Emotions run rampant as fans holler, watching the Coppell football team score a touchdown, as players’ faces beading with sweat on a warm fall evening at Buddy Echols Field.
For many, these moments occur only once: the Friday of the game when they can experience it live. But, for Coppell High School senior Jack Mancuso, the hype of the game, excitement from the crowd and joy of high school sports exists forever within his camera.
Mancuso surrounds himself with what he loves – sports videography – through various involvements. Specifically, Mancuso has been an active member in the KCBY-TV program since his sophomore year, building his technical skills.
Sophomores begin KCBY-TV in an introductory class, covering key skills taught by Kendra Carter prior to moving on to the advanced class creating content, taught by adviser Irma Lazos-Kennedy.
“We invited Jack to come into my classroom as a sophomore because we saw he had the technical mindset and was super respectful and knew his place, but we also knew he wanted to learn more,” Lazos-Kennedy said.
Mancuso’s passion for learning continued throughout his time in KCBY-TV as he sought ways to get involved, becoming the technical and special projects director his sophomore year; his dedication didn’t go unnoticed.
“When someone gives themselves entirely to improve a program, who cares about every decision that is made, who is willing to help at any hour, who stays during his off period and comes early even when he’s not supposed to be here, should receive some sort of merit,” Kennedy said.
This merit came in the form of being the September Coppell Community Development Foundation’s Student of the Month. “The first person that came to mind was Jack,” said Kennedy, who had been asked to nominate a student for the award.
Along with being Student of the Month Mancuso became Project Director where he utilizes years of experience to guide others, building a sense of community with other executive directors in KCBY-TV.
“Building a strong culture is one of the most important things we’ve been doing this year,” Mancuso said. “People aren’t going to work for a leader who doesn’t care about them and you’re more likely to work hard for someone you can personally connect to, knowing they care about you.”
Although Mancuso films a variety of subjects and settings within KCBY-TV, his passion remains with the excitement that sports videography holds. Therefore, when he got the opportunity to film for Coppell Athletics Media, Mancuso jumped on the chance and has assisted Coppell ISD scoreboard video producer Ryan Putman ever since.
Volunteering at games became an official position within Coppell Athletics Media, as Mancuso now records, films and edits content.
“I’m running during games with a camera on the sidelines, hoping to conduct interviews and produce those,” Mancuso said.
The experience helped Mancuso visualize how the work he loves doing functions outside of high school.
“Coppell Athletics Media gives us an opportunity unlike one you’ll get at any other school because it mirrors what they do in the workplace,” Mancuso said. “We’re cutting cameras, we’re technical directing, we’re overlaying graphics and we’re doing all the things a production in the real world does.”
Armed with this experience, Mancuso takes his videography skills outside of school, co-founding One Shot Media with KCBY-TV senior Sydney Beach.
Beach and Mancuso share a passion for sports and media.
When approached with an opportunity to film a baseball game last year for senior Joaquin Oaxaca, Beach asked Mancuso to accompany her.
“Even though I wasn’t super close with Jack, I knew he was responsible,” Beach said. “He knew what he was doing and was obsessed with baseball, so I just thought he was the perfect person to ask.”
That simple request not only sparked their friendship but eventually their business as they wanted to take their work a step further. They began with an Instagram, then flier, website and now have already had several clients for their business.
Yet, one of Mancuso’s first clients had been back when his passion for videography had just begun, being one of his close middle school friends: senior Edward Griffin.
Both having moved from Houston to Coppell at the same time, Griffin and Mancuso became close friends at their new middle school, Coppell Middle School East. Mancuso took an interest in the CMS East media class, learning the technical and editing sides of videography, jumpstarting his interest in film.
Griffin reached out to Mancuso to highlight his football games.
“I knew he was big into filming and I knew he was good at it so I just asked him,” Griffin said.
Mancuso would record Griffin’s games using the old Nikon camera his family shared, capturing close and wide shots and editing them himself using the techniques he’d learned from class.
Most recently, Mancuso filmed a hype video for the Coppell football team, using a Blackmagic camera and editing it with the various skills he’s learned from KCBY-TV, Coppell Athletics Media and One Shot Media.
“It’s been really cool to see his evolution,” Griffin said. “He started just doing film and it was always good, but now seeing what he does for the high school is amazing.”
Mancuso’s journey with film doesn’t stop at high school, as he hopes to pursue sports videography at the University of Notre Dame or the University of Texas at Austin, aspiring for a job as a cameraman for a professional sports league.
“Honestly, I’m very flexible about my dream job,” Mancuso said. “If I’m filming sports and getting paid for it, I’m happy to do it.”
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