Production Process – Simon Nunn Project 2

April 26, 2018Simon Nunn No Comments

Benchamrking

I have chosen to benchmark the first episode of senses, not because it is the strongest, but because I feel that it is to compare with the benchmark. I will be using the BBC Radio 1 programme I hear Voices: Donna.

The Radio 1 programme starts similarly to senses with music being utilised as an opening, however in our episode, I have talked directly on top of the music, with me saying ‘Senses’ and explaining the episode before continuing to explain the premise of that episode, almost identically to what has been done in the Donna episode where the narrator is introduced and then explains her story. While the Radio 1 programme continues to go on with the narrator (Alice), Senses has already broken off into its first interview, showing the difference of styles as there are no interviews in the R1 programme. This shows the first difference in treatment, as senses is a combination of a podcast mixed with a documentary meaning that we have narration and interviews rather than just one single voice. Whereas in I hear voices there is just one voice as it is told through Alice’s own words. This could lead to people saying that it is more emotional and to that I would agree as this episode of senses is me telling my story but also involving others, whereas R1 is just Alice. In regards to the music that is used, we utilised similar genres with the slight difference being that we used a wider variety such as electronic and classical, whereas R1 used just one piano track. If you listen carefully there is a jump in how Alice sounds at 02:04 where it sounds like she is being interviewed rather than narrating, we also applied this technique as I was interviewed by Chloe and we then cut the questions out to make a concise dialogue. Regarding overall levels, I feel that both are similar as they are in essence the same product and our piece doesn’t distort etc.

April 26, 2018Simon Nunn No Comments

Our Multiplatform

To fulfil my multiplatform aim we went about this differently to how I had done previously most notably through us using a website rather than social media sites such as Facebook and Instagram etc. This means that everything i ins one place, be this extended interviews or supporting content such as Youtube Videos. If we were fully professional ourselves it would act as a good way to market our services tying in towards my other learning objective of being professional.

The use of video content was also crucial as it offers the listener a more in-depth experience of someones disability, for example the video for sight is one mimicking the level of Bens vision to truly shock the viewer. The other role was to allow everyone to be engaged so those who are deaf would be unable to naturally engage seeing as this is a podcast, to counter this we made subtitle videos for each episode.

The link for the site is as follows:

https://sensespodcast.weebly.com/

April 26, 2018Simon Nunn No Comments

Our editing process

This post will discuss how we went through the editing process to make it as smooth as possible and make sure that time wasn’t wasted in the process.

First of all we would conduct the interview with either a zoom or a phone in one case, the audio would then be placed onto one of our laptops and put onto the google drive that we had.

The next step was for one of us to then transcribe the interview so that we could copy text out of it into the finalised script document. This was a method i learnt from my time at a production company in London and I felt that it sped the process up.

Following on from this we would then write the script either on our own or as a group and then would make relevant changes.

After a finalised script had been agreed I would then record the narration in a varying amount of takes.

Following on from this I would then do a rough edit of everything, meaning that the interviews were in the right place, the levels were okay and music cues were put in, but were still to be agreed. If needed I would also delete parts of the interviews that I didn’t feel worked.

Finally, we all sat and listened to epsiode and agreed where music needed to be changed or levels needed to be adjusted.

In terms of supporting content, this was done after, with the subtitles being put on to the final version of the episode and the experience videos being made at the same time by Molly.

April 26, 2018Simon Nunn No Comments

Weekly Diary

Week	This week we did
1	This week we met and finalised our idea. Despite our original idea being based around making a documentary type programme on speech therapy, this was expanded to be a three-part series of podcasts, with each of them focusing on a different sense with none of them having importance over each, leading to the name senses. Yet because of the time limit we have and issues around getting enough people to talk to us, we focused on three senses these being, speech, blindness and deafness.Each episode will run for around 20 minutes. This week I started to research different organisations around Lincolnshire and Nottinghamshire and started to put contact details in the grid Molly had created
2	This week we discussed again what our ideas were and how we were going to implement them , alongside creative ways in which we could go about doing this, such as in the blindness having someone who is blind describing what they can see. I also had a meeting with rose to discuss the learning objectives that i would need to discuss and how I would get a client for the project, from this i started to talk to hospital radio stations locally and charity groups by offering them the podcast. Me and Molly also discussed a strategy in getting people to interview with me focusing on Nottinghamshire and Molly on Lincolnshire.
3	This week we continued to contact the groups in and around Lincoln. I received two responses from the previous weeks emails and replied on these and Molly got 2. Molly got in touch with the Lincoln and Lindsey Blind Society in Louth, where she has organised an interview for next week. I also confirmed my learning objectives with rose, alongside pursuing a client at all costs but with a certain doubt in my mind that i would succeed after receiving no replies and decided that it may be worth looking at putting the project on Siren Radio.
4	This week we continued to contact the groups in and around Lincoln. I received two responses from the previous weeks emails and replied on these and Molly got 2. Molly got in touch with the Lincoln and Lindsey Blind Society in Louth, where she has organised an interview for next week. I also confirmed my learning objectives with rose, alongside pursuing a client at all costs but with a certain doubt in my mind that i would succeed after receiving no replies and decided that it may be worth looking at putting the project on Siren Radio.
5	This week started with us interviewing the Lincoln and Lindsey blind society which Molly arranged. Despite being unsure what to expect from the interview it was very good, as there were 5 members of the society who gave us insight into what they do, what its like to work with blind people and being a young blind adult. We also went and visited the Lincolnshire Children’s Deaf Society in Birchwood, despite their being children both me and Molly felt a bit uneasy interviewing children so we only talked to the parents. In the meeting with Rose we talk about we still hadn’t got very far with the Deafness episode and she was able to give us some people to contact, of which Molly and Simon are getting in contact with. We again talked about ‘creative content’ this meaning the supporting material that is made to go with the podcasts such as videos and how we can be creative with the programmes themselves.
6	This week Molly had booked an interview with a blind woman, however, due to a mixup on where it was supposed to take place, it was rearranged for another day. In the meeting with Rose, I discussed the chat with Ryan the assistant editor of Siren FM that I had earlier that week about putting the podcasts out as a one-off hour-long programme. This lead to an agreement that they would be aired and all that was needed was a date to be set.
7	This week after our meeting with Rose, Molly and Chole went to ask about talking to someone about the guide dogs that where on campus on Friday. Unfortunately this never ended up leading to anything and as result, we were quite panicked about getting someone to talk about guide dogs. We then went to the students union to discuss if we could get a mass email sent out asking for blind/deaf students to get in touch with us. As well as this Molly got in touch with Social Paws, of which they are visiting on Monday and a partially sighted student on campus who we are talking to on Friday Molly then recorded Vox Pops around campus and in town, asking: If you had to lose one of your senses, what would it be and why? – we found the majority of students would rather lose their speech. In terms of the goal I set myself this week it was to work towards getting content for our sight episode and continue with the others. https://thelincolnite.co.uk/2018/03/labradorable-guide-dogs-help-lincoln-students-de-stress/
8	On Monday we visited Hykeham to meet Di from Social Paws, one of the founders of a local guide dog group. We went to her house and met her guide dog Bridie, who we’d met on Wednesday. I thought the interview went quite well apart from not knowing what to expect, or knowing if Di was sighted or blind. On Friday I interviewed Ben Cheney, a partially sighted student at the University of Lincoln. He was really easy to talk to and we found out that there was not a lot a large amount of support for him at uni. I found that this interview was the best one I had conducted so far because he was very easy to talk to. Unfortunately our meeting with the therapists was cancelled due to the snow, however we are rearrranging this for after easter. My goal this week was to write the script for blindness.
9	This week we focused on editing the script for the Blind Podcast Episode, which me and Molly did for a two day period. Later on in the week we then recorded the narration for this episode of the podcast. I then edited the interviews down into useable chunks following the script, placed my narration and then started to do a rough edit of the episode, without music. My goal this week was to finish the sight episode.
Easter	This week we finished doing the blindness episode when we spent a solid day of finding music that fits, and ensuring the levels were okay for everyone.
Easter	On Monday I interviewed Megan, a partially deaf student at the University of Lincoln. This went well apart from me being a tad flustered when I was interviewing Megan and I couldn’t recover. However the content was useable. The next day I interviewed Michelle a sppech therapist based in Lincoln, this interview was good fun and was quite interesting for me being that I had experienced therapy myself.
10	This week we scripted the speech episode and then recorded the narration for this so that it could then be turned into a rough edit into audition. My goal for this week was to finish editing the speech episode so that it could be finished for the following week.
11	This week we had received Rose’s feedback on the sight episode so I worked through this and made the changes. Rose also suggested that we use nosie reduction software to remove clicks and whispers that were present in certain interviews and she then showed us how to do this. On the 19^th of April we met with George Tipler, an audiologist at AllHear in Lincoln, our final interview for the project. Following on from this we then sat down to begin writing the script for sound once this was finished I then recorded the narration and Chloe started to create a rough edit that we would put music in later. The goals this week were to get better at using noise reduction software and finish the entire project!
12	On Monday I started doing the editing of the rough mixes, by putting in music, changing levels and at times altering the order in which things were done. I also did basic edits such as cutting out breathes or pauses alongside deleting whole bits that we previously thought worked. Furthermore, I also made a weebly website which is where our multiplatform content will be placed. This meant that Molly and Chloe worked on doing subtitle videos for each episode so that they could be enjoyed by those who are deaf. Molly also worked on a ‘360 vision experience’ and I worked on a sound equivalent, these were then all placed on the website along with the audio. I also spoke to Ryan about getting him the files

April 25, 2018Simon Nunn No Comments

Client problems

Throughout this process I had numerous difficulties in getting a client that would be willing to distribute the podcasts. The initial idea was to try and offer each episode to different and relevant charities for them to promote, however it became clear that not many of them were interested in the project and didn’t want to be involved, but one was willing to link the podcast to their Facebook page which wasn’t really enough. Following on from the lack of enthusiasm from charities I went down the route of contacting relevant hospital radio stations, seeing that there is a relevance with disability being discussed. Both Nottingham and Peterborough hospital radio stations didn’t reply to numerous emails about them airing the episodes. This meant that time was running out in getting a client, meaning that I had a chat with Ryan Jones from Siren Radio who was willing to air the episodes. Despite Siren being based on campus I did try elsewhere and was keen to distribute it via charities as they podcast’s not radio programmes.