After our Green screen session and V/O with fran we had to update the script as we needed it to sound natural for her and i found a few issues with some of what she was saying. I didn't want her to say tonight or specify a time of day due to the fact this was a news feature going onto youtube and people across the world could be watching it at various times and dates so i thought it would be better to say today rather than a time period.
Here is the updated script:
Stay safe,
Helen
Friday, 31 October 2014
Wednesday, 29 October 2014
Digital News: Filming with Fran
Today we filmed our anchor section and V/O with Fran. Myself and the boys and hayley arrived at the studios early to set everything up and do a couple of tests to make sure it was all ready to go when she arrived. This was a really good idea as we had learnt from our green screen test that it will take a while to be correctly set up especially the lighting. We felt that having this sort of prep time would make our shoot run a lot smoother.
From what we had learnt on out test shoot to do with shadows and lighting, Chris had done a lot more research into green screen lighting and spoke with Fergus about some blue coloured tints for them as this makes the image and lighting more even. When we set it all up it did look a whole lot better and i was really pleased with the look of the set. Danny and Chris then did some test shots and i looked over the script for one more time to check everything was good. One of the other things we learnt from the previous tests were that the canon was the best option for visual quality but isn't great for sound. Chris has initially made the choice to use the sony as it had the best quality but we had spoken about this as a group and said if the canon was available we would take that out also and record the audio via clip mic through the sony solving both problems. As the canon was available this is what we did.
After we picked Fran up we prepped her at the studio about the set up and everything. She had been learning her lines as she'd had the script a few days earlier and she felt confident with everything. We also had the AutoCue and Danny and chris worked together to get its positioning perfect for her eyeliner. Below the camera didn't work and above it also didn't get eye line correct so they had danny stand behind chris and the camera just above it but more behind so that it looked like she was looking into the lens. It was great. We ran through the first section we wanted to record and made changes to words that suited her style and that she had issues with when spoken out loud, Then it was time to record. We took a couple of takes to get her phrasing spot on but were really happy with her delivery and connection. We did this method for each section making sure the auto cue speed and size was perfect each time. Soon after we were finished and took pictures of Fran for our website to show our reporters. On This day my job was audio recording, Danny was director/Autocue, Chris was Camera, and Hayley was Script Supivisor. These roles were a great fit for us as this meant hayley could keep an eye on the scripting for me and make sure what was being said was correct and then relay this to danny for him to make changes on the auto cue. Then when this was set up we could go for a take, i would say rolling when i was ready & filming, Followed by chris who would say rolling when he was ready & filming and then danny who would say action for fran to begin. Chris also made the call to have fran stand still and quiet for between 5 and 10 seconds after she had finished her lines on some clips so when we are linking them in post production to our other clips we have plenty of spare to use. This was a perfect idea for the credits especially as we want the virtual studio lights to dim slightly as our credits role.
Next up was the voiceover in the booth. We used 2 recording methods for this as after an inital few tests Chris was unhappy with the quality of the audio coming from the mic and wanted a back up just incase. So we used the clip mic and recorded from the sony and the audio booth recording system. We then ran through the sections we had giving our feedback and redoing as necessary. Then we were complete.
Overall i think the day was a success. Fran was great to work with and really fitted our professional yet relatable anchor that we wanted. Jamie is more lighthearted than fran and i think having the right balance of funny and professional is perfect for our channel - it doesn't make it seem immature and silly but also not overly serious and strict. The auto cue was a brilliant idea and so useful! It really helped our filming go by with such ease in both shoot days.
I have learnt from this shoot that preparation is key and having a team that knows their role and has researched things makes your job a lot easier and helps shoots to go by effortlessly.
What i would do differently next time is that although it is a good idea to help your presenters and actors to relax by taking to them and making them comfortable it can be quiet time consuming and even more so when this person is your friend. I think our shoot would have been a lot shorter if i had been slightly more professional and less chatty with Fran because i could tell initially she was really nervous and wanted so bad to do a good job for us and we really couldn't have her straight away in front of the camera as it would have shown in her delivery. I think the boys were probably a little frustrated by the chit chat and laughing especially in the voice over booth because chris was trying to listen to Frans voice levels and as i was talking it was really difficult for him so he had to keep reminding me to be quiet and have fran just talk. This is something i will definitely learn from as although it is a strength of mine to relax the person i need to be more aware of the situation and time.
stay safe,
Helen
From what we had learnt on out test shoot to do with shadows and lighting, Chris had done a lot more research into green screen lighting and spoke with Fergus about some blue coloured tints for them as this makes the image and lighting more even. When we set it all up it did look a whole lot better and i was really pleased with the look of the set. Danny and Chris then did some test shots and i looked over the script for one more time to check everything was good. One of the other things we learnt from the previous tests were that the canon was the best option for visual quality but isn't great for sound. Chris has initially made the choice to use the sony as it had the best quality but we had spoken about this as a group and said if the canon was available we would take that out also and record the audio via clip mic through the sony solving both problems. As the canon was available this is what we did.
After we picked Fran up we prepped her at the studio about the set up and everything. She had been learning her lines as she'd had the script a few days earlier and she felt confident with everything. We also had the AutoCue and Danny and chris worked together to get its positioning perfect for her eyeliner. Below the camera didn't work and above it also didn't get eye line correct so they had danny stand behind chris and the camera just above it but more behind so that it looked like she was looking into the lens. It was great. We ran through the first section we wanted to record and made changes to words that suited her style and that she had issues with when spoken out loud, Then it was time to record. We took a couple of takes to get her phrasing spot on but were really happy with her delivery and connection. We did this method for each section making sure the auto cue speed and size was perfect each time. Soon after we were finished and took pictures of Fran for our website to show our reporters. On This day my job was audio recording, Danny was director/Autocue, Chris was Camera, and Hayley was Script Supivisor. These roles were a great fit for us as this meant hayley could keep an eye on the scripting for me and make sure what was being said was correct and then relay this to danny for him to make changes on the auto cue. Then when this was set up we could go for a take, i would say rolling when i was ready & filming, Followed by chris who would say rolling when he was ready & filming and then danny who would say action for fran to begin. Chris also made the call to have fran stand still and quiet for between 5 and 10 seconds after she had finished her lines on some clips so when we are linking them in post production to our other clips we have plenty of spare to use. This was a perfect idea for the credits especially as we want the virtual studio lights to dim slightly as our credits role.
Next up was the voiceover in the booth. We used 2 recording methods for this as after an inital few tests Chris was unhappy with the quality of the audio coming from the mic and wanted a back up just incase. So we used the clip mic and recorded from the sony and the audio booth recording system. We then ran through the sections we had giving our feedback and redoing as necessary. Then we were complete.
Overall i think the day was a success. Fran was great to work with and really fitted our professional yet relatable anchor that we wanted. Jamie is more lighthearted than fran and i think having the right balance of funny and professional is perfect for our channel - it doesn't make it seem immature and silly but also not overly serious and strict. The auto cue was a brilliant idea and so useful! It really helped our filming go by with such ease in both shoot days.
I have learnt from this shoot that preparation is key and having a team that knows their role and has researched things makes your job a lot easier and helps shoots to go by effortlessly.
What i would do differently next time is that although it is a good idea to help your presenters and actors to relax by taking to them and making them comfortable it can be quiet time consuming and even more so when this person is your friend. I think our shoot would have been a lot shorter if i had been slightly more professional and less chatty with Fran because i could tell initially she was really nervous and wanted so bad to do a good job for us and we really couldn't have her straight away in front of the camera as it would have shown in her delivery. I think the boys were probably a little frustrated by the chit chat and laughing especially in the voice over booth because chris was trying to listen to Frans voice levels and as i was talking it was really difficult for him so he had to keep reminding me to be quiet and have fran just talk. This is something i will definitely learn from as although it is a strength of mine to relax the person i need to be more aware of the situation and time.
stay safe,
Helen
Digital News: Virtual Studio
Although i am not creating the virtual studio i had 1 request for chris, i wanted a tv in the hope that we could use green screen to put in a clip showing the segment coming up when Fran is talking about it. I got this idea from my research into the BBC 3 news and the scrolling tv idea they use. Myself and Danny also mentioned similarly to sky sports news we would like scrolling news across the bottom.
After our Green screen test chris showed us his initial idea for the studio and i mentioned that it made the presenter look very small and for a initial shot to welcome people to the channel it would be great but we would need to have a mid shot for most of the news in order for the audience to not feel like the presenter has shrank in the wash and connect with them better. Chris said that with this current studio that wasn't possible and he would have a go at working with it to see what he could do.
I really liked the studio he created and it incoperated a lot of our ideas and felt very modern and something our target audience would like.
When he showed us the 2nd version it had so many improvements and i was really pleased. The only change i mentioned was that instead of breaking news could be change it as we didn't actually cover any breaking news stories, danny said to change it to sports news and we all said this was perfect. Everything about the studio, the colours, the text, the graphics were very much individual to our brand and we had put a lot of thought into these things and chris had created something that was really great.
Stay safe,
Helen
After our Green screen test chris showed us his initial idea for the studio and i mentioned that it made the presenter look very small and for a initial shot to welcome people to the channel it would be great but we would need to have a mid shot for most of the news in order for the audience to not feel like the presenter has shrank in the wash and connect with them better. Chris said that with this current studio that wasn't possible and he would have a go at working with it to see what he could do.
I really liked the studio he created and it incoperated a lot of our ideas and felt very modern and something our target audience would like.
When he showed us the 2nd version it had so many improvements and i was really pleased. The only change i mentioned was that instead of breaking news could be change it as we didn't actually cover any breaking news stories, danny said to change it to sports news and we all said this was perfect. Everything about the studio, the colours, the text, the graphics were very much individual to our brand and we had put a lot of thought into these things and chris had created something that was really great.
Stay safe,
Helen
Tuesday, 28 October 2014
Digital News: Recording Jamie's V/O
Today we recorded jamie's voice over. After speaking to the boys we knew we had to get jamie's voice over to be less than 30 seconds due to the timing for our live piece being 2 minutes. Therefore we had proof read it individually and found it to be a difficult one and he may need to speak faster than we wanted. We decided to split up the voice over into 3 sections. After a few takes at each section we had it at around 30 seconds so with the pauses and extra bits taken out we felt that chris would be able to cut together a nice piece that wasn't too pacey. We wanted the last section to be a little more fun so let jamie do a few takes to make it his own and felt that he delivered a really great voice over that suited the piece perfectly.
Overall I found the day a simple day without any problems. It was nice to be able to have a fairly relaxing session and get all our jobs done. As long as our supporting footage is strong we will have a really good live piece for digital news.
I have learnt it is good to have a script and be flexible with it and a script supervisor is a really important role as on set you are able to quickly change any lines or words that an actor/journalist/Voice over artist is struggling with. I wouldn't recommend working with someone who would have to send in a voice over away from you as this could potentially cause problems.
As nothing went wrong there isn't anything i would do differently. We were on time and even managed a spot of team lunch.
Stay safe,
Helen
Overall I found the day a simple day without any problems. It was nice to be able to have a fairly relaxing session and get all our jobs done. As long as our supporting footage is strong we will have a really good live piece for digital news.
I have learnt it is good to have a script and be flexible with it and a script supervisor is a really important role as on set you are able to quickly change any lines or words that an actor/journalist/Voice over artist is struggling with. I wouldn't recommend working with someone who would have to send in a voice over away from you as this could potentially cause problems.
As nothing went wrong there isn't anything i would do differently. We were on time and even managed a spot of team lunch.
Stay safe,
Helen
Fiction Adaption: Changing the Meaning
After reading through the poem it quickly became aparebt to me that some of the literal descriptions needed to have their meanings adapted. I would not be able to physically recreate 'Rain' for example as i do not control the weather. I found a lot of these things very interesting to look at and adapt and one of the first ideas i had was to change the meaning of the word guns. It isn't guns that kill people, it is the people behind the guns and i liked the idea that the 'guns' that killed jack were the gang. Therefore the idea that guns is another way of describing the gang. I had this image in my head of the gang, unaware of what has happened, going about their usual intimidation, laughing and joking around while the narrator says "and far away the thudding of the guns". I felt that this was a really strong and interesting image and audio connection.
Another idea i struggled with the idea of filming stars. i wasn't sure if this would be literally possible but then i thought about the meaning of seeing stars and how this can also be said when someone is hit and concussed. I thought this would be a creative way of showing this idea and also would continue to portray the bullying.
I wanted the words 'lipped by the moonless waves of death' to be about the relentless bullying and torment Jack faced on a daily basis. So having a scene of him being beaten but more so the moments before when he tries to avoid them as he knows they will be waiting for him.
The most difficult part to adapt for me was the section about the rain. I knew i wouldn't be able to have actual rain but i really struggled initially with finding an alternative. Then i thought about things from my own life and not so much physical bullying but mental bullying. Physical bullying could be desrcibed as the "harsh rain" that destroys everything in its path, while "warm rain" is more about the mental side of it, it wears you down, takes your spirit, keeps you small and downtrodden so u can't fight back. In the case of jack this 'Warm rain' is the thing that washes his life away and destroys him.
I had read an article about suicide in a magazine while i was doing research for this project and read about a woman who was found by the river and all she could remember were the lights of their torches as they approached. I thought this could be a really good image and example for the "light many lamps" part of the poem.
I also didn't like the idea of showing Jack dead, or his face while he is dying. Especially as he is a child i think it would be too much. I feel having a calm and quiet image of his favourite place at night while the narrator says the section about "But death replied 'i choose him' ". I think this will be a poignant way of showing his passing.
I feel having Strong Visuals to match the emotional narration will be a big strength in this piece.
I hope this post has helped to show my thinking behind the story.
Stay safe,
Helen
Another idea i struggled with the idea of filming stars. i wasn't sure if this would be literally possible but then i thought about the meaning of seeing stars and how this can also be said when someone is hit and concussed. I thought this would be a creative way of showing this idea and also would continue to portray the bullying.
I wanted the words 'lipped by the moonless waves of death' to be about the relentless bullying and torment Jack faced on a daily basis. So having a scene of him being beaten but more so the moments before when he tries to avoid them as he knows they will be waiting for him.
The most difficult part to adapt for me was the section about the rain. I knew i wouldn't be able to have actual rain but i really struggled initially with finding an alternative. Then i thought about things from my own life and not so much physical bullying but mental bullying. Physical bullying could be desrcibed as the "harsh rain" that destroys everything in its path, while "warm rain" is more about the mental side of it, it wears you down, takes your spirit, keeps you small and downtrodden so u can't fight back. In the case of jack this 'Warm rain' is the thing that washes his life away and destroys him.
I had read an article about suicide in a magazine while i was doing research for this project and read about a woman who was found by the river and all she could remember were the lights of their torches as they approached. I thought this could be a really good image and example for the "light many lamps" part of the poem.
I also didn't like the idea of showing Jack dead, or his face while he is dying. Especially as he is a child i think it would be too much. I feel having a calm and quiet image of his favourite place at night while the narrator says the section about "But death replied 'i choose him' ". I think this will be a poignant way of showing his passing.
I feel having Strong Visuals to match the emotional narration will be a big strength in this piece.
I hope this post has helped to show my thinking behind the story.
Stay safe,
Helen
Digital News: Script Draft 4
Here is the 4th script, it features further edits including a closing statement for fran.
Stay Safe,
Helen
Stay Safe,
Helen
Digital News: Script Draft 3
Here is the 3rd draft of the script. It is further updated after speaking to danny and chris and incoperating things that are more relevant as we were concerned about the time involved. So we cut down on some of Jamie's V/O as we thought we had 2 and a half minutes but we only had 2 so we needed to cut out the game commentary and we decided to use it as a extra on our website.
Stay safe,
Helen
Stay safe,
Helen
Digital News: Script Draft 2
Here is the 2nd draft of the script based on the notes made by teacher helen. It includes more detail as it was updated after filming and shows some changes to our V/O.
Stay safe,
Helen
Stay safe,
Helen
Monday, 27 October 2014
Digital News: Green Screen Test
Today myself, Chris and danny went to the studios to do a green screen test so we could prepare for the anchor shoot with fran. It turned out that the green screen had been accidentally double booked and so although we booked it first we had to split its use with another group.
We set up lighting and the green screen fairly quickly in lecture theatre 1 and found that this was enough space for walking around within our screen screen setting.
After the 1st test we noticed that the camera quality and lighting were posing a problem. We were using the sony ex and it just wasn't able to produce a sharp enough image and the lighting wasn't even everywhere. Here is the first test to show you:
The 2nd test was with a canon 7d that chris borrowed from Vic, this was much better and provided us with a much higher quality image. Myself and danny did our best to sort out the lighting by setting up one tall light either side of the green screen to balance out the shadows and 1 inline with the camera pointing at the green screen. this set up helped a lot but wasn't perfect, chris said he would be able to work on this lighting problem through his own research and that due to his studio it currently wasn't really a problem anyway. here is the 2nd test:
As you can see the quality in much better.
The issue i had was i asked chris if we would be able to zoom into the studio for a more mid shot as the studio layout made the presenter feel a little small. Chris said this could be a problem but understood what i was looking for, he said he would work on this idea over the next few days before our shoot with fran and should be able to come up with a work around or alternative.
I am really pleased with the way our green screen went, if we hadn't have done it we may have been left with a poor quality video and not what we wanted. Things to improve on for the future would be to learn more about lighting as it is very important and i am still not fully confident with this sort of thing, i understand the 3 point lighting but for something more specific it is difficult and with a small room we can't have 5 or 6 lights and then 7 people working around them as it would be dangerous. I know in the studio tests this was the case but that room is much bigger. I have learnt a lot about green screen from this and also about the cameras we use as i haven't had a chance to use a canon before, but i would like to at some point and can see the difference and benefits and disadvantages a lot clearer now.
Stay safe,
Helen
We set up lighting and the green screen fairly quickly in lecture theatre 1 and found that this was enough space for walking around within our screen screen setting.
After the 1st test we noticed that the camera quality and lighting were posing a problem. We were using the sony ex and it just wasn't able to produce a sharp enough image and the lighting wasn't even everywhere. Here is the first test to show you:
The 2nd test was with a canon 7d that chris borrowed from Vic, this was much better and provided us with a much higher quality image. Myself and danny did our best to sort out the lighting by setting up one tall light either side of the green screen to balance out the shadows and 1 inline with the camera pointing at the green screen. this set up helped a lot but wasn't perfect, chris said he would be able to work on this lighting problem through his own research and that due to his studio it currently wasn't really a problem anyway. here is the 2nd test:
As you can see the quality in much better.
The issue i had was i asked chris if we would be able to zoom into the studio for a more mid shot as the studio layout made the presenter feel a little small. Chris said this could be a problem but understood what i was looking for, he said he would work on this idea over the next few days before our shoot with fran and should be able to come up with a work around or alternative.
I am really pleased with the way our green screen went, if we hadn't have done it we may have been left with a poor quality video and not what we wanted. Things to improve on for the future would be to learn more about lighting as it is very important and i am still not fully confident with this sort of thing, i understand the 3 point lighting but for something more specific it is difficult and with a small room we can't have 5 or 6 lights and then 7 people working around them as it would be dangerous. I know in the studio tests this was the case but that room is much bigger. I have learnt a lot about green screen from this and also about the cameras we use as i haven't had a chance to use a canon before, but i would like to at some point and can see the difference and benefits and disadvantages a lot clearer now.
Stay safe,
Helen
Sunday, 26 October 2014
Digital News: Jamie's Waiver
Jamie had to sign a waiver at KRG as he was using skates and their insurance wouldn't cover him as he didn't have his own mouthguard. In future this is a mental note for me as a producer to personally find out what equipment we needed but as chris was only told on the day of the shoot at 5pm of this fact so on a sunday we had no hope of finding one.
here is the waiver:
Stay safe,
Helen
here is the waiver:
Stay safe,
Helen
Digital News: Filming Day 2 Reflection
The 2nd filming session was in Herne Bay with the KRG. We arrived before training started and met with Jocomotion and Roxy Rink Rash to discuss more about what we were filming. I was really ill for this shoot but felt the most confident in speaking to the girls and getting our message across to them about what we wanted to film, especially as i had thoroughly researched the game and felt like i knew it like i know football. After a couple of edits to the script we were ready to go. When we first saw the space i was very happy as there was a higher up section where we would be able to film our commentary bit from. Danny, Chris and myself then had a little problem due to the fact Chris was uncertain if having the package in the middle of the live segment would work as how would people know what roller derby is about if they have never seen it before and felt having it at the start would be the best option. I mentioned to him that the only problem with this is that it is a lot of pressure on Jamie to speak live, unedited without the use of the prompter for about 1 minute 30 when he has only really had the full script today. Most of our set up is him interviewing the girls so the promter wasn't something we could use as he could keep looking back to the camera as we wanted it to be like a causal chat scenario. i wasn't sure if it was fair to him to have this extra pressure on getting it right in 1 full sweep. Jamie is naturally funny and for this to come across we need him to be relaxed and not stressed and although both Chris and Danny had confidence in his ability to deliver under pressure ultimately when we spoke to Jamie he said he much preferred splitting the live segment in 2. So that is what we did. I completely agreed with chris's point that if someone completely knew to the sport was seeing this then they might not understand it and it probably would have worked better reworking it but i think we were all more than happy with having this option as a sort of safety net.
This discussion however wasted a fair bit of time and as Danny pointed out a few times we were missing a lot of good stuff we could be filming. On reflection i think it might have been a better idea for everyone to be on the same wavelength when it came to this scenario. I had written the script taking into consideration both of these options but felt it would be easier and more manageable to film 2 shorter live pieces than 1 longer one. I don't think it was the right place to have this discussion and rightly so Danny was quick to encourage everyone back into the right focus and shake off this little set back.
We were all a little tense after this but soon enough our 1st interviewee came across, so i introduced myself and began prepping her the interview. I always enjoy this part of filming the most as i feel my strength is my people skills and hopefully relaxing each interviewee down enough so they appear natural and confident on camera. I also use this time to try and get any interesting information from them that we could quickly incorporate. Lady killer or Mollie was up first. She was a drama student so said she felt confident to help us get the answers we wanted and when i spoke with her she came across very likeable and funny so i was happy we would get a good interview. I ran through the questions with her and mentioned that is was a live piece so we would have to go through the whole process in 1 straight clip. She was a little daunted by this but after a few more minutes both her and jamie were ready.
This was the first time i wasn't actually interviewing anyone myself so i took the canon as our 2nd camera and chris and danny asked me to shoot the reaction shots of lady killer so i got a close up and focused on that. When danny was happy with the shots me and chris had we took a take. And i was so pleased when they both did a fabulous job on the 1st time of asking. Jamie was brilliant, and Mollie's answers were great! We were all so happy that we knew we wouldn't have to do a 2nd take, plus as it is a live piece it was important to us to get it done in 1 or 2 takes to get it to be natural and true to live news as possible.
The next part was organising jamie to get some skates and gear for his little lesson. We had already mentioned to the girls that we wanted him to take part and they kindly arranged for him to borrow a helmet, pads and skates. They then sent over one of the skaters called Boot'em Khamun. I again explained to her what we wanted and that jamie would ask her about her skate name and then explain his own we had come up for him, then she would need to teach him a simple skate move and then jamie would come back to the camera to sign off. She was a little bit more nervous about this than Lady Killer but again after a few minutes both of them were ready. For this piece we used a clip mic and attached it to Jamie. Jamie asked why we didn't use the hand mic he used earlier and have him pass it to us after but i felt it might be a little unprofessional plus we wouldn't be able to hear them as they skated away from us. We also had the 2nd audio and pointed that directly at Boot'em and had Hayley follow her when she skated away to try and continue to get her audio. In hindsight it would have been easier to have 2 clip mic's but we had to work with what we had. I think on the 2nd audio will hopefully be good enough to capture anything jamie's clip mic didn't pick up.
The 1st take of this interview was a little sloppy, the answers were great but we didn't know exactly where boot 'em was going to go so we missed a bit of her movements and myself and chris weren't able to pick it up with either camera. So we did a 2nd take just to make sure we could capture everything. We were pleased with what we got the 2nd time and i made it my job to follow boot 'em with the canon while chris focused on jamie until i was out of his way. Overall i was really happy with what we got from this interview and felt jamie again really managed to capture the sort of personality our channel needs and would clearly be appealing to our target audience.
We then moved our cameras for our commentary footage, chris took the sony up to the top of the seating to look down on a game kind of like they do in all other sports, a sort of birds eye view, while myself and danny took turns with the canon being the camera rinkside, capturing all the contacts, falls and pointscoring up close and personal. This was something we had prepared for in advance and knew exactly what we wanted. I had a few shot ideas as did danny so we had our own mental shot lists and made a note to try and capture as many of the things our commentary would need. Especially footage of the blockers, jammers and passing the star.
Today was a very stressful day as again we had 2 hours to film everything and by the end of the shoot i was feeling very ill indeed. I think what i have learnt from this shoot is that you need to be prepared and have numerous chats with your team about the angle and focus of the film. we all want whats best for the film but it has to be something the presenter or actor would be willing to do so that is why prepping them and yourselves is the best strategy. Having 2 cameras on this shoot really paid off and we would never have managed it with 1 camera and i think chris would have had a breakdown as it just wouldn't have worked and we would have ran out of time. One of the problems we had with Hero Hounds was continuity in terms of we filmed over 3 days for 3 weeks in a row and this meant the children, clothes and dogs were different each time. Filming everything over 1 day was great as it has taken away a lot of those issues and also means there is a lot less footage to sift through to find the right clip. What i would do differently would be to maybe have worked with Jamie a little more on the script and given it to him a lot earlier than we did. This was my fault and i should have thought about this issue before and is something i have already sorted with fran as she currently has this script. This would have meant we could have filmed in 1 long live segment as he probably would have been able to memorise his questions and segments but i would have also had to rework the entire piece so it would be very different and as danny said we wouldn't have been able to have him stood in a helmet and skates from the beginning as it would have looked odd so that whole part would have been scrapped and this is something teacher helen said she liked about our piece.
The girls even asked me and hayley to join their squad so as i no longer play football i might just take them up on the offer.
Stay safe,
Helen
This discussion however wasted a fair bit of time and as Danny pointed out a few times we were missing a lot of good stuff we could be filming. On reflection i think it might have been a better idea for everyone to be on the same wavelength when it came to this scenario. I had written the script taking into consideration both of these options but felt it would be easier and more manageable to film 2 shorter live pieces than 1 longer one. I don't think it was the right place to have this discussion and rightly so Danny was quick to encourage everyone back into the right focus and shake off this little set back.
We were all a little tense after this but soon enough our 1st interviewee came across, so i introduced myself and began prepping her the interview. I always enjoy this part of filming the most as i feel my strength is my people skills and hopefully relaxing each interviewee down enough so they appear natural and confident on camera. I also use this time to try and get any interesting information from them that we could quickly incorporate. Lady killer or Mollie was up first. She was a drama student so said she felt confident to help us get the answers we wanted and when i spoke with her she came across very likeable and funny so i was happy we would get a good interview. I ran through the questions with her and mentioned that is was a live piece so we would have to go through the whole process in 1 straight clip. She was a little daunted by this but after a few more minutes both her and jamie were ready.
This was the first time i wasn't actually interviewing anyone myself so i took the canon as our 2nd camera and chris and danny asked me to shoot the reaction shots of lady killer so i got a close up and focused on that. When danny was happy with the shots me and chris had we took a take. And i was so pleased when they both did a fabulous job on the 1st time of asking. Jamie was brilliant, and Mollie's answers were great! We were all so happy that we knew we wouldn't have to do a 2nd take, plus as it is a live piece it was important to us to get it done in 1 or 2 takes to get it to be natural and true to live news as possible.
The next part was organising jamie to get some skates and gear for his little lesson. We had already mentioned to the girls that we wanted him to take part and they kindly arranged for him to borrow a helmet, pads and skates. They then sent over one of the skaters called Boot'em Khamun. I again explained to her what we wanted and that jamie would ask her about her skate name and then explain his own we had come up for him, then she would need to teach him a simple skate move and then jamie would come back to the camera to sign off. She was a little bit more nervous about this than Lady Killer but again after a few minutes both of them were ready. For this piece we used a clip mic and attached it to Jamie. Jamie asked why we didn't use the hand mic he used earlier and have him pass it to us after but i felt it might be a little unprofessional plus we wouldn't be able to hear them as they skated away from us. We also had the 2nd audio and pointed that directly at Boot'em and had Hayley follow her when she skated away to try and continue to get her audio. In hindsight it would have been easier to have 2 clip mic's but we had to work with what we had. I think on the 2nd audio will hopefully be good enough to capture anything jamie's clip mic didn't pick up.
The 1st take of this interview was a little sloppy, the answers were great but we didn't know exactly where boot 'em was going to go so we missed a bit of her movements and myself and chris weren't able to pick it up with either camera. So we did a 2nd take just to make sure we could capture everything. We were pleased with what we got the 2nd time and i made it my job to follow boot 'em with the canon while chris focused on jamie until i was out of his way. Overall i was really happy with what we got from this interview and felt jamie again really managed to capture the sort of personality our channel needs and would clearly be appealing to our target audience.
We then moved our cameras for our commentary footage, chris took the sony up to the top of the seating to look down on a game kind of like they do in all other sports, a sort of birds eye view, while myself and danny took turns with the canon being the camera rinkside, capturing all the contacts, falls and pointscoring up close and personal. This was something we had prepared for in advance and knew exactly what we wanted. I had a few shot ideas as did danny so we had our own mental shot lists and made a note to try and capture as many of the things our commentary would need. Especially footage of the blockers, jammers and passing the star.
Today was a very stressful day as again we had 2 hours to film everything and by the end of the shoot i was feeling very ill indeed. I think what i have learnt from this shoot is that you need to be prepared and have numerous chats with your team about the angle and focus of the film. we all want whats best for the film but it has to be something the presenter or actor would be willing to do so that is why prepping them and yourselves is the best strategy. Having 2 cameras on this shoot really paid off and we would never have managed it with 1 camera and i think chris would have had a breakdown as it just wouldn't have worked and we would have ran out of time. One of the problems we had with Hero Hounds was continuity in terms of we filmed over 3 days for 3 weeks in a row and this meant the children, clothes and dogs were different each time. Filming everything over 1 day was great as it has taken away a lot of those issues and also means there is a lot less footage to sift through to find the right clip. What i would do differently would be to maybe have worked with Jamie a little more on the script and given it to him a lot earlier than we did. This was my fault and i should have thought about this issue before and is something i have already sorted with fran as she currently has this script. This would have meant we could have filmed in 1 long live segment as he probably would have been able to memorise his questions and segments but i would have also had to rework the entire piece so it would be very different and as danny said we wouldn't have been able to have him stood in a helmet and skates from the beginning as it would have looked odd so that whole part would have been scrapped and this is something teacher helen said she liked about our piece.
The girls even asked me and hayley to join their squad so as i no longer play football i might just take them up on the offer.
Stay safe,
Helen
Friday, 24 October 2014
Digital News: Filming Day 1 Reflection
Today myself, chris and danny visited Pole Persona in rochester to film our Package. We met at 10:30am where 2 instructors and a class participant were there. When we went inside we had already been informed that there was a mirror on one wall of the room, Similarly to when we filmed in essex. We knew this would be one of our major stumbling blocks as the room was a lot smaller than Essex.
We began by discussing with the girls in a little bit more detail what we were looking to film. I had already had this discussion with Angie but now had the script to show her a clearer picture. We then let the girls warm up while, we discussed a quick idea on how to film, as we had the Canon and the Sony EX, chris suggested that he focus on any close ups and myself and danny take it in turns with audio and the canon for the more artsy shots and wider shots. We thought this was a good idea and took this approach to filming. After setting up we began by having the girls perform various pole moves so as we could go around and film each person and the group. This worked well as we knew it would provide plenty of cut aways during interviews and shots of the girls in action. We then asked if Angie could 'Teach' a class so we could show our audience an example when she is discussing the benefits of pole fitness especially as they do a lot more than just pole work. This worked well as it provided us with another example of how the classes work and gave us a bit of variety in terms of footage.
The next thing we did was set up for the interviews - Danny would direct & check audio, i would ask the questions and Chris would film. For the interviews we wanted to make sure our eye levels and framing was spot on this time as this is something that was a problem in hero hounds. Chris and danny both had me moving around to get the perfect eye level for the shot for each interview and on reviewing the footage they did a great job.
One of the problems we faced was that the girls weren't too keen on the interview section as they were very nervous, i did my best to reassure them that we would take our time and i went through each question with them in advance as i found that helped our hero hound interviews and prepared our interviewee's of their answers. Beth was particularly nervous and we had to try and get her to focus her eyes on me as she accidentally kept looking at the camera.
One of my ideas was to have someone do pole in the background of an interview. I thought it would be an interesting shot and a great use of depth of field. Danny and Chris suggested Angie as she was the most keen so during Beth's interview we set up the shot accordingly and it looked very good.
I was really pleased with both Beth and Angie's interviews and the answers they gave were fantastic, they left us a lot of scope for cutaways and were interesting. If there answer was a bit vague i reworded the question or got them to expand a bit as to give us plenty of options in the edit.
We wanted to make it interactive so our viewers could see how difficult it was for beginners. So Danny and myself had a little go. It was much more difficult than we thought and we filmed the results as a potential clip for our package. We then filmed a couple more cut aways of things around the class including high heels used for the 'sexier' class and some pole fitness pictures that angie had collected and put on the walls.
We finally filmed the outside of the centre and asked the girls to arrive and open up so it would give us a introduction option.
Overall i was really pleased with the filming today. We only had 2 hours to film everything as it was angle's birthday and we weren't time conscious which was good. We managed to take our time and get everything we needed. I think it was a great idea to have 2 cameras for this shoot as it meant we were able to film the same event from 2 angles and 2 different shot types.
Things we could improve on were perhaps seeking out people to be interviews who were keen for this to happen rather than use people who weren't particularly confident about the whole situation. I think that they did an excellent job though and was really pleased. Another thing we could think about for the future is a location scout. Although we tried really hard to visit the centre before filming we never heard back so went in blind. Location scouts are very important and if we had not had the experience from hero hound with mirrored rooms then it would have been a big shock and caused a lot of problems. It also would have been nice to have a few more members to film so it looked less staged, however i think that Angie did ask around but due to stigma that comes with pole dancing and how people look most people didn't want to be on camera.
Stay safe,
Helen
We began by discussing with the girls in a little bit more detail what we were looking to film. I had already had this discussion with Angie but now had the script to show her a clearer picture. We then let the girls warm up while, we discussed a quick idea on how to film, as we had the Canon and the Sony EX, chris suggested that he focus on any close ups and myself and danny take it in turns with audio and the canon for the more artsy shots and wider shots. We thought this was a good idea and took this approach to filming. After setting up we began by having the girls perform various pole moves so as we could go around and film each person and the group. This worked well as we knew it would provide plenty of cut aways during interviews and shots of the girls in action. We then asked if Angie could 'Teach' a class so we could show our audience an example when she is discussing the benefits of pole fitness especially as they do a lot more than just pole work. This worked well as it provided us with another example of how the classes work and gave us a bit of variety in terms of footage.
The next thing we did was set up for the interviews - Danny would direct & check audio, i would ask the questions and Chris would film. For the interviews we wanted to make sure our eye levels and framing was spot on this time as this is something that was a problem in hero hounds. Chris and danny both had me moving around to get the perfect eye level for the shot for each interview and on reviewing the footage they did a great job.
One of the problems we faced was that the girls weren't too keen on the interview section as they were very nervous, i did my best to reassure them that we would take our time and i went through each question with them in advance as i found that helped our hero hound interviews and prepared our interviewee's of their answers. Beth was particularly nervous and we had to try and get her to focus her eyes on me as she accidentally kept looking at the camera.
One of my ideas was to have someone do pole in the background of an interview. I thought it would be an interesting shot and a great use of depth of field. Danny and Chris suggested Angie as she was the most keen so during Beth's interview we set up the shot accordingly and it looked very good.
I was really pleased with both Beth and Angie's interviews and the answers they gave were fantastic, they left us a lot of scope for cutaways and were interesting. If there answer was a bit vague i reworded the question or got them to expand a bit as to give us plenty of options in the edit.
We wanted to make it interactive so our viewers could see how difficult it was for beginners. So Danny and myself had a little go. It was much more difficult than we thought and we filmed the results as a potential clip for our package. We then filmed a couple more cut aways of things around the class including high heels used for the 'sexier' class and some pole fitness pictures that angie had collected and put on the walls.
We finally filmed the outside of the centre and asked the girls to arrive and open up so it would give us a introduction option.
Overall i was really pleased with the filming today. We only had 2 hours to film everything as it was angle's birthday and we weren't time conscious which was good. We managed to take our time and get everything we needed. I think it was a great idea to have 2 cameras for this shoot as it meant we were able to film the same event from 2 angles and 2 different shot types.
Things we could improve on were perhaps seeking out people to be interviews who were keen for this to happen rather than use people who weren't particularly confident about the whole situation. I think that they did an excellent job though and was really pleased. Another thing we could think about for the future is a location scout. Although we tried really hard to visit the centre before filming we never heard back so went in blind. Location scouts are very important and if we had not had the experience from hero hound with mirrored rooms then it would have been a big shock and caused a lot of problems. It also would have been nice to have a few more members to film so it looked less staged, however i think that Angie did ask around but due to stigma that comes with pole dancing and how people look most people didn't want to be on camera.
Stay safe,
Helen
Digital News: Consent forms Pole Persona
Here are the consent forms form filming at pole persona... Beths, Angie's and Emma's
I made sure i took plenty along as i wasn't sure how many people would be there.
I made sure i took plenty along as i wasn't sure how many people would be there.
Stay safe,
Helen
Thursday, 23 October 2014
Fiction Adaption: Cinematographer Search
Today i posted an advert on Casting call pro & Star now under the film crew section as i am very keen to work with a outside cinematographer in order to help me get the visuals i want for my project.
I remember that at the start of 1st year when we were shown the previous students work that simon had said that one person had found a cinematographer and when i watched their work it was very impressive and clearly helped capture the look they were going for.
Here is my advert:
http://www.filmandtvpro.com/uk/job_view.php?uid=246624
I am hopeful of finding someone who i can work well with and is as passionate about this project as me.
Stay safe,
Helen
I remember that at the start of 1st year when we were shown the previous students work that simon had said that one person had found a cinematographer and when i watched their work it was very impressive and clearly helped capture the look they were going for.
Here is my advert:
http://www.filmandtvpro.com/uk/job_view.php?uid=246624
I am hopeful of finding someone who i can work well with and is as passionate about this project as me.
Stay safe,
Helen
Monday, 20 October 2014
Friday, 17 October 2014
Digital News: Rochester Film
Here is the finished rochester tourism film:
i think its a fairly good video and i like a lot of the shots we have used. I think it would have been nice to incorporate some of the history of rochester including its charles dickens heritage and some things about the sweeps festival. I also think it would have been better to use more of danny as the presenter as one minute he is there and the next he isn't. a little bit of consistence would be good and this is something i will learn from for the main project. It has given me a little bit more of an incite into filming a package for the news and i found it useful preparation.
Stay safe,
Helen
i think its a fairly good video and i like a lot of the shots we have used. I think it would have been nice to incorporate some of the history of rochester including its charles dickens heritage and some things about the sweeps festival. I also think it would have been better to use more of danny as the presenter as one minute he is there and the next he isn't. a little bit of consistence would be good and this is something i will learn from for the main project. It has given me a little bit more of an incite into filming a package for the news and i found it useful preparation.
Stay safe,
Helen
Thursday, 16 October 2014
Digital News: Contacting KRG
Chris and myself emailed the Kent Roller Girls through Facebook and their email address however all their emails seemed to bounce back so i began to get worried. Then Chris said he had heard back of a player called Jocamotion and that they were really keen to be involved. Initially as we knew they trained in Chatham we felt this would be our best filming location as it wasn't too far, however Jo mentioned that the sessions they do in Herne bay are for the squad players and the ones in chatham are more for beginners. We had a chat amongst ourselves and said that we would go to a sunday session. She mentioned that the track they have is more professional and their is even a spectator area and that during the sessions in herne bay they have bouts which would be a match to us outside of the sport. This felt like it would be perfect and chris said that she had mentioned a lot of the girls are used to speaking on camera or would be willing to be interviewed so this was great.
now to put the finishing touches to our plan for filming.
Stay safe,
Helen
now to put the finishing touches to our plan for filming.
Stay safe,
Helen
Wednesday, 15 October 2014
Monday, 13 October 2014
Fiction Adaption: Budget & Scriptwriting
One of the biggest things i have learnt about screenwriting is that you have to write with a budget in mind. You cant be writing about aliens and spaceships and being set in a galaxy far far away where most of your scenes are featuring CGI characters if your a.) funding the project yourself and you dont have the resources to pile money into it & b.) wanting someone else to fund it and you've clearly written with money most definitely not on the mind. Obviously in this case im funding the project and if i did want someone else to make the project i would need to have a realistic script that could be made sucessfully as i would be considered a risk. Money plays an important part in film and television and therefore i have thought about it as ive made my script, ive also thought about locations as ive written the script as i need to know what is logistically possible. I cant be writing about speeding down the thames on a hovercraft as im fairly certain im not going to be able to get the access.
These things are important as i'm not only the director but also the screen writer and as screenwriting is something im very passionate about i want to be able to create something that is moving and special and i would rather put money into actors or cinematographers than paying £700 for something like an hour in a safari park just to get a tiny scene shot. I'm sure in the future, when i work with an outside director on a script ive written that they will also appreciate this.
stay safe,
helen
These things are important as i'm not only the director but also the screen writer and as screenwriting is something im very passionate about i want to be able to create something that is moving and special and i would rather put money into actors or cinematographers than paying £700 for something like an hour in a safari park just to get a tiny scene shot. I'm sure in the future, when i work with an outside director on a script ive written that they will also appreciate this.
stay safe,
helen
Digital News: Story Change
After danny spoke to the agent for our freestyle footballer, he sent him an email to discuss things further but said he didnt feel that confident in us being able to link up with him as part of our news. We decided to try and look at other avenues we could pursue for a story. After speaking with helen we liked the idea of just having a female news sports channel and a quick bit of youtube research came with the response that there is definitely a gap in the market for this kind of thing. I had heard a radio show over the summer about Roller Derby and so i decided to look to see if there was a team in kent. I was fairly shocked to see there was and that they train in Chatham! After explaining a bit more about it to the boys and showing them the sight they liked the sound of it and especially the funny roller derby names. Danny mentioned he had a friend who might suit a sort of 'Roving Reporter style' and that he was a really funny guy who would handle the live situation well and could work for this sort of segment too. So Danny got in touch with him and myself and chris drafted an email to the roller derby girls and shall wait for a response.
Hopefully this will be the one!
Stay safe,
Helen
To Whom it May Concern,
My name is Helen Welsh, I am 2nd year student at the University for the Creative Arts,
currently studying Television Production. I am the Producer of a new online channel for 16-25, focused on innovative sports around the area of Kent. I would like to know if we could do a 2 minute story about the Kent Roller Girls and what you do. We will be coming to you in Chatham for this project. We are really excited of being part of this unique sport and showing the local people about this exciting activity. If possible, we would like to have a contact number to discuss and explain more in depth what our aim is about. If you rather arrange a meeting with us, we are more than willing to come to you.
Kind Regards,
Tekkers Productions,
Helen Welsh, Danny Hewitt & Chris Sarmiento
My name is Helen Welsh, I am 2nd year student at the University for the Creative Arts,
currently studying Television Production. I am the Producer of a new online channel for 16-25, focused on innovative sports around the area of Kent. I would like to know if we could do a 2 minute story about the Kent Roller Girls and what you do. We will be coming to you in Chatham for this project. We are really excited of being part of this unique sport and showing the local people about this exciting activity. If possible, we would like to have a contact number to discuss and explain more in depth what our aim is about. If you rather arrange a meeting with us, we are more than willing to come to you.
Kind Regards,
Tekkers Productions,
Helen Welsh, Danny Hewitt & Chris Sarmiento
Hopefully this will be the one!
Stay safe,
Helen
Digital News: Roller Derby Research
I have been doing a lot of research into roller derby so i can understand the game as if i played the sport. I think this will not only help when writing the script but also help to connect with it and understand what we should film and what is going on during training.
Our current idea is to focus on the fact that roller derby is the fastest growing female sport in the UK, something that i did not know about. I found out this information through various news articles but found it difficult to find any facts or figures to support this.
Here are the articles i found:
http://thepositive.com/roller-derby-female-sport-britain/
"The Positive talks to the stars of roller derby, the UK’s fastest growing female sport
Our current idea is to focus on the fact that roller derby is the fastest growing female sport in the UK, something that i did not know about. I found out this information through various news articles but found it difficult to find any facts or figures to support this.
Here are the articles i found:
http://thepositive.com/roller-derby-female-sport-britain/
"The Positive talks to the stars of roller derby, the UK’s fastest growing female sport
As Britain nurses the hangover from London 2012, there has been some concern that the legacy of the Games is bypassing women. But there’s one almost exclusively female sport that is thriving and gaining momentum in the UK: roller derby."
"It has been described as "a series of muggings on skates" and is the fastest-growing women's sport in the UK."
"A sport which originated in Chicago in the United States of America in the 1930s is enjoying a resurgence - and is the fastest growing women's sport in Wales."
Due to this lack of statistics and facts i had to search through UK surveys to try and find some hard evidence to support this statement. I felt that if the independent are calling it the fastest growing women's sport in the UK it must be the case though.
I eventually stumbled across this:
http://rollerbillies.com/2009/04/05/hello-world-2/
"the first UK league, the London Rollergirls, was established in 2006 by American and Australian ex-pats"
http://ukrda.org.uk/?p=90
"Arriving in the UK in April 2006, roller derby is a unique, fast-paced and fast-growing female-dominated sport. In the beginning, there were only a handful of active leagues, now just over 4 years later, there are currently in excess of 70 leagues nationwide." (February 2011)
http://www.redditchadvertiser.co.uk/archive/2006/10/30/993771.Bee_s_on_a_roll_with_US_craze/?ref=arc
"Bee, 36, from Studley, has been skating for 30 years and is recruiting other women to take up the sport so a Birmingham league can be formed." - October 2006
Two further leagues would form in early 2007 - glasgow and a 2nd in london.
Here are some other useful stories -
http://ukrda.org.uk/?p=90
"Roller derby recognised as a sport in the uk - February 2011"
http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2014/jun/18/could-the-men-of-roller-derby-become-sports-first-male-feminists
"Revitalised on the back of third-wave feminism, roller derby, a contact sport on skates that is created, owned and managed by women, is a direct challenge to the male domination of sport. A sport that says women can be just as aggressive, just as competitive and just as entertaining. And a sport that demands women get top billing – just as men do everywhere else."
http://rollerbillies.com/2009/04/05/hello-world-2/
"the first UK league, the London Rollergirls, was established in 2006 by American and Australian ex-pats"
http://ukrda.org.uk/?p=90
"Arriving in the UK in April 2006, roller derby is a unique, fast-paced and fast-growing female-dominated sport. In the beginning, there were only a handful of active leagues, now just over 4 years later, there are currently in excess of 70 leagues nationwide." (February 2011)
http://www.redditchadvertiser.co.uk/archive/2006/10/30/993771.Bee_s_on_a_roll_with_US_craze/?ref=arc
"Bee, 36, from Studley, has been skating for 30 years and is recruiting other women to take up the sport so a Birmingham league can be formed." - October 2006
Two further leagues would form in early 2007 - glasgow and a 2nd in london.
Here are some other useful stories -
http://ukrda.org.uk/?p=90
"Roller derby recognised as a sport in the uk - February 2011"
http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2014/jun/18/could-the-men-of-roller-derby-become-sports-first-male-feminists
"Revitalised on the back of third-wave feminism, roller derby, a contact sport on skates that is created, owned and managed by women, is a direct challenge to the male domination of sport. A sport that says women can be just as aggressive, just as competitive and just as entertaining. And a sport that demands women get top billing – just as men do everywhere else."
http://www.kentrollergirls.com
More information on the league we will be featuring.
What is roller derby?
More information on the league we will be featuring.
What is roller derby?
Roller Derby Bootcamp:
The people of roller Derby:
Roller Derby Culture:
I found these videos really useful as they helped me to understand the rules and some of the calls involved in the sort. I like this idea that roller derby is more than just a sport its a lifestyle and the culture and everything behind it really intrigues me. Obviously it is much easier to learn the rules of any sport through participation so i felt that perhaps watching a game would help me further.
Here is a game of roller derby in action, i like the filming style and commentary and hope to create something similar for our piece:
I have also been watching whip it, the roller derby film from 2009. Whip it was the directorial debut from drew barrymore and features 2 of my favourite actresses Kirsten Wiig and Ellen Page. Here is the trailer for the film.
One of the things i found interesting about roller derby are the nicknames.
here is a video explaining a little bit more about how Roller Derby names:
I also fund an interesting and ultimate guide to roller derby names:
All of these videos and articles have really given me a better understanding of the sport and i feel confident in getting the right portrayal things across.
Stay safe,
Helen
Saturday, 11 October 2014
Digital News Project: Rochester Filming Task
Today myself, danny and chris filmed our rochester tourism video.
The day started with myself popping down to cineworld, where i work, to ask them if would be possible to film inside during a quiet period and also to get a quick interview with one of the managers if they weren't to busy. They said that this was fine and they would be available for an interview as long as it remained quiet.
When the boys arrived we got everything set up and chris realised that the clip mic batteries were almost dead - on reflection i now will make sure i bring batteries to every shoot even if i am not in charge of the kit. He also forgot to charge he camera batteries but luckily they were both full. I went into my work and borrowed some batteries so we were very lucky or it would have messed up our whole day. We began by filming a quick walking scene outside the cinema. Danny was our presenter for this piece. We got him to walk by the posters to help orientate people to the cinema and lined up the shots quiet well. Chris then did a couple of cut aways of the river, the various eat out places, and the cinema itself. I then checked to see if my manger was available but the cinema was incredibly busy, he said to come back in 15 minutes so we decided to go away and film a couple of other bits. We decided to shoot the ending and then hopefully we could get our interview. The only problems we had in this location were that it was right next to a road and cars kept whizzing past and therefore we could pick it up on audio so i decided to be on car watch and then hopefully we could get the filming done inbetween cars. Luckily we managed it but as we didnt do a location scout we didnt think about this. On all my future shoots this will remind me of how important it is to remember as it would have been a nightmare to film a long scene for a short film a this location. We then went back to the cinema but although it was quiet my manager was still unavailable so we decided to shoot the cut aways and all other relevent stuff and then see what we could do. After this was finished with i made the decision to do the interview myself as we were wasting time and i could answer all the questions anyway. I then was interviewed by danny and chris and danny set up the shot. We decided to have it by a film standee and i borrowed some uniform of one of the other workers on shift. After that we went to our next location which was hollywood bowl so we could film bowling as an exciting activty to do in rochester. However it was packed and the next available slot was at 6pm so we couldnt film it. Instead we filmed chris and danny playing air hockey on a table at the arcade they have and i did a 360 turn to try and show the bowling alley but it was difficult. This has taught me to always plan and although this was just a test project it would have been a disaster if we had just turned up thinking we could go bowling and then been turned away on a proper shoot. I have learned you always need to plan dates and times with the people you are filming or places you are filming at. Getting an exact time and date helps things to be less stressful and also more professional and doesnt leave you in the lurch. We decided to have some food and then head back to rochester castle and catherdral to do the final bits.
As chris had work myself and danny did the last 2 bits to try and show a little more culture and history. We wanted to go into the cathedral but a service was on so we had to stand outside and film a couple of interesting shots and i think due to the sunlight it looked pretty nice. Rochester castle also looked really nice is this lighting so this was really good for filming. We then walked back to give the footage to chris when i realised we hadnt really got a way to begin the film - we decided to film the welcome to rochester sign so we could get danny to do a voice over and hoepfully that would make the film flow.
From this project i also learnt the importance of having a solid flowing idea. i felt that we didnt utilise danny enough as a presenter and he sort of would appear one minute and then not the next. We didnt really think it through properly and so for next time i would definailty be able to improve on this aspect. Chris will now put the film together using the script outline and we will record danny's v/o later in the week.
stay safe,
helen
The day started with myself popping down to cineworld, where i work, to ask them if would be possible to film inside during a quiet period and also to get a quick interview with one of the managers if they weren't to busy. They said that this was fine and they would be available for an interview as long as it remained quiet.
When the boys arrived we got everything set up and chris realised that the clip mic batteries were almost dead - on reflection i now will make sure i bring batteries to every shoot even if i am not in charge of the kit. He also forgot to charge he camera batteries but luckily they were both full. I went into my work and borrowed some batteries so we were very lucky or it would have messed up our whole day. We began by filming a quick walking scene outside the cinema. Danny was our presenter for this piece. We got him to walk by the posters to help orientate people to the cinema and lined up the shots quiet well. Chris then did a couple of cut aways of the river, the various eat out places, and the cinema itself. I then checked to see if my manger was available but the cinema was incredibly busy, he said to come back in 15 minutes so we decided to go away and film a couple of other bits. We decided to shoot the ending and then hopefully we could get our interview. The only problems we had in this location were that it was right next to a road and cars kept whizzing past and therefore we could pick it up on audio so i decided to be on car watch and then hopefully we could get the filming done inbetween cars. Luckily we managed it but as we didnt do a location scout we didnt think about this. On all my future shoots this will remind me of how important it is to remember as it would have been a nightmare to film a long scene for a short film a this location. We then went back to the cinema but although it was quiet my manager was still unavailable so we decided to shoot the cut aways and all other relevent stuff and then see what we could do. After this was finished with i made the decision to do the interview myself as we were wasting time and i could answer all the questions anyway. I then was interviewed by danny and chris and danny set up the shot. We decided to have it by a film standee and i borrowed some uniform of one of the other workers on shift. After that we went to our next location which was hollywood bowl so we could film bowling as an exciting activty to do in rochester. However it was packed and the next available slot was at 6pm so we couldnt film it. Instead we filmed chris and danny playing air hockey on a table at the arcade they have and i did a 360 turn to try and show the bowling alley but it was difficult. This has taught me to always plan and although this was just a test project it would have been a disaster if we had just turned up thinking we could go bowling and then been turned away on a proper shoot. I have learned you always need to plan dates and times with the people you are filming or places you are filming at. Getting an exact time and date helps things to be less stressful and also more professional and doesnt leave you in the lurch. We decided to have some food and then head back to rochester castle and catherdral to do the final bits.
As chris had work myself and danny did the last 2 bits to try and show a little more culture and history. We wanted to go into the cathedral but a service was on so we had to stand outside and film a couple of interesting shots and i think due to the sunlight it looked pretty nice. Rochester castle also looked really nice is this lighting so this was really good for filming. We then walked back to give the footage to chris when i realised we hadnt really got a way to begin the film - we decided to film the welcome to rochester sign so we could get danny to do a voice over and hoepfully that would make the film flow.
From this project i also learnt the importance of having a solid flowing idea. i felt that we didnt utilise danny enough as a presenter and he sort of would appear one minute and then not the next. We didnt really think it through properly and so for next time i would definailty be able to improve on this aspect. Chris will now put the film together using the script outline and we will record danny's v/o later in the week.
stay safe,
helen
Friday, 10 October 2014
Digital News: News Package workshop
Teacher Helen set us a task today to put together a news package about tourism in the local area. We chose Rochester as it was the most convenient area and as we are doing our main project planning also it would be good time management. In the group we had a discussion about what we could look at in rochester for tourism. As i work at Cineworld Rochester i mentioned that we could have fairly good access to the cinema and we could interview myself or one of the management about what tourism brings to the cinema. Chris is member of the virgin gym at the same location so we thought we could also talk about this, and danny mentioned about the bowling in this area also so we decided it would be a really good location to film and save a lot of time. We also spoke about looking at rochester high street, the castle and the cathedral.
That night i did some research on Rochester and learned more about the town and its story. It holds events to do with Charles Dickens as he was very fond of the town and actually used some of the locations around the area as inspiration for his books including Great Expectations. The 1959 James Bond Goldfinger describes Bond driving along the A2 through the Medway Towns from Strood to Chatham. Of interest is the mention of "inevitable traffic jams" on the Strood side of Rochester Bridge, the novel being written some years prior to the construction of the M2 motorway Medway bypass.
Many famous faces also have a connection to rochester - Kelly Brook was schooled in the area, Comedian Joe Pasquale and James and Ola Jordan from Strictly Come Dancing live in the area as does Singer Songwriter Tara Macdonald.
I thought these things were interesting and will help us on shoot tomorrow as we travel around rochester and film our segments.
Stay safe,
Helen
That night i did some research on Rochester and learned more about the town and its story. It holds events to do with Charles Dickens as he was very fond of the town and actually used some of the locations around the area as inspiration for his books including Great Expectations. The 1959 James Bond Goldfinger describes Bond driving along the A2 through the Medway Towns from Strood to Chatham. Of interest is the mention of "inevitable traffic jams" on the Strood side of Rochester Bridge, the novel being written some years prior to the construction of the M2 motorway Medway bypass.
Many famous faces also have a connection to rochester - Kelly Brook was schooled in the area, Comedian Joe Pasquale and James and Ola Jordan from Strictly Come Dancing live in the area as does Singer Songwriter Tara Macdonald.
I thought these things were interesting and will help us on shoot tomorrow as we travel around rochester and film our segments.
Stay safe,
Helen
Fiction Adaption: How should the words be delivered?
I have asked myself this question a few times recently - How should the words from the poem be utilised in my adaption. I have spoken to my friends about this and mentioned how i initally felt that prehaps the boy could say these lines, like a voice over. But it was mentioned to me that as my main character is someone who has learning difficulties of some sort that prehaps the wording of the poem is a little advance and therefore this would loose its effectiveness. I then said how my other thought was to have the mother of the boy say the words through v/o. They felt that this would work well so im currently thinking more along these lines. I will post and advert on casting websites for an actress as i may need to include a scene with the mother at some point to show who this women speaking is but i will run this idea past simon and helen and see which if they think possibly a v/o artist would work just as well. Her voice is obviously the most important part as i want someone who is able to deliver the poem in a certain light. She also needs to look like a mother though so it needs to be the right balance. I won't rule out having jack say the lines as i still think this could be a good portrayal.
stay safe,
Helen
stay safe,
Helen
Digital News: Finding a 2nd Story
We have spent a lot of time trying to decide what our 2nd story should be. After we didn't hear back from John our freestyle option we decided to find something more alternative and possibly continue our theme of bringing fresh and sidelined sports into the forefront. We began brain storming possible ideas out loud over a meeting. We were suggesting things such as possibly looking at women's football, Karting, Roller Derby etc. I thought roller derby could possibly work if we found a local team and a quick search on google proved this to be not only true but very local - Rochester & Chatham!
After looking at their websites we began to get even more enthralled by the story, the nicknames they give to each other, how the sport works, The fact the rochester team is a coed while the other is soley a women's team. All this is quite interesting and possibly something that could make an interesting story especially if we speak to the players and learn more about them.
We decided to give them a quick email and to continue to look for a phone number to engage properly with them about our project.
Hopefully we will hear from them soon!
Stay safe,
Helen
After looking at their websites we began to get even more enthralled by the story, the nicknames they give to each other, how the sport works, The fact the rochester team is a coed while the other is soley a women's team. All this is quite interesting and possibly something that could make an interesting story especially if we speak to the players and learn more about them.
We decided to give them a quick email and to continue to look for a phone number to engage properly with them about our project.
Hopefully we will hear from them soon!
Stay safe,
Helen
Thursday, 9 October 2014
Fiction adaption: Script outline
Here is a breakdown of my script in a basic form using an outline of what im currently thinking for each section of the poem.
The ? in the outline are bits that i'm yet to figure out and will be discussing with my friends and helen and Simon to get some outside views.
Overall im really pleased with how its going as i feel im getting a clear picture of the characters and the flow of the story im telling.
stay safe,
Helen
The ? in the outline are bits that i'm yet to figure out and will be discussing with my friends and helen and Simon to get some outside views.
Overall im really pleased with how its going as i feel im getting a clear picture of the characters and the flow of the story im telling.
stay safe,
Helen
Wednesday, 8 October 2014
Digital News: Branding Meeting
Today myself, danny and chris met to discuss some of the branding as part of our channel. We made it our priority to come up with a design for channel logo. We all know that most channels have a clear logo that makes it clear what channel is which and that logo also reflects the style and brand that they are delivering.
One of the points from my research is that the colour and font need to reflect our channel's identity and professionalism. One of the things we did for hero hounds was to use a paw print text which was a little quirky and helped to get our child friendly message across, However from my research into font i had found that any fonts that are a little different or quirky can make your brand a little less professional. We want our channel to be professional but also relatable so i thought an american college sports style text would not only look simple enough to remain professional but would help us to become instantly recognisable as a sports brand. When it came to colours we ruled out colours like pink, red and blue for the reasons that - pink is far too girly, red and blue are easily recognisable for certain sports teams colours - a man united fan wouldnt be seen dead in a man city blue for example - we also wanted to steer clear of using colours that were already in use by popular sports/ news channels - bbc are red, sky are red/blue.
We spent a long time talking and trying to think of a colour that could work when we all agreed on purple. Then we wanted a second colour that would help get our logo standing out. Chris was testing some colours out when he chose orange. Instantly it just felt right. It worked well and it was eye catching and also 2 colours that i feel women would like. From my research purple means creative and orange means friendly. Barbie, Aussie hair products and Cadburys all have a purple logo while nickelodeon, fanta and amazon use orange in their logo's.
Chris pointed out that we needed to come up with a way of creating something simple prehaps using the letters TTV to create a logo for the brand . We cant just write Tekkers TV in the corner of the youtube channel. (This is something i had mentioned earlier that i thought would be cool as a lot of channels always have a logo in the corner and most youtube channels do now aswell).
He googled some examples of tv station logo's to show us. Here is a similar picture to what he showed us:
We also spoke about our website and i mentioned we should use white as the base colour as too much orange and purple would be really garish and uncomfy on the eyes for too long.
The next point we discussed was our slogan - We knew danny would be the man for this job as he is always coming up with great puns and catchy phrases so hed already brought a few ideas to the table through our facebook chat.
Sports. News. Now
This is very catchy and it felt very much like a slogan that sky sports would use for their trailers. I liked this idea.
Over The Line
Danny also mentioned about wanting to use the phrase over the line. I liked this idea very much, it could be used in a few different ways - bringing sports news over the line for example - but we couldnt think of a catchy enough way of incorporating it.
Net
Danny mentioned using the word Net in a sentance for our slogan as it means internet and therefore goes with the digital news aspect but also helps with our sports brand - we could say, in the net, on the net. I liked this ideas also as it a little different from the others but also explains what the brand is. However because we arent using sports that have balls in them or basically mainstream sports it wouldnt work for the specifics of our channel.
Shooting sport onto your screen
This one we felt might be misinterpreted so we decided against it.
All Sports, No Balls
I like this one the best. It suits our target audience 16-25, brings a little sense of humour into the news and gets the message across. i think its something people would remeber.
The final thing we discussed was what we wanted to see in our intro and news studio. Danny liked the idea of having the TTV come up in the centre of the screen at the end with out virtual studio behind it and then the TTV shrinking and slotting into the corner. I wanted it to include different sports we might feature like the pole dancing and prehaps clips from our 'future' shows. I also mentioned that in the studio i would like a TV to one side where our stories could pop up when Fran mentions them before we cut to them. Chris said he will take all the ideas on board when he creates the virtual studio and intro and also encorperate his own ideas and spin on things.
Stay safe,
Helen
One of the points from my research is that the colour and font need to reflect our channel's identity and professionalism. One of the things we did for hero hounds was to use a paw print text which was a little quirky and helped to get our child friendly message across, However from my research into font i had found that any fonts that are a little different or quirky can make your brand a little less professional. We want our channel to be professional but also relatable so i thought an american college sports style text would not only look simple enough to remain professional but would help us to become instantly recognisable as a sports brand. When it came to colours we ruled out colours like pink, red and blue for the reasons that - pink is far too girly, red and blue are easily recognisable for certain sports teams colours - a man united fan wouldnt be seen dead in a man city blue for example - we also wanted to steer clear of using colours that were already in use by popular sports/ news channels - bbc are red, sky are red/blue.
We spent a long time talking and trying to think of a colour that could work when we all agreed on purple. Then we wanted a second colour that would help get our logo standing out. Chris was testing some colours out when he chose orange. Instantly it just felt right. It worked well and it was eye catching and also 2 colours that i feel women would like. From my research purple means creative and orange means friendly. Barbie, Aussie hair products and Cadburys all have a purple logo while nickelodeon, fanta and amazon use orange in their logo's.
Chris pointed out that we needed to come up with a way of creating something simple prehaps using the letters TTV to create a logo for the brand . We cant just write Tekkers TV in the corner of the youtube channel. (This is something i had mentioned earlier that i thought would be cool as a lot of channels always have a logo in the corner and most youtube channels do now aswell).
He googled some examples of tv station logo's to show us. Here is a similar picture to what he showed us:
We looked at some of the channels such as the E network which has a ! with an e inside as its logo with the slogan 'entertainment television' underneath. We tried thinking of something that could incoperate our letters or channel name that would still make it recognisable as a sports channel. Chris mentioned about some channels in spain using letters in different directions such as downwards or diagnoal so i drew some ideas on paper while chris and danny worked on the computer. Chris then came up with what would be our finished idea. We liked the look of it and it worked well with the colours. He played a large T in the centre with T V either side of this T. He then said some channels have their channel name underneath and that as people may not know what TTV is initially we should put Tekkers Tv under it. Danny mentioned about having just TV in capitals and making sure it was central under as it will look more professional. We all decided that having orange as the focal T in the front with purple trim and purple in the back letters with orange trim would also help to understand that it its Tekkers TV. This is our final logo:
The next point we discussed was our slogan - We knew danny would be the man for this job as he is always coming up with great puns and catchy phrases so hed already brought a few ideas to the table through our facebook chat.
Sports. News. Now
This is very catchy and it felt very much like a slogan that sky sports would use for their trailers. I liked this idea.
Get Your Head In The Game
This slogan was a little bit of a mixed bag. It was perfect for describing exactly what our channel does - bring new and under appreciated sports to our audience but as Chris rightly pointed out it is a song from High School Musical. The target audience for Disney is not our target audience and would easily confuse a few people and make them think our channel is something that is isnt.
Danny also mentioned about wanting to use the phrase over the line. I liked this idea very much, it could be used in a few different ways - bringing sports news over the line for example - but we couldnt think of a catchy enough way of incorporating it.
Net
Danny mentioned using the word Net in a sentance for our slogan as it means internet and therefore goes with the digital news aspect but also helps with our sports brand - we could say, in the net, on the net. I liked this ideas also as it a little different from the others but also explains what the brand is. However because we arent using sports that have balls in them or basically mainstream sports it wouldnt work for the specifics of our channel.
Shooting sport onto your screen
This one we felt might be misinterpreted so we decided against it.
All Sports, No Balls
This one was a little bit of a joke at first as our channel is aimed at women so the 'no balls' bit is a bit of a joke but also it gets the point across that it only features sports that arent normally shown. We wont feature any sport that has a ball in it. Danny made a good point that the all sports part is therefore a bit confusing so we came up with...
Just Sport, No Balls
I like this one the best. It suits our target audience 16-25, brings a little sense of humour into the news and gets the message across. i think its something people would remeber.
The final thing we discussed was what we wanted to see in our intro and news studio. Danny liked the idea of having the TTV come up in the centre of the screen at the end with out virtual studio behind it and then the TTV shrinking and slotting into the corner. I wanted it to include different sports we might feature like the pole dancing and prehaps clips from our 'future' shows. I also mentioned that in the studio i would like a TV to one side where our stories could pop up when Fran mentions them before we cut to them. Chris said he will take all the ideas on board when he creates the virtual studio and intro and also encorperate his own ideas and spin on things.
Stay safe,
Helen
Fiction Adaption: Idea Background
The inspiration for my idea has come from 2 stories that are very close to home. Back home when i was around 12, a friend of mines brother was befriended by an older gang of people. He has learning difficulties including autism and wasn't able to understand that these peoples intentions were not very nice. They often would encourage him into situations where he would end up either being beaten up by them or on occasions be 'nice' to him and encourage him to drink alcohol or get into trouble or face the consequences. As he was in college it was very difficult for his parents to stop most of this happening as they would encourage him to skive off with them and the teachers at the college weren't the most helpful. One day they took him to the beach and forced him to sniff lighter fluid. He suffered a seizure and the gang panicked and left him on the beach, alone. Although someone found him and he managed to survive, the damage to his brain was so severe that he has been left unable to feed himself amongst other things and doesn't have a great quality of life. The gang responsible haven't been punished due to lack of evidence.
Another story is that of a family members child who is regularly bullied and has switched schools to escape it but the gang have waited outside his new school for him to beat him up. He has recently been befriended by this group and they have encouraged him to skive school and get into trouble also and due to his previous run ins with them he is scared to disobey them.
These stories of bullying have had a profound impact on me and i wanted to tell a similar story and show the effect these types of actions can have on people.
stay safe,
Helen
Another story is that of a family members child who is regularly bullied and has switched schools to escape it but the gang have waited outside his new school for him to beat him up. He has recently been befriended by this group and they have encouraged him to skive school and get into trouble also and due to his previous run ins with them he is scared to disobey them.
These stories of bullying have had a profound impact on me and i wanted to tell a similar story and show the effect these types of actions can have on people.
stay safe,
Helen
Digital News: Anchor Presenter
I have a friend who is a Youtube Vlogger and has over 18,000 views on youtube. She is starting to build a fairly solid fan base up and i thought it would be a good idea to potentially use her as the anchor for our show. I approached her and asked if she would be willing to which she agreed and then it was time to see if Danny and Chris liked what she could do. I showed them a few of her youtube videos which are about various topics and they agreed that she is very comfortable in front of camera and gets her personality across well. All going well we will be using her as our anchor for our show or maybe as a roving reporter depending what the best fit is.
Here is one of her youtube videos:
Stay safe,
Helen
Here is one of her youtube videos:
Stay safe,
Helen
Tuesday, 7 October 2014
Fiction adaption: Characters
I have made a character outline for my 2 main charaters and the other extra's needed. I will send this to Hazlitt youth theatre to see if they have anyone who fits the bill.
Here is the outline:
I will also be posting casting calls for adult actors who have the ability to play down to a teenage age in terms of looks.
Stay safe,
Helen
Here is the outline:
I will also be posting casting calls for adult actors who have the ability to play down to a teenage age in terms of looks.
Stay safe,
Helen
Digital News: News Package Workshop
Today we were given the task by Rachel Royce to create a news package about a global news story. Due to the story being ongoing and of a sensitive nature i will not be talking about the story we were given. However i found the lesson to be particularly challenging. We split up into our groups so i was working with Danny and Chris. After lunch i googled the story and read an article from the guardian newspaper about it and found out a lot more about the case, i then began making notes about the story so that i knew the key facts and important things to do with it. This helped me to get a better understanding and also helped when setting up interviews and 'deciding who to interview'. The parts of this part of the task i found challenging were figuring out how we were going to cover the story and what new and interesting angle could we bring to it. After speaking with Helen she asked us to think more about the location we were in for the story and what could we use about this location to make it a bit more personal to the public. This helped us to begin our PTC and find a interesting way of using the location and tell the story.
The next part of the task was to interview 2 people about the story, the first interview was easy to think of as they were a family member so Danny stepped in to play this role. The 2nd proved more difficult and the only person we could think of was a lawyer as we weren't sure who else aside from a made up expert we could use. The interview with Danny was tough as he had to remember a lot of facts and ad lib them into a normal conversation as if he was telling the story himself. He managed to do a very convincing performance as also get some key facts in whilst giving some emotion to make it believable.
Chris was in charge of camera and sound for this shoot so we just used a clip mic so that he wouldn't have to hold a boom as well. We alternated the clip mic to the person that was talking or in a 2 person shot we used the person who was talking first and have them stand close together. Obviously in a normal situation we would have a clip mic on the reporter and a boom over the 2nd person to get the sound coverage and make it equal level.
Overall i feel I've learnt a lot about how a reporter works and the kind of script involved from facts, it also helps me to prepare for interviews as sometimes the answers people give aren't enough so you need to draw more out of them and reword the question slightly to encourage a certain answer that they may have mentioned in a previous take but not this time around. This is a problem we had with Roy Dyer in Hero Hounds and was a useful tool. I feel i understand how quickly you need to set up and also what jobs people can be doing in the group or be in charge of. Assigning these roles helps save time.
Stay safe,
Helen
The next part of the task was to interview 2 people about the story, the first interview was easy to think of as they were a family member so Danny stepped in to play this role. The 2nd proved more difficult and the only person we could think of was a lawyer as we weren't sure who else aside from a made up expert we could use. The interview with Danny was tough as he had to remember a lot of facts and ad lib them into a normal conversation as if he was telling the story himself. He managed to do a very convincing performance as also get some key facts in whilst giving some emotion to make it believable.
Chris was in charge of camera and sound for this shoot so we just used a clip mic so that he wouldn't have to hold a boom as well. We alternated the clip mic to the person that was talking or in a 2 person shot we used the person who was talking first and have them stand close together. Obviously in a normal situation we would have a clip mic on the reporter and a boom over the 2nd person to get the sound coverage and make it equal level.
Overall i feel I've learnt a lot about how a reporter works and the kind of script involved from facts, it also helps me to prepare for interviews as sometimes the answers people give aren't enough so you need to draw more out of them and reword the question slightly to encourage a certain answer that they may have mentioned in a previous take but not this time around. This is a problem we had with Roy Dyer in Hero Hounds and was a useful tool. I feel i understand how quickly you need to set up and also what jobs people can be doing in the group or be in charge of. Assigning these roles helps save time.
Stay safe,
Helen
Monday, 6 October 2014
Digital News: Sports News & Youtube Research
When we were originally coming up with the idea that we wanted a sports specific news channel i wasn't sure if there was something like this on youtube already, Especially that is geared towards a 16 - 25 year old market. However i came across VICE Sports which is a branch of the VICE Media Youtube Channels. VICE News, Another branch of this group, markets itself as "an international news channel created by and for a connected generation. Our documentaries and original news series bring you an unvarnished look at some of the most important events of our time, and shine a light on underreported stories around the globe". The sports branch markets itself as "a piece of web real estate dedicated to the game beyond the game, where the unbridled passion of the true fan shines through, for better or for worse. Headlined by original video content and distinct voices, VICE Sports shines a light on the endless array of characters both inside and outside of the game that tend to inspire such undeniable, and at times, unreasonable devotion. More often than not, the compelling stories and rich experiences that sit in the sports sidecar tend to eclipse the sport itself. We're here to celebrate that."
VICE News has 970,127 and was created Novemeber 2013 subscribers while the sports channel has 298,688 subscribers and was created May 2014. The channel has recently been chosen along with 2 othe popular youtube channels by YouTube, who are paying to run TV, print and billboard ads in the UK for the three channels, as well as running online ads on its own and other websites. Vice Media recently secured a $500m investment from Silicon Valley firm Technology Crossover Ventures and US cable broadcaster A+E Networks, which valued the company at more than $2.5bn.
http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2014/sep/25/youtube-vice-news-zoella-slow-mo-guys
I am very interested in their style of videos so will be posting a few that i found interesting below and then discussing and comparing to our style.
This was the first video posted by the channel, It has some features that would defiantly fit in with our market however i think that most of the episodes are more documentary or package style. Similar to our channel it also bring to the forefront sports than don't get the same recognition that mainstream ones do but i feel our channel will be more relaxed in its style and like a friend talking to another friend - similar to how a lot of vlogs work on youtube.
In this video they send an ex olympic boxer as their 'reporter' to a Baseball event and film as he chats informally to players and managers, despite the fact he has no clue who is who. I like this relaxed style a lot more however there is no real story here. They haven't utilised the 'celebrity' they got in the right way and although the video is funny in parts it isn't something that flows well. I think it would work better if he was interviewing boxers and promoters and possibly talking about the future in the sport and this is something that i would suggest for our group if we were to create something like this. I do however like the way they are able to portray the celebrity as one of the people and show him unable to hit a baseball. It makes the package more relatable and possibly a feature we could use in our news - young british people tend to enjoy a failure rather than a success.
Here is a video from Today's episode of Vice News Daily:
Although this news is obviously important i don't find that its aimed at someone like me, i don't enjoy watching the news and its not spoken in a way that engages me with the story. I think this is one of the reasons we as a group decided against world news or stories like this as, typically, its covered in a certain way and this doesn't bring anything different to the news. I like the idea of brining something different out of stories and hopefully with a clear branch with the sports channel this will work well.
Sky sports news is a dedicated news channel on digital TV. It is the leading sports-dedicated news channel on television, with a sizeable, predominantly male, audience of all ages tuning for programming slots such as Evening Report and Good Morning Sports Fans. is a table of the rough being figures:
The onscreen graphics are an important feature of this news channel as it helps to let viewers know what is happening in various sports in a very brief outline incase they have missed the feature on the channel. Often each of these rolling news graphics are repeated by the presenter throughout the timeslot and also up to the minute 'breaking news' features heavily. It also live and goes to reporters interviewing managers and players at the last minute especially on deadline day.
Looking at these channels i think we will be able to look at the styles and use this to create something different and successful that our target audience will enjoy.
Stay safe,
Helen
VICE News has 970,127 and was created Novemeber 2013 subscribers while the sports channel has 298,688 subscribers and was created May 2014. The channel has recently been chosen along with 2 othe popular youtube channels by YouTube, who are paying to run TV, print and billboard ads in the UK for the three channels, as well as running online ads on its own and other websites. Vice Media recently secured a $500m investment from Silicon Valley firm Technology Crossover Ventures and US cable broadcaster A+E Networks, which valued the company at more than $2.5bn.
I am very interested in their style of videos so will be posting a few that i found interesting below and then discussing and comparing to our style.
This was the first video posted by the channel, It has some features that would defiantly fit in with our market however i think that most of the episodes are more documentary or package style. Similar to our channel it also bring to the forefront sports than don't get the same recognition that mainstream ones do but i feel our channel will be more relaxed in its style and like a friend talking to another friend - similar to how a lot of vlogs work on youtube.
In this video they send an ex olympic boxer as their 'reporter' to a Baseball event and film as he chats informally to players and managers, despite the fact he has no clue who is who. I like this relaxed style a lot more however there is no real story here. They haven't utilised the 'celebrity' they got in the right way and although the video is funny in parts it isn't something that flows well. I think it would work better if he was interviewing boxers and promoters and possibly talking about the future in the sport and this is something that i would suggest for our group if we were to create something like this. I do however like the way they are able to portray the celebrity as one of the people and show him unable to hit a baseball. It makes the package more relatable and possibly a feature we could use in our news - young british people tend to enjoy a failure rather than a success.
Here is a video from Today's episode of Vice News Daily:
Although this news is obviously important i don't find that its aimed at someone like me, i don't enjoy watching the news and its not spoken in a way that engages me with the story. I think this is one of the reasons we as a group decided against world news or stories like this as, typically, its covered in a certain way and this doesn't bring anything different to the news. I like the idea of brining something different out of stories and hopefully with a clear branch with the sports channel this will work well.
Sky sports news is a dedicated news channel on digital TV. It is the leading sports-dedicated news channel on television, with a sizeable, predominantly male, audience of all ages tuning for programming slots such as Evening Report and Good Morning Sports Fans. is a table of the rough being figures:
As you can see from the table Sky Sports News garners average audience figures ranging from 1,000 during breakfast, daytime and late peak, and up to 900,000 viewers during daytime. The cost per spot can vary from between a minimum of around £10 and a maximum of approximately £8,000 per 30 second broadcast. There is also a heavy focus on male sports although they do have women presenters. This leads to a heavy male bias in viewers.
Here is an example of a typical sky sports feature:
The onscreen graphics are an important feature of this news channel as it helps to let viewers know what is happening in various sports in a very brief outline incase they have missed the feature on the channel. Often each of these rolling news graphics are repeated by the presenter throughout the timeslot and also up to the minute 'breaking news' features heavily. It also live and goes to reporters interviewing managers and players at the last minute especially on deadline day.
Looking at these channels i think we will be able to look at the styles and use this to create something different and successful that our target audience will enjoy.
Stay safe,
Helen
Sunday, 5 October 2014
Fiction Adaption: Contacting local Youth theatres
As i will be looking to cast teenagers for my film i decided to get in contact with some local youth theatres to see if they would be interested in possibly collaborating with me and auditioning some of their members for the roles in the film. I Emailed the Kent Youth Theatre & Hazlitt Youth Theatre and will wait for their response:
stay safe,
Helen
stay safe,
Helen
Digital News: Branding Research
Most tv channels have a clear brand and often a colour associated with that brand. For example the bbc one is associated with red, sky is associated with blue, e4 is associated with purple, bbc 3 is associated with pink... they also have a very clear style and fomat that is fluid throughout all their idents. I wanted to do some research into what colours and fonts and things appeal to our age group.
Here are a few colour charts with their meanings that i have found useful:
Here are a few colour charts with their meanings that i have found useful:
I also found a very intresting article from the huffington post about the psychology of logo's which featured the above picture:
I like the idea that multicolour represents diversity, this could be something we could work with as we are hoping to appeal to all sports fans so picking a specific colour could affect someones view of the channel for example - i support manchester city football team who's colour is sky blue and their rival is manchester unites known for their red and this affects my decisions such as choosing the colour of my scooter or when decorating my house as i wouldn't be caught dead in red.
Here are some pictures i found useful when looking at fonts:
These pictures have been useful in looking at what brands have used, most like a very clear professional style - anything too quirky instantly looks tacky and can be difficult to market to collaborators and something of quality. I think it is easy to try and create something original but this could mean looking less professional.
Stay safe,
Helen
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