Learn to be a fixer
I absolutely love the new Media Center. The new equipment we have, such as the flash camera and monitor, makes our newscasts more interactive and helps up present better news content. However, it also becomes challenging for producers because we need to start fresh and learn to use the equipment before MJs come up to us for help.
One of the difficulties about working as a 1pm/graphic producer is that I am dealing with different tasks during the day. In the morning, I am the producer who decides news content and determines formats for each story in 1pm show. Then I work with the Monday art director to create graphics for the nightly newscast. After the video producer goes into the control room, I take over his job to make sure all the videos are edited and ready to air. I think the hardest part is to find out what is missing and fix it in time.
Yesterday was pretty smooth until an hour before the nightly show. None of the five packages were done. Some of the SOTs and VOs were missing outcues and TRTs. There were several MJs having trouble with exporting videos to Fork. And many scripts needed to be copy-edited.
So I started to help reporters and MJs to put in CGs and locators, made sure all the offline videos were being edited, and worked with the social media producer to edit scripts. Working as a producer often challenges me to work with people of different skill levels. But as a student-run news outlet, we cannot expect MJs to come in and know everything. It is a learning process for them as it is for us. Therefore, a good knowledge of how the system works in the editing room, control room and newsroom could save us plenty of time and avoid mistakes.
Right now, I think I am far from knowing everything during the producing process. Sometimes I was even stuck on minor issues, like where to put the requested CNN videos. My goal for the remainder of the semester is to work on learning all the technical aspects of the Media Center and keeping calm when ‘storm’ breaks out. I will achieve this goal by practicing with Tom and John during my spare time. I will also make it a habit of mine to check the rundown frequently in order to find problems in time.
By the end of the semester, I hope to be capable and confident to face every possible issue during my day of air.
