Week 4 - Debate

Week 3 - Drama

This task, known as drama involved going in to the studio and filming two separate scenes from Shakespeare’s Hamlet and Macbeth. In the two scenes, the things that we needed to think about was the subject and what we wanted to convey through the pieces paying particular attention to the way it’s shot, design, sound and lighting. As a group we decided who would take on which roles. In this task, my role was as lighting in Hamlet and sound in Macbeth. 

Before we filmed in the studio, everyone had the chance to create their own shot list for the two scenes as experience. I felt that this was an important experience for me to have as I found it difficult at first in formatting the list, but I enjoyed deciding how I would film the shots. 

Practical: 

In the studio, we filmed Hamlet first and so my role was lighting. I worked with the director by communicating with the floor manager, who relayed all of the information. As this was my first time doing lighting and I’d never done it before, I found it quite difficult to work out what each of the controls did which I think affected how efficiently we worked as a lot of time was spent trying to figure out how it worked and what the desired effect was. Once I had become a bit more confident in how it worked, the director asked for the lighting to be blue and create a ghostly midnight atmosphere which really suited the style of the piece as it created an eerie mood. 

After filming Hamlet, my role in Macbeth was sound. I had done sound in a previous task so I had a basic understanding of what was required to make sure that all of the actor’s voices were clear and at the same level throughout. In this task I had to find sound effects, which were lighting for the opening and a drum beat for a section in the script. I went over this with the director and we looked for sound effects that would fit but couldn’t find a suitable drum beat sound effect, which affected the overall atmosphere of the piece. When we began recording, I made the mistake of continuing to play the lighting sound effect which was on You Tube and an advert played throughout the take which meant having to do another take to get it right.

In terms of improvements, I think that next time it is important that I plan in advance and source the sound effects before going to the studio to ensure that no adverts are attached to the effect. I also think that I need to become more confident in my responsibilities and the choices that I make. 

Week 2 - The Magazine

Set reading: ‘The New Television Handbook’

Holland, P. (2017) The New Television Handbook. Taylor and Francis Group. Chapter 17

The second task of the module was to create a magazine show which included a number of different reports known as packages that would last around 16 minutes and using a 1 minute intro with graphics. As a group we decided to base our magazine show around the idea of a student survival guide that would be targeted specifically at students to give them an idea of what University life is like and inform them of what living in Plymouth is like. As it was a magazine show, the packages covered different topics: Homesickness, how to combat being homesick, and things to do in Plymouth.

Before the Practical, as a group we had a couple of days to go out and get footage for the piece. We went out and filmed some interviews and locations for the packages. This was done in key locations of Plymouth and on the university campus to get some opinions from current students as we wanted to capture life in Plymouth in a way that is relevant to people interested. 

Practical:

In the studio, for this task my role was as one of the camera operators. This was my first real experience with the camera and I spent a bit of time before we were going live and recording just trying to understand how the focus and zoom worked as this was something I wasn’t confident with. Part of my role was framing, I had to make sure that the actors in the piece were central with none of the lighting equipment visible on-screen. When we were actually going for a take and recording, I didn’t actually have chance to move the camera of use the zoom, this was because I had not been instructed to by the director but also because I was not very confident in myself and didn’t want to take the chance.

In terms of improvements, I think that I need to be more confident in making decisions for myself and experimenting more with the zoom functions on the camera instead of always waiting to be told what to do as it can affect the overall look of the show. Another improvement would be that even though we only had a short amount of time to film the interviews for packages, we should have as a group been a bit more organised about devising and making sure that everyone had a clear role with set tasks as I think this would have made the process a lot smoother. 

Week 1 - Interviews

Set reading: ‘The New Television Handbook’

Holland, P. (2017) The New Television Handbook. Taylor and Francis Group, Chapter 9-12.

The lecture was based around introducing us to the new module, discussing the reading and the roles involved in creating interviews for live TV in the studio. The main focus was the first task known as the interview and the different styles in which interviews can be done. There were two different interview methods, known as the “Stand Upper” and the “Sit Down”. Both interviews had to be done with first single camera and then multi camera and that there would need to be a lot of attention on timings and how many people are included in the interviews. We would also need to focus on who the subjects of the interview would be such as having an interviewer and an interviewee would be known as a 1+1 and then adding another interviewee would be known as a 1+2 and then a 1+3 etc. 

Practical Task- Interviews

Practical:

As this was the first task I was quite nervous about working in the studio as it’s something I’d never done before, especially taking on roles within the space such as sound, lighting etc. and having to work as a team with others in a short space of time.
The first thing that the group had to decide was who was going to undertake each of the roles in the tasks. We had three different interviews that we needed to create and so everyone would have three roles. Within the group my three roles were Communications with Camera, Acting and Sound. I had never done any of these things before in a studio context and I felt the first task was a great opportunity to get to grips with the different jobs. In the first interview which was a “Stand Upper” and a 1+1, my role was known as “Comms” which was essentially communications with the camera operators. 
I felt that in this role, there wasn’t a lot to do as I was only ever needed if the director wanted to discuss shots with the camera operators or tell them to do something specific such as zooming and focus and since in the first interview this wasn’t really necessary, I only occasionally had to interact with the camera operators. I liked the relationship between the Communications Operator and the Director as it was important to be clear with each other. The role taught me in a way how to deal with the pressure of relaying information between people, which is necessary to keep everything running smoothly. 

The next interview task we did was still a “Stand Upper” but a 1+2 interview. In this interview my role was acting. I found that in this role, even though it wasn’t really a role within the studio’s operation, it was still an important role to try as it gave me an understanding of how you deal with an interviewee when they are in the studio and the set-up process of mic’s, interacting with the interviewer and floor manager. 

The last interview was a 1+3. In this interview my role was working on Sound. This is something I had never done before and I really enjoyed learning about the role and how recording sound actually works. This role had a bit more responsibility to it and I had to control checking who was using which microphones and doing tests for voice levels. When we were going live and doing takes, it was my job to make sure that the voice levels were the same throughout using the master controls and individual sliders. Similar to the other roles, I experienced interacting with the team and working together to get things done as quickly as possible. 

Throughout the entire process of making the interviews, there was a lot of pressure to make sure that each of the interviews were completed in the two-hour time slot and also taking on these new roles that some people had never done before, so I think that myself and the group did well to adapt to these new surroundings.