REFLECTIONS ON RUNNING A GRAPHICS PROGRAM FOR LIVE TELEVISION

It had never crossed my mind to consider how tv shows got their boxes of text flashing on the lower half of their programs, it always so seamless. Well Now I know exactly how it feels to be the person operating the graphics, it’s a flurry of typing, dragging and clicking timed to the very last nano second. It’s one of those jobs that no one notices when it’s going well, but is glaring obvious when you muck it up – mistype something, or load the wrong music video.

I was able to shadow previous graphics operator for one of the shows and through close observation was able to suggest a few things to help her. She was quite young and had a bit of “superstitious” thinking – not thinking through the reasons that something may work or not work, but claiming things without questioning it. But it meant that if something went wrong she wasn’t able to fix it and would often freak out and freeze on the job. I never thought I was particularly good at technology but I convinced the producer I was a “technical whiz” just by realising that you can work out most things by logically thinking about it (which kind of excited me).

So it’s fast paced and you have to make decisions in split seconds so you always have to think ahead, but that makes the hour long show fly fast (you don’t see much, but you can always catch up later with the podcast, such as the one here which you can see for yourself…)

KEY SKILLS

•   Basic photoshop skills
•   Operating a graphics
•   Prioritizing many competing tasks that require immediate attention
•   Following technical directions
•   IT Problem solving
•   Working to a precisely timed schedule
•   Keeping a cool head under pressured situations.
•   Attention to detail
• Following a run sheet. Like this one:
•