News Analysis

Because a news bulletin is the main element of my radio extract I'm going to start by analysing the way news is presented in a variety of different formats, looking at newspapers, online news, TV news and radio news to see if there's a consistency in terms of conventions.

I'm going to start by looking at national news stories online from the BBC news website and the websites of national newspapers. I'm going to look at a range of different stories to see if they contain the 5Ws and news values regardless of what type of story I am analysing.

I'm going to look at a number of different types of stories including the following:
1) Celebrity/entertainment
2) Politics
3) Sport
4) Business
5) Health
6) Education
7) Disaster
8) Crime
9) Good news
10) Technology

News Values

News values are the factors defined by Galtung and Ruge that help to explain how journalists and editors decided that certain news stories an image were accepted as newsworthy, while others were not. While they applied these factors to news stories in newspapers, they can also be applied to radio news bulletins.


Immediacy- has it happened recently? is the story 'breaking'? 
This often pushes a news story to the front page of a newspaper or in our case, to the top of a radio news bulletin.

Familiarity- is it culturally or geographically close to us in London/Britain/Europe/the USA? 
This news value becomes even more prominent with local news coverage.

Amplitude- is it a big event or one which involves large numbers of people? 

Frequency- does the event happen often?






Impact- can we identify with the story as having a profound effect on our lives? Does the story contain elements that would make us feel threatened? 
The often has the effect of pushing a news story higher up the news agenda.

Predictability- Did we expect it to happen? 

Surprise- Is it an unusual or unexpected event? 
This news value, more then predictability, tends to push a story further up in the news agenda. Surprise as a news value can relate to positive as well as negative stories.





Continuity- Has the story already been defined as news? is it part of an ongoing or lone-running story?
Many news bulletins contain stories with continuity as a news value. However most of the time the news story will be further down the news agenda. Often there will be 'breaking' elements to a story that has already been defined as news.





Conflict- Does the story contain drama in describing disagreements, arguments, fights or battles between two or more people/organisations? 
Most news stories will contain this news value






Elite people- Does the story concern well-know people, such s celebrities? 
Certain types of newspapers (such as tabloids including the sun, the mirror and the star), certain television news broadcasting (such as E News) and certain radio stations (such as capital radio) are dominated by stories including this news value.
There are many that only become 'news worthy' because they involve celebrities.





Personalisation- Is it a human interest story?
This is a prominent news value providing an emotional response from the audience. This is one of the most frequent news values because a large percentage of the audience can relate to them.






Negativity- Is it bad news?
News bulletins and news papers are frequently dominated by bad news stories.






Scandal- Is the story likely to provoke moral outrage from part of the audience? 
Scandal, particularly involving elite people or members of society in positions of trust feature high up on the news agenda.

Balance- The story may be selected to balance other news, such as a human survival story to balance a number of stories concerning death. 
Whilst 'good news' stories don't tend to dominate news bulletins, they are often found towards the end of a bulletin as an antidote to the bad news that has dominated.

When I analyse news in more detail i'll make a note of all of the news values. Determining what news values are in stories will help me when I am creating my own news stories, helping me think about a story's suitability for inclusion.

The 5Ws

Who is it about? 

What happened?

When did it happen?

Where did it happen?

Why did it happen? 

The 5Ws are the essential bits of information that readers, viewers and listeners expect to find within a news story. Journalists and news editors tend to include this information towards the beginning of the story- this helps the audience determine whether they will keep reading/watching/listening, but also means that if a story has to be cut this can happen without losing the most vital information.

This has shown me that when I create my news stories I should include the 5Ws in my stories and within the first two paragraphs.

Below is a link to a news story about the death of a famous singer which includes the 5Ws in the first few paragraphs.

News Story showing the 5Ws

Preliminary Task Evaluation

Below is a list of things that I have learnt from doing my preliminary task which will help me with the planning, recording and editing of my final radio extract.

• The software, Adobe Audition 1.5 enables you to edit out pauses and any mistakes - this means that I don't have to keep stopping and starting dueing recording if my actors make mistakes
 

• When choosing the people to be in my preliminary task I didn't give much thought to representation, and in particular directing my actors - this is something I'm going to think about more carefully with my full extract
• When recording, the person needs to stand very close to the microphone 
• Each voice is recorded separately which makes it easier to edit out any mistakes before mixing the different voices together
• You can cut and paste the different segments you want from one audio file to another and you manipulate the gaps
• I used a 'chorus' effect on my jingle which makes it sound different from all the other voices

• I used a relatively basic jingle with two layers: one being the voice and the other the impact sound - I used a relatively simple effect on the voice

• From carrying out this task I can now see what I can do in terms of structuring jingles - I can be more adventurous in the real extract
• For the archive clip, I made it more adventurous in terms of the number of layers of audio I used -  there was the voice, but also a number of sound effects

• Even though i've only created a jingle and a very brief archive clip i've realised what I can achieve through the use of sound effects - sound effects that authentically sound like an arena thats holding an award ceremony

• When creating my adverts or news stories I'm going to think carefully about what scenes I can create using a range of sound effects to recreate existing, authentic sounding locations
• I learnt that multiple sound effects (6 or 7) of essentially the same types of sound make a scene sound more realistic 
• During recording and editing I improvised a little recording of actors screaming or shouting for Ryan to win during the archive clip - the microphone was placed further away so it sounded like it was coming from the audience in the distance

• I learnt that compression makes everything sound louder so anything thats quieter is brought up to be more equal to the rest in terms of volume - making it sound realistic as radio

Finished Preliminary Task

Here is my finished preliminary task for Celeb FM.

Preliminary Task - Potential Music and SFX

I will be recording my preliminary task later this week so I need to choose some potential sound effects for my archive clip and maybe for the jingle. I also need to choose some music for the jingle and possibly in the archive clip.

I need the following music and sound effects for my task:

• upbeat, modern pop music for my jingle
• dramatic, serious, rousing music as the actor makes his way onto the stage in the archive clip
• impact sound effect for the station jingle
• drum roll sound effect as the announcement is made in the archive clip
• cheering and applause sound effects for the archive clip
• audience murmuring sound effect for the archive clip
• microphone reverb sound effect as actor speaks in the archive clip
   

Below are some potential tracks I may use - though I will make the final decision after I have recorded my voices and when I am editing together the preliminary task.

Here is an impact sound that I might cut down for my jingle:



Here is a sound effect that I might use for the microphone reverb (the opening second):

Preliminary Task Script

For my preliminary task I had to create a five minute extract from an imaginary local radio show which will include a jingle, a presenter introducing a guest, the guest responding and an archive clip featuring the guest. 

I didn't spend a lot of time researching or drafting the script, and I didn't specifically listen to the radio for this task - everything I did came from memory.

This task will help me to learn how to use the equipment - the recording and editing software. It will also get me to think about appropriate music and sound effects that I will use. 

Below is my preliminary task script with annotations: 

AS Foundation Production - Brief

For my AS media coursework I will be scripting, recording, and mixing a five minute extract from an imaginary local radio show which will include a news bulletin (with a jingle, outside broadcast, and voxpops), jingles, presenters and adverts.

Before writing my script I need to research the structure of news stories and listen to a number of radio stations so that my extract sounds as realistic as possible. Before I start  this research and planning I am going to script my preliminary task which will include a jingle, a presenter introducing a guest (who responds) and an archive clip featuring the guest.