram video, that’s stuff I can take to exporting like a short film that I’m going to make or stuff like that. So make it your own and try to diversify. 
Yeah, you can learn a lot from what you want to do in the future by doing other things as well.

Carissa:

I have two things. My first one and everyone says it is networking. It’s so important to talk to people, even if it’s just talking to them the first time you see them and just saying hi and stuff, it can put your foot in the door and help you out because if you don’t know anybody, you’re screwed. 
Second, I’d say record everything and take pictures of everything. That’s the way you have content to use if you’re into social media.