First week back after Christmas and we have been thrown straight into WINOL. I have been given the “beat” of education. However, we had other stories prepared so we will start those jobs next week.
For my first news story of the semester I attempted to put a local spin on a national news story. The new government website www.police.uk has received a lot of negative press because the servers running it were overworked, causing the site to crash. My take on the story would be to see how much crime the site recorded for Winchester city centre in the last month, and consequently, if residents were worried about the results.
I used voxpops to gauge the mood of the people of Winchester in response to the new site. I don't really like the idea of voxpops in general. They seem quite weak to me, and often don't add any real insight or important information. But on this occasion I thought they were appropriate as the public were an integral part of the story.
Another issue with the voxpops this week was that I ran the risk of identifying people in the background. Obviously we have to be very careful with privacy of people when we don't have permission for them to be on camera and I shall endeavour to avoid having people in the background in future.
I decided to use a piece to camera (e.g. me on camera) to help explain my story. I felt it was appropriate as I was talking about a particular area of the city to be on the street in question. The first attempt I had I walked straight down the road. I took this in for editing but Charlotte (our editor) didn't like it as I had walked straight down the street. She wanted me to do it again, this time walking at an angle, which I was more than happy to do. I realised I wasn't happy with what I had said on tape so I re-scripted and headed back out. The result was much better this time, it looked more natural walking at an angle. Looking back there is still a problem; I left too much headroom, making me look even shorter than usual.
This was also the first time I had used a radio microphone (the ones you see on peoples clothes on TV all the time). This went really sucessfully. The quality of the sound really is much better than using a gun microphone. Much less interference and background noise is picked up, leading to much cleaner and crisper sound.
I'm grateful to MP Steve Brine for getting back to me and providing me with a quote, even if he didn't have time for an interview. It was important for me to get a quote from somebody who supports the scheme in order to provide balance.
I'm realising how easy it is to get in contact with people, but tying them down for an interview can be a different matter altogether. In order to use the quote I thought it might be a good idea to put the words on screen and read them out in my voice. I have since learned that this technique is only really used when people are making a statement defending themselves or their company. Therefore, from an editorial point of view it was not the best idea.
However, from an aesthetics perspective I think it came across quite well. My skills on Final Cut Pro are coming along and I think I showcased them here.
I'd just like to thank Ian Tait for once again taking the time to meet me, and for summing up the mood of people he has spoken to so well.
Overall, a pretty solid effort first time out. Especially considering the time constraints we were under this week. Roll on next week.
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