[Pro-diary] My Assessment Evaluations

What i learnt from our practice assessment:

·         To ensure all our cameramen are on the same page

·         Give everyone a full programme running order to help fluidity

·         Ensure there are no extra’s on the studio floor to prevent chaos (Floor Manager)

·         Run through the transitions between VT (Director and Vision Mixer)

·         Keep all batteries charged

·         Attempt to fix the talkback issue – (only having 1 microphone connecting to the gallery makes communication between director and crew limited)

·         Run through the script with the presenter in order to decrease the chance of a mess up in front of camera. Any responsibility for the failure of the show should be on the producers/crew rather than the talent.

·         Ensure props are prepped to be brought on as soon as the previous group finishes broadcasting

·          Have multiple copies of the VT (Me)

·         Once wired up, do not attempt to change any of the wires due to poor connection in some of the BNC cables – (+RGB)

I used this checklist on the day of our assessment to remind myself of the issues we had experienced last week. I found this to be greatly beneficial as we only needed one of these problems to go wrong for our assignment to be deemed a failure. If we could learn to avoid only one of these things, this list would have benefitted us and averted possible disappointment.

One of our biggest problems on the day was a technical one. Unfortunately our group had been pushed forward to the assessment slot after lunch. Despite this not being an issue for us, during the break the connection for camera 2 had become faulty. This seemingly small problem has a domino effect and can create bigger problems for the entire production. An example of the domino effect in this situation would be with regard to the running order; if the camera crew are working to a script based on 3 camera’s, the removal of one of the camera’s leaves empty spaces in the broadcast, putting greater pressure on the other cameras to find new shots. This can also create pressure for the director, having to be more creative with his shot choice. This domino effect continues as the increased pressure on the director can cause friction between the director and the vision mixer. This is just an example of why small technical problems can create larger disasters. From this technical exercise I learnt that often you have to be prepared to improvise a bit in this industry, because not everything can run entirely smoothly in live broadcasting.

We attempted to fix this camera issue for at least half an hour, resulting in lack of concentration in the studio, leading to some interference with classmates jumping on set. It was hard for the floor manager to keep order on the set whilst this technical fault happened, and as a result time that could have been spent ensuring a smooth run through was wasted chatting. We overcame this when the problem was sorted by our tutor Rico Vilela and order was restored by the floor manager. I was happy with the result of our broadcast. I can only comment on how I performed as my role as the vision mixer, and I am happy that I fulfilled that role to the best of my ability. I feel though that I was somewhat limited as the role of “vision mixer”, I feel that my work for the group far exceeds that title, as I spent most of my time working collaboratively with the group. I was developing ideas, researching leads and planning our production in detail. 

[Pro-diary] My Pitch

Our news package is based on the relationship between students of different courses in the Manchester College. The idea came about when we started working with music students from another campus of The Manchester College. Organised by our tutors, media and music students we’re asked to work together, having the music students perform for the media students to record. What I found unique about the relationship was the skills it was able to provide for both courses. 

Here is why I think our package will work. After speaking to some of the musicians, I realised how it would give the students on both courses an opportunity to recreate a situation that is very common in both the music and media industry. It is crucial for music and television to work together and create a symbiotic relationship, as the finished product can be mutually beneficial. The students on the music course were noting how they felt under pressure whilst performing in front of camera; and the media students felt under equal, but different, pressures when they had to act professional in front of the performers. These pressures force a steep learning curve on both sides of the production and shows how students from different courses can get together and learn, despite working on separate projects - which I think should be encouraged across students of all walks of life, not only in the Manchester College. I think our idea will be unique in the way that it is self documentation, and shows how the work we do in class can be taken to the next step by taking great interest in college projects, wanting to learn more about the assignments we have been set.

Our aim is to record both sets of students working together, seeing how they reacted to working in a foreign environment, what problems they faced and the lessons they learnt from the whole experience. Aside from the work we have to do filming the musicians performing as part of our course, we will aim to film both sets of students preparing for the collaboration, during the performance, and their reactions after the experiences. We will splice this footage together and use it in 2 short VTs, where we cut between the two courses working together and interviews of the performers and crew. These VTs will be run in the middle of our live broadcast, in which we will have further interviews of the students and the possibility of a live performance by the musicians, to give an example of how we worked together throughout the process.


By Fred Velody

[Pro-diary] Furthering Ideas 2

I looked at another article about The Manchester College’s inclusion in the Olympics, in which students from the college were given the opportunity to help make repairs and improvements to TeamGB’s bobsleighs – which are to be used in the 2014 Winter Olympics. This brought forward another string to the already strong bow of the college’s relationship with the Olympic teams. I would be able to developed this idea and manipulate it in such a way that it would be beneficial to the College, with the broadcast giving a positive image to not only the skill of the students at the college, but the college’s inclusion in international events. This would create a symbiotic relationship with the college, in which both parties are benefiting.

This is the article relating to TeamGB’s involvement with The Manchester College:

http://www.themanchestercollege.ac.uk/news/college-students-meet-team-gb-bobsleigh

Emily Rawlins, like all other professional athletes, is looking for funding and sponsorship which would add yet another layer of interest to this already mutually beneficial relationship between regular people and broadcast media

Unfortunately, we decided to drop my lead of a story when communications with Emily Rawlins broke down and appeared uninterested in appearing in our news package. As is the same with all journalism, you can’t always produce the stories that appear to be very interesting. As it stood, before collapse in communication, there was potentially a very good story that involved The Manchester College and would be extremely relevant to current events, but without there being a possibility of an  interview with Emily Rawlins, our news package wouldn’t contain enough substance and would lose the personal touch that it would’ve had, were the interview to have taken place.

[Pro-diary] Furthering Ideas

Whilst browsing the news archives on the Manchester College looking for a "scoop", I came across an article talking about one of the students attending the Manchester College. Her name is Emily Rawlins. Further research into the student revealed a possible story/angle for me to pursue.

I decided to look further into this person as the base of a very possible and credible news article to pursue. The news package would be about an aspect of The Manchester College that is, now more than ever, relevant in current news/affairs and a key talking point throughout the country.

The Olympics have obviously had a large impact on the UK since 6th July 2005. This decision, made by the IOC, has had a great effect on London and the entire country throughout the past 6 years. As soon as the London 2012 BID, backed by former Olympic champion Sebastian Coe, was announced, there was an influx of individuals and companies trying to get involved/prepare for the waves of foreign supporters that will inevitably flood the UK and exhaust every resource available here. This planning/preparation for the heavy flow of travellers has given a large chunk of the population a 'stake' in next year's Olympics, which means that there is usually a fairly huge interest in all news related to the event. Currently, almost all large companies based/selling in the UK have released advertising campaigns related to sport and more importantly, the London Olympics 2012.

Here are some examples of advertising campaigns that are using the international event to promote their company/product:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nf5AmzLcOXU

This is an advert, produced in association with the London 2012 Games, promoting the company British Telecom with their BT INFINITY promotion, an advertising campaign promoting faster broadband speeds. Here is a great example of how the Olympics are being used by a company to promote their product, and gives us evidence that there is natural interest from companies as well as the general public, which is why there would be the same level of interest in the story that I would be producing about Emily’s possible inclusion in the 2012 games.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FJeLGj3o54Q

This is another example of how the Olympics are being shamelessly used and related to certain products in order to gain higher volume of sales and to give the company a better image, suggesting that their involvement in the games is crucial to the success of London’s triumph . . . whether this statement is true is not something that cannot be proved. Http

I can do nothing but to speculate as to whether more energy will help people run round a track faster, but nonetheless, these companies feel that the Olympics are so prominent in today’s media that it can only be beneficial for the large companies to be involved, which is why a news package related to it would gather interest from large potential audiences. The vast majority of my audience in the UK would have some sort of stake in the Olympics, whether it be business related or just national pride.

Here is the article I found on Emily Rawlins, a Manchester College student who is attempting to qualify for the 2012 Paralympics:

http://www.themanchestercollege.ac.uk/news/paralympic-hopeful-manchester-college

This article, regarding Emily Rawlins’ possible inclusion in next year's Paralympics, gave me an idea into the possible new direction I could take my group. This was the article that helped me to develop my idea from what, is essentially a story about a Paralympics hopeful, into a story that could potentially promote The Manchester College and the facilities they provide for their students.

[Pro-diary] Exploring Ideas

As the Manchester College is split up into 17 different campuses/sites - the odds of bumping into the Principal of the whole college are very low. We looked at this unusual "phenomenon" as none of the members of our group had met the Principal - let alone knew his name. I thought this was odd for a college, as all of the educational institutes I had attended before had provided a figure of institution, whereas The Manchester College had not provided any information about the controller of the Higher Education establishment, which I thought was odd. After a brief information gathering/fact finding session, we found a page of information on the college website about the Principal - which provided even more of an enigma, as there was little information about the person in question.

Here is a link to the page on the college website: http://www.themanchestercollege.ac.uk/about/welcome
As is apparent from this page - there is little to no information on the character himself and therefore nothing we could use to get a good angle if we were to per sue it as a news package, so we decided, despite it being an interesting concept, it wasn't really the right direction for our assignment, and in all honesty, a slightly silly idea we had run away with. Although we pursued this no further, it still benefitted us as it showed us our boundaries and helped us to move on to better and more focused ideas.

[Pro-diary] Learning Studio Roles

For a few weeks, we have been practicing setting up the equipment we will need for our 5 minute broadcast. We we’re given an opportunity to sit down with our Programme Team Manager and Tutor, Colin Ralph, to familiarise ourselves with the tri-casting equipment. Colin took us through setting up the mixing desk, challenging each of us individually to connect all relevant wiring. He then tested us on directing and vision mixing. He continually paired different teams up to co-ordinate a mock live broadcast. I felt this put pressure on everyone in the gallery, and helped us to gain confidence in vision mixing and directing. I feel that both roles can only be improved upon with practice and experience. The pressure that was felt in the gallery that day is nothing in comparison with directing coverage of the world cup final, so only constant practice can achieve dealing with that heightened pressure. It turned out that this helped me tremendously as I was cast as the vision mixer for my project. I remember all the sessions in which we set the equipment up, and made sure to familiarise myself with a new bit of kit each time.

[Pro-diary] Splitting Into Studio Roles

During one of our lessons, in which all 4 members of the group were present, we began talking about our individual roles in the project. Until then, we had worked together as a collective on the research but were forced to divide ourselves up into work-specific jobs. This concerned me somewhat as the group had been working well together in the research elements and now that our roles had been defined, we appeared to talk less freely as a group.

 It was a very democratic system, whereby a majority opinion would decide who was best fitted for each role. This was controversial slightly, as not all of us had been given an opportunity to show why they were best suited for their role of choice. Despite this, exploring new jobs and roles gives the student an opportunity to better themselves at different areas, for example, I will feel more confident at controlling the vision mixer once I am forced to deal with it.