Orem High students win Emmy

A short video produced by two students at Orem High School has won an award from the organization that presents television's Emmy Awards.

Collin Barkdull and Trevor Robertson, both graduating seniors at the school, will travel to New York with their teacher, Lorelie Andrus, on Friday to attend a ceremony and receive their Student Emmy Award for the short piece titled "All Tied Up."

The Foundation of the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences announced the National Student Television Award for Excellence winners Wednesday. Seven winners were chosen out of more than 600 high school entries.

"I was pretty shocked by it. It just kind of came out of nowhere, but what an honor," said Robertson. "It was really impressive that something that we did for a school assignment ended up going to nationals."

Both hope to continue to work in film or theater in college and beyond.

"It was very obvious when they completed the assignment that it was a very nice piece of filmmaking," said Andrus, who advises them in the school's video production program.

The video is a nearly 5-minute film with no dialogue, just music, that depicts a student, played by Barkdull, having a terrible day at school. It ends with him getting his shoelaces tied together and falling on his face, when he returns home and opens a mysterious package he received, but ignored, that morning. It contains new shoelaces.

Robertson said the message — that the answer to one's problems is often in front of them all along — was something he and Barkdull had been wanting to make a video about for some time.

The video, created in spring 2005, was submitted for the award in January and won in the competition's arts and entertainment category.