My Interview

Hello!

Today I was preparing for my interview for which I intend to use for our radio programme Is Christmas too Commercial and how would the Recession affect it?

The person that I am interviewing is a owner of a Greek restaurant called The Weston Omelette & Grill, which is located in Weston-Super-Mare.

The for this interview I will be taking on two roles which are Interviewer and Production Sound Mixer.

The time for my interview was for 3:00 p.m. so I had plenty of time to prepare the questions and to book out the Fostex recorder.

The questions that I prepared to ask for the interview where:

• How important is the Christmas trade to the business?


• Has the Credit Crunch affected trades this year?


• Have you had any cutbacks to the amount of employees you take on?
  
• What are your predictions for sales next Christmas?

As 3:00 p.m. was looming I headed over to the restaurant where I managed to arrive there early and set up the equipment as my interviewee was making her self comfortable.

Before we began the interview I showed her the questions as she wished so that she could prepare her answers as she was naturally nervous. I also did a sound check to make sure that her levels we ok.

We began the interview at 3:05 p.m.

During the interview I was checking the sound levels and making sure that the equipment was recording the responses successfully along with the placements of the microphone.

Fortunately my interviewer wasn't microphone shy and gave me good answers to each of my questions.

The interview ended at about 3:45 p.m.

My Role as Production Sound Mixer

I thought that I carried out this role to an acceptable standard. I felt confident with the equipment that I was handling and I didn't get into any difficulties or problems.

The areas that I need to improve on is to listen very carefully and be aware to any unwanted sounds that might ruin the recording.

My Role as Interviewer

I thought that I handled this role resonabally well. I put alot of thought into the questions that I was intending to ask and thinking about the answers that I am aiming for during the interview.

The areas that I can improve on is to be more confident in asking the questions and not to be to nervous or shy whilst conducting the interview.

Roles in the Media Industry

Hello!

Today I was researching different job roles that there are within the media industry. During my research I have learnt about the different types of roles there are and what each of them involves.

The main roles that I looked at were Film Producer, Director, Camera Man, Editor and Production Sound Mixer.

Each of these roles are mostly involved with being self employed and working on a freelance basis. When you first enter the industry your malinly working on a voluntary basis with a role title called Runner. This role mainly involves making the tea for the film crew along with doing odd jobs around the set and helping things run more smoothly through out the day.

Whilst researching on the internet I had come across several media related job emploment site called Skillset.

I found this web site to be very useful becuase it supplied me with lots of step by step guidence of how to get your career started in the industry. It gave me information of the different roles that are out there.

It also gave me a good insight of the different areas that there are within the industry like:

• TV


• Radio


• Film


• Gaming


• Corporate and promotional films


• Animation

Another website that I had been on was Freelance Broadcaster. I found this to be a very useful website because it helped to inform me of what current jobs there are in the industry including the areas of the country that they're based at.

I had discovered some other websites but had not yet investigated like:

• http://www.productionbase.co.uk/


• http://www.shootingpeople.co.uk/


• http://www.startintv.co.uk/

I managed to look into the different responsibilities that each of the roles have.

Film Producer

The role of the film producer is to overlook and supervise the project by taking care of matters like:

• The financial cost of the project


• Hiring the key people to make the film


• Marketing along with promoting the film for the distributors.

The producer is involved throughout the whole production of the film from the development through to the completion.

The producer has the ultimate complete control of the project and is responsible for everything that happens in the production.

Whilst researching this role I found that there are lots of other types of producers like:

• Executive Producer would over look the financial and creative sides of the production.


• Co-Producer would organise and provide the money to finance the project along with being involved towards the day to day production.


• Associate Producer would share the same amount of resonsibilities delegated from the main Producer.


• Assistant Producer would work under the supervision of the Associate Producer.
  


• Line Producer would overlook the budget of the film along with the day-to-day production of the project.
  


• Administative Producer would employ freelancers to work within the production.

Film Director

The Directors role is to control the creative and the artistic side of the production of the film. The Director developes a vision towards how the film should look and to take into consideration of how he wants the audience to experience when watching the finalised cut.

The Director works very closely with the film crew and actors by guiding them through his creative vision so that he could create some positive results.

On set the Director is responsible deciding and approving every camera angle, lens effect, lighting and the set design.

Besides controlling the creative side they are also responsible for the coordination and dramatic effect displayed by the actors.

During the post-production the Director also plays the key role in overlooking the last phases of creating the final look of the film.

At this stage the Director works closely with the film editor to ensure that the selected shots and cuts for the scene is sending the right emotions towards the audience. Apart from workng with the film Editor the Director also works along side with the sound production along the musical composition.

It is up to the Producer who selects and hires the Director. During the different phases of film making, the Director works closeley with the Producer where they are both responsible for the script approval, financial matters, contract negociating along with marketing to distributors.

Camera Man

The role of the Camera Man is to operate the film camera. The Camera Man is responsible for maintaining composition throughout a scene or a shot.

It is very important that the Camera Man communicates with the Director so that they can both confirm creative and technical decisions.

Film Editor

Film Editors play a very important creative part in the film making process. Film Editors are responsible for arranging the dialogue, music, pace, visual and sound effects into producing a variety of edits and then finishing with a final cut.

The Film Editor is mainly used during the post-production of the film making process.

Production Sound Mixer

The role of the Production Sound Mixer is to record the sounds and sound effects on location or on a studio set. They are mainly responsible for the quality of the sound by keeping control of the sound levels so that it doesn't peak. The Production Sound Mixer plays a big during the post-production phase. During this process the production sound mixer corrects any errors that might have occurred during the recording process.

Radio Programme

Hello Again!!!

Today we were introduced to another module BC1003. In this new module we are required to produce a 5 minute radio programme on a factual subject of our choice.

Before we began thinking up ideas we listened to some radio programmes, which previous students had created so that we could hopefully get some inspiration for our project.

The first programme we listened to was about a sleeping condition called Insomnia.



After listening to the programe I had listed some good points along with some bad points.

Good Points:

• I found the programme to be very informative. I found this useful becuase it delivered lots of information about what the condition is and the effects it has on the sufferers. Again it gave information about how to treat insomnia along with giving some contact details to people who specialise in treating people.
  
• The proggrame had very interesting interviews with doctors who explained what the condition is along with the causes and symptoms for people who are experiencing this to come foward and recieve treatment.
  
• The programme had very interesting facts about famous people who suffer from insomnia, which still kept me intersted in continuing to listen.

Bad Points

• Unfortunately I didn't take to their radio jingle due to it was far too long and I found it to be a little off putting.
  
• I found that their vox pops was too long and due to it was a closed question the answers were short and samey.

The second radio programme that we listened to were about buses.

Again after listening to the programe I had come up with some good and bad points.

Good Points:

• I found the programme to be very innovative to listen to because of the interesting storys about buses that were very entertaining.
  
• I thought that there was a good selection and choice of music used throughout the programme that really worked for me becuase it helped settle into different moods between each story as if you were going on a bit of a journey.

Bad Points:

• I found that there wasn't a clear linear structure through out the programme because it started off with discussing about the new hybrid buses along with some vox pops. But then with out any warning it changed into telling amusing stories about events that happened on buses, which inheritently are more interesting but unfortunantly it didn't make any sense of what the programme is about.

After listening to these radio programmes we then each adopted the roles of Production Developer and then started thinking about the subject for which I am hoping to make my programme about.

The subject that I have thought of basing my programme on is the history of the Mods and the Rockers.



The reason why I had thought of this idea is because I had always been interested in the different trends that people follow in particular the Mods and the Rockers. This happened so long ago that it would enable us to talk about all our yesterdays. And during the programme I thought it would be good to compare the old to modern trends like the Chavs and the Emos and have a quick debate to whether it is simular or disimular to 40 years ago.






But due to there are only four students on the course we all grouped together to create one production team, which unfortunately we had to use only one idea. I sadly had to ditch my idea becuase the rest of the group weren't that keen on it due to it wouldn't be that easy to find the suitable resources.

In the end we then decided to base our programme on how commercialised christmas is and compare it to what it might have been like 50 years ago. We thought that this would be a good idea becuase with the advent of the chritmas season coming up would supply us with lots of fantastic oppertunities for interviews, vox pops and it is a topic that a majority of people are interested in.

At the end of the meeting we decided that each of us would split the research tasks between each of us so that next next meeting we could compare all our findings and help the project to progress.

Different Types of Microphones

Hello!

Today we had a lesson into the different types of microphones there are and why they are all different.

A microphone is a transducer, it works by taking air pressure levels (sound) and turning them into electric energy. It then gets reversed back into sound as we listen to it through the speakers.

The two types of microphones there are in the industry are Condenser and Dynamic.

(The microphones in these pictures are an Aries condenser and a SM58 dynamic microphone)

The reason why they're both so different is because:

• Dynamic microphones has a moving coil which is placed just behind the wind screen. This only works when air pressure levels passes through the wind screen and comes into contact with the diaphragm. The diaphragm then vibrates moving the coil within the magnetic field that produces electric energy.

• Condenser microphones (capacitor) has the diaphragm placed on a gold plate because it has the least resistance than any other substance. The plate is placed within the wind screen which allows sound to pass through and come into contact with the diaphragm. The diaphragm vibrates and produces electric energy. Condenser also need Phantom Power (48v) to create more charge for the diaprhagm to work.

We also learnt that condenser microphones have special settings known as Polar Response Patterns. The reason why they have these patterns is so that they can be able to cope in different frequency levels. Polar Response Patterns also dictate the directions to which the microphone picks it's sound.

After learning about the types of microphones there are, we then began to produce a 30 second edit on ProTools of our vox pops about the Grand Pier that we recorded last week.

Intro to Sounds

Hello Again!

Today we had a group introduction to the basic physics of the nature of sound with our tutor Ace Taylor.

During the introduction we learnt the meanings of:

• Decibels (DB) which measures the amplitude of the sound pressure levels in the air. It was invented by scientist Alexander Graham Bell (3rd March 1847 - 2nd August 1922)


• 

• Pitch which is measured in Hz (Hertz) that records a number of events that happen every cycles per second. Hz was invented by a German physicist Henrich Hertz (22nd February 1857 - 1st January 1894).
  

We also exlpored the way how sound travels due to compression between each individual molecule that is found in the air.

Ace also introduced us to the Doppler Effect which was discovered by Christian Doppler.

The Doppler Effect means a rapid change of frequency and wavelength of a moving object (for example a sound of a ambulance siren approaching and passing the stationary listener)

It was now time to put our learning into practice by starting the first excercise of our module BC1002. The excersise we are required to do is to go and record vox pops with the use of sound equipment in order to create a short edited session for our proffessional edit.

The sound equipment that I would be using today are the Fostex FR-2LE and the Sony Mini Disc recorder Type S. The Microphone that I used where an SM-57.

The topic that I would be asking people about would be centred around the most recent destruction of the Grand Pier. The question that I would be asking people is "What is your fondest memory of the Grand Pier?"

During the collecting the vox pops I was thinking upon the possible places of where to place the microphone in order to get a good quality recording. But with the lack of sound experience that I have it was quite a hard technique that could be overcame with practice.

After collecting the vox pops we then imported the sound files into a audio software known as ProTools where we will begin to edit the tracks down into a 30 second session.

02/10/08

Today we had a quick recap of our exercise of recording vox pops. We took note over the amount of vox pops recorded and did a group self evaluation.

The areas I felt as though I could improve on were the levels of confidence of asking people in whether they would like to participate in the vox pops. I can improve on this next time by being a bit more prepared on what to say as approaching the person and be sure of the question that I am asking.

I also need to take into consideration of where to place the microphone during interviews in order to get a good quality recording for future projects. I can achieve this by getting some more hands on experience with using microphones so that I can plan ahead before recording my desired sound.

After evaluating we then headed down to Weston sea front to collect some more vox pops for our project. On the way to the location I thought about the places of where to find people who would hopefully contribute to the project and provide me some good answers.

The equipment I used to record today was a Sony Mini Disk rescorder type s. I shared the mini disk recorder with a fellow peer named Rich.

When I arrived at the sea front my first chosen location to ask questions were the Grand Pier. I chose this particular location becuase I thought that it would be a good place to ask people due to they would be relaxing on the pier to which they might be more easy to approach. I also thought that it would be a good idea to record the sounds of sea over the vox pops so that it would set the scene for the listener.

Unfortunately not as many people as I originally hoped didn't want to participate in the vox pops. Even the ones who did participate completely missed the point of the question and didn't give the answer that I hoped to get.

After recording at the Grand Pier Rich and I then thought about recording down the High Street because of the possibilty of recording lots of vox pops from so many different people. But dissapointingly this didn't work out because nearly everyone were in such a hury that they couldn't spare us any time.

After the High Street we both decided to head back to the Grand Pier where it would be more relaxed and certain people would like to contribute to our project.

After collecting our vox pops we then headed back to the college to import our sound files from our mini disk recorders into Pro Tools.

I felt as though there was a slight improvement with asking people to participate in vox pops then the previous time because I was more confident in approaching people and I was deciding on places of where to record as many vox pops as possible.

The things that I can improve next time would be to collect resources from as many different people as possible via their age, gender and ethnicity. I think that this is important due to fact that I would recieve as many different answers and opinions that would make future projects much more inovative.

Hello!

Hi my name is Monish and this is my first Blog.

I have just begun my FDA in Broadcast Media, but previously I achieved two BTEC qualifications in Media Moving Image and Music Practice at Weston College.

The reason why I have decided to do the FDA is not just because of financial matters but also the course covers the areas that I am most interested in like TV and Radio production.

What I am hoping to achieve on this course is to gain more experience in working within the media industry and hopefully earn a high pass rate at the end of my learning.

The areas I am mainly interested in is camera work and film. I would like to develop some more knowledge and confidence in the sound production side, as it would be just as useful as having skills in making films.

During my BTEC days I was offered the opportunity via the college to participate in some work experience with Endemole West on the show 'Deal or No Deal' and Gala bingo for two weeks. This experience has been very useful as it has given me the confidence to make the first step in the industry.