This module will equip you with the core skills to work inside a broadcast TV studio: gallery directing, vision-mixing, camera operation and production assisting, among others. It will also acquaint you with some of the key forms of studio television from a combined storytelling, aesthetic and technical point-of-view. In this you will encounter panel shows, games shows, and magazine programmes alongside multi-camera studio drama production and live music presentation. The module's aim is to give you insight into - and experience of - what remains one of the dominant forms of television production, not least because of its capacity to capture and mediate exciting and important live events. At the same time, the discipline of working alongside fellow students in the team environment of the TV studio will equip you for group-working elsewhere, both on this degree, and in the creative professions more widely.
Module will run
Occurrence
Teaching period
A
Semester 1 2024-25
B
Semester 2 2024-25
Module aims
Over the course of this module, you can expect to:
Develop creative and technical confidence with TV studio operations, including vision-mixing, directing, camera and sound.
Develop strong team-working skills, including the ability to take command in creative situations
Explore the importance of liveness in mediating various forms of TV subject-matter, using the TV studio as a space to capture and present distinctive forms of screen storytelling.
Produce and create short programmes across a range of studio-based genres, including demonstrations, game-shows, discussions, multi-camera drama and live music performance
Acquire detailed logisitical and production skills in keeping with professional broadcast practice.
Be encouraged to innovate and explore new forms of live, multicamera storytelling.
Module learning outcomes
At the end of this module, you will be expected to:
Demonstrate an understanding of pre-production planning for multicamera shooting, and an ability to prepare scripts that will communicate across studio departments to the audience beyond.
Demonstrate a practical understanding of the discipline of studio directing and floor management as a means of co-ordinating creative activity.
Demonstrate an ability to fulfil several technical roles in multicamera studio production, and an ability to understand how those roles contribute to a team creative production process
Demonstrate an informed insight into the aesthetic principles and the technical requirements of TV production in a live environment: how gallery direction combines with camera operation, lighting, design and sound to deliver comeplling screen stories.
Demonstrate a thorough understanding of health and safety issues during production.
Demonstrate an understanding of the different aesthetic and technical requirements of producing varied forms of studio content, in particular: complex multi-item shows, game shows, studio drama and live music.
Indicative assessment
Task
% of module mark
Groupwork
30
Practical
70
Special assessment rules
None
Additional assessment information
Formative work is embedded in weekly practical feedback.
*Students will lose three marks per practical or workshop missed applied in weeks 1-7 to the first group assessment and then in weeks 8-11 to the individual assessment during the common assessment period.
Indicative reassessment
Task
% of module mark
Essay/coursework
30
Practical
70
Module feedback
You will receive written feedback in line with standard University turnaround times.
Indicative reading
MODULE READING LIST
Millerson, G. (1999). Television Production. London: Focal Press
Utterback, A. (2007). Studio Television Production and Directing. London: Focal Press
Fairweather, R. (1998). Basic Studio Direction. London: Focal Press
Thompson, R. and Bowen, C. (2009) Grammar of the Shot. London: Focal Press
Ward, P, Bermingham, A. and Wherry, C. (2000) Multiskilling for Television Production. London: Focal Press
Ward, P. (2001) Studio and Outside Broadcast Camerawork. London: Focal Press
Nisbett, A. (2003) The Sound Studio. Amsterdam: Elsevier
Singleton-Turner, Roger (2011), Cue & Cut, Manchester University Press