Teaching television broadcast skills to ensure journalism and media students are future proof in a multi-skilled media industry

Television broadcasting is the most wonderful, dynamic, vibrant, frustrating, demanding, rewarding and all-consuming of industries. For me, there is simply no better feeling than delivering a finished programme for transmission. Be it a 60-second news item or a 60-minute documentary, the feeling is always the same; one of accomplishment, excitement and sheer relief, in equal measure.

Now, if you’re reading this, chances are that you may also want to sample that feeling and enter TV broadcasting. So can I take this chance to say good choice… and good luck! This blog will offer you a few tips to get you started on the path to your chosen career, drawing on content from lessons I have given at Harlow College to degree and NCTJ students.

You need to be multi-skilled and future proof in a fiercely competitive marketplace. This means you will need to research, write, shoot and edit your own work, and this rule applies to both broadcast journalists and self-shooting documentary-makers. At the core of all you do is the need to tell clear, engaging stories, and in television of course, that is done through a combination of words, sound and pictures. The art to a great TV script is the way you complement the images in frame, so that both work together to tell your story. You don’t want to overwrite, or repeat what you see on-screen.

Advances in technology make it possible for broadcast journalists to achieve more and more by themselves. So as a result, they will be expected to move effortlessly from video to online, from text to audio. Broadcast newsrooms are increasingly multi-skilled environments, and to fit in, you will need to demonstrate this fluid ability yourself.

Which is hopefully where this blog comes in…

During the coming weeks, I will add content to this blog, which will build into an introduction to practical skills used in broadcast television.