GROUP STUDY:

1. conceptual aims – themes/ideas to explore, intended meaning/s

As a group, our main aim is to explore the idea of altering reality, filtering what the real world see’s, hence the name ‘Filtered Reality’. We intend for people who use our interaction to be able to alter their real appearance with ease like they would on apps like ‘Snapchat’ and ‘Instagram’ which both have a variety of filters that can easily be switched between. There is no hugely deep meaning behind the idea of altering reality, but it is simply for enjoyment and fun, something that those who interact with it will find pleasure and entertainment in.

1. technical aims – skills/techniques to develop, expected challenges

Through this project, I hope to develop a good understanding of video objects and increase my confidence in using Max. I’m aiming to understand how to use the video objects with ease, and hopefully gain a basic understanding of a few keyboard shortcuts in Max. I don’t have huge expectations for myself and my group, other than for us all to gain a basic level of understanding of Max and more specifically the video objects and alterations that can be made to it, I believe by the end of this assignment we will each have much more confidence in Max.

As for issues, considering this is our first assignment, I expect a couple of issues:

• figuring out how to connect each filter to a different key on the keyboard, and with an easy transition between filters
• working together as a group on something that isn’t accessible to everyone at all times may prove to be a bit difficult when we’re not in class
• potentially giving ourselves too much work, we have the idea of including audio with each filter but it may prove to be too confusing for our first assignment.

 

SOLO STUDY:

1. conceptual aims – themes/ideas to explore, intended meaning/s

For my solo project, I’ve chosen to explore the idea of the association between image and sound but in quite a simplistic way. Rather than display video image and audio, I intend to create a colour playlist of my own, in a way like a colour wheel, but with audio corresponding to each colour. I aim to either find or create colours that will be the visual displayed on the screen and then search for songs that I find correlate well with the different colours, selecting a different song for each colour. I’m in a way also aiming to explore the idea of the association between colours and ‘moods’ or feelings, although these will be my own personal choice of what colours and songs I feel correlate, I hope audiences will agree with at least some of my choices.

1. technical aims – skills/techniques to develop, expected challenges

I have similar aims for the group and solo projects. My main objective is gaining a basic understanding of the program as I think having basic knowledge and understanding of how to navigate Max will benefit me with future projects, making it easier for me to work without assistance. In doing this solo task, I do hope to develop an idea of the keyboard shortcuts in Max, as well as understanding how to connect visuals and sounds at once, and with ease. I hope that I correctly understand and demonstrate knowledge of what tactile interaction is, even if my project is quite simple and basic. As it is the first assignment I do expect challenges here and there. I think I may struggle with understanding how to connect the right sounds with the right images, and I can see myself struggling to figure out how to connect the visuals and sound to particular keys on the keyboard, allowing for easy navigation between the colours and their corresponding audio.

 

Reflective Statement: http://www.mediafactory.org.au/lauren-bisignano/2019/03/22/reflective-statement/

Einat Amir:

Einat Amir is an Israeli artist, specialising in video installations and live performance art. She was born in Jerusalem, Israel and currently resides in Tel Aviv (the capitol of Israel).

Amir’s website states her ‘works are a research of human interactions that explore the possibilities inherent in everyday communication between people’, and goes on to explain that she creates installations like these to combine the use of authenticity, fabrication, and manipulation.

The purpose of Amir’s works are to research human emotions and interactions with one another.

Below I have inserted a picture of one of her installations ‘Coming Soon Near You’. Amir created a living room set, that once installed into art galleries, invited one person per day to bring in videos (on DVDs, VHS tapes) to watch (people can register in advance to be the selected person of the day).

Visitors to the gallery are welcome to sit and join in watching the content. Part of the purpose of the exhibition is for members to ‘present their choices of moving images, and also to present themselves’, allowing them to communicate part of themselves to the public.

 

 

One of Amir’s more verbal communication based installations is ‘Enough About You’. The performance consisted of emotional encounters between two complete strangers, controlled and guided by a set of pre-recorded directions. The performance set included five sound-sound-proof units with glass fronts in which two strangers would enter together after being selected by the host. Only 20 people would be allowed in the room at a time and those not selected to enter the sound proof units would stand and observe the first interactions of these strangers.

 

 

Video: https://www.einatamir.com/project-2

Amir also works in video as an art medium. She has a number of video works presented on her website, but the one that stood out to me the most was “________ Please”. Which was listed as an ongoing work of hers. Since 2009, Amir has been documenting performances of herself and a local actor to perform with her in the local language. Travelling the world, Amir is is able to create a diverse range of performances. The instructions listed on the website are as follow: ‘Amir and the chosen actor are walking arm in arm among the opening’s crowd. The actor converses with the guests, while Amir remains in complete silence. These performances are unscripted – a total improvisation. The actors is always instructed to say whatever he wants, and to behave in any way he likes, with only one rule – he needs to refer to himself as “the art work”, and to Amir, who clings to his arm, as “The Artist” who created him.’

This in particular stood out to me as Amir was allowing someone who is essentially a stranger, to have complete control over the art. This level of interactivity was something I hadn’t exactly seen before. There was interactivity both with audiences, but also interpersonal interaction between Amir and the hired actor. I don’t believe I’ve ever seen interaction like this between an artist and their work.

Each of Amir’s art pieces are unique, and each have a continuous theme of communication. Whether it be blatantly obvious and clear communication from person to person, or communication of personality through visuals. I really enjoy how involved she allows people to be in her work, she uses tactile, non tactile and sustained interaction which I think is really interesting as she’s able to maintain attention through a variety of forms of interaction.

I think what i’ve taken from doing some research on Einat Amir is that I’d like to maybe look at combining multiple types of interaction, most likely tactile and sustained as I think it would be interesting involving people in the interactive art.

Blog Post 1: Week 7 Pitches

http://www.mediafactory.org.au/lauren-bisignano/2018/10/22/the-news-is-a-joke-week-7-pitches/

Blog Post 2: Week 8

http://www.mediafactory.org.au/lauren-bisignano/2018/10/22/the-news-is-a-joke-week-8/

Blog Post 3: Mad as Hell and Updates

http://www.mediafactory.org.au/lauren-bisignano/2018/10/22/the-news-is-a-joke-mad-as-hell-and-updates/

Blog Post 4: Weeks 11 & 12 Class Reflection

http://www.mediafactory.org.au/lauren-bisignano/2018/10/22/the-news-is-a-joke-weeks-11-12-class-reflection/

Blog Post 5: Reflecting on ‘Early Afternoon’

http://www.mediafactory.org.au/lauren-bisignano/2018/10/22/the-news-is-a-joke-reflecting-on-early-afternoon/

Blog Post 6: Reflecting and Goodbye to the Studio

http://www.mediafactory.org.au/lauren-bisignano/2018/10/22/the-news-is-a-joke-reflecting-and-goodbye-to-the-studio/

All too quickly my second semester of university and my first ever studio has come to an end. I really was not expecting such an amazing experience from my first studio class, but my expectations have been happily exceeded, and I’m genuinely sad that it’s now over.

To think that 3 months ago, I was petrified of beginning The News is a Joke, dreading the initial class as I feared what was in store for me, yet here we are 12 weeks later and it’s safe to say that I will truly miss The News is a Joke. Spending 4 hours each week (and up to 6 hours in the later weeks), allowed me to create strong bonds with my peers and not only learn to work well with others in a studio environment, but also to make friendships I hope to carry with me throughout university and my media career.

The News is a Joke is one hell of a studio. From the early weeks, you get right into understanding comedy news. Throughout the semester we have continuously come back to the questions of ‘what is comedy news?’ and ‘what makes comedy news?’. Asking these questions has allowed us to continue to develop understandings of what comedy news is, through further research, class discussion and personal experience. Right from the beginning of the studio, we were given the task of researching and developing a news story in groups, alongside class discussion and informative and insightful readings. I’d never usually been a huge fan of readings, but each week I found that I was genuinely being intrigued by the content. I found I was enjoying the content because it was new to me, and I was able to apply the information to class discussion and my work. Understanding the theory, history and development of comedy news has been crucial in developing my love for the studio and comedy news itself. I used to think comedy news was basic and well done, but I didn’t quite understand how much goes into the production of comedic news programs and how influential comedy news has been on me. The readings were great in guiding my assignments, allowing me to have a greater understanding of how to go about research, script structure and how satire works and doesn’t work.

I’ll admit, when I first allocated the studio as my first preference, I was worried. No one I knew in the course was even considering The News is a Joke, but to me, the studio really stood out and when choosing my preferences, I kept coming back to it. I knew I liked comedy because I’d say I’m a funny person myself, and I guess that was how I felt the studio would be relevant to me, but the academic and news aspect had me worried. Going into the studio, I was genuinely really concerned. Yeah, I watched a bit of comedy news here and there, but I wasn’t an avid watcher, and I had concerns that maybe the studio wasn’t for me because of this. Despite these worries, I was definitely proven wrong. The studio didn’t require me to have a wide and deep knowledge of satire and news, because the focus of the studio was developing that understanding of satire and learning and developing skills in news production. Open thinking and reflecting was consistent throughout the weeks of this class, and over the 12 weeks, I’ve certainly learned a lot. Almost instantly we were already working on an unmarked project, each of us having allocated roles and being designated researches, which was beneficial to my approach to the research aspect of Assignments 2 & 3. Having the experience within the first few weeks of the semester, and without the stress of recorded marks, allowed us to experience the studios, become familiar with roles and the development process of a news program. These skills we had learned and began developing were only further deepened when it came to Assignment 4. Yes it was a hectic, complicated and sometimes messy experience, but in the end it came together well. In the first half of the semester, we’d only worked in our groups of 10-12 people, but now there was at least 20 of us all working together. We each took our own abilities, skills and knowledge and collaborated together to produce our news show ‘Early Afternoon’. Over 5 weeks, each team member made a contribution (some more than others), whether it be script writing, producing or graphic preparing, each person had some level of involvement in the process. I won’t lie, communication and misunderstanding was often an issue for us. Lack of preparation for rehearsals and misunderstandings of script structure potentially could have been prevented if more communication had been made between producers, writers, directors and the entire crew. If we were to do things again, I’d definitely hope we’d be aware that communication really is key. In the end though, ‘Early Afternoon’ came together well and the positives and negatives of the experience have definitely taught me many things about how to go about a production with a large crew.

Alongside the practical work, throughout the semester, we spent many hours analysing satire, how it can be differently presented and the effect it has on the transmission and reception of the news. We often evaluated people such as John Oliver, Jon Stewart, Samantha Bee and more, comparing and contrasting the similarities and difference in their use of satire. To summarise the impact of satire, the quote “satire is flourishing in the post-network era…satire is no longer simply an occasional style (though at times it is that, too). It is its own genre, and a thriving one at that“ (Gray, Jones and Thompson, 2009) summarises the widespread growth and prominence of satire in news today. Satire thrives and only continues to increase its impact with its inclusion of a wide audience through simplifying and making news more accessible.  Each of these presenters (and any comedy news host), encourages audiences to actively engage with and think about what they are consuming, and I think this is one of the most important things I’ve learnt when examining comedy news.

Overall, The News is a Joke has taught me a great amount. I’ve learned that many people have a contribution to the execution of a news show and that each role is significant in executing the ideal news show.  Being immersed in the TV studios in my first year of uni has also been extremely gratifying and exciting, as I now have an understanding of operating a camera, directing, assistant directing and the lengthy process of creating a news show. This class has allowed me to take on major roles both in the control room and studio, and I am extremely grateful for everything it has taught me. To only be a first-year student and already have experience working in a television studio, is something Year 12 me never could’ve imagined. A year ago I hadn’t even graduated high school, and now I’ve had an extremely beneficial, educational and useful experience in a different environment to what I was used to. It’s safe to say, my expectations have certainly been met. The News is a Joke is going to be an unforgettable experience for me, everything it has taught me I know I will carry throughout my time in the course and in the years of my media career.

Thank you to Ruth, Ed and my peers for allowing me to have such a great experience, The News is a Joke exceeded my expectations and without such a cooperative and fun class, I doubt I would have felt this way.

Here are some photos I collected over the weeks! 🙂

I’m definitely pleased with the outcome of our comedy news program ‘Early Afternoon’, but in evaluating the use of satire and structure of comedy news, I do have some thoughts.

Although the show has comedic tones and elements running through it, after seeing the final cut and watching back the clips on their own, the comedic aspect is slightly drowned out by the informative content. This simply could’ve been because of the timing of the production of this show, with many of us working on other assignments simultaneously, but I also believe planning and allocation of roles was certainly detrimental to the outcome. Our team of writers by the end of the show came to roughly 4 people, and if I’m honest I don’t think it was enough. Maybe to even out the playing field, everyone, or at least the majority of people should have been allocated to a segment each, yes that may be excessive but I feel that having one, maybe two people writing one whole segment proved to be challenging. Yes, Early Afternoon is a news show, but it’s also a comedy news show, and unfortunately, when reviewing the final cut, the comedy doesn’t come through as strong as I’d hoped for. As I’d said earlier on in other blog posts, we all seemed to admire and find entertainment in John Oliver’s show, and we each seemed to want to strive for a John Oliver style show. Although we did incorporate jokes and humorous EVS and graphics, I feel as though the comedic tone may not have come across as much as we wanted to in all the segments, and an incorporation of more jokes and humorous banter would have certainly increased the comedic value.

A section of our program that I believe works quite well, is the ‘Political Climate’ with Anhar and Ryan. The cuts back and forth between a calm Ryan and an anxious, angry and afraid Anhar work well in balancing information with comedy, and I believe that is due to performance and tone of voice, which really proves to be crucial in distinguishing between comedy news and regular news.

The use of two hosts in the sports segment is what I believe worked the best comedy-wise. The contrast between Zac and Julian and their ‘characters’ in the segment allowed for some witty and natural banter, and with Ryan intervening in the beginning and almost making a joke out of his own co-hosts, a further comedic layer was added to the show. If these passionate personality’s and personas had been taken on with each of our hosts, then possibly the lack of super comedic dialogue would be made up for in personality and delivery.

I am pleased with the outcome of ‘Early Afternoon’, I know many of us were putting in a large amount of effort and time into preparing and presenting the show and for many of us being first years, I think we did well. Although I’m pretty happy with it, that doesn’t mean there aren’t things that I wanted to be better. As I’d mentioned, I think the comedy aspect of our show wasn’t entirely consistent, I do understand that we also wanted to include the information so the segments made sense and had structure, but in future I’d like to spend more time on incorporating John Oliver esque or even Samantha Bee, Stephen Colbert or Shaun Micaleff humour and style. I think having more time to work on the assignment too may have resulted in a better outcome, as there was almost a rush to complete the show in 4-5 weeks, even an extra week may have been beneficial but I guess it’s hard when we only have 12 weeks in the semester. I do feel that more group collaboration would have assisted us greatly, with writing and in general. If we had a larger group of writers working from week 7 onwards and communicating with us to gather responses and ideas for jokes and general script structure, maybe ‘Early Afternoon’ would’ve felt more comedic.

As for the final outcome, I believe Julian, Jack, Hao and Joseph worked well on the edit and it came together well, but to me, the out of time graphics and monologue like scripts really stand out. Overall though, for such a large group project that was put together in roughly 5 weeks, with many people being absent, Early Afternoon came together well and I think each of us should be proud of our efforts.

While some areas of the show might not have lived up to my expectation or standard I would have liked, I’m still very fond of the show. As a class, we made sure to prioritise the essential aspects of comedy news that are inciting critical thinking and using satire to educate and inform, and I’d say we executed this fairly well.

Week 11:

The 4th of October, the much anticipated (and maybe dreaded) shoot day has arrived. Although the week 10 rehearsal hadn’t been necessarily bad, we certainly felt unprepared for the coming week.

We began the day rehearsing in chronological order, meaning the segment I was directing was first up. The nerves had certainly kicked in as I felt the pressure to ensure not only I was pleased, but everyone in the class. At this point, I was familiar with the script (which was now complete) and had a vision in my head for how I aimed to bring it together but I knew there was still some minor issues and tweaks I would need to make.

The rehearsal was certainly crucial in perfecting the presentation of ‘Vegans and Vaccines’. I consulted Hao, my AD for the duration of the rehearsal, ensuring both he and I were clear on the structure of the segment and the flow of the script. Before we knew it we were rehearsing and after just one rehearsal I was able to pick up and clearly see some issues. Vision switching was certainly not on time, and from hearing the script read out loud by Ryan (the host), I could immediately recognise structure issues. I then decided to take some time before the next rehearsal to make adjustments to wording in the script, as well as the pacing and placement of graphics and camera changes, speaking to Hao (AD), Trista (Vision Switcher), Julian (EVS), Auto Cue, and essentially anyone else in the control room and studio to ensure we were all on the same page. Once we had run through the segment a couple times, I was relatively okay with how it went and it was already time to hand things over to Darcy who was directing Segment 2 – Bendigo, which I was only camera operating in.

Skipping ahead a couple hours, after some sushi, frustrating phone calls and anxieties building, it was time to film ‘Early Afternoon’. As I sat down in the director’s chair and put my headset on and glanced at the script in front of me, I felt the perfect combination of anxiety and excitement. I believe we only did two takes of Vegans and Vaccines, and sure, there were some slip ups with out of time graphics and a few stutters from Ryan, but other than that and a slight issue with EVS, I was happy with what we got. My personal favourite part of my whole segment being our open with a gradual zoom in on Ryan turning around at the desk with cool blue lights beaming in the studio, it was the perfect open to Early Afternoon and I’m proud of myself for it hit I’m honest.

Once Vegans and Vaccines was out of the way, I handed the headset over to Darcy and I hopped into the studio to jump on camera. The segment went well, although there was a lot of graphics and a couple mix-ups here and there, I think it ran relatively smoothly. Segment 3 is where the bulk of a show is with it containing the sports segment and fluff piece. Originally I wasn’t in this segment, but due to attendance issues and such, I hopped onto camera yet again, which required me to do a simple slow pan at the end with Ryan and his fluff piece on Kim Jong-un. I hadn’t originally been too familiar with the sports segment, but as I’d sat in the audience during rehearsal, I was definitely able to get a sense of the comedic aspect and I certainly felt more immersed in this segment then the others, which may have been because I wasn’t overly familiar with it and wasn’t working on it.

Week 12:

Week 12 was definitely a much calmer and shorter week. With the bulk of the show recorded in Studio A last week, all we had left to film in Studio C was the ‘Political Climate’. I originally was camera operating this segment, but with us only needing one camera that someone else was operating, I decided to jump in as AD for Darcy as his original AD was away. Before we began shooting, I worked with Darcy and Ryan (the writer of the script) in breaking down the script further to cue in graphics as we needed the timing of the graphics to match with the timing of the script. Throughout the rehearsal and filming of the final takes, I worked with Anhar in assisting her in presenting in the ideal comedic way we aimed for.

I definitely spent a lot of the class running back and forth between the control room and studio floor, transmitting messages between the control room crew and Anhar. This segment was the only one of ours that required the use of a green screen as in the other segments we had used the cityscape. As we’d never used a green screen before, it did take a little while to position both Anhar and the graphics correctly, but we got there in the end. Although we were ready to shoot the segment, it did take a number of takes to nail it. With a lot of running back and forth from me, we were making constant alterations and minor changes to the segment. Initially, we had a part where Anhar was handed a raincoat to put on, but due to issues with the audio muffling, we decided to scrap it and instead stick with just adding the storm audio in post-production and having Anhar shiver in fright. Unintentionally, Anhar was often clapping and moving her hands around the mic whilst presenting, which resulted in further distorted audio, so again I was running into the studio to help Anhar with perfecting her presentation and use of mannerisms. In the end, we ended up with a good take with well-timed graphics, little audio issues and a steady enough pace to transmit the information but also come across comedically.

On Tuesday the 2nd of October, myself, Darcy, Chloe, Emilienne, Hao and Zac attended a taping of Shaun Micaleff’s ‘Mad as Hell’. We had booked these tickets earlier in September and had anticipated more people from the class to come, but despite the few spare tickets, the 6 of us headed to the ABC studios for what would be a very entertaining night.

Being in the audience for a show like ‘Mad As Hell’ really opened our eyes into how much goes into the production of a news show, even if it only runs for roughly 28 minutes. The show is filmed on a Tuesday night, and airs on Wednesday, meaning we technically weren’t a ‘live’ audience and that left room for errors and slip-ups for the cast and crew. In comparison to Studio A at RMIT, the Mad As Hell studio was roughly 4 times the size. At Mad as Hell, the set includes a number of stages. One being the main set, Shaun Micaleff’s desk and room, next to it being a smaller room used for a number of sketches, and against the wall was a green screen, used for small clips requiring a cut to another host or guest on the show.

Experiencing being in the live audience of a comedy news show like Mad as Hell whilst being a comedy news student is certainly a worthwhile experiencing. Having the ability to apply theories, facts and information you have gathered in the semester to a real-life experience happening in front of you is gratifying, interesting and overall eye-opening.

As for the studio project, it’s safe to say that I am stressed. Within the weeks we’ve been working on the assignment it feels as though not as much progress has been made as I had hoped for. Many of the scripts aren’t completed and a number of people haven’t attended class or contacted any of us, which has certainly proved to be frustrating. The lack of preparation is something however that we are working around. The frustration with the script isn’t something we can easily fix, it just puts pressure on us as a team to have things prepared by week 11 and causes a large amount of frustration for those of us in the control room. Especially when I’m directing, I’m struggling to put together my segment and visualise it when I don’t have graphics, EVS or a finished script. It’s impossible to piece together a puzzle when you don’t have all the pieces and that’s how it feels trying to direct a segment with missing pieces.

I know that once we get to week 11 and ‘shit gets serious’, that everything will literally have to be complete, but for the time being, rehearsing and structuring ‘Early Afternoon’ is challenging. In the meantime, I’ve offered my assistance in building the Vegans and Vaccines script, and have been trying to help Darcy in lengthening the Bendigo script with the help of Ruth who’s been helpful in giving ideas for things to bring into and out of the script.

This week was much spent around organising the pre-production stage of our news show. Crew roles had only just been allocated, and to my luck, I was actually placed as director for segment 1, and camera operator for segment 2. If I’m honest, I was shocked I actually got chosen to direct, and despite my anxieties, I’m certainly excited to see how I adapt to working in the two new roles.

This class I would say would probably be the first in which we had all worked together as a whole, as for most of the semester we had a divide of the two groups, as well as our smaller groups we’d been in for Assignment 3. Having the entire class come together proved to be difficult, working collaboratively with the entire class proved to be much different to working within smaller groups.

Generally, decision making ran relatively smoothly, however, issues with placement and prioritising segments were not the smoothest. Assignment 4, being such a large show, does indeed require us to piece a number of different news stories together, even if they don’t entirely correlate. Having such a variety of news stories that currently seem to minimally overlap is going to require some level of adjustability and flexibility within the segments and topics in the program to allow us to avoid having a disjointed and muddled news program.

I think over these weeks and through further discussion as a group, we will begin to come to a better understanding of how to structure a coherent satirical news show. However, with the consistency in in inspiration from John Oliver, I fear we may lose that element in the program as sacrifice for coherence, as we’ve seen in Last Week Tonight with John Oliver, there is often a very consistent flow and sense of correlation, which I believe we may find difficult to achieve with our chosen news stories. This may however only be how I feel about the structure of the program. I would ideally like to make the John Oliver style work, but as I’ve mentioned, we may have to adapt and trial different comedic news style presentation, such as something like Mad As Hell, which incorporates a number of skits, comedic actors and a variety of stories into one 30 minute program. I’m honestly not too fussed about the direction the show takes, but I would definitely like to incorporate John Oliver elements as he’s a clear favourite of many of us.

For the majority of the week 7 class, each group presented their ‘Pitch’ on the news idea/story that they had been allocated in the weeks prior. After the time we had spent researching and piecing together our news story and pitch, it was a relief to finally have something to show for it and present the idea to our peers.

I genuinely found it interesting to watch everyone’s pitches, some of the news stories I hadn’t really heard of or didn’t know much about, so seeing my friends and peers discuss them from a student perspective allowed me to grasp a better understanding of the stories. Funnily enough, pretty much every single group had taken inspiration from none other than John Oliver himself, who’s personality and presentation is something we are all fond of. I found it interesting that such a majority took influence mostly from John Oliver, his sarcastic, humorous and passive aggressive tone is easily identifiable, his approach to comedy news being heavily reliant on personality, persona and on-screen energy. Oliver’s personality although having similarities to those of Stephen Colbert and Jon Stewart stands out with a high level of energy and snarky, sarcastic wit. The intensity and

We presented to Ruth, Ed and another RMIT staff member (who I, unfortunately, cannot remember the name of). These 3 were like our ‘judging panel’, after we had completed our 5-minute presentation each of them delivered feedback on how we could expand the story, unpack it and develop it further to create a lengthier segment as well as improve the overall quality of the potential segment. Whilst we had worked on developing our pitch and script for the segment, we found that we may have become so absorbed by the story that we weren’t thinking critically about all the options we had.

We received suggestion from both the panel and class, that we could integrate vox pop footage, which would give a more humorous touch to the segment, and also make for great original footage of Bendigo itself. Although the idea was strong, we quickly realised RMIT would not fund a simple trip to Bendigo, so the idea was greatly appreciated but sadly dismissed, despite how fun it would be.

After the completion of everyone’s pitches, we were to fill out a google form, voting on our top 3 stories we would like to develop into larger news segments for assignment 4. Much to our surprise, Bendigo actually received the most votes, Only a couple minutes before we arrived at class earlier that day, we had said to one another that ‘surely Bendigo won’t get picked’, but here we are. The surprise wasn’t bad, but we were more surprised at how many people were intrigued by a simple story about a country town.

After acknowledging and deciding upon our headlining stories, and discussion of how Assignment 4 was to unfold, we each submitted preferences to a google form about our ideal crew roles for the assignment. I decided, after being Assistant Director in the earlier studio work, that I would like to go a step further and try directing. Although I enjoyed working in the control room and watching things come together separateeperate environment, I had a desire to experience working on the studio floor, and so I listed Camera Operator and Floor Manager as potential roles that I would hope to gain new experience from.

Proposal & Reflection

Overview: our proposal document includes the assigned questions and overview of what we aim to achieve in potentially producing our news segment in the coming weeks of this studio. We have also included the script which includes a number of colour coded directions for prop use, camera work/editing and graphics we will need in producing this segment. Not everything is set in stone, it is definitely subject to change.

Google Doc of Proposal & Script: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Bj84LM7lZJ8poY5ra8YoHZpymbFbAJE5Ilw5tYux1Dk/edit 

The process of working on A3 for the past few weeks has certainly been different to other experience I have in group assignments, but none the less I am still content with the outcome.

Due to the uni break and our own personal schedules, we never really managed to meet outside of class time, and even then our discussion was limited due to the production of our news segment with our larger group. However despite this, thanks to the power of social media and google docs, we were able to easily communicate with one another with ease.

Over the time we were away from uni, we were consistently messaging one another about the requirements of our task, discussing what research we had and where we would go from our current stage of production. With no problems at all we divided up the tasks between the 3 of us by listing them and letting one another choose. Each of us have been completely fine with the roles/tasks we’ve had, Darcy was happy to write the script as he has a strong writing ability, whilst Emilienne and I happily divided up the proposal questions so we’d each have a balanced and fair workload. We updated each other throughout the process of writing, ensuring that we were each involved in all the questions and tasks.

I personally was assigned answering the proposal questions about production requirements and social media potential, and I found these easily attainable. We had a master google doc that included the research conducted by all of during the process of A2 and up until now, as well as Darcy’s script, which made it much easier to access particular parts of the script to reference in our proposal and to have constantly available when arguing our social media potential.

By discussing with the group, I was able to ensure I was including everything they agreed with and wanted to be included in our proposal. I really think our constant checking in with one another and cooperation is what has lead to the success of this assignment and how we’ve been able to achieve something we are each happy with.

 

Other Posts:

Reflection on class: http://www.mediafactory.org.au/lauren-bisignano/2018/09/04/news-is-a-joke-a3-reflection/

Reflection on reading: http://www.mediafactory.org.au/lauren-bisignano/2018/09/04/news-is-a-joke-a3-reflection-2/