Here's our finished show, it's something i'm incredibly proud of so please take the time to watch:
Looking back at this module it was something I was so excited for at the beginning of the semester and it didn't disappoint It has been my favourite part of the course so far, I think i'd pay all the fees just to work in that studio. I find it such a shame we only get to use it for one semester because it's amazing, I would love to be in there every week creating something new.. I hope next year we get the chance too. At the beginning it seemed so daunting that we would create a show, I didn't even know were to begin and it's so strange to know we pulled it off, it's genuinely one of my best achievements in making it all work. At the start I remember saying I was scared of the role of Producer, I didn't think i'd suit it at all.. How wrong I was, I think I was born for that role. Making sure everything stayed on track, knowing what we had to do, how and when, countless lists of what we had done/what we still needed to do and most importantly keeping everyone else moving and the project moving forward, I actually loved it. I didn't think I was the time of person to like to take control, but you learn something new every day I guess. The biggest thing to come out of this module though.. my aspirations. I remember being in year 6 and they asked us what we wanted to be, people said the usual 'Vet' or 'Fireman'.. I said Director, even from a young age I always knew TV was my passion but as I got older I worried that had changed and was unsure where I wanted to go with my career. Even last year I was questioning my degree choice. But i'm so glad I stuck it out, because working in a TV studio was one of the most fun experiences I've had. While i'm still not sure whether I want to be a camera woman or a producer I know one thing.. Live TV is where I want to go, while i'm not a movie-making kind of person, working in a Live TV studio is where I know I want to end up and I have this module to thank for that.. I just hope I get to fulfill that goal!
At the end of the focus group we wanted to get overall feedback so I designed a questionnaire for them to fill in based on the activities in the focus group. Credit to my other team member Ceri for creating the document below summarizing all the answers we received for each question:
Our lecturer Sarah gave us two books she had to look at, the strange thing about these books is that they have no formal structure, the pages are loose to be read in any order you choose. We thought this was really interesting and so asked the focus group what they thought of them. They were fascinated by them as it was something they've never seen before however while they found them interesting, they said it would not be something they'd want to sit and read as it would feel like hard work trying to piece the jumbled story together.
The next activity we played is another storytelling game called 'Firsts and Lasts'. The idea is you take the first sentence and the last sentence from different books, and then create the middle. We thought this would be a good way to get the group feeling like authors. Here's what they came up with:
Pressia is lying in the cabinet.Wondering what to do with herself today. "Why am I in a cabinet?" she wonders. When all of a sudden a loud bang, "oh an aeroplane has crashed into my house" she exclaims. A lone man leaves the wreckage. His breathing became softer, lighter, finally it stopped altogether.
When I woke up the other side of the bed was cold. I did not know where she went. Company is hard to find in this world. Before the end. Before the storm. [Plot] Basically man wakes up to find his bed empty, he had a lady friend sleep over. But this is a zombie apocalypse world and she has turned into a zombie. So the main character learns to not trust anyone in this new world.Here's what I learned - you've got to be really good to survive out there more than a few days.
My Mother drove me to the airport. She's drunk. Again. Well one thing led to another and now... Something's caught fire.
My Mother drove me to the airport.As I got on the plane I was really nervous. I decided to take some sleeping tablets to help with the nerves. My eyes closed and I drifted...
When I woke up the other side of the bed was cold. I therefore decided to go downstairs and put my socks in the microwave. That is when I saw my husband lying face down on the floor with a knife in his back. His breathing became softer, lighter, finally it stopped altogether.
One of the websites we got people to look at during our focus group was called 'Plaid-Libs'. It's similar to consequences in that it lets you put in certain information and creates a story from that. While the website isn't very professional, I thought it would be a nice way for them to have a go themselves and see what stories they could create. It works by having fixed points of the story but the audience can change certain details for instance you can say that a person eats an apple, and that is added in, it's a very basic form of user participation. Want to try for yourself, Here's the link: Plaid-Libs
After finding the research already available it was time for us to create our own. We decided on a focus group as it'll give us better results that a questionnaire and rather than just asking questions which is rather boring we decided on some activities for them to play. The more fun you have the more detailed answers you're likely to get! We started off by playing a storytelling game called Consequences. Working in groups of three, we asked each person to start by writing down a location, fold the paper over and pass it along where the next person would write an action, fold and pass again adding a character, dialogue and another character. Once unfolded you end up with a completely random story. Here are the ones our group created:
At Alton Towerson a bus rideWilliam Wilberforcesaid "why are you doing that?" to Becca Fadden.
In Japanon a see-sawAdele said "did you eat my cheese?" to Enrique.
In The Razpicking their noseMavis said "would you like a lift?" to Pink Panther.
In Australia frying a courgetteJeremy Kyle said "I want a muffin" to Hugh Grant.
In my sock cupboardriding a cowJames Dunn said "what are you doing in my garden?" to Barrack Obama.
In Floridahaving a boogie Mr Dunn said "where is my car?" to Ian Gardner.
With filming complete for both the interview/demo and the music segment it was time to edit and add in titles. I thought editing our show wouldn't take long, I didn't think there would be much to do, in fact we were there for most of the day. I really enjoy editing, while it's tedious work and can get frustrating I like piecing things together and making something complete. One of the main problems with our show was with the music shoot, because we were cutting 'as live' we didn't realise until we watched back that 2 shots of one of the musicians feet happens within a space of 30 seconds and honestly.. It makes it look like a foot fetish, it did not look right at all. So we tried correcting that and luckily we made it work. Creating our titles also took some time as we shot them on the day, looking back I wish we'd created different titles, I don't think they went well with the theme of the show, but they were still good. This show is something i'm incredibly proud of, it took A LOT of hard work and dedication but it really paid off, I think our final piece is really good, I would actually pitch it to Channel 4 myself!
Deadline Day for the Soundscape assignment may be one of THE most stressful days I have ever experience. My group decided to come in early, we didn't have much to do, the sequence was basically complete, we just needed to complete the ending, add in the titles and then transfer it over to After Effects to use the Rostrum Camera Tool. Sounds simple for 6 hours till the deadline right? WRONG. Firstly it took me at least 20 minutes to get the hard drive to work because it decided it didn't want to turn on.. with ALL of our work on it, that happened twice. Stressful situation number one. While Stevie was correcting the sound levels so they were all even, me and Josie created the title sequence, ready to add into the beginning of the sequence. However would it add to the beginning of the timeline, no. For some reason unknown to us or the lecturers it would not work. Stressful situation number two. However probably the most stressful part of the day, learning that the sequence we first created in Adobe Premier as we had film footage to add into the sequence.. Wouldn't go into After Effects to use the Rostrum Camera. We weren't aware that you couldn't do this and unfortunately we found out too late. The final stressful situation of the day! Luckily Premier does have Rostrum Camera techniques, but they are extremely basic, it was so frustrating knowing we had all these plans to make our piece even better and we couldn't do them.. It was also disappointing knowing we wouldn't get the grade we wanted because of it. On the positive side I was so proud with my team all pulling together to get it to work, especially the fact that we sourced nearly all of the material we used ourselves. I also take a lot away from this project, knowing your way around how software works is really important, and not leaving it till deadline day is not a good idea, even if you have little to do.. If something goes wrong it could be a disaster.
I recently attending a CV Workshop... I've had a CV since we had to make one in school, and I haven't really undated it, so it's no wonder I struggle to find a job. While this workshop was about CV's for media work, it can apply to both media jobs and a general job, both of which I desperately need and I was surprised by how much was on my CV that didn't need to be, and what simple techniques I missed out using that would make me stand out. I wasn't aware you didn't need to list every qualification you owned.. That took up far too much space than necessary. I also know it sounds stupid now, but I didn't think putting something like 'I like to go to the cinema' sounded incredibly generic and dull. Livening it up such as 'I like to engage in debates about current art films out in the cinema' sound MUCH better... Simple little tricks like this help to make you stand out more. This is one of the most helpful things I have attended and now my CV is up to a professional standard, hopefully it will now get me a job!
