Critical Reflection Semester One, Year Three:

Over my final semester of contributions to Winchester News Online (WINOL) the team has continued to work hard and combine efforts in improving and innovating its multiplatform presence. The circulation stats show that since last semester there has been a significant drop in the websites global and UK rankings. But overall this semester (October to December) there has been an increase in those rankings, starting at #1,309, 425 globally and  #38, 579 in October. Peaking last week ( 3^rd December) at #773,133 globally and #30,063 in the UK. These figures can be compared to the stats of our competitor East London Lines on the same date, #607,418 globally and #30,116 in the UK.

Though, overall this semester we can see a significant difference in our global raking, rising 536, 292 places.

The news team hold together the whole WINOL team and are relied heavily on week in, week out for legally safe and high quality content in text or video form. Like last semester the role of New Editor was passed around the news team, which was beneficial for all as they have the opportunity to put together the bulletin that week. The WINOL news website went through ups and downs in terms of content being regularly updated and shifted around on the site. The decision was made to designate a front page editor to keep on top of this and as the semester came to a close the quality, order and updating of the content was improved dramatically.

The quality of the news bulletin improved greatly over the semester and each week the news team fulfilled what was requested of them. Personal packages, like each semester, improved with practice in terms of sound, picture and interview quality, especially those of the second years.

Sports weeks viewings also improved over the semester peaking at 435 views in week eight and separately uploaded football highlights receiving higher views than Sportsweek itself some weeks. An achievement for the sport team was the syndication of football highlights to Basingstoke Town, AFC Totton and Biggleswade Town.

The features website are still in the process of finding the right format and correct categories for the work produced by WINOL. A breakthrough this semester involved cutting down the many online magazines for different topics. WINOL ‘Here and Now’ has become the central hub for all features material, allowing easier access for all visitors and the opportunity for viewers of the site to stumble across content that is different that what they were looking for.

Access Winchester was a new addition to the WINOL family this semester, which follows the same structure of the WINOL news bulletin, but is filled with features content and I feel reaches out to a particular young, student target audience, ideal for campus viewing.

My place in WINOL this semester was as part of the production team, and like my first semester on the production team, everybody was required to take on a different role for each bulletin, having the Tuesday to practice on the equipment during sports week.

My role for the first two bulletins was the director, a role I really enjoy and understand the importance of. I knew it was crucial to have the script as early as possible so that the crew in the gallery could prepare and practice the bulletin with and without the presenter, just in case VTs cut out early or there were problems with the script and /or equipment.

The script was finished twenty minutes before the deadline giving us a short amount of time to practice. The time we did have was spent concentrating on the OOV with UPSOT so that we could concentrate on getting the timings right. I made the decision to go live at three, hoping that our producer agreed and the team felt confident enough to do so.

In the lead up to the bulletin I created the headline and credit sequences for the bulletin, these look okay technically but the by-lines decided on by the group could have been more creative. Filming the headline VT went well, but like the bulletin there was a lot of waiting around for the script to be completed. Overall The bulletin went smoother than I could have hope for a first bulletin;

I helped Nicole with post production, something I was hoping to get involved in because I had never done so before. There was a huge change in the way the bulletin was uploaded. Half way through the recording in the gallery we took a break to change the tape so that the bulletin was in two parts.

This made capturing and editing out the black holes a lot easier & quicker. The bulletin was also uploaded in two parts to make it easier to hit the five o'clock deadline.

Though we didn’t make the five o'clock deadline. This was because the programme used to upload it to website changed to Dreamweaver rather than YouTube and the .mov files didn't work. The problem was solved quickly and once we knew what format was needed the upload was fairly quick and simple.

My second week as director was not as smooth as the previous week. We encountered quite a few problems throughout the day which threw everybody off track.

We had a lot of problems with exporting files this week as none of the news room computers had Final Cut Pro seven to re-export the Final Cut Pro x files in a different format so that they worked and were the right size in the gallery.
It was suggested that we no longer film the headlines as the presenter isn't seen - instead utilize the radio studio to save time to sort out other problems. This idea was taken on board because the headlines were not filmed until late in the afternoon because of the changes made to the headlines and the headline clips by the editorial team (this method was tried the following week and was used for the rest of the semester). 

From week three onwards I alternated using the pieces of equipment in the gallery. First was the Autocue the one thing in the gallery I found most daunting because it so heavily relied on and because changes are made to the script seconds before going live or even during VTs when live. The more I practiced, the easier it became and I felt more confident using it. There were no glitches with the Autocue on the weeks it was my role but when there were issues with the Autocue they were usually to do with it being backwards in the studio for the presenter or it would be temperamental and stop scrolling at times – which could we sorted fairly easily with enough time.

The VT machine was a role I enjoyed as it kept me busy all morning collecting and checking the packages coming out of the news room. The main part of this role, other than pressing play, is checking that the VTs are in the correct play out order and format so that they air in the right dimension and where the VT ends - If it cuts out of a VT suddenly its my job to communicate this to the director and vision mixer. Being in charge of VTs requires a lot of effort outside of the gallery in terms of badgering the news teams for finished packages.

The vision mixer is a role that I find most stressful as it is most relied upon because it determines the quality of the cuts between presenter and VTs – if there are black holes there is a little more pressure in post production to fix them and if a VT/presenter is cut out of too early a rerecord could be needed. The vision mixer is responsible for the quality of the green screen also.


Throughout the semester we continued to meet the three o'clock deadline in the gallery and achieved this through communication with the news team and within the production team. At times this was really difficult especially when editorial changes were made last minute and VTs were later than planned.

 
Although the main chunk of the production teams time is focused on the bulletin, we are around to help out in other productions and packages coming out of the news room.
The first event of the semester was the filming of the COMPASS meeting which was very different to the way we film WINOL in the way that it was mixed live, because of the use of all three cameras in the studio.
As director it was my decision when to cue the vision mixer - which was nerve racking because it was an unscripted event. Judging when to cut between Simon Hayes, Andy Marsh and a shot of them both on screen was difficult at first but because of the q&a nature of the meeting, after a while it was easy to judge when a question was going to be asked/answered. Once or twice the speakers were cut out of too early, but because there was no script there was nothing we could do to avoid it.
The second event of the semester was an in studio interview with UKIP member Diane James, arranged by Nadine Forshaw, which required the help of the production team. The studio was set up differently to how WINOL is filmed and we didn't use the green screen.

The first of the issues we faced with the studio was that the main camera was out of focus. This made the entire shot soft and facial features etc. were not defined. We were unable to come up with a solution before the interview and so we made the decision not to use the main camera (which had been set up as an establishing shot of Nadine and Diane James).

To top this off the lighting in the studio was quite bad. This was because we moved the set up for interview into the corner of the studio, which was directly under the main florescent lights. Even when we used a lighting kit and/or turned the house lights off the image in the gallery wasn’t great, though in the end we managed to get a decently lit set up.

Throughout the interview myself and Nicole were in the gallery, watching the sound levels and vision mixing live. With only two cameras being used I felt the interview looked a little rigid, but because of the way the shots were framed it worked well for the purpose. Mixing was a little easier than for the COMPASS meeting because there was one less camera but also because it was easy to judge when a question was going to be answered and when Diane would respond.

The following week Nadine had arranged a second in-studio interview with Rowenna Davis, who is running for the 2015 Southampton, Itchen seat in parliament for the Labour Party.
The quality of the Diane James interview was criticised and was said to look outdated when played back, so for this interview the decision was made to use the DSLR camera instead of the studio cameras because they film more crisp image.
The problem with using the DSLR cameras for interviews before this was that there is no known way to capture sound on the camera and meant a lot of extra effort in post production because it had to be captured separately. But Nicole discovered a simpler way to capture sound with film using a radio mic, which is perfect for interviews and will likely be the way that they are filmed from now on. 
Because of the cameras used everything was reliant on those watching the cameras. We had to check the sound levels on the cameras and keep an eye on the lighting & framing of the shots, so that there were three seamless shots of the interview (interviewer, interviewee and a two shot), there was no need for using the gallery equipment or live vision mixing.

Alongside WINOL I was asked to take over the filming of the coffee house sessions tour at the student union. I began by looking at Spence’s previous packages for the sessions to get an idea for a suitable structure to fit the performance and informal interview together so that it flowed together nicely in the edit.

I wanted to use three DSLR cameras recording the entire length if the performance so that it would be the best possible quality, but unfortunately they weren’t available to book out and I had to settle for the standard JVCs. Spence had advised me to use a Marantz to capture the sound for the performance because a sound technician could get a live line of audio to record.

For me, the most important part of turning the performance into something watchable was the quality of the sound as well as a variety of camera angles so that it didn’t look static, so it was vital that the live line on the Marantz worked as did all three cameras. Though as soon as the footage was uploaded I knew that I hadn’t got what I wanted - one the cameras was so over exposed and they only way around it was ditching that footage completely. 

The live line into the Marantz worked perfectly and was really the only thing that saved the package after the failure of the third camera. Using the Marantz meant that in post production there was a little more than cutting between shots  - the sound and video were separately recorded so they had to be pieced together by lip syncing the clips using markers in final cut, something I had practice doing from previous projects and felt quite confident doing. I also did a brief interview about the tour and that particular performance which was faded in and out with the music from the performance under laid. 

I wasn't entirely pleased with how the packaged turned out. I think that the interview could have been done better and the questions I asked could have been more specific/I could have pressed for more specific answers. The main thing I disliked about the package was the lack of the third camera because of how much it limited the editing process and would have jazzed up a very boring setting.

Overall, the WINOL team have worked hard and well in continuing a high quality and award winning news and features content but still need to work on producing more content, more frequently than on a Wednesday for the website particularly over the weekends.

Coffee House Sessions - Stephanie Fraser

Alongside WINOL I was asked to take over the filming of the coffee house sessions tour at the student union. I began by looking at Spence’s previous packages for the sessions to get an idea for a suitable structure to fit the performance and informal interview together so that it flowed together nicely in the edit.

I wanted to use three DSLR cameras recording the entire length if the performance so that it would be the best possible quality, but unfortunately they weren’t available to book out and I had to settle for the standard JVCs. Spence had advised me to use a Marantz to capture the sound for the performance because a sound technician could get a live line of audio to record.

For me the most important part of turning the performance into something watchable was the quality of the sound as well as a variety of camera angles so that it didn’t look static, so it was vital that the live line on the Marantz worked as did all three cameras. Though as soon as the footage was uploaded I knew that I hadn’t got what I wanted - one the cameras was so over exposed and they only way around it was ditching that footage completely. 

The live line into the Marantz worked perfectly, despite the length of time it took the technician to set it up to the PA system and was really the only thing that saved the package after the failure of the third camera. using the marantz meant that in post production there was a little more than cutting between shots  - the sound and video were separately recorded so they had to be pieced together by lip syncing the clips using markers in final cut, something I had practice doing from previous projects and felt quite confident doing.

I also did a brief interview with the singer about the tour and that particular performance, which was faded in and out with the music from the performance under laid.

Overall I wasn't entirely pleased with how the packaged turned out. I think that the interview could have been done better and the questions i asked could have been more specific/i could have pressed for more specific answers. The main thing i disliked about the package was the lack of the third camera because of how much it limited the editing process and would have jazzed up a very boring setting.