Please critique my news segment

[MacFan25863]

Hi everyone,

I'm in the TV Production class at my school. We produce a live news show everyday that broadcasts to every classroom. Yesterday, a segment that I filmed and edited aired. I produced it about our marching band, whose first performance was that night. I got a lot of comments from teachers and from the administration on how much they enjoyed it, so I posted it and was hoping to get some comments from the professional world:

Click to Watch

I'm hoping to do a follow up segment next week on how the night went, and I would love some tips on what I can improve on!

Thank you!

 

[GoCubsGo]

hahah holy cow. First it's good, honestly. It's just funny because I didn't quite expect you to be reporting on Valencia High...or do you call it West Ranch now?

I think the editing is good and the sound was great. I think it's sometimes windy around there and the sound appeared professional or how it'd be heard on a regular news cast. What I did find though is that your voice over was good and all, but we as watchers become disengaged from the news reporter when we do not get to see them. I think that's important to at least show you, then whatever you're reporting on, the back to you for the segway over to the next interview with the girl, and then finalize it with you again. I'm talking like 10 seconds...even less...10 seconds is a long time when you're talking 1 min 40 sec I'm sure.

Overall it's good, but as a newscaster I would also think you'd want to try and have a relationship with yourself and your viewers.


On a side note:
I graduated in 1995 from Hart High but spent the majority of my years in Saugus High. There was quite the rivalry going on between Saugus, Hart, and Valencia. We didn't like another school coming in you know...and then the students got to choose the colors and we were baffled by the purple. I guess you had to be there, but in the end, the school is nice, nicer than Canyon, Hart and Saugus. It's in a great location and Valencia has grown leaps and bounds since I've been there. My parents are still there so I'm up there all the time.

 

[MacFan25863]

hahah holy cow. First it's good, honestly. It's just funny because I didn't quite expect you to be reporting on Valencia High...or do you call it West Ranch now?

I think the editing is good and the sound was great. I think it's sometimes windy around there and the sound appeared professional or how it'd be heard on a regular news cast. What I did find though is that your voice over was good and all, but we as watchers become disengaged from the news reporter when we do not get to see them. I think that's important to at least show you, then whatever you're reporting on, the back to you for the segway over to the next interview with the girl, and then finalize it with you again. I'm talking like 10 seconds...even less...10 seconds is a long time when you're talking 1 min 40 sec I'm sure.

Overall it's good, but as a newscaster I would also think you'd want to try and have a relationship with yourself and your viewers.


On a side note:
I graduated in 1995 from Hart High but spent the majority of my years in Saugus High. There was quite the rivalry going on between Saugus, Hart, and Valencia. We didn't like another school coming in you know...and then the students got to choose the colors and we were baffled by the purple. I guess you had to be there, but in the end, the school is nice, nicer than Canyon, Hart and Saugus. It's in a great location and Valencia has grown leaps and bounds since I've been there. My parents are still there so I'm up there all the time.

Haha..West Ranch is a new school. It's in the Stevenson Ranch area. All the stadiums in the district are being redone, so all the home games are at either Canyon, Valencia, or COC, since Hart, Saugus, West Ranch, and Golden Valley (the other new school) don't have anywhere to play. My math teacher graduated from Hart in '95 too...would be funny if you knew her. I would have gone there if I was like 2 weeks older (which would have made me a senior rather than a junior). My girlfriend just graduated from Saugus.

People still make fun of the "Purple Pansies".


Thanks for the comments on the video. The one thing I regret about it was not having a stand up, but I didn't have anyone to film me, and I enjoy being behind the camera more than infront of it. Hopefully next time I'll find someone to operate the camera for me.


I filmed it on a Panasonic DVX-100B with a Sennheiser shotgun microphone (which really helped with getting good quality sound).

 

[LethalWolfe]

I have to echo jessica.'s comments that was very good. My only big comment is that there is no nat sound under your VO. Obviously what you are saying should be much louder than what we, the viewer, are seeing (in this case the marching band) but we should still be able to hear what we see on screen. For example, the nat sound heard while you were interviewing the band director really helps pull the viewer into the story.

My only other comments are more "tweaky" type stuff. Such as not opening the segment w/VO. A few seconds of the band playing/practicing would be a good lead into the story to capture people's attention.

The editing at at times felt a bit off. Editing is much like music in that is dependent on beat and rhythm. When you have music or a VO under video you should try your best to make sure your audio and visual edits are in harmony. For example, on your opening line "The marching band season has begun, and the wildcat marching band is in full force." An edit on/near the "w" instead of the "c" in "wildcat" might have flowed a little better and an edit after the word "force" (instead of on it) could have helped punctuate that statement.

The girl at the end didn't need to have her lower third when we came back to her.

Overall, lots of good b-roll (both the variety and the camera work), good audio, and good pacing.


Lethal

 

[MacFan25863]

I have to echo jessica.'s comments that was very good. My only big comment is that there is no nat sound under your VO. Obviously what you are saying should be much louder than what we, the viewer, are seeing (in this case the marching band) but we should still be able to hear what we see on screen. For example, the nat sound heard while you were interviewing the band director really helps pull the viewer into the story.

My only other comments are more "tweaky" type stuff. Such as not opening the segment w/VO. A few seconds of the band playing/practicing would be a good lead into the story to capture people's attention.

The editing at at times felt a bit off. Editing is much like music in that is dependent on beat and rhythm. When you have music or a VO under video you should try your best to make sure your audio and visual edits are in harmony. For example, on your opening line "The marching band season has begun, and the wildcat marching band is in full force." An edit on/near the "w" instead of the "c" in "wildcat" might have flowed a little better and an edit after the word "force" (instead of on it) could have helped punctuate that statement.

The girl at the end didn't need to have her lower third when we came back to her.

Overall, lots of good b-roll (both the variety and the camera work), good audio, and good pacing.


Lethal

When I first edited it, I had the underlying audio turned down low. To me, it sounded really weird (if I kept the clip audio, it jumped from instrument to instrument, and if I replaced the whole track with something else, the beat wouldn't match to the marching or playing).

What would be your suggestion to be able to use the nat sound but not make it look off, and how would I blend the nat sound during the b-roll with that from the interviews?

I really was debating if I should use the lower third on the 2nd clip of her or not. I wasn't sure if the first clip was long enough to read all the info.

Thanks for the comments!

 

[LethalWolfe]

When I first edited it, I had the underlying audio turned down low. To me, it sounded really weird (if I kept the clip audio, it jumped from instrument to instrument, and if I replaced the whole track with something else, the beat wouldn't match to the marching or playing).

What would be your suggestion to be able to use the nat sound but not make it look off, and how would I blend the nat sound during the b-roll with that from the interviews?

People see a band, people hear music, people assume the music is being played by the band. Unless the video is a tight shot of a drum and the audio is a loud, blaring trumpet the vast majority of your audience will not notice. And the audio should be low enough that your audience "senses" it more than "hears" it. If that makes sense.

People want to believe what they hear and see are "real" so unless you show them something blatant that indicates to them it's not real they will continue to assume it is real. Everything in TV is smoke & mirrors.

I really was debating if I should use the lower third on the 2nd clip of her or not. I wasn't sure if the first clip was long enough to read all the info.

2 seconds is the rule of thumb for how the short you can should make lower 3rds.


Lethal

 

[MacFan25863]

People see a band, people hear music, people assume the music is being played by the band. Unless the video is a tight shot of a drum and the audio is a loud, blaring trumpet the vast majority of your audience will not notice. And the audio should be low enough that your audience "senses" it more than "hears" it. If that makes sense.

People want to believe what they hear and see are "real" so unless you show them something blatant that indicates to them it's not real they will continue to assume it is real. Everything in TV is smoke & mirrors.


2 seconds is the rule of thumb for how the short you can should make lower 3rds.


Lethal

Would you suggest taking a recording of the band and playing it under the video, or just fading together the audio from each clip? It just sounded and looked really strange to me, but that may be because I did 2 years of marching band and have been playing the clarinet for 8.

Thanks for the lower third tip.

 

[LethalWolfe]

Would you suggest taking a recording of the band and playing it under the video, or just fading together the audio from each clip?

I'd select the most generic sounding song they played while you were shooting them and use that one. If you start off w/nat sound (like I'd suggested before) that sound needs to synch, but once you get into the piece w/VO and interview it typically doesn't need to synch as long as it stays in the background.

It just sounded and looked really strange to me, but that may be because I did 2 years of marching band and have been playing the clarinet for 8.

It looks strange to you because 1. you know it's wrong and 2. w/your musical background you are more inclined to notice things like that. Your typical viewer has neither 1 nor 2.

If there is a spot you are worried about ask a non-musical friend to take a look at your edit. Don't say, "Hey, does this look fake" just have them watch the whole thing and after they are done ask them if anything seemed out of place. If you point it out they will notice it, but if you don't say a word they most likely will not.

Thanks for the lower third tip.

No sweat.


Lethal

 

[Texas04]

Very good story, informative and it kept my attention. I liked the b-roll footage (looks like you had a lot to work with) and you didnt stay on the sidelines with a tripod you actually got close ups and into the march (I like that ) I dont like shots that are just random pans... I wanna see detail, and you did that. Very good, informative.

Tips:
1. Nat sound... very important in every news story and I think it has been mentioned above.
2. It would be nice (but not nessesary) to see you on camera. Just to add to who is talking
3. Another interview with a student to tell thes story would have been good. You talked a lot twoards the middle, again very imformative but it would have also been good to have a student tell us about the vigerous training and band camp.
4. Identifiers. We use these at our video program however they are more used for our purposes. Maybe get together with your team/class and make a custom identifer in photoshop that way you can have it uniformed in all your stories and a special graphic for your school. Just adds to the flare.
5. I understand the whole zoom and fade out to the night light shot, but maybe instead end with a team band shot. Or when they are all marching or the finished product or something.

Overall I thought it was a very good informative story that worked. And you got very good interviews and did your reasearch. Very good job.

 

[sarge]

Nit Picking

I think the point about nat sound has been drummed home.

I would say that part of the smoke and mirrors would be maintaining continuity. You switched btwn daylight and night shots all through the piece. You had plenty of b-roll and could easily have put the twilight first and night shots at the end of the segment.

1:40 is not a lot of time, and maybe that was why you were running your words together. You need to slow down and enunciate. If it doesn't fit, then consider trimming your script.

Also would have liked to see a standup.

Those are tweaks, but otherwise it wasn't bad.

 

[MacFan25863]

Thanks for the tips.

4. Identifiers. We use these at our video program however they are more used for our purposes. Maybe get together with your team/class and make a custom identifer in photoshop that way you can have it uniformed in all your stories and a special graphic for your school. Just adds to the flare.

What do you mean by a custom identifier? If you mean a lower right logo, we have one of those, but it is added real-time during the show.

Sarge,
I was trying to do the whole day to night thing, but almost all of my b-roll that was close up was shot at night (since they didn't practice most of their show until it was dark out). There was really nothing I could do about it.

 

[Texas04]

ahh ic... we dont have that "advanced equipment" at my school to do real time stuff like that... lol kinda sucks but its all good. Ours is all taped and edited before its put out. And we have like 4 weeks to do a story along w/ other things. But yeah thats what I mean by custom idents. Good Job tho

 

[MacFan25863]

ahh ic... we dont have that "advanced equipment" at my school to do real time stuff like that... lol kinda sucks but its all good. Ours is all taped and edited before its put out. And we have like 4 weeks to do a story along w/ other things. But yeah thats what I mean by custom idents. Good Job tho

Our show is 10 minutes long, and is broadcast live everday. I think my teacher would kill me if I took 4 weeks to do a segment

Do you guys have a website? Ours is http://www.westranchtv.com