Project Evaluation

 Evaluation  

 

Overall, I am impressed with the success of the show and the final outcome. The year came together and worked well as a unified team to pull off a complete 30-minute live production, including graphics and VTs to meet the brief. We continuously pushed ourselves and our abilities to gain as much experience as possible from this process.  

 

There were so many victories throughout the overall production which resulted in the crew creating a show we are incredibly proud of. The team came together and formed a crew where people could rely on one another and trust that work would be completed to a high and suitable standard for someone else to progress forward with. I think this came from my attitude as a producer. I was always approachable and friendly so people felt as though they could come to me when they needed help. I was proactive in delegating work from one person to another when needed, this kept the production running to schedule and reduced the stress levels of other members. When making these decisions I did consider the workload of others and made sure not to put too much work onto another.  

 

I held regular meetings with different departments throughout the production to keep everyone on the same page, doing this meant that we created a cohesive and clear house style across all departments e.g., graphics, social media, marketing, set design, props, costume. As this was replicated throughout every aspect of the show, we demonstrated how every small detail of the show was thought out and carefully considered to see how it would affect the overall tone and vibe of the show. Inevitably, there were some small disagreements in the crew. I did not want these to hold back the team and stunt progress, so I decided to step in and resolve the issues as soon as I knew about them. I found that often these disagreements were down to miscommunication. I got the crew members involved for a meeting where I listened to both points of view, identified where the miscommunication happened and resolved the issue at hand. As I was proactive in solving these issues, I think I prevented any major arguments.  

 

As the producer, I also took on the responsibility of writing the script. I started to develop the script as early as possible. This meant there were many changes over the weeks and many different drafts however, having a rough draft of the script for early rehearsal and workshops meant the team could visualise the show and get a feel for the tone. Having this gradually developed script set us up for success closer to TX day as in the final few days of rehearsals there were only a few changes to the script as I had been constantly developing it over the weeks. This also meant that the team could rehearse with the most accurate script possible. We managed to fit in as many rehearsals as possible which meant that the show became second nature to us, we reached a point where we stopped rehearsing a few hours before the live transmission as we were well prepared and wanted to avoid over-rehearsing.  

 

The live transmission went really well and there were minimal mistakes made. Any mistakes that were made weren’t noticeable to the audience or viewers at home and could easily be recovered by the crew behind the scenes. For example, the hosts were nervous and rushed through the Hot or Not segment, this left 30 seconds spare from the segment for me as the script supervisor to redistribute to another segment of the show. However, I managed to stay on top of timing adjustments, with Sarah Newton’s help, and the show ran perfectly to 30 minutes.  

 

Some elements of the whole process also went wrong and provided me with good experiences to learn from. For example, the development of the VTs was slow, and although I held lots of meetings with the team to ensure we were all on the same page I should have been more persistent as a producer and held more regular check-ins. I will do this in future to prevent work from falling behind. Unfortunately, we also encountered more troubles with the VTs as some of the concepts did not work, for example, we wanted to involve a small section of Vox pops, however, it was a struggle to encourage the public to get involved with these. The team were persistent but eventually, I had to make the editorial decision to remove this segment and replace it with another. I made this choice as I knew the content, we had would not keep the energy and vibe we were going for so instead of disrupting the house style we created it was a much better choice to replace this segment with an advertisement.  

 

Due to health complications, we also faced losing our head camera operator a week before the show. Initially, this caused me stress and panic but as a producer, it is your job to find solutions. I allowed myself a few minutes to feel the stress then decided to be proactive to dissolve the situation before the rest of the crew would find out and also begin to panic. I worked with the director and another producer to reach out to skilled camera operators who may have been available to cover this role. Within a few days, we had two operators on standby who were experienced and ready to step up when needed. We got them into rehearsals as quick as possible so they could learn the blocking, camera movements and learn to match the other operator’s style so the show kept a cohesive look.  

 

We also had trouble motivating the set team to get on the same page as us and work faster to meet their deadline. This meant that we got and made many additional props/ set dressing items to be the set together. We also ended up getting the crew together to build the set. This meant we spent a lot of time picking up this work when we could have been focusing on other aspects. But many hands make light work and the crew pulled together really well to get the set completed and keep it reflecting the tone of the show.  

 

There are also a few things I would have done differently. One of these being I would have monitored the VT team and their progress more to ensure they were on track for their deadlines. Although they are responsible for this themselves, I feel as though if I had monitored them closely from the beginning, we would have avoided the rush in editing nearer TX day. This is something I will learn from when producing in the future.  

 

This project has also taught me a lot about myself as a producer and LIVE TV overall. The workshops allowed us to try multiple roles and gave me a good insight into the roles and responsibilities of others. This helped me massively when it came to managing the team as I knew what everyone was responsible for and to whom I should be directing certain questions. This also helped to highlight that every single member of the crew is important and without one role many other roles would struggle. I think knowing this helped the crew come together as a cohesive team, no one was seen as more valuable/superior to the other as we all needed one another to execute a successful show. There is a thrill to Live TV which I enjoy, and I will consider a career in Live TV in the future. I found I am a good leader and am successful at motivating the team to push their limits and get behind new ideas. One of the most important tasks early on was to motivate the team to be passionate about the concept and if this had failed then I think there would have been much slower progress. I also found that people find me approachable and friendly, they did not hesitate to ask me for help or communicate any issues they were having. I achieved this by always making sure I was an integrated member of the team and enjoyed lunch with the crew. I think being approachable is a good quality as a producer as it ensures people do not hide struggles from you and progress is not hindered by this. The energy I displayed, I found, would also radiate through the crew. Therefore, it was important for me to be happy, bubbly, energized and motivated to make the most of the day and be proactive. When I had this energy, it encouraged others to also be proactive which meant that we were always making a lot of progress. Although there were times when I was stressed it was important for me to not (always) show this to the crew as I did not want them to panic and become less motivated. Another thing I discovered about myself is that I’m good at taking action when needed. For example, I was proactive in delegating work from one person to another when one person’s workload was becoming too much and another was becoming smaller.  

 

Overall, I think the show and every process leading to the final product on TX day was successful. We faced the inevitable challenges and disagreements within a production crew and tackled them head-on. We did not let issues fester and affect the overall success of the show and we created something everyone could be proud of. Although there were minor issues with the live show these were only mistakes visible to the crew as the audience was not aware there was another option. This being said the number of mistakes made was minuscule and for a student crew with no prior experience, the show was amazing.