WINOL Debrief - May 12th

Last weeks live edition of WINOL was probably one of the slickest, best looking and most news worthy bulletin we have managed to put on air so far. The stories were all in on time, luckily there was not many technical problems in the studio, or out on the field, and everybody knew what they were doing and everyone gave 100% in doing so. I think mostly this was thanks to the live general election coverage we hosted the week previous to last, when we all worked producing live television for hours and hours, and thanks to everything we learnt this evening, it was easier to put together the 10 minute WINOL bulletin than it has been before. Overall, the bulletin ran over with 10 seconds, which is the best running time so far - and I am sure it would have been spot on if the VT-computer had not frozen at the start of a package. Sound is still a hard nut to crack, and it seems we might need to focus on this issue in our practice run on Wednesday to perfect this, and as director it might be worth shouting even louder for the sound guy to hear what is going on.

The traffic was unfortunately not very high, only just under one hundred people watched it on LiveStream, and as Chris pointed out that we need to promote ourselves better with leaflets, social networking and other ways to promote what we are doing. One thing that might help is bringing back 'Date of Fate' which attracted quite a big audience every week, and maybe develop other similar type of shows that can attract an audience which might stay around our website to not only watch this, but also read our text stories and familiarise themselves with who we are and what we are doing every week, and hopefully want to keep coming back to our news service.

"Symmetry is boring"

Chris Horrie

Some technical details... Chris mentioned that we should not keep the presenter in the center of the camera, as this is very symmetrical ... and boring. Play around with the angles and get a more interesting and asymmetrical shot so that the audience can be a bit more entertained... Also, we should zoom in tighter on the presenter to give a feeling of him/her telling the news in your face, like a friend would. Additionally we have to get better at writing the scripts. At the moment they are alright, but they need some polishing and we definitely need to simplify them. We are telling the news. Simple. Not features. Complicated. So we need to keep the language structure simple so that everyone can digest what has been said first time around, cause you will not hear it twice. A more factual, less poetic script!

First package on air this week was Stuart's which, as always, delivered an excellent piece - this week about Winchester's own Conservative candidate Steve Brine and his first day in Westminster after the coalition had been made official. Potentially, there could be some juxtaposition going on in the piece when speaking about a former member of Parliament as the same time as the Cromwell statue is being shown - Cromwell former member of Parliament? Throughout the package the scripting improved and towards the end it was excellent, and the piece the camera was spot on perfect.

Secondly Grant provided a very well balanced package with an almost perfect script. As a pay off we all have to improve though, and cannot keep saying "wait and see" and such, it needs to be more concrete and definite! Like Chris said, a "near perfect package"!

Following these two political packages, Joey contributed with a well balanced piece about a race row that broke out at the University of Winchester during one of the BOP nights. Even though the angle was good, it might have been possible to have made it even more distinct. It was technically not excellent, but the script was simple and very good for a news package.

Last one of the more heavy news packages on the agenda for the bulletin was Claire's report on teenage pregnancy in Hampshire, and how it's risen throughout the last years. Unfortunately this was more of a featury package than news one, but a very good one. There was also quite a lot of comment going on, which tends to lean towards feature as well, since you are not allowed to comment in news.

At this point sports should have made an entrance, but this week we didn't have very much at all, except for Josh talking for a minute about rugby and what will happen later on this year. This basically due to the football season being over, and the sports team not being able to find very much else going on in and around Winchester.

Finally, Paul added some flavour to quite a heavy bulletin with his story about award winning tea - even though it was good it missed a bit of balance, and also that sting that makes people more interested in it. A nice puff piece to finish off one our best bulletins so far, which we all were very pleased with.

Hopefully, with BJTC coming around for an inspection this week, we can produce just as a good bulletin again!

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Election Night goes LIVE Gonzo Style

Question Time at the University of Winchester

Election Night goes LIVE Gonzo Style

About twenty-five nervous, excited and for once well-dressed students have been gathering throughout the day in the News Room at the University of Winchester. The date is the 6^th of May, 2010, and for most people this means Election Day 2010, just like it does for our students. But it is just not like any other election day for them. This is the day when their first broadcast is going to be put on air, online, live – and hopefully being watched by thousands of people who are not only their parents or other halves, but also more ‘important’ such as politics.

Everyone has been working hard to plan it all into detail but even so the panic is now starting to creep up on the Winchester News Online team as every minute seems to go faster towards that crucial 10pm live election coverage start. The WINOL team has been working for weeks and have known for just as long that it will be a long night, filled with sweat, yawns, too much coffee and a few headaches.

As the tedious script writing eventually takes off properly, a lady dressed in blue walks in, telling the team that they can no longer stay in the news room, which is equipped with all the technology they will need throughout the night, any longer due to security reasons. The ice cold, burning journalist eyes that meet these words fill the room with a fuming, negative and downbeat atmosphere that does not go away until the issue is later resolved and the students can go back to panicking about the “real stuff” again.

With only a few hours left until the coverage itself is about to begin, everyone is running around like silly geese, not really knowing what to do, but still somehow managing to pull it all together before 10pm. A script is delivered to the presenter. The studio crew is flying into the studio with just a few minutes before takeoff. The gallery is buzzing with nervousness and nail biting, shouting and directing, too much people but no one really knowing what to do next.

Ten. Nine. Eight. Seven. Six. Five.

PANIC!

Four. Three.

Light, check. Sound, check. Autocue, check.

Two. One.

Presenter cue. GO!

As with everything that involves technology something is bound to go wrong. First possible thing does. The unreliable autocue decides to crash but luckily the presenters are able to pull it off anyway and deliver what seems to be a fantastic show. Fiery spotlights are turning up the heat even more in the studio, while icy air conditioning works hard to cool down the equipment as well as the team yelling to people what to do next in the gallery. A can of Red Bull stands next to the presenters PC and he is asked to move it out of shot. He giggles and does what he is told.

‘SHUT UP’

A million voices are buzzing around the director who cannot hear what is being said in the studio due to the cacophony of noises that merge together as one big choir. But after about ten minutes some sort of calmness fill the studio and the gallery, and our hard working students manage to pull through and give their audience an amazing live show presenting the evenings results streaming in from all around the United Kingdom.

‘SOUND UP’

Sweat dripping down the presenters’ forehead as begging over and over again for the studio sound to be louder, ‘LOUDER’! First outside broadcasting is arriving from our fellow students around in the different constituencies in the South East of England, but it seems it is either sound or picture that does not want to work properly. The two different elements necessary for a broadcast can definitely not cooperate and agree on working as a team, instead all that comes through is either lousy sound with good picture quality or the other way around.

A sigh of disappointment echoes in the gallery as everyone had looked forward to being one of the few, if not the only, university doing something like this with live links around the UK, and other far off places such as Austria. But determined students as the team are, no one gave up and as the evening went on the broadcast came to include some almost professional outside broadcasts from around the country. When the next election comes knocking on our doors, the WINOL team will be more prepared on these challenges and knowing how to work their way to the end result without too much disappointment.

At midnight presenter number two is taking over presenter ones seat and realises the script has somehow not been fully finished, which leaves her with a lot of black holes and empty minutes to fill. The director keep frenetically whispering questions and ideas to her for discussions with the studio guests, and at the same time trying to puzzle the script from the first couple of hours together to something new for the remaining god knows how long time.

At half past two most of the constituency packages are not usable due to the fact that the result for that specific constituency has been announced. The crew ends up with an awful lot of packages with issues being discussed with the public and politics, such as trident, immigration and the economy, but as the minutes go on, even the WINOL team gets tired of seeing the same packages getting repeated over and over again so it is decided to throw in more live commentaries to our news room, where a third presenter does a brilliant job keeping track on what is going on in the UK and what might happen next.

Around 4am the team decides to keep going until the results for Winchester has been announced, which should be “any minute” now. Countless of coffee mugs can be traced between the News Room and the studio, and the apples, bananas and cookies provided in the News Room seem to decrease rapidly as it gets brighter and brighter outside, and as Winchester starts waking up again.

When the results are finally being announced for Winchester the entire studio held its breath waiting for the word – KEEP! – that would keep Winchester under Martin Tod’s regime with the Liberal Democrats, or – GAIN! – which would make the constituency a blue or red part of the map for the next five years. Tiredness, frustration, headaches, excitement, smell of coffee and a big sigh of relief fill the room as the outside broadcaster announces that Winchester has fallen in the hands of the Conservatives, and Steve Brine, and whether the members of the team agree or disagree with the public’s choice they all burst out in a round of applauds – most likely due to the fact that the University of Winchester, and its team of WINOL journalists, is being the first university covering an election live for seven hours and still being alive at 6am in the morning. It has been an amazingly well organised night with memories for the rest of everyone’s lives.

There is something special about that WINOL team.

To vote or not to vote.. for change?

To cast a vote in an election is a right you have been given. Not everyone has got this right. It is not an obvious right to everyone around the world, so we should definitely use it, and make sure that we are to keep this vote as an individual right, a human right.

On 6^th of May the British nation will vote. I predict for a change. I would prefer a change, but not to the total opposite. I would prefer a change where to parties were to work together, forming a coalition and through this new (unique as it would be first time ever in Britain) way the decisions being made would have to be tested even harder by more than one party and its policy to actually become a part of Britain.

Change.

That’s what they are all talking about. How to change Britain, for a brighter future. And then in the next second, instead of explaining how and why this or that could be changed, they start playing the naughty political blame game, cause it’s so much easier to point out what the other parties are doing wrongly to prevent a positive change for Britain than it is to encourage the audience, the voters in a debate concerning what the party itself actually will do to achieve this change within society.

Change.

I am not a British citizen. Therefore, I am not allowed to vote in the general election. What I find a little bit weird though is that even though I cannot vote in the general election, the law finds me important enough to vote in the local election. And I just can’t get my head around it. Yes, I can understand that as a British citizen you are not eligible to vote in the general election, but wouldn’t this suggest that I should not vote in the local election either? After all, a vote is a vote, maybe not for the bigger scale, but still a vote, from a non British citizen in Britain. On the other hand, hey, I pay the £3.000 tuition fee each year, to study in Britain, and isn’t that more of a contribution to the country than many other British citizens do?

I am not arguing for a vote really, I just find it really interesting how so many things, such as paying taxes in Britain, tuition fees and so on, is done every month even though I am not a citizen, but when it comes to an election where I could possibly affect my taxes, tuition fees and student loans, I cannot take part in it...

Change.

If I was allowed to vote, I would cast my vote. For change. But not for the complete opposite of what Britain is today. I already mentioned a coalition. And I would prefer seeing Labour and the Liberal Democrats in it. I do not agree with David Cameron’s policies, they feel as if they would actually make my life as a Swedish student in Britain harder than it already is, and to some extent Liberal Democrats seems to walk a bit along the same route, but not to the same extent...

Daily, you hear people complaining about the economy. About the recession. How badly Britain has been affected and so on. But honestly, I think Labour has done quite an alright job getting out of the recession with a Britain that has survived it better than many other countries around the world. This recession was always going to happen. No matter whether Clegg, Cameron or Brown would have been in power, so I do think it’s wrong to fully blame Labour for it, I mean from the sounds of it their still trying to tidy up what happened with Britain’s economy years and years ago.

I am not a 100% follower of Brown, but I have always been more of a lefty. I do not like everything Labour says, but then again, no one can be fully satisfied with a party’s manifesto. I do think though that the only way forward, only way leading to a change, is a proper change. And if I could vote my vote would probably go to Labour.

So, even if I can’t – you can. And you should.

Thursday 6^th of May.

You decide Britain’s future.

Make sure you make your voice heard.

I know I will, in Sweden, on September the 19^th.