FDA Broadcast Media

Saturday, 25 April 2009

The Weston Hospice Care Project

The Weston Hospice Care Project







My role on this project is editor. It is my responsibility to edit together a finished film meeting the client’s requirements.
Having been given a brief schedule of the filming requirements – I needed to make sure Kate and Aleicia would get plenty of pictures and cut away shots during their filming days.
Having been told very little about what the project involves and what is required I decided to go along to the first filming day – to get an idea of what I will be editing.


The First Filming Day.

We arrived at The Hospice at 9.30 ready to set the equipment up and begin filming. The aims of the day were to film ‘The Training Programme’. This involved filming the speakers talks and the volunteers listening and interacting.




For the shoot we had two cameras.

Camera One was on a tripod and its main focus was to film the speakers.






Camera Two was hand-held and its main aim was to get a variety of shots of the volunteers, speakers and general cut aways.




As they were three of us in the crew Aleicia, Kate and I we decided to take it in turns and rotate the jobs. My first task was Sound this meant I was responsible for ensuring the sound was being recorded correctly and to a good standard. At first we did have a few problems with the sound as there was a slight humming noise, at first we thought this could be down to a faulty cable – but we soon discovered it was the headphones. To resolve this issue we decided to use my Ipod headphones for the rest of the day to monitor the sound.






My second task was to film using the hand-held camera. Knowing a lot of cut away shots were required for the edit I tired to get as many possible shots of people listening, people moving their hands, writing, etc. I then decided to go off and get some outside shots of the garden and grounds.
I then moved onto the tripod camera, this job was o.k. I just had to film the speaker, which didn’t involve much I just needed to ensure I followed them when they walked around.

During the breaks Aleicia, Kate and I went around the hospice filming different shots. As we were unable to film patients a lot of the filming involved filming empty rooms or using some of us within the shots.

After lunch I went back to using the hand-held camera it was decided I would use the hand-held camera to film the tour rather than using a tripod. We thought this would look more effective, and give the feel the viewers are part of the tour rather than observing it.


I found this to be one of my best work experience days I feel this was because I had a lot more involvement and hands on tasks. I enjoyed working with Kate and Aleicia and feel we worked well as a team.

I would give this work experience 8 out of 10.

My Final Day at TwoFour!




Today I spent most of the day transcribing some tapes for the programme ‘On Thin Ice’. Then in the afternoon I had a meeting with Graham Perkins to evaluate my two weeks work placement with TwoFour.
One of the questions I was asked was:

“What have I enjoyed most during my work experience?”

To my surprise over the two weeks, the part of the placement I enjoyed most was getting the opportunity to go into the edit suites. I found it interesting to see how they put together the programmes, how they compose the voice-overs, as well as getting the chance chat to the editor and director of ‘Hotel Inspector’ finding out different things about the media industry and the company.

Another question I was asked was:

“What were the dislikes to the placement?”

If I’m honest I wouldn’t say they was anything I really hated and would totally put me off from working within the media, however I did find some of the logging and transcribing did get a little boring. I think this was only because sometimes I was doing this for long periods of time and like anything after a while you do get a little bored and want to do something different.


I found I enjoyed my first week a lot more to the second, this was because there was a lot more to do, I was always doing something different and learning something new each day, where as the second week the majority of the time I was doing the same or similar tasks.

I think overall I did enjoy my work placement at TwoFour and did I find it very beneficial encouraging me to explore different career options rather than focusing on one area of the industry something I feel I was doing.

If I had the chance to improve upon my placement I would have liked the opportunity to go out on a shoot with one of the teams, to see how their shoots are run, whether the people are still all bubbly and full of energy and just gain a better understanding of how a production company works. Although I understand the reason why I was unable to attend a shoot was because of the company’s insurance and work experience polices.

I would rate my work experience with TwoFour as 7 out 10.






Picture Source

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&client=safari&rls=en-us&ei=IhnzSYieC5a6jAeQqfnNDA&sa=X&oi=spell&resnum=1&ct=result&cd=1&q=
Smiley+Face&spell=1

Wednesday, 15 April 2009

Video Interview with Robin

Thursday 12th March 2009.


Today I interviewed Robin Johnson an Associate Producer at TwoFour about his job, previous experiences and what interested him about the media industry.




The most beneficial thing I got from Robin’s Interview was to develop a range skills in order to be flexible, that way you can become more employable within the industry. I personally think this is great advice to anyone wanting a career within the media, just because the more skills you have, the more opportunities there will be in the future. There is always something new to learn, especially in a fast-changing world like the media.

The other comment that stuck in my mind after the interview "Was never complain!" the reason this stuck in my mind was the last few days I found the logging has become fairly boring …but it’s real work, in a real production company and something everyone has to do in the early days of their career. You need to start at the bottom of the career ladder and work your way up…and do what every it takes to get a break in this fast-moving industry!

Work Experience at TwoFour


Tuesday 10th March 2009

Today I was asked to follow a voice-over script for the programme ‘Design for Life’, which is a programme on the similar lines of The Apprentice however it’s twelve people all competing for a six-month contract to work in Paris along side top designer Philippe Starck.



My task was to follow the script through amending any errors or changes that may occur. Although I was doing a similar thing to the previous day, I found this a little more interesting because I got to watch the finished programme rather than the footage tapes and to be honest it was a lot easier to transcribe.

Throughout the day a few production assistants on another project ‘Gutted’ were researching, selecting contributors and interviewing them over the phone to find out whether they would be suitable contributors for the upcoming programme. It was interesting to see certain reasons why they chose particular contributors – E.g. How unusual they were, the location they lived in, how much ‘junk’ they had; all because it helped make good, entertaining T.V.




(Gutted will help launch UKTV's new Home channel.)




Although I didn’t help out on this, it was really good to see the process of their planning for the programme. (The pre-production stage, something I had yet to see until now.)


I was surprised how long amending the voice-over script ‘Design for Life’ took, by the end of the day I was only just past the half way mark. I think this was down to having to alter all the interviewee answers to match what they actually say in the programme.

Wednesday 11th March 2009

Today I was asked to finish amending the script for ‘Design for Life’. Again because of the interviewee answers it took me a couple of hours to finish and to be honest I was quite glad when it was over, just because I got fed up watching the same programme. I personally wanted to do something else other than transcribing and logging however this wasn’t the case after I finished ‘Design for Life’ I was asked to log and transcribe some more of the BBCOn thin Ice’ and this is what I spent the rest of the day doing! After a while I did find this slightly boring, I personally wanted to see more of how the company run and other departments to give me more of an insight of what TwoFour does and how the industry works. However I guess with it being a ‘real’ production everyone is really busy and you just need to help out with what needs doing at the time.



Picture Sources

http://www.twofourbroadcast.com/img/twofour-broadcast-logo.gif

http://www.christopherfinlay.com/files/page8_blog_entry10_1.png

http://www.broadcastnow.co.uk/images/mark_durden_smith
_resized_150_tcm19-2012717.jpg

http://www.roadtripmedia.co.uk/images/uktv-logo.jpg

http://www.twofourbroadcast.com/img/production-top-thin-ice.jpg

Wednesday, 8 April 2009

Returning to TwoFour!

Monday 9th March 2009

When I returned for my second week’s placement at TwoFour I was told I would be based up in the broadcast office working along side Elaine. Having met Elaine during my first week and got along well with her, I was looking forward to the week ahead.

My first task of the week was to transcribe the BBC programme ‘On thin Ice’ with James Cracknell and Ben Fogle. Elaine explained that previous work experience students had begun transcribing, however had not transcribe the tape word for word, something the directors, editors and the BBC required. This meant me starting at the beginning of the tape and amending the transcript ensuring every word said was documented.



To be honest when I was first told the task, I honestly thought after a while I would get a little bored but I actually found the programme interesting and at some parts quite comical. Having got engrossed in the programme, trying to figure out and guess what content they will actually keep in the edit I discovered the time went extremely fast and before long it was the end of my first day back.






Being based it the broadcast office was brilliant. I loved the fun, bubbly, buzzing atmosphere it had it was surprising to see this. I had always assumed everyone in a production office would be stressed, running about, all panicking about meeting their next deadline this however wasn’t the case; everyone was very calm and took everything in their own stride and just had fun with their job!

Picture Sources

http://www.thesouthpolerace.com/images/home/BBC2.jpg

http://www.thespeakersagency.com/uploadedfiles/CracknellFogle1.JPG

Tuesday, 7 April 2009

TWOFOUR - DAY 5

Today was my final day of my first week at TwoFour and today I got to go into MCR. MCR is where they log and capture all the tapes ready to go into the library where the editors can go and get the footage they need without hunting through every tape used during the production. This was o.k. but it was just general logging and capturing the same thing we all do with our projects. All I had to do was load the tape, mark (log) each scene change with a brief description, save it, type in the barcode number and rewind the tape and do the same thing over again with another tape. The process didn’t take long because I was told to fast-forward through the tapes quickly just to get a rough description of the tapes content.



After lunch I got another chance to go into the editing suite with Bernie and Kelly again for an hour and half, which was fun! After that I continued to log some tapes of Hotel Inspector for Sharon and Bernie ready for him to read through before their next editing session.

I really enjoyed my first week at TwoFour and I have generally surprised myself because I thought I would like a career within a journalistic area of the media but now I’m not too sure.




To be honest I didn’t think I would enjoy the placement as much as I did because my interest in the media industry were in other areas but I wanted to go for the experience to see how a ‘real’ production company worked. Having had this opportunity
I think I would like working within T.V Broadcast and out of my week’s placement I have preferred working in the editing suite which has completely shocked me because at the start of this course I saw editing as one of my weaknesses and something I wasn’t really keen on. However having completed more editing assignments and being in a ‘real’ edit suite this week it’s something I might consider branching into as a career.
Overall I feel this week’s placement has been very beneficial to me and has made me think strongly about the different careers I may enjoy and like to consider in the near future.

Picture Sources

http://www.geniusdv.com/weblog/archives/Avid%20Capture%20log%20mode.gif

http://www.masternewmedia.org/images/notebook_reporter.jpg

Work Placement Changes!!!

As I mentioned in a previous blog I had arranged to complete some work experience at two local newspapers ‘The Bristol Evening Post’ and ‘The Weston Mercury’. Unfortunately due to another local newspaper ‘The Weston and Worle News’ ending publication I will no longer be able to complete my work placement at the papers due to office refurbishments.




This was a big disappointment for me not only because of course requirements for completing 15 days work experience but also I thought it would be a great opportunity to gain a wider understanding of the print and journalistic area of the media industry something I am looking to branch into.

I decided to contact another newspaper ‘The Clevedon Mercury’ I e-mailed the editor Carol Deacon about completing some work experience; I received a quick reply but unfortunately due to recent changes with the newspaper they wouldn’t be able to accommodate any work experience placement at this current time.



At the time of receiving this information I was still currently completing my work experience with TwoFour. I was really enjoying my placement with them and thought it would be a good idea to try and complete a second week with them. After speaking to Vikki in HR she agreed to this and said I could complete a second week in the Broadcast sector with Elaine on the week commencing 9th March 2009.

Now I was only two days short of my work experience day requirements but after speaking to Kim we agreed that I would work on The Hospice project with Kate and Aleicia. My job role on the project would be editor. However although I didn’t know a great deal about what was being filmed I thought it would be beneficial to myself and the project to attend the two filming days to get an idea of the type of shots and pictures I would need to edit together to produce a 30 minute film.



Picture Sources

http://www.westonhospicecare.org.uk/wiki/?page=aboutus

http://www.toughten.co.uk/images/wwn.jpg

http://s3.mediauk.com/logos/50/41623.png

TWOFOUR - Day 4

Today I was in the camera store with Ben Whitehouse. To be honest when they first told me I would be spending the day there I wasn’t particularly looking forward to going because I’m not really interested in all the cameras; I prefer the pre-production stages.

When I first got there, there wasn’t very much to do because equipment was not due to be hired out until later in the day. So Ben explained what his job involved and how the camera store operated. I was really surprised to discover that the camera store was managed under the ‘DIGITAL’ sector of the company and the ‘BROADCAST’ sector needs to pay to hire out any of the equipment. To be honest I didn’t fully understand this at first because to me it seemed pointless TwoFour paying to hire their own equipment. But Ben explained that the equipment hire costs are always in every production budget and if they didn’t have their own camera store the sectors would have to hire the equipment from another hire company so this was a way for TwoFour to put money back into their own company rather than into someone else’s. It was set up for TwoFour to save money in the long-term. However if lots of projects are taken place at the same time, in some situations the camera store do need to hire in extra equipment in for the production teams to use.


My first task in the camera store was to carry out a few camera tests, to test the quality of two different brands of DV tapes. This required me to film twenty four-minutes of the camera storeroom, twelve-minutes of footage on each DV tape using a Sony Z1 to film. I had to ensure I filmed exactly the same on each tape so the editors and directors could analyze the difference in quality and decide which DV tapes would be better to use for future projects.
After lunch I helped Ben gather up all the kit ordered by one of the production team. This meant looking down their order form and loading everything on it onto the trolley ready for them to take out. While doing this Ben was explaining the different types of equipment and why it’s relevant to the type of shoot.




The other thing Ben and Elaine showed me was the Camera and Sound contacts. This was a spreadsheet in Excel filled with names and telephone numbers of hundreds of different camera and sound operators. The spreadsheet is used when production teams need someone to shoot their production or to manage the production’s sound. The sheet is updated regularly with production teams leaving comments about the contact’s abilities and whether they worked well or not and whether they should be recommended for future projects. This is a good way for TwoFour to build a strong team that can work well together.






Overall my day in the camera store went well and wasn’t as bad as I had imagined. The day went really fast and I learnt some more about TwoFour Group and how the company operates.

Pictures Source

http://worldserviceyourstory.files.wordpress.com/2008/11/z1.jpg

http://homepage.cs.uri.edu/tutorials/csc101/pc/excel97/images/excel1.jpg

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_as1z24C6xaA/R45zvxH6hCI/AAAAAAAAAAk
/cwdZbSJ6OVk/s320/excel_logo.jpg