Audio Journalism Evaluation

The audio journalism assessment required me to make a three-minute podcast and a 2 minute interview. My podcast was about Charles Dickens and the Dickens 2012 event that is taking place this year, in celebration of his 200th birthday. My interview was with Nathan Wadlow, an editor of an online magazine and a recent university graduate.

For the podcast I did a lot of research. I wanted to know about the Dickens 2012 event and looked into what events would be taking place. Before I even began interviewing anyone for vox pops I compiled a list of questions for them to answer. I also completed my audio script.

I wanted to have a vox pop aspect to the podcast to add more depth to the piece. It also meant that my piece would not be stale and boring because it had a number of people talking throughout. In most podcasts I have listened to there is usually an expert opinion or a short interview with someone involved with the story. I had tried to contact someone from Dickens 2012, but had no luck, so I tried the Charles Dickens Museum. I asked a member of staff a number  of pre-prepared questions. In this stage of the project I felt that I had worked hard and the only thing I may have done differently would have been to try to contact someone from the Dickens 2012 event sooner, instead of emailing one or two weeks before.

I felt that my interviews with people were good and I felt confident that my audio was of a high quality. One problem I did face when interviewing the lady from the museum was that the sound from her recording was not brilliant. When I began to edit, my voice was very clear and extremely loud, where as her voice was very quiet and very hard to hear what she was saying. I also interviewed a few people over Skype and although the quality was clear, when you put it next to a piece of audio recorded in person you can tell the difference.

The interview was conducted last-minute. I had planned to interview an author about how to get into writing, but I was unable to get in contact with the authors that I wanted to interview. Looking back I should have done this sooner and next time I will do this. Once I had contacted an editor for a publication that I write for the interview was arranged. I had planned the questions that I was going to ask him. I stuck to these for the most part, but asked him other questions as the interview got started.

The quality of the interview was good. I found it hard to edit the interview down from four minutes to three because I felt that the material was all really useful. I chose to ignore the about you part of our interview because I was able to introduce him in the text that went before the interview. I also got rid of things that the audiences would not find as interesting. Hesitations were mainly removed from the audio, but some of them led into their answers that the edit would have been bad and very noticeable. I also felt that if I had deleted all mistakes and hesitations the interview would have sounded staged and fake.

For this project I was still organised, but when it came to the interviews with experts, not just people I knew or from the street, I could have been more prepared and tried to contact and arrange them sooner. The editing was done on the day of hand in, but I felt that this was in plenty of time, so I would not change that. Due to the problem in the audio, when completing a task like this again, I will double-check that all the levels on the equipment are correct before starting, just to ensure that the audio could be of a good quality. I also would have changed the music on my podcast if I had the chance. I found it hard to find copyright free music, so I made my own track on the programme Garage Band. Bit as I had never used it before, I felt that the music was a little basic and could have definitely been improved upon.

Video Journalism Evaluation

For my video journalism assessment I created a mini-documentary about The Globe Theatre. I wrote the narrative, filmed the theatre and also took pictures of the theatre too.

In the planning stage I felt I did well. Before I even began filming I researched the theatre and a little bit about its background. Using the information I wrote a script for my narration. I felt that it was good to write the script before filming because it then gave me something to think back to and to try to work towards. I also had prepared a few questions that I was going to ask people at and around the theatre.

When it came to filming I think I could have done better. I had planned ahead and knew that filming inside the theatre was not allowed, which is why I took photographs of the inside of the theatre myself. There were also building works outside the theatre at the time of my visit, which I feel ruined my shots a little, because there was a lot of background noise and it just didn’t look visually appealing. I managed to film a number of shots of the theatre and the surrounding areas, but feel that I could have shot more and in better quality.

I was pleased with the interview that I managed to secure on the day. I approached the tout guide and asked him my pre-prepared questions and got brilliant answers. Despite this great interview I not feel that I should have asked more people these questions. My original idea was to do a series of short interviews, to do a vox pop part of the video. But I felt that because my interview was good I did not need it. I think that had I interviewed more people my short documentary would have benefited because it would have had a number of voices and opinions, not just mine as the narrator and the tour guide. It would have also given me more material to work with, which is always good because you do not know if the material you filmed will work until you begin to edit.

Editing went ok, but I felt it could have been a lot better. I had only filmed the week before, so the editing was done the day before the assessment was due in. This was a lack of planning on my part and if I was to do this again I would have made more time to edit my work and would have completed this stage sooner. I was happy with how the work looked, but I could have included more detail and more shots. As I mentioned previously I also think that more interviews would have made the project better.

Overall I feel that my work was to a high standard, but could have been improved upon. The initial planning and research stages went well and I feel that I did my best to do as much as possible before filming began. In terms of filming I would next time shoot more footage than is needed, just incase some of the footage shot was not to a high enough standard. Editing would be completed in the same way, but I would plan this stage better and would begin editing a lot sooner that I did this time round.

What Influenced My Audio Journalism Assignment

As you may have all seen by now I have created a podcast about Charles Dickens, for the audio part of my Multimedia Journalism module. This can be listened to on this blog and also on SoundCloud.

I had a rough idea of how to create a podcast already as I made one for my A-level Media Studies coursework, so used this as guidance. From past research I knew that Radio 1 make amazing podcasts, so I listened to them for inspiration on how to format my work.

In terms of inspiration for the actual content I was inspired by a poster. I was on my way back to uni after a weekend home and spotted a poster on the wall of one of the tube stations. I can’t seem to find the picture on the web, so you will have to use your imaginations. It was advertising the Dickens 2012 event that is taking place all year. This planted the seed for a podcast on Charles Dickens.

What’s more is that the blog I wrote about Charles Dickens birthday, also inspired the podcast. It showed to me that the podcast content was newsworthy and would be interesting to a number of people.

The interview was not inspired by anything, to be honest. I had a hard time trying to decide who to interview and after a few failed attempts at making contact with some authors, I approached an editor of an online magazine that I write for. This was actually a really good idea because as well as being interesting and useful to my audience, it was also incredibly helpful to me too.

 

News Update- Happy Birthday Charles Dickens

Before you guys say anything, I know I have already published this and yes it is old news now. But, for the ease of the person marking this blog I thought I would re-post this article with all my other pieces of work to be marked. Because that’s the kind of girl I am. So on with the news update.

People all around Britain are celebrating the 200th birthday of Charles Dickens. Today a service was held at Westminster Abbey for the writer. Prince Charles, the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Duchess of Cornwall, were all in attendance. Charles described Dickens as “one of the greatest writers of the English language.” (Metro)

Charles Dickens was born on the 7th February 1812 and went on to become a successful novelist. His most famous books include Oliver Twist, Bleak House and Great Expectations. The latter is being made into a film, starring Ralph Fiennes and Helena Bonham Carter.

Google have even joined in with the celebrations. The Google image has been re-designed to include characters from Dickens novels. What’s more people have flocked to Twitter in a bid to celebrate the life and work of Charles Dickens.

This picture is provided by Martyn Pattison, on the Geograph website.

Nathan Wadlow Interview

For my final piece of work for my multimedia journalism module, I had to create an interview. I racked my brains for inspiration and decided to call up one of the few contacts in the media industry that I had.

My contact was Nathan Wadlow, a graduated History and Journalism student. Nathan is currently the editor of the online magazine, The Student Pocket Guide. He arranged interviews with bands and deals with the social networking aspect of the magazine, among other things.

But what I really wanted to know, apart from all the brilliant advice, was had he always aspired to be a journalist, or did something else take his fancy at a younger age?

 

Charles Dickens Podcast

This year is going to be eventful for fans of the brilliant British author, Charles Dickens. He has just had his 200th birthday and to celebrate a host of events will be held around the globe to remember a commemorate one of the greatest writers of all time.

 

 

The picture is not my own, it can be found here

Opinion Piece- Hunger Games Classification Too Low?

Clicking through the Guardian’s culture pages I stumbled across an article about the classification of the recently released Hunger Games. The film was given a 12a rating, but some people are not happy with this and believe the film should have been given a 15.

After reading the article I was a little confused at this opinion. I’ve seen the film in question and although there is some violence, it is not as bad as these worried parents make out.

If the parents were truly worried about the film, then they should have researched what the story line was about before taking their young child to the cinema to see it. The books and online all stress that this is a story about 24 children fighting to the death. If that doesn’t spell it out to them, then what does?

But some people truly felt that the film was too disturbing for young viewers. One mum had to leave the cinema with her child, she said on mumsnet that “12yo DD was so distressed at one particular part, not long before the end that we had to leave the cinema!” The film only shows three or four deaths, but I believe they were shot in a way to ease distress that would be felt by some of the younger members of the audience.

In my opinion this classification was suited well to the film. There were warnings about the nature of the film everywhere and if parents decided to take their child to see it, that is their choice. I’d just like to say that there are others films out there that children should not be watching, that are more damaging than this one. So what do you think?

What Influenced My Video Journalism Assignment

For my Multimedia Journalism work I created a mini documentary about Shakespeare and The Globe Theatre, which can be seen on Youtube and on this blog.

I am not sure what really influenced my idea for this documentary. I think it was the mention of the best literary couples on Valentines Day that started my train of thought. Last year The Guardian wrote an article called “The 10 Best Love Stories In Pictures“. This led to the creation of “My 5 Favourite Literary Couples“. Obviously Romeo and Juliet was mentioned so that pushed the idea of Shakespeare to the fore front. As this was a visual piece of work I needed somewhere to go and film about Shakespeare and of course The Globe was the place to do it.

Initially I was going to do a number of Vox Pops, as  I have seen quite a lot in video journalism. I watched Pockets on 4docs and loved how a number of people were used. This moved the story on and did not allow me to get bored because I had more than one person to listen to. But I managed to secure a really good interview with a tour guide at The Globe and wanted this to be the main part of my documentary. For this reason narration would also need to be used, to break up the documentary and to add another voice.

Once I had got to the editing stage I didn’t really have any influence. I arranged the documentary in a way that felt right for me and allowed the content to remain exciting and not boring and full of too many facts.

Multimedia Review- You’re Guide To Vegas

For this post I am going to be reviewing a piece of multimedia Journalism. I tried to find my own example to review and have come up with something that is hopefully interesting.

I am going to be reviewing the Your Guide To Vegas application on the I Heart Vegas website. This is part of the site where you can see a map of Las Vegas. Places that have been suggested are represented with little hearts. Once clicked a picture and a description of the place comes up. You can also add your own suggestion to the map, for others to see.

I think this is quiet different to some other travel websites. When suggesting to readers where to go, websites tend to compile a top ten list of places to go. But I also found a similar piece of multimedia on one of my favourite blogs Sending Postcards. One one of their pages they have created an interactive map, documenting all the places that they have visited so far. You can then click on the icons and it takes you to all the previous blog posts about that area.

I feel that the Your Guide To Las Vegas application is very interesting. Instead of simply listing the places to suggest, you are able to see the place on the map, the road and what it is near for yourself. You are then able to read and see pictures of those suggested places. I also found it interesting that you could then add your own place to the map and write your own description of that place. The fact that readers could get involved with the developing of the website and that piece of multimedia was something I haven’t seen too often before now.

 

Photograph courtesy of Jon Sullivan on this website

 

Media Filtering Post- The Hunger Games

The highly anticipated “The Hunger Games” was released in the UK on 23rd March. The film starring Jennifer Lawrence, Josh Hutcherson and Liam Hemsworth, is a film adaptation of the young adult novel which shares the name. The book is the first in the succesful set written by Suzanne Collins. And with whispers that “The Hunger Games” will be the next “Twilight” the first week of box office records was sure to cause a bit of a stir.

1. The Guardian: “The Hunger Games smashes US box office records”

“The Hunger Games” took $155 million in its first weekend after opening in the US. The film is also set to make astonishing amounts of money overseas. The movie has also overtaken the popular film “Twilight” which only received $69. 6 million in its first weekend. New Moon, the biggest opening Twilight film, which received $142.8 million in the first week, may also been beaten by “The Hunger Games”.

For the UK I feel that The Guardian provide good quality, up-to-date information with regards to culture. Their website is excellent and will not only provide a story, but you can communicate with other readers in forums etc. This makes the story more interactive and interesting for the readers.

2. USA Today: “Hunger Games devours the competition at box office”

Expectation were beaten this weekend when “The Hunger Games” received $155 million in its first weekend. It is set to challenge “Twilight” as it appeals to both genders. It includes romance, for the females, and a lot of action that would appeal to males.

USA Today take a similar stand point to The Guardian. They both share the impressive figures for the movie. But although they both compare it to films such as “Harry Potter” and “Twilight” USA Today, go into more depth as to why this film had trumped other competition.

3. Boston Herald.com Sport: “The Hunger Games mirrors our ever-increasing appetite for sports violence”

Teenage girls from all around the globe are rushing to get their hands on books and merchandise related to “The Hunger Games”. But this film based on Suzanne Collins’s book, seems to encourage brutality in sports and amongst people. 24 young children are forced to fight to the death until one winner remains. Films are not all entirely at fault, sport itself is too, as it had just emerged of a scandal called Bountygate. Where players injure others and get bonuses for doing so.

This was an interesting article by the Boston Herald. Even in the sporting world “The Hunger Games” is known and is succesful. To link a big film story with a big sports story was really inventive and shows a negative stance towards the film, that most other sites have avoided.