Sometimes it’s hard to appreciate things until they’re over and you realize they were a blessing in disguise.
On Friday I had my first VO patrol shift at KOMU. When I was first assigned the story I felt a little disappointed and had hoped for a more hard-hitting story. But later I realized this lighter shift gave me a chance to get familiar with the equipment and process at KOMU.
I came into the station with three story ideas - two on events going on that day and one I thought was interesting enough to be a VO, but not important enough to be a package. Unfortunately the events I choose were given to the reporters doing packages or live shots. Either Friday was just a really slow news day or I need to downgrade my story ideas when doing VOs. After a bit of searching, the Tiger Chair wanted me to do a story on the Central Missouri Humane Society extending its hours. After one quick phone call I was headed to the shelter.
Once there, I conducted an interview with the shelters relations coordinator. I wanted to find out why they were extending the hours, how they felt it would benefit them, how it would benefit the public, if there were any hurdles in obtaining longer hours, and if they have tried something like this in the past. I found the most important reason why they were extending their hours was they had hoped to increase adoption and be more accessible to the public. In the past they have tried being open for seven days a week, but this was just too much.
Before setting up the interview I tried to pay close attention to my surroundings. I have always found setting up interview backgrounds to be challenging. Sometimes the backgrounds you think may work for interviews end up looking terrible on television. The interview did prove to be the most challenging part of my story. It’s not the interview itself part I always worry about, but if the interviewee ends up off camera, ends up not being framed well, or something goes wrong with the equipment during the interview.
Everything went well in the interview except one thing: I didn’t realize until later I didn’t white balance the interview because I was so focused on setting everything up right. Although she didn’t appear blue on the LCD screen, I wanted to make sure she wouldn’t when I showed up to the station. After shooting b-roll (with the white balance) of the animals at the shelter, I asked if it’d be all right if I asked a few more questions on camera. I know I won’t be able to do this in future interviews, but I feel it really helped me out that she was so willing to work with me.
Working with the tripod also proved to be difficult. I hope to become better skilled at setting up my shots quicker, especially if the shot is a one-time thing I don’t want to miss it.
Writing the scripts and editing the video went fairly quickly and easily. This was one of the most enjoyable parts of my day. It feels nice to have everything you did throughout the day put together into a complete story.
During my shift I also tried to contact Columbia’s Second Chance to see if there was anything new going on with them, or how the move into the new building was going, but I wasn’t able to reach anyone there.
I feel blessed I was not stressed at all during the day and although I feel there is a lot more to learn, I don’t feel it will be impossible. I can’t wait to see what the next few shifts have in store for me!
To view the web story and the video on KOMU.com click here.
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