Journoblog.com

My efforts in WINOL last week looked successful, but weren’t. I got a lot done, but could have done so much more.

On Monday, Charlotte was away and so I stood in for her. One of the first things to do was make a decision on a live outside broadcast which was planned for Sport. The problem was, it was really a technical exercise, but would have added nothing to the program as there was nothing going on “live” at the time; the OB would simply have been from outside an empty football ground. I made the decision that a live OB will be great to do at some stage, but not until we have some live action to report. Angus Scott and Will Cooper supported this and so it stuck and I think the bulletin was better for it.

Another thing we tried for sport was to have the presenter standing in the corner rather than sitting at the desk. I think this looked much better, although there is still work to be done with regards to camera positioning and background graphics, but it holds a lot of potential and with a bit of polish it could give the whole  bulletin a slicker, more professional look.

The big news was that Colin Firth won an Oscar. He is from Winchester and his parents still live here, so I went and interviewed a teacher from his old school. Unfortunately, no one at the school was there when Colin Firth was, and didn’t know much about him. I was persistent with uni staff in trying to get hold of his parents, who used to lecture at the university, but no information would come my way.

In the end, I put together some pictures and a script for an OOV. My big mistake here was giving up, which isn’t like me and I don’t know why I chose to do something so out of character on such a massive story. I could have done more and I’m still angry with myself as, even if I continued to try and fail, I wouldn’t be living with the knowledge that I didn’t try hard enough.

Still, I presented the bulletin and did an okay job. Every time I talk to a camera I’m more relaxed about it and feel like I’m close to getting it right.