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Title of Video: Environmental Recycling & Garbage Reduction: TV Presenter University Challenge News Report
During my BA TV course at Scottish Edinburgh Napier University, Scotland I did some presenting exercises where I had my first experience of doing a piece to camera as a Presenter.
At first, I felt quite nervous with people watching and staring which made me feel a bit like an idiot but I knew it was all part of the process so the gradually got better throughout. The piece was on the environment and how to be green with recycling and waste management.
One of the things I find tricky when acting or presenting talking about recycling is remembering my lines or adlibing on the spot; it's worse when I am static as there aren't many things around me to talk about. Maybe to improve my performance in a recycling piece is for me to have a walk around my surroundings first and get to know what's going on which will give me some backup while speaking live. This is partly bloopers but not quite the funny outtakes you would expect.
Throughout the Presentation module, I have gained a wider understanding and awareness of the role as a Student Presenter while taking away the skills I've learned and then putting them into practice. Despite being interested specifically in a technical role such as a Producer and Camera Operator, I was keen to try out every role of television production to increase my working knowledge of the three processes from start to finish. Having a try at presenting has given me a wider perspective from in front of the lens where I can now appreciate what's important to get the best out of a Presenter and the pitfalls that can be experienced such as forgetting lines and following Director's instructions.
Looking back on the beginning of the module, one of my weak points as an individual was my communication skills with people and on screen which I put down to low self esteem despite having so much passion and enthusiasm for the subject as a whole. I wanted to improve this so pushed myself into situations that I was unfamiliar with where other television students are watching.
I found initially during my first attempts at presenting working with the auto cue quite distracting, mostly due to alterations of text to funny words to put me off on the first day but also because of it's positioning, particularly on the Green Screen setup where I felt boxed in. Over the weeks, I found it easier to ignore it and started to learn the technique of reading the auto cue while I presented a piece without appearing to glare straight into it which is a skill I'm still to master.
Despite cameras being focused on me for student TV, I felt comfortable with the positioning of them and since they were in the dark, I wasn't distracted although I then came across another problem which was to keep eye contact with the viewer while not trying to use the auto cue as much. I found this particularly difficult and I think to become efficient in the ad lib skill, I need to just let go of myself and experiment a little more with student television exercises.
To increase my awareness of the current industry developments in the UK British Broadcast industry, I carried out extensive student video research including taking a look at United Kingdom's BBC's New Talent and Skillset Websites which provided me with a good resource for hearing literally upcoming voice talent for the radio. I've found the radio podcasts useful. One feature I noticed from listening to the Presenters was how very confident and outgoing their speech speech was which encouraged me to improve, using their personas as something to inspire to. One recording in particular from the 'Early Breakfast Presenter 2005' competition included Vox pops in a busy town center. The presenter, Mark Powlett managed to carry out the radio interviews on location for a good ten minutes without many hick ups which taught me that a great deal of presenting is knowing how to make the most of a situation and to speak fluidly. In addition to some background reading, I tried applying some of the skills that I learned in class to our student videos such as body posture, eye contact and smiling in camera pre-roll.
I enjoyed as a video student getting a taste of what it's like. I'm quite sure that I'll never be a presenter but what I will take away with me as a TV student from the module are skills that I can use for when I'm filming on location covering events or needing to stand in for Vox pop interviewing. I hadn't done either before and now I feel confident enough to set up the camera and do a short piece to camera for our students videos by either turning the LCD screen around or having another operator to handle it for me.
Presentation practice by Alan Taylor, Alan Andrew Taylor from Willow Creek Pictures
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Have you ever tried presenting before?
WillowCreekPictures 4 months ago