My First Day on Big Brother

Thursday 31^st May – Tech Day – Live Office Runner

Call time: 10 am

Today was my first day working on Big Brother. This morning I was really excited about getting stuck into the job and meeting the people I was going to work with but at the same I was very anxious, this was a really big opportunity for me and I just didn’t want to mess it up. When I first got to Elstree Studios, after my long train journey, I went over to the Live cabin and this is where I began to meet the other runners and the rest of the production team I was going to be working with. We all signed out our assigned walkies and made our way over to the Reality cabin to get our security passes which we would use for the run of the show. We got taken into a runner meeting to run through what was expected of us and what each of our individual roles were. We then had a whole crew health and safety meeting on set and then we were taken outside for a tour of the site. When we arrived at the Big Brother set I couldn’t believe how small it was. It defiantly looked 10 times bigger on TV and it made me realise even more the magic of cameras.

My first task was to help with the script run. We had to print schedules, camera cards in different sizes and scripts. We had lots of problems with the photo copiers as they kept getting jammed and the script run ended up taking us 3 hours. As it was the tech day we didn’t worry about it too much but it is definitely something we need to solve for the first live show.

For the rest of the day I did various office runner jobs like tea runs, booking out walkies and giving out dinner vouchers. I also had to take dinner orders from the production team and go out and buy or order whatever they wanted. I had to get money from petty cash from Penelope and make sure that I kept all receipts.

Later on that evening I got the chance to be a stand in contestant and walk out of the orbit, down the catwalk posing for the cameras, get interviewed by Brian and walk up the stairs to the house. This was like a dream come true as I had been a massive fan of Big Brother when I was young age. As there is going to be a twist on launch night I also had to be a stand in for that. All of the stand in contestants were sat on chairs behind the orbit with blind folds on, blankets over our heads and sound cancelling head phones on to see what we were aware of so that they knew what the contestants were going to be able to hear and see.

After this cars were called and it was time for us to head home.

I had a really good first day, everyone seems really nice and I just can’t wait for Tuesday for the show to actually start.

The First and Only Unsigned Live

Heres the first and only Unsigned Live episode. We all worked really hard in our individual roles.

What I Have Learnt from doing AS Live

I have learnt a lot from doing this AS Live project. I have learnt that when producing a VT I need to produce a good solid shooting script which makes sense and tells the viewer everything they need to know in 1"30. I need to make sure that I get as much useful footage as I can so that I have enough GVs to cover my edit.

I have also learnt that even though I enjoyed the experience of being the Vision Mixer in the gallery I have realised that this is a very stressful job and I would much rather be on the floor with the talent and the action. On the day I had a lot of fun with it and tried my very hardest to do the best I could and I hope that I did a good enough job to make the show look amazing.

AS Live VT: Editing Continued

Today we have added the footage from last night and begun editing again. The VT has changed from being a gig guide to a VT about the Maidstone Fringe Festival. The whole thing is cutting together nicely but we are running a bit over time and finding it hard to cut it down. We will try our best to get it to time but if we can't then we will have to ask Lauren' the producer, if we can have some more time.

AS Live VT: Helen's Oppinion

Today we showed our edit to Helen and she gave some very constructive criticism. She told us how she thought the VT should be laid out and gave us some advice for future shoots such as the subjects need to be set up and so we need to get a sequence to show who the subject is before we start seeing them speak/ interview them.

We are re-shooting a few things tonight and hopefully what we film will change our VT and make it a better.

As Live Vt: Re-shoot

We had planned to re-film over the weekend but the camera was not working properly and so there was nothing we could do about it. We wanted to re-record the interview, some of Jess's pieces to camera and a few voice overs. Luckily have been able to get Jess on board to re shoot one of the PTCs and the voices overs on Monday once we have a different camera. We won't have time to re-shoot the interview so we will have to deal with what we have.

The content of the footage isn't bad its just the picture quality which lets it down a bit. The shots and music we do have fit together nicely and I think we have done a good job with the clips we have got.

AS Live VT: The Edit

I put all the footage on the computer today and for some reason it is all quite grainy and I'm not sure why as it was on low gain. I have also realised that the lighting on Zoe in the interview is not excellent which is really annoying as her answers are so good.

Abbi and I will try our best to edit the footage the best we can but hopefully we can arrange to re-shoot at some point.

AS Live VT: The Shoot

Yesterday we had a shoot inside and outside Earls which I think went pretty well. Jess, the presenter, was really easy to work and get along with and was very professional. We shot a few pieces to camera and I also shot a few acts performing.

Today we had a shoot at the Style and Winch and again Jess was very professional and easy to work with. We filmed a few pieces to camera, GV's, shots of the bands and an interview with Zoe explaining what the fringe festival was all about.

Tomorrow I am hopefully going to upload the footage and start editing.

Being a Vision Mixer

Watching this video really helped me understand my role as vision mixer even more. I found it so helpful.