For my add-vantage module, I have been working alongside many of my friends off the Media Production course along with some 1st and 2nd years off other courses helping work on and run the Coventry University’s Youtube Channel, CUTV.
I have been involved in a number of projects for the CUTV Youtube channel over the past two terms and have found this advantage module extremely fun and by the far the most rewarding advantage course I have taken during my time at University. I believe overall this channel and society has been a success, but there has been a few problems and setbacks along the way. Having CUTV running as both an advantage module for third year students as well as a society open to all, it made sure there were a wide range of students participating and showcasing an equally wide range of skills and talents, we had Media Production students, Advertising students and even Journalism students working together to try and make the CUTV channel as successful as we could.
We needed to designate roles to each member to make sure the projects ran as smoothly as possible – due it being my final year on my Media Production course, I did not want a major role within the society as I was not sure if I could put the required time and energy into a larger role such as President or Programme Controller – I then agreed to give a helping hand to anyone who needed help on their projects as a crew member, whether it be sound recorder or camera man. As a Media Production student, many of the non-Media students were looking for advice on how to use the equipment, etc. and I was always willing and able to give them advice on how to set up and use the cameras and other recording equipment
At the start of the module we were told that one of the offices in the Student’s Union basement would be ours to use for CUTV – we were also given a small budget to buy equipment, such as a computer for editing. Unfortunately, we never managed to acquire the room fully or get any editing equipment which was a harsh blow for the project. If we, as a group, had one place where all editing could happen. I think CUTV could have been even more productive, as most the projects were being editing off-campus at the contributors own houses, it was difficult to keep track of the progress of work and so many projects were finished behind schedule. Another problem caused by this was the non-Media students could not get editing tips and advice from those with more experience as they had to do all editing alone at home.
The first project I have been involved with is the CUTV Student Cooking Programme. A small group of around five of us originally had a meeting to discuss what direction we were looking to go in with the programme. We decided that we wanted to make student-friendly food: a tasty and healthy meal that is able to be made on a budget. We got in contact with Sainsbury’s and they were happy for us to film in their store, whilst be bought the ingredients and then moved on to a typical student kitchen to film the cooking portion of the video. My role within the group was the sound engineer, I was in charge of connecting the microphone, setting up the sound levels through the camera and then holding the boom microphone and positioning it throughout so our presenters, Leo and Andrea sounded perfect during the shoot. The cooking show was a great success and it was very clear and coherent – very easy for someone to follow along at home to make the delicious noodle dish.
Having a large interest in sport, the chance to film Varsity Day – an annual sporting event, pitting Coventry and Warwick Universities against one another in a range of games – was extremely exciting. There were around six of us volunteering to film the sports footage and as there were a large number of various sporting events happening throughout the day we split into groups for filming. I worked with Mark and our task was to film the hockey match at Coventry University’s sports hall. Things went wrong early on, however – firstly we were told that the sports hall were expecting our arrival and that they were happy to have us filming there, but we soon found this was not the case. They had no idea that we were supposed to be filming the games there and they made it clear that they had a very strict “no filming” policy inside the building. A few panic-stricken phone calls to the head of the sports society at the Student’s Union and to the Coventry University marketing department cleared up the problem and we were able to shoot. Once inside, me and Mark quickly set up the camera in a suitable position to get both Volleyball teams in shot and the game teed off shortly after. It is difficult filming a Volleyball match as it is played at such a fast pace and making sure you get all the action on camera can be tricky at times but after a while I think I adapted to the pace well and some of the action – it was also one of the few events that Coventry beat Warwick in so it was good to have the occasion on film! The Volleyball team were extremely interested in the filming we did and requested the tape of the game to use as training. The footage was editing together along with clips from other sports events that day to create a Varsity Day montage along with a voice over presenter and graphics detailing all the Varsity Day results – akin to Sky Sports News coverage of sporting events. This has experience has taught me to make sure that every single detail of a shoot is carefully planned, things are always bound to go wrong but with careful planning, you can be prepared and will know what to do and how to rectify the problem with minimal fuss.
Prior to filming the Varsity Day footage, I was part of a group focusing on the sports results for all the Coventry University teams. It was to be a weekly programme, again, similar to Sky Sports News that would do a weekly roundup of the sporting results. We were planning on shooting it like a sports broadcast, however, showing no action of the sporting events – as we did not have time to film the sports every week, it would just have a presenter reading out the results whilst the results would also be shown on screen using graphics. After filming the first episode and re-watching it, we realised that not many would be interested in this sports programme – firstly, due to the dates of the CUTV meeting and work times, the results show could not be completed until a week after the games had taken place and we realised that most people who were interested would know the results by then, making the round-up programme redundant. The programme never made it to broadcast in this form but we used the layout and graphics in the Varsity Day round up video.
On the whole, I have thoroughly enjoyed the CUTV project and believe it has been a great success. Many of the videos have been viewed by hundreds of people on Youtube and as we have achieved advertising on both the main Coventry University website and the Source newspaper. Once the CUTV project has more time to grow, I can see it being a big part of the University’s media coverage for years to come. Personally, I have learnt greatly from working with a wide range of fellow students from different course backgrounds and have found the times where I have been teaching others extremely rewarding.
