Logan Live: Behind the Scenes

 

A little about me...

I would like to share a little about my experience working with Logan Live to hopefully inspire others to search for similar opportunities and learn valuable techniques and technologies in Electronic Media Production.  If you are interested in video editing and are curious about what goes on behind the scenes of a simple news broadcast, read on! 

First of all, what is Logan Live? 

Logan Live is a news broadcast that I worked on at my high school, James Logan High School. I had the opportunity to be part of the Logan Live team through my Electronic Media Production course. There I was able to work behind and in front of the camera and I was able to develop skills that I would love to share with you now.  

My Logan Live team diffused our news broadcast show every morning from 10:30 a.m. to 10:40 a.m. It is important to post videos and blogs on a regular basis. This way viewers know that they can count on you and are more likely to tune in on a regular basis. It is also great to work with a team with each person possessing a unique quality that they could share. Personally, I was the News Anchor and worked primarily in front of the camera, but diverse skills are necessary to put on a good show.

Take a look at this video to get an idea of what went into our broadcast: 

There is definitely room for improvement as this was our first year working with these technologies, but I believe that this video shows creative ideas that can differentiate your news broadcast videos from a simple video. 

In the beginning of the video, there is a catchy tune with a simple short introduction video that introduces the name of the news broadcast and logo. This is an important step to creating a news broadcast or even a Youtube channel video. Not only do the intro video and logo have to be coherent, but it also needs to match what you are trying to convey to the audience. As the news broadcast was for our high school, we included the school logo in our Logan Live logo. We also stuck to the colors of our school for the logo. If you are trying to come up with a logo for your own channel, there are many resources available. Adobe Illustrator, Canva and similar applications are great tools for making a logo. 

The same goes for the Logan Live set. To create a set that suits our needs, we needed a green screen for the weather and entertainment segments. We also needed to have a desk to give off a more professional look and to allow us to keep the printed version of our scripts with us during the diffusion of the show. 

As mentioned in the title of the show, the Logan Live show is broadcasted live. Because of this, we needed to use different machines behind the scenes to keep the show running smoothly. For example, an important tool that allowed us, students, to read the script while still looking like we are staring at the camera is the prompter. To have the script readily available to us, the document must be prepared beforehand and sent to the computer system inside the prompter.

Here is what a typical prompter could look like:

 

This next video shows what Logan Live looked like behind the scenes: 

As you can see, many camera views can be viewed at once. This is so that cameras can easily be switched back and forth when changing between anchors and segments. In this room, sound can also be regulated and different intros for segments can be saved in order to provide short video segments during the live shows at the push of a button. 

Weather Forecast

Another important aspect of a news broadcast is the weather forecast segment. I find this segment quite interesting and challenging because the weather forecaster is working with a green screen. To see what they are pointing at, they must look at another screen which shows what the audience sees. It can be challenging and definitely takes some getting used to. 

I hope you enjoyed this behind the scenes look! 

I learned skills while working with Logan Live that will last a lifetime. I hope that this little behind the scenes look will encourage you to look further into the field and maybe even try it yourself!