Sports Show/Wellness TV never ends!

Yesterday, to John Luti's great delight, I tagged along with Dakota to the sports show taping. Practicum got out about a half an hour early, so we stayed there from 4:30 to 6:00. It was the first time I had ever been to the sports show or seen anything taped in the studio. It was pretty interesting to see how everything works. Then, Dakota and I shot a stand-up for Wellness TV from 6:00 to 6:30. Hopefully, that introduction will complete our package and it will be able to be used for the next Wellness TV show.

Hours to this date: 39.394

News Media Practicum Final Paper

Final Practicum Paper

            Wellness TV could be the most hectic thing I have ever been involved in. Even more hectic than my senior year as Editor in Chief of my high school yearbook, and I didn’t think that was possible. But I love every minute of it. I love being in front of the camera, and I’m growing to love being behind the camera as well. I’m excited about learning how to use Final Cut Pro, and at the end of the day when I watch the finished package, I’m so proud of my work.  I know a lot of people change their majors after their first semester of college, but despite the chaos, after working on Wellness TV I know that I am want Broadcast Journalism to be my future career. 

            To begin with, I was working on Wellness TV as well as Tasha’s project “The Word.” Unfortunately, once I started getting involved with Wellness TV, I had to drop The Word because I couldn’t do both at the same time and still maintain good grades in my other classes. Plus, I felt that I was doing much more productive with Wellness TV. 

            My love for Wellness TV started when I anchored for the first time. Before then, I had merely observed or carried equipment just to get hours. But the first time I was in front of the camera was very exhilarating. My acting experience made it easy to memorize my anchor script quickly, and I felt completely comfortable talking in front of the camera. I was dyeing to see the finished product, and when it came out on Facebook I was so excited about it that I emailed the link to my parents. That was when I really started to feel like I was establishing a place in Wellness TV.

            That first anchor shoot was also the first time I worked with Dakota, a team that would soon be the most dynamic Broadcast duo since Bivens and Luti. We found out that we both have a lot in common: we have the same major and minor, and we were involved in the same things in high school. We immediately became friends. When the next Wellness TV package came around, we exchanged numbers and decided to work on it together. Unlike some of the other older members of the staff, Dakota took the time to teach me how everything worked, rather than just letting me sit there and watch her. She would even occasionally “quiz” me about how to upload video onto Final Cut Pro, or how to put in a voice over. After Consuelo’s accident, our Costumes package was the only package that was good enough to air, which we were both very proud of. We had worked really hard on it and we want to the theatre department to get the publicity we had promised.  I started going to her Intro to Broadcast class with her, and became close with Charlotte, Ana, Meg Bragg, and the rest of her group. I really enjoyed working on something comic, and they actually used some of my ideas. 

            I understand now that the Broadcast industry will be hectic, and sometimes intensely stressful. But I love it; I love every minute of it. I’m so excited about everything to do with it, and I can’t wait to move further in to the major.

Intro to Broadcast Final

On Friday, December 3, I worked with Meg and Dakota on their Intro to Broadcast final, and later Wellness TV from 1:30 to 3:30 pm. We worked on the promo for Meg and Dakota's final. There was a small moment of panic in the studio when Final Cut Pro unexpectedly quit. The girls thought they had lost everything, but Luti showed the girls how to look in the Autosave folder and all of their stuff was there. I made sure to jot down that trick for later! I also learned how to add a piece of music to clips of video. For the last 30 minutes, Dakota and I decided to walk down to the Wellness TV office to take a look at our Healthy Eating package. Despite all of our hard work, Consuelo said that Michael thought that our package did not have enough information. She suggested an intro. We puzzled over what we could do to make the package better, and eventually decided to follow Consuelo's advice and add an intro. Unfortunately, the camera was not in the Wellness TV office, so all we could do was rearrange the package so there is room for the intro when we film it on Wednesday. It is frustrating that we have to do more work on the package when we feel that it is complete, but that is simply the industry and we have to do what is best for Wellness TV.

Hours to this date: 37.394
YAY!!!!!!

Intro to Broadcast Class

Yesterday, I worked with Dakota's Intro to Broadcast group from 2:30 to 4:00 pm. I was a half an hour late because I was given an opportunity to audition for Jekyl and Hyde yesterday, and I didn't want to miss it. We worked on one of the commercials for their final project. The commercial was a remake of the comic AXE commercial "Clean your balls." We worked on putting together the set, shooting the commercial, and the Practicum kids that were there even got to be actors! We played the very excited audience sitting in the stands. It was quite a thrilling experience indeed!

Hours to this date: 35.394!

Goodbye for now, Wellness TV!

This week, Dakota and I worked tirelessly to finish our package for Wellness TV. Dakota has some projects of her own, so on Wednesday from 5:00 to 6:00 pm, I helped her and her group work on their commercial for their Intro to Broadcast project. We did a spoof on the "Hooked on Phonics" commercial. Some of the Practicum class was cast as "actors" for the commercial. It was very entertaining! On Thursday from 6:00 to 7:00 pm, I helped Dakota edit her "Bivens" interview for her Broadcast Writing class. She interviewed Justin Bivens about "FSC TV," and her assignment was to write a broadcast script for it. She showed me how to do it; you have to match the b-roll and the second it occurs with the voice over. On Friday, Dakota and I edited our footage from our Greek Quad interviews from 12:30 am to 2:00 pm. Finally, on Friday we shot the outro, edited, and inserted the voice overs from our package. We worked from 3:30 to 6:00 pm, but it was well worth it. We finished our package, and can now relax until Thanksgiving break! Woo hoo!

Total hours as of this date: 33.892
YESS!!!

Wellness TV/Intro to Broadcast

This week has been a busy week! First, I met with Consuelo and the rest of the gang on Monday from 4:15 to 5:00 pm. We shot our "Goodbye" scene for the last show before the end of the semester. It took a couple of tries to get it right! Then, on Tuesday I worked with Dakota on our Wellness TV package from 12:45 to 1:45 pm. We set up the camera and interviewed random people that were passing by in the Greek Quad. We asked them how many calories were contained in different holiday desserts and recorded their answers. We decided to mix it up a little and use a stick mic. Then, I went with Dakota to her Intro to Broadcast class, which was from 2:00 to 4:00 pm. I worked with Anna, Charlotte, Dakota, Meg Bragg, and the Alpha Omicron Pi girl (unfortunately, I can't remember her name, only that she is from Rhode Island!). For their project, the girls have decided to do a spoof on Anchor Man, and have included several popular commercials. During the meeting, we mostly focused on script writing for two of the commercials. One of them will be shot today!

Total hours to this date: 27.892

Wellness TV is back in Full Swing!

This week, the Wellness TV meeting resumed on Monday from 4:30 to 5:00 pm with none other than... CONSUELO SANCHEZ!!! We were all so excited to see her! We got right to work on our next show, which will be the last until next year. We decided to talk about group exercise for fitness, healthy holiday desserts for healthy eating, and travel tips for college life. These would be our packages for the last show. My partner in crime Dakota, as well as Shannah, and I will be working on healthy holiday desserts. We decided to do a "This vs. That" type show, where we could compare the calorie intake in two different holiday desserts. For example... which has more calories, a slice of pumpkin pie or a slice of chocolate mousse pie? Hmm... you'll just have to wait and see! Dakota and I got together to research the amount of calories in different desserts on Tuesday. We also discussed our upcoming Oscar video, brainstorming more ideas for topics that we could bring into the video. We worked from 4:00 to 5:30 pm. Today, I tagged along with Meg Bragg, Shannah and Dakota to reshoot last week's anchor stand ups. We filmed from 11:30 am to 12:30 pm.

Total hours to this date: 24.142

Dakota and Maggie are heading to the Oscars!

Unfortunately, we had no Wellness tv meeting this week due to unknown cirucumstances. However, Dakota and I did meet from 4:30 to 5:15 pm. We have decided to compete in the Oscar competition that Dr. Bradford sent to all of us, and we met to brainstorm ideas for our video. Dakota and I have decided that we would like to switch the positions of reporter and recorder in the middle of the video, since it doesn't say in the rules that we can't. We have also decided that we would like to shoot the video on Lake Mirror, with a red carpet of course! We plan to meet with Dr. Bradford this afternoon during her office hours to ask her opinion on some of our ideas for our video. We need all the professional advice we can get!

Wellness TV Shananigans!

This week, I really started to become very involved in Wellness TV. On Thursday, Dakota, Krissy and I did stand-up reporter shoots for our packaged from 5:30 to 6:15 pm. Dakota and I edited the package from 6:30 to 8:30 pm. To our shock and horror, when we started editing the package we realized that the sound on the stand up shoot did not come through, despite the fact that we had tested the sound. We decided that we had no choice but to switch the reporter to Dakota, and shoot some voice overs right then. We re-shot the anchor stand-ups with Dakota on Friday and then edited the rest of the package. This lasted from 12:00 to 1:30 pm. Shanti led the Wellness TV meeting on Monday because Consuelo is still out. We talked about the current status of the show that was supposed to air on Monday. Unfortunately some people still had not completed their package, and we did not have an anchor shoot as a result. Shanti said that no matter what, we would air the show on Wednesday with or without the missing package. This makes me happy because Dakota and I worked really hard to get our package done on time, and it would be disappointing if it didn't air. We also discussed future packages, and the possibility of creating an executive board instead of just having a producer in case situations where Consuelo is not available arise again. The Wellness TV meeting lasted from 4:30 to 5:05 pm.

I have really, really enjoyed working with Dakota this week. She taught me how to edit video, and "quizzed" me occasionally to make sure I was retaining the information so I would know how to do it myself. Not only is she great to work with, but we have also become really good friends. I definitely want to work with her on packages from now on.

Hours to this date: 20.392

Wellness TV: Package Progress/Helping Colleen

This week has been a very busy week! On Monday, I attended a Wellness TV meeting, which lasted from 4:30 to 5:09 pm. Poor Consuelo had to conduct the meeting over the phone, because she was in a car accident during fall break. At the meeting, we discussed the progress of our packages, and decided the final due date would be Friday at 10:00 am. On Tuesday, Dakota and I chased Mary T. around for an interview from 4:00 to 4:26 pm. Mary T. decided that she did not want to be interviewed after all, thus avoiding our previous attempts to contact her, but with some help from Paul Bawek, she decides to arrange a student representative for our interview. Today, Dakota, Krissy and I shot b-roll and interviewed our theatre department spokesperson from 3:00 to 3:30 pm. Some of the kids even dressed up in some of the costumes for sale. They did such a good job! I edited with Dakota from 8:00 to 9:10 pm. After looking over our footage, we decided that a standing reporter would be better than a voice over as we had originally planned. Krissy will be our reporter, and we have scheduled a time to shoot this footage tomorrow at 9:00 am, bright and early. This week, I have learned that putting together a package takes a lot of work, but it sure is fun!

Today, I also helped Colleen film the Zeta Tau Alpha Yogurt eating contest. Colleen is putting together a memorable video for our sorority, and she asked me to help her with the yogurt contest shoot, since I had to be there anyway. Colleen even let me take some of my own shoots. It was a great experience, and I got to work with one of the Comm department cameras instead of just the one used for Wellness TV. I worked with Colleen from 5:00 to 7:00 pm.

Hours to date: 16.559

Interviews for Various Packages/Anchor Shoot

Today was a very busy day! First, I worked with Tosha and Lauren from 12:20 to 12:45 on two interviews for our Healthy Eating package for this week's wellness tv. My job was to read the questions to the interviewee, and make sure that he or she made eye contact with me. Then, Krissy and I took the camera to interview Lauren Albano, an art education major, for the next's show's College Life package, which will focus on how to make cheap Halloween costumes. We worked with her from 1:00 to 1:30. It took a few tries, but we finally got a good take that we can use for the show. Then later this evening, I got to be an anchor with Wellness TV for the very first time. Dakota and I were the anchors, while Consuelo and Michelle manned the equipment. There are lots of things to do with lighting and the camera that I never really considered, and remembering your lines is harder than it looks, but it was an awesome experience! The anchor shoot took place from 5:30 to 6:30 pm. I feel like I'm ready to really start working now!

Hours to date: 8.809

Wellness TV Meeting with my Package Group

Today I met with Krissy and Dakota from 8:00 pm to 8:30 pm in the JR lobby. We discussed possible interviews, and we decided to interview Mary T. and my Zeta sister Lauren for our package. We also created a list of questions for our interviewees. We our scheduled to interview Lauren tomorrow at 1:00 pm in the Zeta house. I am nervous because it is my first time taking this on my own, but Krissy will be there to help me too.

Hours to this date: 6.893

Midterm

Midterm 

            During my early days in my News Media Practicum I class at Florida Southern College, I began to have an exciting revelation. The world of broadcast is constantly changing. This might seem to be obvious, due to the invention of a new portable informational device everyday, but I don’t think it ever really hit me until listening to the presentations my peers give every Wednesday afternoon. From the invention of a camera that shoots HD video, to a job that’s sole task is to constantly update information on Facebook, to Dalton’s daily insistence that eventually the only world will become so vast that there will be no need for television anymore, every Wednesday someone has come out with new information on an industry that is constantly in motion. As future reporters, news analysts, video editors, radio talk show hosts, writers, and sports anchors, this sort of research is essential to our survival. We are required to remain up to date on the latest technology, the newest job openings, what’s hot and what’s not, so that when we graduate from Florida Southern we will be the most desired, most experienced, most “can-do-it-all” bunch of broadcasters the world has yet to see.

           

Coming into the broadcast journalism department, I had absolutely no experience other than yearbook staff, making family videos and scrapbooking. I grew up in a small school in a small town, and we just didn’t have the technology to have multi-media programs like some of the bigger schools that feed Florida Southern’s student body. So when I signed up for Wellness TV, I will admit that I was nervous about whether or not I would be more of a nuisance than help. But what I found was a group of upperclassmen that were kind, understanding, and willing to allow me to peek over their shoulder as the frantically try to do their work. I found my hunger and enthusiasm to do the work has increased as I have slowly become more involved in Wellness TV. With Wellness TV, I have learned how to use and define terms such as b-roll, nat sound, and package. I have learned the basics of how to put together a package and I understand a specific timeline for the package to be completed. I understand that all deadlines are final. I have learned the importance of working together and making it known to the upperclassmen in charge of our package when I am available to work with them. In the real world, work will not come and find me; I will have to seek out job opportunities.

            

Working with Tosha on “The Word” staff is a very different experience than working on Wellness TV. Wellness TV is already well established; there have already been people who developed a system that works. The Word, however, is brand new show, and while this allows for a lot more creativity, figuring out what exactly to do can be a bit of challenge. Perhaps the biggest thing Tosha has taught me is how to use Final Cut Pro. I had never even seen the program before, let alone know how to use all the complex tools. But she showed me that using the program is easier than it looks, and there are a lot of great tools that will help maximize the quality of my video.

           

I am confident that the Communication department is the right place for me. My favorite classes and professors are all in the Communication department, and programs like Wellness TV and The Word will teach me the skills I need to succeed.

Wellness TV Meeting/Healthy Eating package interview

Today I met with Wellness TV from 4:30 to 5:00 pm. We discussed the current progress on this week's show, and also assigned packages for our show after fall break. That show will have a Halloween theme, and I have been assigned to the college life package. We will be discussing how to find or create inexpensive Halloween costumes. We plan to interview Mary T. and talk about the Theatre department's annual costume sale. I also shadowed Tosha for an interview for this week's show. We interviewed Mr. Michael, the nutrition specialist in the Wellness Center, about how certain foods can boost your mood. Tosha also showed me how to work the camera for my own interviews.

Wellness TV Meeting: Show Number 3

On Monday, I attended a Wellness TV meeting from 4:30 to 5:05 pm. We talked about ideas for this week's show and also discussed a possible Halloween theme for the next show. I was paired up with Lauren and Tosha for the healthy eating package. We are going to discuss certain foods that are clinically proven to effect your mood. Lauren has set up an interview for this Friday at 4:00 pm.

"The Word" Meeting

Unfortunately, our Wellness TV meeting was cancelled this week. However, I was able to attend a meeting for The Word from 4:50 to 6:00 pm on Monday. During the meeting, we discussed what we would like to do for the intro of the show. We also decided on five questions for the "survey" segment of the show. We also looked at You Tube videos for possible "clips of the week."

Hours to this date: 5.31

Wellness TV Meeting/The Word Meeting

On Monday I attended the Wellness TV meeting. It was a short meeting, only from 4:30 to 4:45 pm, but during that time we broke up into our package groups and discussed our "plans of action" for getting things done on time. I also volunteered to be the anchor for this show. The Word meeting took place on Wednesday from 4:45 to 5:45 pm. In this meeting, Tasha led us through a quick Final Cut Pro "lesson," and then we scheduled a date for our first shoot. We will be starting our first shoot on Monday at 5:00 pm.

Wellness TV Anchor Shoot/ "The Word"

Today I spent 4:45 to 5:30 pm working on Tasha's new project, an entertainment-based television show. We discussed topics and tentative titles. Then I went to the first Wellness TV anchor shoot, which was from 5:35 to 6:30 pm. I was not an anchor this time around, but I did get to play with some of the equipment. I am looking forward to doing some more work!

Wellness TV Meeting 2

Today I attended the second Wellness TV meeting, which started at 4:30 pm and ended at 5:10 pm. We talked about the progress of the first show, and brainstormed ideas for the second. We decided to talk about  aquatics (Fitness), sweet alternatives (Healthy Eating), and staying organized (College life). I was assigned to the "staying organized" package. I also talked with Consuelo about the anchor shoot on Wednesday. I will be there to learn and help as much as I can.

Wellness TV Meeting

Today was my very first meeting with Wellness TV. It started at 4:30 pm and ended at 5:04 pm. We each filled out forms, listing our position and topic preferences, and we introduced ourselves to the group. We also got the chance to view the very first episode of Wellness TV, and the most recent episode of Wellness TV. We took notice at the difference in the two episodes, and how much Wellness TV has improved over the years. We discussed new topics and the upperclassmen told the new recruits how the show is going to work. We have set a date for the next meeting, same time on Monday. I am looking forward to working with the upperclassmen and learning from them.