Saturday 30 October 2010

WINOL Week 4

What a hectic week this turned out to be! Dear me, this week was filled with drama, panic, lack of communication and a tense newsroom. But we got through it, and some superb hard work from Stuart Appleby, Joey Lipscombe and Andrew Giddings should go highly remembered for the news team.
I'm not going to say "There was no news" because there was, but it came in very short supply and even Chris admitted on Tuesday afternoon that "News is very slow this week."

As far as this bulletin goes I thought Andy produced his best display so far. His story was about a GBH which happened last year, and his commitment over the last 3 weeks finally paid off when he managed to get an interview with the victim along with CCTV footage of the events after the attack. Superb work. I get on well with Andy and know he's been disappointed and frustrated with himself over the past weeks so I am pleased that he managed to get something worth watching and producing a well constructed package.

My own work however was disappointing. Sat in front of a computer the Friday and Saturday before, making calls, and researching produced nothing for me. Whether my brain was just on standby or I just was not getting any luck I do not know, but for the first time, I went into the news meeting without a story and if I'm going to be honest, this frustrated me.


I despise not having options, or even something to work on. It annoys me, simply because people either think I get lazy or simply don't try. This would be lies. I always put the effort in, but whether it pays off or not is another issue. I was given a story in the news meeting and looked set to not waste any time.

I set to work quickly and contacted numerous councillors in the hope I could get some major development on the story, however strong or not it was, with the intentions to produce a package. Nothing. Nobody knew anything about the story I was working on and in the space of a few hours I was back to square one. Unbelievable.

Monday was a slow day for me. Tuesday I came in very early and set myself a task of finding a story. All day I worked and called people, and not a lot came to pass, however in the closing stages of the afternoonI foudn something and started making the trek to Bar End to meet a councillor for an interview regarding King Alfred's resting place.
A glass panel symbolising his place of rest had been vandalised in July, and was set to be replaced after a Winchester charity had voted for it to be re-structured.

The interview was done, and I had contacted Kayleigh late on Tuesday to let her know the update of my situation. I was up extremely early Wednesday. I made the 45 minute walk at 7am from Stanmore to River Park Leisure centre to take GVs of Hyde Abbey Gardens (the resting place of King Alfred) and returned to the MMC with the intention of producing something toward the bulletin, whether it be an OOV or a NIB or a package.

Enter the "disco-wheel" macs. Wow these things have ben rather frustrating the last few weeks. It's not an excuse, I was unprepared this week but trying to produce a package in a short amount of time when the network is being used by every journalism, media, and film student in the university does hit a nerve.

What made it worse was news was struggling for stories. Michael's had folded, Jack had nothing, and Julie had nothing because of a recent house move. We had Andy's, Stu's and Aimee's piece about former England captain David Gower, after he received an honorary doctorate at the cathedral from the University of Winchester.

If anything, I had enough done for it to be put in as an OOV if anything did fail to succumb. However, the news team grafted and with support of fellow reporters, Stu and Andy were done. The bulletin was filmed at 3 and went live at 4. Kayleigh bless her. I'd never seen her so stressed before, and there was a sense of relief by the time 5pm came.

I don't want to say we let her down because the news team all worked hard. But we should have worked harder. Brian was right though in the de-brief - There was a lot of panic in the newsroom, and the morale was really low throughout the first half of the week. However, he admitted this is good because it is going to happen in the future, either at WINOl or in future jobs. There is always pressure, but the ability to overcome it as individuals and as a team shows your true potential.

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