Be a Video Journalist !

My venture in the field of broadcast journalism was accidental.

I was at the right place at the right time. It was 26^th December 2004, when the Tsunami had hit the Indian peninsula and I was in Chennai for my studies at that given point of time. And just a week back my brother had gifted me a JVC handycam.

If not have been for my professor Nishat Ahmed at ACJ, I would have stayed back at my hostel. He asked me to go out and shoot whatever I could on my JVC handycam. At that given point of time I did not even know how to operate a camera and what Tsunami was.

When I returned to Chennai after visiting the affected districts of Tamil Nadu, I had no clue about what I was doing. Again, Nishat Sir came to my rescue and helped me put the tapes together in a short documentary.

 

Two years later the same work was adopted in an award winning half an hour special for IBN 7 and I was asked to do a three minute ‘Citizen Journalist ‘ report for CNN IBN. http://ibnlive.in.com/videos/29411/cit-journo-recaps-tsumani-horror.html

In hindsight, when I go through the footage I feel that not even one shot was worth going on-air. It was shot hand-held, the footage was shaky, the sound poor and about the reporting - we better not talk about it. But the fact remains it made it on national television!

So what worked for me? May be I was lucky to be at the right place at the right time and the magnitude of the event so huge that all my technical errors were overlooked to tell the story.

The point I want to put across is that you do not need to be great cameraperson or a terrific reporter to become a Video Journalist. All you need to have is a common visual sense and you need to understand the basics of television reporting.

With news channels like CNN IBN, IBN 7, IBN Lokmat which have revolutionized the concept of Citizen Journalism and organisations like Video Volunteers there is ample opportunity for everyone to showcase their stories.

So all you need to tell your story is the urge and we will help you with how to go about.

In a 10 part series we will bring to you the steps in which a news channel gathers news, covering all the aspects from reporting, shooting, scripting, sound, editing and packaging and you will be on your way to be a Video Journalist !