Today, I shadowed Chad Flowers and Amanda Lamb on a live run to the Johnston Correctional facility! From the very beginning, I noticed how quickly a reporter’s plan can change depending on the importance of certain stories or the availability they have to enter certain places.
Today’s story centered around Gary Goldman, a man who had spent several decades in prison after being convicted of a crime that he claims he didn’t commit. Ms. Lamb had already been on the scene with another photojournalist when Mr. Flowers and I arrived, getting interviews and b-roll for the news story. Ms. Lamb went on air at 12 pm, 4 pm, and 5:30 pm, but each time slot had a different package displayed for the story. For the 12 pm live shot, I actually got to hold the reflector to help the lighting while Ms. Lamb introduced the topic. With each time slot, she went deeper in depth with the story, as Mr. Flowers edited in more interviews and voice-overs.
Most of the time in between live shots were designated for creating the script and editing the package. While Ms. Lamb wrote and recorded voice-overs, checked her facts, and memorized what she would say for the live intro, Mr. Flowers edited the b-roll to match the voice-overs, put in the video/audio of interviews, and uploaded the final package to a shared network for WRAL. Both Mr. Flowers and Ms. Lamb are veterans in their field and they’ve worked together for about 15 years, so they made the process look quick and effortless, though I could see the tremendous amount of work that goes into each one of their segments. I can’t wait to learn more tomorrow!
