KMGH New Studio Premiering Soon

[ABC 7 Denver 1600]

A few years back, Scripps sold KMGH's building on Spear built in the 1970s (https://denverprblog.com/2022/07/14/denver7-planning-move-to-rino/). The new studio, located at 2323 Delgany Street, Denver, CO is ready, as indicated by these pictures:

 

 

 

 

 

I've noticed that KMGH is using the original anchor desk from their DDG set from 2014 - as demo'd in Brian Sander's Exit video. Although the anchor desk was replaced for a seated desk (KDKA's design) in 2015, as you can tell by this photo, it was moved to the new studio. So that anchor desk is already 9 years old. That's more so commentary on Scripps willingness to spend money on any new set. Also, in comparison to the anchor desk from 2014, from the 'other website', it looks like the two front monitor panels were replaced with seamless LED video panels, which provides it a sold, horizonal flow, and no vertical break where I center logo might be cut in half with a black line (seen below).

 

 

However, it seems like this new set has fewer architectural elements than many other sets have. Where here, video walls are the focal points for standups, with only a few duratrans or flats are designed to hold the monitor panels. So quite minimalist.

 

What are your thoughts on what we see so far?

 

I'll add more visuals as they become available.

Edited June 21 by ABC 7 Denver

[Weeters 1846]

WTMJ got the "KDKA desk" brand new a few years ago, so perhaps it's just popular within the company. I wouldn't be surprised if that set order was paired back with the "neighborhood news" initiative. The studio looks huge.

 

I will hold my judgement until we see more, but at the end of the day, so what if the set is more "minimalist"? The whole "neighborhood news" initiative is supposed to get talent out of the studio, invalidating the need for the massive sets with 1000 video screens (that consultants, set designers, and bloggers love to claim are for "storytelling", but how much "storytelling" is happening when a reporter is standing in place, fronting a package with a "BODY IN A BOX" graphic behind them?)

 

 

[Rusty Muck 4309]

This fandom is so out of touch with real life if you're judging a news set to be a dud because it doesn't have all the bells and whistles and zooming graphics like the Fucking WSVN Newsplex.

 

It's always, always, always fucking style over substance.

[mer764KCTV5 97]

1 hour ago, Weeters said:

WTMJ got the "KDKA desk" brand new a few years ago, so perhaps it's just popular within the company. I wouldn't be surprised if that set order was paired back with the "neighborhood news" initiative. The studio looks huge.

 

I will hold my judgement until we see more, but at the end of the day, so what if the set is more "minimalist"? The whole "neighborhood news" initiative is supposed to get talent out of the studio, invalidating the need for the massive sets with 1000 video screens (that consultants, set designers, and bloggers love to claim are for "storytelling", but how much "storytelling" is happening when a reporter is standing in place, fronting a package with a "BODY IN A BOX" graphic behind them?)

 

 

 

Exactly! It doesn't care if it looks smaller than what people think, if it works, it works.

 

1 hour ago, Rusty Muck said:

This fandom is so out of touch with real life if you're judging a news set to be a dud because it doesn't have all the bells and whistles and zooming graphics like the Fucking WSVN Newsplex.

 

It's always, always, always fucking style over substance.

 

I know that WSVN is in Miami, but geez, That's too weird for an Television station, works better on CNN- Wait, CNN's sets got inspired by 'SVN.

[Encore 323 5]

The Miami TV market is a more serious news market compared to Denver and even though the newsplex idea is a little bit over the top and other news outlets copied it, that is what made WSVN unique and the quality of the journalism there is what makes it the news leader in South Florida.

As for KMGH, they have been doing the neighborhood news thing and Scripps has been cutting costs lately so it doesn’t really matter if the set is small or not.

[ABC 7 Denver 1600]

Per another video posted by Danielle Grant

 

 

 

 

[ABC 7 Denver 1600]

4 hours ago, Weeters said:

WTMJ got the "KDKA desk" brand new a few years ago, so perhaps it's just popular within the company. I wouldn't be surprised if that set order was paired back with the "neighborhood news" initiative. The studio looks huge.

 

I will hold my judgement until we see more, but at the end of the day, so what if the set is more "minimalist"? The whole "neighborhood news" initiative is supposed to get talent out of the studio, invalidating the need for the massive sets with 1000 video screens (that consultants, set designers, and bloggers love to claim are for "storytelling", but how much "storytelling" is happening when a reporter is standing in place, fronting a package with a "BODY IN A BOX" graphic behind them?)

 

Just more so a comment on there being soooo many screens, which add what?

 

What do you call this desk? KDKA uses the first occurrence of it, but I don't know what to call it. RE WTMJ:

 

[Weeters 1846]

18 minutes ago, ABC 7 Denver said:

What do you call this desk? KDKA uses the first occurrence of it, but I don't know what to call it. RE WTMJ:

I was looking at the DDG website, and realized WAGA is also using the same general design, just with more plexiglass:

 

Kind of just seems to be a stock design for them.

 

From the top, it kind of looks like a shard of broken glass, so if we're going to give it a name, I propose "the shard"  

[ABC 7 Denver 1600]

5 minutes ago, Weeters said:

I was looking at the DDG website, and realized WAGA is also using the same general design, just with more plexiglass:

 

Kind of just seems to be a stock design for them.

 

From the top, it kind of looks like a shard of broken glass, so if we're going to give it a name, I propose "the shard"  

 

Better than "the Shart", I suppose.

[newsteam13 371]

wish there was coverage on ABC7's move from Speer to Delgany. A Goodbye to Speer & Lincoln Special Presentation, if you will. 

Edited June 22 by newsteam13

[ABC 7 Denver 1600]

2 hours ago, newsteam13 said:

wish there was coverage on ABC7's move from Speer to Delgany. A Goodbye to Speer & Lincoln Special Presentation, if you will. 

 

I can ask. I know the ND.

Edited June 22 by ABC 7 Denver

[MediaZone4K 1597]

11 hours ago, ABC 7 Denver said:

 

Better than "the Shart", I suppose.

Sidebar, thanks to whoever brought up the WAGA set. I've been griping that it looks waaay too blue, lol. It's better than KDFW but definitely not one of the better FOX owned sets.

Edited June 22 by MediaZone4K

[newsteam13 371]

At the Speer and Lincoln location, lots of TV magic came alive during these past 50+ years. Not to mention lots of changes too. It survived the switch from CBS to ABC in September 1995. It survived KMGH's ownership changes from Time Life, to McGraw Hill to now Scripps. Anchors, reporters and behind the scenes staff came and gone. KMGH Logos, news set design and theme music came and gone. Technology has changed, including going from analog to digital in 2009. Field reporting evolved from film to videotape to digital. Bob Palmer, Bill Stuart, Larry Green and Ed Greene all graced Channel 7 before moving to rival Channel 4 in 1982, which is where most of us remember them most. The two-women of color anchor team of Anne Trujillo and Bertha Lynn lit up the screens. 

But you know the old saying, The Show Must Go On and Life Goes On. The show and life will indeed go on...at ABC7's new state-of-the-art digital broadcast home in the RiNO district. However, we'll always remember the building as that beacon when entering downtown Denver through Speer and Lincoln, despite its brutalist structure.

[mrschimpf 2093]

A smaller thing; guess this means Woody Paige has a new Around the Horn 'set' for his appearances (I assume the board is coming along if not the green screen).

[C Block 1511]

Huh, I was so out of the loop on this that I didn't realize they already picked a specific location and are ready to move in. Looks like the building is an old warehouse that was heavily renovated a few years ago. It's kind of a weird location. It's near so many things, but is situated in a way that almost nothing will be an easy walk, and there's not really any sort of coffee shop or deli that looks easy to dart in and out of.

 

The set does look like an in-house job. It all is probably fine, though certainly not the most stylish or colorful. There's something about that smaller plasma hung on the wall looks not quite right to me. I do think that having at least a handful of different reporter standup positions is important, regardless of the current flavor of the month "nobody is ever live or in-studio" thing. Plus, no matter the set, they have to get the lighting right. Bad lighting will ruin even the fanciest of sets. I guess we'll see how it looks on air.

 

I'd be curious to see what the rest of the building looks like, particularly the newsroom and sales department. Knowing the building is a former warehouse, hopefully it's not all one big open space on a single floor.

[C Block 1511]

On 6/21/2024 at 6:34 PM, Encore 323 said:

The Miami TV market is a more serious news market compared to Denver and even though the newsplex idea is a little bit over the top and other news outlets copied it, that is what made WSVN unique and the quality of the journalism there is what makes it the news leader in South Florida.

As for KMGH, they have been doing the neighborhood news thing and Scripps has been cutting costs lately so it doesn’t really matter if the set is small or not.

 

I don't think it's fair to say that Miami is a "serious" news market and that Denver isn't. Miami is big on pacing, style, and breaking news. The Denver market is perhaps plainer in style but with much more community-driven stories. I think the Denver market is pretty similar in style to what you might find in Minneapolis or Seattle. I don't think either approach is necessarily wrong.

 

You're right that plenty of stations tried coping WSVN and failed. In Denver, that station was KMGH. The short-lived "Real Life, Real News" era brought in outsider Natalie Pujo from Toronto. They put her in a short skirt in front of a big monitor and reformatted the newscast with lots of punchy franchise segments ("Burn and Learn"). It didn't work. KMGH has pretty much always been a #3 or #4 station, but the best momentum they had was years later with the Mike Landess-Anne Trujillo pairing and with a more traditional format that was heavy on investigative reporting and weather.

 

 

Edited Sunday at 07:04 AM by C Block

[Encore 323 5]

@C Block I am aware that every station in every market has a different style of covering news and different pacing and in this case, Miami is more of a fast-paced market compared to Denver which takes a softer approach and there is nothing wrong with that as long as the most important stories are being covered.

[alaskanews 108]

On 6/22/2024 at 11:37 PM, C Block said:

There's something about that smaller plasma hung on the wall looks not quite right to me.

 

This is likely the touch screen recycled from the old set.

[ABC 7 Denver 1600]

On 6/23/2024 at 12:37 AM, C Block said:

Huh, I was so out of the loop on this that I didn't realize they already picked a specific location and are ready to move in. Looks like the building is an old warehouse that was heavily renovated a few years ago. It's kind of a weird location. It's near so many things, but is situated in a way that almost nothing will be an easy walk, and there's not really any sort of coffee shop or deli that looks easy to dart in and out of.

 

The set does look like an in-house job. It all is probably fine, though certainly not the most stylish or colorful. There's something about that smaller plasma hung on the wall looks not quite right to me. I do think that having at least a handful of different reporter standup positions is important, regardless of the current flavor of the month "nobody is ever live or in-studio" thing. Plus, no matter the set, they have to get the lighting right. Bad lighting will ruin even the fanciest of sets. I guess we'll see how it looks on air.

 

I'd be curious to see what the rest of the building looks like, particularly the newsroom and sales department. Knowing the building is a former warehouse, hopefully it's not all one big open space on a single floor.

 

It's a former WeWork building. It's already been heavily modernized. The studio feels very PBS NewsHour, imo.

 

3 hours ago, alaskanews said:

This is likely the touch screen recycled from the old set.

 

Possibly, but they haven't exited their old studio yet. Except for the desk, I don't know what else they've brought over.

[DENDude 191]

When does the move start?  I had read mid/late July?

 

Edited Monday at 11:39 PM by DENDude

[ABC 7 Denver 1600]

47 minutes ago, DENDude said:

When does the move start?  I had read mid/late July?

 

 

Yes. But the building is mostly ready to rock.