The Second Day.

Today, the 2nd of December 2011, was my second day at BUStation. I had been scheduled for the 25th of November to follow my first day but unfortunately was not very well. Anyway let us continue on with blogging the important stuff; what I did and how it went.

Today was to be far different from my first day; it seems I have chosen a good week to come in.

It is ‘One World Week’ which celebrates international and national diversity amongst students and we fortunately had people working in BUStation who ranged from not only different parts of Britain (Scotland, Wales etc) but also from different countries. One student from my class of scriptwriting for film and television, Petter Vielberg, was present and we decided as a group that we should interview him as part of the Lunchbox Live show in order to see how an international student felt about Bournemouth University. (He was also one of the presenters on the show). But my part in producing questions was very limited and I was left to other devices.

In fact my role as a writer was very limited and I found myself sat at the computer consistently logging into BUStation’s Twitter and Facebook accounts in which I updated status’s informing others what our show would entail. To be honest it wasn’t exciting and we had a large group in so there wasn’t a lot to do apart from that. Not the most exciting job in the world and definitely not the most productive. I was quite bored and decided there and then I would not end up in this role again.

However things were about to take an interesting turn; our show was to be shown at an earlier time and so I was asked if I would like to be a camera operator. My mind’s first reaction was ‘no chance’ but then after a couple of seconds thinking about it I decided to give it a shot. What was the worst that could happen?

Trevor was very helpful and guided me through how to operator the headphones and the microphone when and if I needed to talk to the Director to follow his instructions for camera shots and angles. Fairly simple and so far so good.

Next came actually being out on the studio floor with the camera; they are big and on first glance very confusing. However the other two camera operators understood that I was unfamiliar on how to use the camera; they showed me how to track vertically and horizontally with the wheel, how to zoom in and out and also how important it is to keep the camera firm and steady during the live show. I didn’t want to mess up so I held tight!

Anyway it was actually nice to be out in the studio where the actual interviews and presenting take place (especially having been sat down and at a computer all morning!) This meant I could focus on what was being said and learnt what the other students had done that morning.

Because of the strikes that had taken place the previous week they managed to bring Kate Jones (Vice President of Education for SUBU) and calculated questions which resulted in very informative answers; I personally learnt and have understood why teachers decided to go on strikes due to their pensions. But also felt a bit annoyed. This is our education and we are paying for it and at the end of the day if teachers go on strike then our education is being affected! There was even a mention that school field trips had been cancelled!

All in all a morning which did not start out very productive but, in the end, a very informative one. However I shall now make sure I do something more active for the third day (hopefully something to do with writing!)

Laterz :)