Self-Critique

On the first day I thought this class wsa going to be fun. I've had Jill for other classes and I knew that she would be able to help me work on being an anchor/reporter, mostly because she's been one and so she know what she's talking about. The first day packet that I got was kind of intimidating, but what do you expect for J-term, you have to fit a semester worth of stuff into two weeks. I felt comfortable my first time on air, because i've done it before, but by the time it was my tern to be on-air, we had talked about my voice and pacing, so I was a little nervous, because I was trying really hard to concentrate on those things, while still reading the teleprompter and showing emotion. Shooting a stand-up was something new to me. I've done tons of packages before, but I pretty much did interviews and then just an intro and outro on camera. So that was something that I really needed to learn. It still takes me a little bit to think of a good stand-up, since at that point of the process, you haven't written the script yet.

Something that I believe to have improved on during this class is pacing myself while reading the teleprompter. Before I didn't mean to, but did, read really fast through everything... causing me to slur or mess words up. I will continue to work on everything that I learned from this course. However, on major thing is the sound of my voice while speaking on camera, for example NOT speaking from my throat. My weakness as a reporter is the whole package script and thining of everything fast, to get the story done in a short amount of time. I think that's something that I'll get better at as time goes by and the more I do it. One major strength that I have is my persistency. I'm very persistent and any station who I work for will find that out...so no matter what, you know I'm going to get the information I want and need for my story.

My ultimate career goal is to be an anchor of a morning show, like "Regis and Kelly". However, to get there I'll have to put in my time working as a reporter and anchor. For those reasons alone, this class helped me to grow and open my mind on some of the things I was doing wrong before, and how to improve them. Talking to Jill and Virginia Kerr were two of the main parts of this class that helped to streamline my goal as a morning show host. They put me at ease and let me know that I can do anything I put my mind to, if I want it bad enough. I really enjoyed this class. In fact, the only negative thing I have to say is that I don't like the fact that I can't take it again!!

KPLR

The first thing I noticed while watching KPLR was how the CW11 set didn’t look as professional as the other stations in Saint Louis. The anchors were Melanie Moon and Rick Edlund. Melanie was wearing blue eye shadow (it may have been the smoky-eye look, but it looked blue to me), bright red lipstick, a red blazer, and a white undershirt. Rick was wearing a black suit, white undershirt, and red striped tie.

The reporters that I saw within the first ten minutes were Tony Miller, Grant Rampy, and Theresa Petry. I did see the three packages, but I don’t believe that any of them were live, because it’s dark outside at nine o’clock and in their packages, they weren’t dark out. Tony Miller was the first one that I saw and his stand-up was in front of a building, I don’t know what building it was, but there were a ton of windows and I’m assuming it might be the court house.

One story that I remember was reported by Tony Miller and was about a man named Clifford Rowling. Police arrested Clifford because he entered an elementary school and abducted a little girl. He is currently in jail and his bond is set at 1/2 a million dollars. Another story that I remember, because it was so sad, was about two puppies. A pit bull and a golden retriever were tossed over a Saint Louis overpass and fell about 30 feet in traffic. The pit bull is under care with broken legs, while the golden retriever ran from the scene. One last story that I remember was reported by Theresa Petry about Saint Louis police officers wanting a pay increase. It used to be that officers must live in the city to be policemen, but was changed that if they’ve been officers for 7years they can move out of the city. One man said that they do have good pensions. However, they make about 4 thousand less than county officers and 8 thousand less than Chesterfield officers. Saint Louis is requesting a 5 percent increase of pay, and without it people are afraid they might walk away. One proposal intended to pay for this is to have a two percent raised sale tax.

The newscast was good, but it was something that I would think to see in a much higher market, not a market 21. The scenery of the studio just looked kind of amateur. The news team does seem credible, because they are in a market 21, but also because they were dressed appropriately and presented themselves nicely (voice and pacing of story). I will definitely watch this station again…just not for the news, because I don’t watch television at 9pm, I either watch it at 10pm or in the morning.

TV Jobs Assignment

#1 - Market number 145, KSNF-TV, in Jopin, Missouri. They are seeing a morning show co-anchor who can bring a sparking on-camera presence and interview skills to the show, and can interact well with the other co-anchor and forecaster. The ND is Jim Jackson.

I would be very interested in this job, and I would probably choose it over the other ones, because it's in Missouri (so i'd be willing to move there), it's a good market size for my first job, and it's a morning show co-anchor, which is what I want to do!!!

#2 - Market number 132, WHBF-TV, in Rock Island, IL. They are looking for a weekend anchor/producer who is sharp and aggressive on both sides of the camera, and can do GA reporting as well. The ND is Scott Frederick.

I would be willing to move for this position, because it's only one state over, so it's not that far away. Also, it's a weekend anchor... so that would be a good start. Producing would be fun and I could still report. It's like the best of all worlds!

#3 - Market number 132, WTVO/WQRF-TV, in Rockford, IL. They are seeking a GA reporter/fill-in anchor who is aggressive, is creative, is highly motivated, loves to break local news stories, comes to the table with story ideas daily, is a team player, can handle the pressures of deadlines and breaking news in a competitive fashion; must be able to go live, with experience is a plus. The ND is Kent Harrell.

I would move here...again, because it's somewhat close to home. I would like this job, because I would be doing the reporting, but still have a chance to anchor, fill in anyway...which is better than nothing!!

Weather With Beth

No... the title of this comment isn't a mistake...now I realize that I'm meant to be an anchor (lol), but I have to put in my time and try other positions. Today we did the news live... so that means that if I mess up... I mess up, and everyone who watches it will see my error made. But I didn't mess up, I did it perfect!!! OR SO I THOUGHT! We were all getting ready to leave and what happens, "Beth, we need to do weather again because we did it wrong in the control room and we switched it to the wrong camera." AHH!! So, I go to do the weather forecast over and... wouldn't you know it... I messed up! Someone (Ed) once told me that we mess up when we don't do shows live, because in our minds we know we can, but when we do it live...we we do it right, because if we happen to make a mistake then we just have to live with it and there's no option to go back and change anything.

Needless to say though, it was a good day and I did get some good information from Jill. My favorite was the list of all the stations in the country and what they ranked. So, now I can start looking up information on the places that I would like to get my first job at, and know that i'm not applying for a station that is a top 75 market, when I would think that they would be ranked like 120...so that'll help me out!

St. Louis Ban

Today myself, Neal, Dustin, and Katharina joined together again to shoot package number two. We decided to do our package on the ban that St.Charles is proposing to put on bars and restaurants. We shot an interview with the R.T.'s owner and a Lindenwood University graduate. It was FREEZING cold out, but we were all outside for a good three hours. By the time we were done I wasn't even cold anymore... I was just frozen! lol. We were able to find a sign to do our stand-up by, which was just perfect! When we were done shooting, we went back to the tv studio, which was locked... thankfully there was a janitor that let us in. If he wasn't there, we probably wouldn't have been able to log our tape... resulting in a bad grade. While we were logging, I was already thinking ahead about what my script is going to look like. So, that's good that I do have some kind of idea and now when I sit down to write my script tonight, it shouldn't take as long as my last script did.

Something else that I wasn't too happy with was the fact that I didn't get my KPLP news analysis done, because I didn't know that they only had one newscast a day, for a half hour, and it was at 9 pm. YIKES!!! But I felt better this morning when I got an e-mail back from Jill, and I wasn't the only one with that problem, so we will have a chance to re-do it tonight! Thank You Jill!!!


Also, I wanted to post a picture I got from our tour at Fox 2 on Tuesday.

Tour time.

Yesterday we didn't have class in the tv studio, or in the classroom. We met at KTVI, My Fox, Channel 2. I didn't know this before, but out school actually had a J-term class that was working at Fox... that's pretty cool. They were doing all sorts of things that had to do with the web... but they did a ton of blogging. That's really neat that they had the opportunity to go there and do that. Then who ever wanted to ask some people at Fox some questions were able to. Lastely, I was able to shoot a stand-up outside of Fox 2. You see, while our class was there talking to people, Ed's class was there shooting b-rolls and interviews. By the time we're done with everything, we'll have a package.

Speaking of packages... today is the day that our group has to get together, again, and start shooting for our next package. Today we'll go down to Main Street and talk to some people about the who banning of cussing in bars. I think that this story is going to be fun to work on and I know that a lot of people have an opinion on this particular subject, so we should be able to get tons of footage. When we're done with that we will be logging our tapes... but this time they have to be hand written... not typed!

KTVI

The first thing I noticed on the show was the background, behind the anchor, it’s Saint Louis and has a blue tint to it, it just popped out at me. However, something that also “popped” out at me was that the anchors were holding a little baby Jesus in a crib. I guess they found it and said that if anyone was missing the baby Jesus to call Fox 2 and claim it. The anchors were Randi Naughton and John Pertzborn. Randi was wearing a red jacket and John was wearing a light brown suit with a yellow undershirt and tie. After they talked about the baby Jesus Glenn Zimmerman talked about the weather and informed me that today will be bright, but not necessarily warm. The high for today is 36 degrees. After a few stories ran Glenn came back on camera and played the song of the day, “On a Clear Day.” While this ran it showed what it currently looks like outside, at the Lambert Airport.

The reporters I saw in the first ten minutes were Shawn Lindsey and April Simpson. Shawn Lindsey talked about how Kenneth Hall Regional Hospital might be closing. There will be a hearing at nine this morning to decide what they are going to be doing with the hospital. Her stand up was in East Saint Louis, in front of the hospital. April Simpson was also live this morning in Kirkwood to talk about the excessive speeding on I-44. To help with the traffic situation they added another lane, however it is more narrow than the rest of the lanes. That doesn’t stop people from driving extremely fast in the lane, at speeds of 90 degrees. April talked with the highway patrol and they said that just because there isn’t any shoulders on the interstate, they will still pull you over. They had some b-roll of a car in the far left lane speeding, quickly passing cars. After that came Real Time Traffic, with Monica Adams. She showed that there was a huge back-up on 270.

I think that the newscast seems nice and likeable. They are communicating with each other, as well as looking into the camera. They seem credible, because they sound confident in what they say, are dressed nicely, and the stories they report on sound well researched. I will definitely watch this station again, FOX 2... not only because I like the newscast, but because I’ll be interning them and helping them out with their morning show this coming Monday!!!