Winol Week 8.....Everything went right and then we had a wonky collar

Week 8 and I felt that this week was my best week to date as I felt that I took good story that after countless number of technical problems and interview time changes, was resurrected at the last minute.

The week started with the usual news meeting where I pitched my story, which would cover the plans for Southampton City Council to implement commissioning of services, but these changes were being seen as a chance to privatise the council, according to local unions. I was able to obtain an interview with Councillor Royston Smith, leader of Southampton City Council and Mike Tucker, Branch Secretary for Unison Southampton.

I had a series of problems on Tuesday with my equipment, which included my camera not working, the battery dying, not taking the right tripod and changing cameras. However, after 3 trips, back and forth from Winchester to Southampton, I brought Tom with me as I had arranged an interview with a local Green Councillor for his story. Luckily at the last minute, I received a phone call from Southampton City Council's press office and they had arranged for my to meet Councillor Smith.

I felt this was my best interview to date, as Councillor Smith was very vocal in his opinions to defend the council and attack the union's claims. This left me with Wednesday morning to do all my filming of my Gv's, my piece to camera and the second interview with Mike Tucker. Just your usual Wednesday morning at Winol

After a morning of rushing around, I returned to the new room with two hours to editing my piece together and hand a headline clip in.  I finished my package and was given in time. I felt that my overall package this week was my best to date as the interviews I had gave two very good soundbites, as well as continuity as this was the first time I used two part of one interview to use as counter balance to the ongoing debate between Southampton City Council and the local unions.

There was still some issues with the overall piece. I felt that Gv's I used could have been stronger, however I was on my own and worked to a very tight deadline, therefore it was good with the limited amount of time I had. My second interview with Mike Tucker was framed well, but he was looking directly into the camera as if he was being interrogated and I need to ensure that they are looking at me to make the piece look more natural. The final gripe I had was the most annoying as my piece to camera was confident, I kept constant eye contact with the camera, but my collar was wonky. This made me look scruffy and unprofessional and I may take Angus Scott's advice from now and take a mirror with me to ensure I do not look scruffy.

Now to the bulletin, I feel we are getting stronger with our overall content and focus to our primary and secondary demographic. In terms of the bulletin it was good to have the Vice-Chancellor, Joy Carter as it promotes the University in a positive light and in any news institution if you can have an important figure within the organisation (in this case The University of Winchester) in the bulletin, you do it as it the best way to reach your target audience. We also included an in-studio discussion about the rise in youth unemployment, which was again good as we were target the demographic.

However, we should of known in advance and made a package about an important topic to students, as they will be interested in job prospects after graduating. We finally had a court story, but it was not a broadcast news story as it was about a local paedophile and we only had a mug shot and as it involved a minor we could not divulge many details. This would of worked better as an OOV, but it was good that Flick found a story in her patch.

Overall Winol is going from strength to strength as we are targeting our demographic audience's and grabbing their attention with good stories. We just need to ensure that we are focusing on getting the most detail out of every story and keeping the audience engaged every week. With the impending and now success of the 30th November national strike protest broadcast in history, we did not have a Winol bulletin last week and therefore my next Winol review will be the rolling coverage of the strikes!

Winol Week Three..... I learned a valuable lesson

After reflecting on last week, I realised that I had panicked and did not think that the best thing that I could of done was to of came in and seen if I could of salvaged anything out of my shots to meet my deadline. Well a lesson learnt and a new week to make amends, the only problem I had across the weekend was finding a story.

the start of a new week at WINOL began with the news meeting on Monday and I had found a story where Winchester City Council had announced a budget deficit of £825,000 and was looking at a story with the angle of where the money had gone and who was to blame. However, Chris Horrie suggested I went with a different angle and look at who may be affected by the deficit and the potential resulting budget cuts.

I took this advice and contacted the Winchester Church Nightshelter, a charity that had it's funding cut twice in the last three years by the city council who agreed to an interview the following afternoon. I had already arranged a interview with Councillor George Beckett, the leader of Winchester City Council to get his views on the matter.

Tuesday was straightforward as I was able to conduct both of my interviews with relative ease and gain some interesting quotes, which could be used in the story. I filmed a variety of different shots that would be used as cut away for my interviews and used throughout the story. I finished the day with recording my piece to camera and taking Angus's advice from week one, I ensured that I finished the story with my PTC and not at the beginning.

Then it came to the part of the week I am not a fan of in the slightest, editing. I was able to cut my footage down and structured the story and realised that I could finish the last few bits on Wednesday morning, so I decided to call it a night. I had noted down that I needed to film a couple more shots and record my voice over again in the morning as some of the audio in my initial voiceover was either distorted or my speech was slurred.

Wednesday morning I was able to film my last few shots and record my voice over again and thought that I had finished the story. However, I encountered a couple of legal issues as in two of my shots where number plates on cars were visible and I would have to edit the footage to ensure they were not visible. Thanks to Gareth and Will who helped me cut the shots down and delete the number plates from the clips.

This did leave me with a lack of usable shots, therefore I had to reuse a couple of my shots again, but I was able to complete my story on time and without any major problems. I was now looking forward to the bulletin at three, full of optimism and looking forwards to the comments of WINOL's guest editor for this week: Rachael Canter from BBC South.

Debrief

Rachael felt that I had a very good voice and delivery and told the story well. She advised that I could of taken further hold on my angle, I could of tried and planned ahead and tried to of filmed an interview with one of the homeless people affected as that could of possible made it the top story.

She also advised that in my piece to camera that I ensure I always keep my eyes centre down the camera as there was a moment where I looked down to check my script.  This is key as I need to ensure that I am engaging with my audience and always keep constant eye contact with the camera.

Angus Scott then gave his feedback on my story and felt again that I had an interesting, engaging voice and quoted that he can could definitely see me as "A regional BBC reported in 6 to 7 years." That was an encouraging piece of feedback, but I know not to get carried away as there is much more I have to do and I need to try and make every story better than the previous one.

He also advised that I ensure that I gain a variety of different shots in able to gain a varied aspect of the story and keep the viewer engaged. I also was told I need to ensure that when interviewing someone that I am at the same height and level as my interviewee. This was evident when I interviewed Michele Price as she was looking up at me and I need to make the interview look as natural as possible.

Other key points that I picked up from the debrief from the bulletin as an whole was to use the skill of favouring in interviews. This is where you point the gun mic to yourself when asking questions that you want to be heard. We also had another banned phrase to be added to the list and this was be the last time I will type "Only time will tell."

This week has been a much more encouraging week, but I need to ensure that I do even better with my story next week and take the feedback on board and make the changes they have advised happen.