Chris's Broadcast Writing Blog

Kyle,

I feel like I’m talking to myself in a mirror here. We had different problems, but we had problems nonetheless and they were pretty frustrating. I keep telling myself, like you said, that now is the time to make mistakes. It’s true, because now that I’ve done it, I’ll never forget about the ND filter again, but it still bugs me every time I look at that grainy garbage of a shot. 

Beating myself up over it won’t help anything, but it’s important to be a little upset so you actually learn from it, and then you can move on. 

degenerationnation:

Well if I could summarize my entire process of making my feature story in one word…it would be “nightmare”. I’ve always known my relationship with electronics to be a little on the rocky side…but thanks to final cut pro I have a new found hatred for computers.

Just one week before our…

The problem is my face. 

No, a twelve year old child didn’t tease me with a lame remark about being ugly. The problem is probably my face. 

I used to be manly. I had a beard. 

I was so popular in class, and I was ready to build decks, eat wings, shoot animals, and do other manly things. 

Then I shaved. 

And, this week, I did a story about butterflies.

It’s definitely the face.

In all fairness, Courtney picked the story. It wasn’t my idea. I didn’t come up with it, but I did (gulp) kind of enjoy it. A little bit. Sort of. 

It wasn’t as easy as it may seem. Filming moving objects while getting them into a steady shot, in focus is difficult, especially when you zoom in far enough to actually be able to tell what it is. I missed a lot of opportunities because I needed to focus or zoom in. The other problem was that when zooming in on a small object like a butterfly, it can be difficult to track it, especially when it’s moving, so you end up with a lot of shots of 

My strategy was to wait for a butterfly to land, film it and then wait for it to fly away. At first, this was a frustrating exercise. The little guys (and girls) wouldn’t land; however, I was patient, and eventually I got some good shots. 

Meanwhile, Courtney, my reporter was walking around, talking to the butterflies, trying to convince them to land on her. When I’m reporter I try not to step on the camera person’s toes (so to speak), but this was a strategy of staying out of the way I have never seen before. 

They never did land on her. Maybe next time, Courtney. 

It was a nightmare. 

It was the second nightmare of my young reporting career. The first was when my interview, James Gordon of the NDP, took a phone call when I was interviewing him live, LIVE on our web broadcast for the election. The story is in this blog. 

The second was doing my feature story. 

I was doing an interview with Mike Farwell, the colour commentator for the Kitchener Rangers. He was really nice, but I’m sure he’s really busy, so I wanted to make it as quick as possible, while still getting the answers I need. 

He asked if I wanted to film the interview inside the arena, and I obviously agreed, because the rink would make a great background. I made some small talk while I was setting up. I checked the buttons and glanced at the ND filter. It said 1/64, but I assured myself that it didn’t really matter. I wasn’t sure what it did anyways or where it was supposed to be. I figured the last person probably had it on the right setting. 

Forgetting about that, I made sure the audio was set up properly, did a white balance, and looked through the viewfinder. 

It was dark.

Really dark. 

Well, no big deal, because I didn’t have my light on yet. I turned on the light, looked through the viewfinder and…

It was dark.

Really dark.

Okay, that was no problem. I played with the iris, and turned it open all the way. I looked through the viewfinder.

It was dark. 

Really dark.

Still.

So, my mind raced. I had a busy man waiting here, and I needed to get it together.

We moved to the press box which was decently lit, and I looked through the viewfinder.

It was still dark. 

Really dark.

So, I did the unthinkable.

I did what Steve Parr told me never to do.

I turned the gain from low to medium.

And, I looked through the viewfinder. You guessed it, it was dark, really dark, but it was going to have to be good enough. Moving locations and the delay for my set-up (which felt hours longer than it was to me) had to end. I’d have to try to fix it in post-production unfortunately. I did the interview and got great audio, but the video was pretty ugly. 

I learned a valuable lesson that day: check the ND Filter, or your shots might be dark. 

Really dark. 

It’s been great to hear how excited you guys are after coming back from that event. I still don’t understand why everyone is so thrilled with meeting Lloyd Robertson though. The real catch was James Duthie, who I see multiple times on TSN while I’m watching hockey. (Note: No disrespect to Mr. Robertson, he’s a broadcasting legend.)

As for the last part of your post, who knows? Maybe someday, budding journalists will come into their class after meeting Christine Stonos on the weekend, gushing about how friendly she was, and how they doubt they’ll ever be as famous as her. 

I’m sure if you asked Mr. Robertson, Ms. LaFlamme, and Mr. Duthie, they’d tell you they never dreamed they’d be where they are either.

“Keep on keepin’ on” and you never know what can happen. 

christinestonos:

On Friday night I was fortunate enough to cover a United Way event honoring Lisa LaFlamme; anchor for CTV news. I knew that there was going to be some very famous journalists there, but I honestly didn’t know what to expect. I wasn’t sure if we would be able to grab them for an interview,…

Bring it on, Iggy. 

Jarome Iginla is my favourite hockey player. He has been for a long time. I watch his Calgary Flames play whenever they are on TV in Ontario (including tonight conveniently enough), I have an Iginla jersey, I have his autograph, and I follow his stats pretty closely. So, I think I know him pretty well. You could say we’re pretty close friends. 

And, as such, I can tell when he’s lying. I can tell, not only because of the close relationship we have, but because I took TV Interviewing and Ethics, and we learned about how to tell when someone is lying. 

Jarome has been in the sports news for weeks now, with trade rumours swirling around his name. In this piece, he tells reporters that he has never wanted to be traded, and that the rumours in the media are false.

I think he’s telling the truth. He doesn’t fidget, look to the side, or appear nervous. His words are well-thought and controlled, but that’s just the way he is. 

Maybe it’s because I want to believe him. Maybe the Movember moustache is throwing me off. Or maybe, just maybe, Mr. Iginla is indeed happy right where he is in Calgary. 

All in all, this piece is well done, and they have perspectives from Iginla, his coach, and the general manager, as well as B-roll that really fits the writing well. 

Is he stringing us along for a ride? Lying through his teeth? I guess we will find out if Mr. Iginla is still wearing that familiar Flames uniform by the end of the season. 

http://watch.tsn.ca/featured/#clip576737

You can call me “one take host”. 

Well, technically I guess it was two takes, but it’s not my fault. We had to cut a story that didn’t work out so the host segment had to be shot again because we referenced that story in our opening, and in the transitions as well. 

Not my fault. 

Host is pretty fun, especially when it’s not live. There’s no stress, because you can take as many tries as you need. You can mess up and then you’ll just cut that part out. Or, you can be awesome like Rachel and I and just not mess up. 

The part about being a host that can be tough is following along on the teleprompter without looking like a) you’re following along on the teleprompter, b) you’re angry or c) you’re bored. It’s a balance between looking at the teleprompter and looking at the co-host when they are talking. 

As long as the host is conscious of these issues, then there shouldn’t be a problem, but you have to make a real effort to look at the other host, make some subtle facial expressions and not look at the camera for too long with a stone face.

It’s pretty easy as long as you think about it. 

Well, I think so anyways.

I can only imagine what it was like having you on the studio camera and Oje as host. Lots of laughs, lots of takes and lots of lost focus. I hope you guys started at 9 to get it shot on time. 

This is not trying to put down Oje, but I have been in class with the two of you for long enough to know it was probably an… interesting combination. 

I haven’t watched this week’s show yet, but I’m sure you guys did a great job as always. I’m the host for tomorrow, so I’m admittedly pretty thankful that we aren’t going live.

degenerationnation:

This week for 519 online news, I was assigned to be studio cam operator. I was looking forward to getting more roles that would increase my technical abilities and this was a good learning experience.

As I do not have a lot of experience working with cameras, it was fun to experiment with…

 Field trip!

This week we covered the Occupy Toronto movement. Not surprisingly, there were some interesting smells in the park: the smell of people living there in tents for weeks, smoke from the ‘sacred fire’, and dare I say, marijuana.

There were also some interesting people: the man sitting at a table singing what seemed to be ‘Amazing Grace’, the man with a maple leaf painted on his face, and a barefooted man walking around the park with two dogs.

As expected, the people were more than willing to talk to us. Part of the problem was to get our clip and leave because these people are passionate, and will talk to you about how they feel and their cause all day, but it’s a lot of footage you won’t end up using. Most questions morphed into talking about their reasons for protesting.

If anyone had a preconceived idea that the protesters would be difficult to deal with, my experiences would definitely disagree. As long as you showed the protesters respect, they’d respect you right back. I even talked with them about getting footage from them of a protester being arrested, and they were more than willing, but couldn’t give it to me until 6:00, which was too late.

All in all, it was a good experience and it was fun to report under pressure. 

It’s like I was there.

This week I decided to look at the CBC’s coverage of the Occupy Toronto movement on the day we went to cover the story to see how our coverage compared to the CBC. Most of it was the same. The CBC talked about the eviction just like we did, and the decision of the judge.

The biggest difference between the two was that we talked to protestors and the CBC didn’t. When we covered the Occupy Toronto movement, the protestors said that they didn’t like the mainstream media. They looked at our equipment, noticed that there were no logos to represent a news outlet and embraced us as independent media.

Perhaps the lack of reporting the side of the protestors is why the movement feels so bitter. They claim (and they are correct) that mainstream media outlets are owned by large corporations. Does this impact their coverage? Probably. Does it mean that mainstream media shouldn’t be trusted? Probably not.

Is it a mistake for mainstream media to not get the views of the protestors? I think so. As a journalist, it is your obligation to inform the public of both sides, in a fair and balanced way. Do the protestors have to have the same on-air time as the side of the police, and others opposing the protestors? No, but omitting the side entirely just isn’t fair to the viewers.  

Check it out: http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/story/2011/11/16/occupy-toronto.html

Yeah man, that was pretty sweet. I had no idea it’d be that easy to score an interview. I’m a sports guy and it’s insane to try to get an interview with anyone. Or maybe I’m just doing something wrong. 

In any case, the interview was well done for sure, and that’s a sweet experience to have for someone not even finished with college yet. You guys did a great job and it’ll be great to show off to prospective employers. 

Next time Coldplay comes to Toronto, maybe you can be my camera man to interview Chris Martin. 

nscox22:

Yay, a Dexter reference!

Anyway, last week I was able to interview Sam Roberts. Well, Steve Tanner actually did the interview, but I helped film it, along with Brent Swance and Matt Viveen.

People keep asking me how I managed to get the interview, and are surprised when I tell them that it was…