Today was interesting! I keep waiting for the other shoe to drop, but every single person I’ve shadowed so far has done their best to make sure that I’m getting the most out of my time with them. I hope that I get to work in an office with kind people like them one day.
This morning, I worked with Wendy Gatlin, the Social Media Manager. In just the past few years, the changes in social media have drastically affected the way news is dispersed. When I think about what platforms I use to get news, I find that most stories I see are through news pages on Instagram or the News app on my computer, proving how important it is to change with the times.
To begin the day, I sat in on the morning producer meeting. Although I had been in this room before a few times, I made sure to pay attention during Wendy’s bit about social media. Each day, her department has a variety of goals that they want to hit, like unique viewers for example. In the meeting, she went over the goals that were hit (all but one) and summarized some of the big stories of the day before. Although the stories differ from day to day, apps like topic pulse help Wendy predict what will go viral and what’s dying out.
Around 10:15 ish, Wendy and I went outside for a dunk tank! Little parties like these, with a dunk tank with the top bosses of the company and loads of ice cream, aren’t common, but WRAL recently finished a great ratings period. During the fun, Wendy took videos that she took back to the office to edit for a fun social post. The process of compiling videos and overlaying text to make the video an ‘engager’ is key to her job. In fact, all of WRAL’s igtv videos are edited and posted by Wendy. However, the responsibilities don’t end with the company’s pages. Relatively often, she consults all the talent (reporters and anchors) on the their social media, breaking down both their stats and their content for ways to improve even more.
Seeing all the thought and techniques behind their social media will definitely make me pay attention more to what I’m taking in. I absorb so much content in a single day, and I need to make sure that it’s purposeful. Did I finish watching a video or reading a post feeling more educated or enlightened than when I began?
At about 2, I came back from lunch to spend some time with Greg Ziller. He’s a wealth of knowledge! Although he came to the studio about three years ago, he’s been in the television business for much longer. As with most of the people in the industry, he moves around a lot to different stations, helping him to network and establish connections in different places. Because directors can’t really prepare too much until the producers and editors have finished, we had a bit of down time to fill. At 3 pm, Greg directed the drawings of the powerball with one of the graphics operators. Although it was a short segment, I could tell that watching him direct during the 5 pm show would be a privilege.
Leading up to the show, I could see the importance of good relationships with producers, because everyone needs to communicate efficiently in order to everything ready for the show. Greg waited for the producers to finish their scripts so he could print them out and take notes on them, marking what cameras would be used and who the anchors speaking would be for each segment. For example, one page was marked with 3T, reminding him that he would be switching to camera three for a Tight shot on the anchor.
During the actual broadcast, Greg gave me a headset so I could listen in to the chatter during the show. As I heard him giving directions and watched him seamlessly run the set, I was reminded of something he told me before the show started. He said that the director was like the conductor of an orchestra, putting all the pieces together to create the final product. Unlike a conductor though, Greg says that if he’s doing his job well, he shouldn’t know what the show was about. There’s so much to focus on that if a director gets caught up in listening to the story, he might miss something and compromise the quality of the broadcast.
Directing was quite the whirlwind! I’m so glad I got the opportunity to learn from Greg, because it gave me a great look into the behind-the-scenes, and really allowed me to picture myself doing this job. With practice I sure anything is possible, but I would need a whole lot of it to keep up with him!