Thanks to all of our students and staff who volunteered their Saturday to help produce the live streaming event for the FIRST Lego League BC Championships on Saturday, January 14th.

This is the second year running where the Television & Video Production students have provided a live stream of the event for friends and family to enjoy!  This year we had viewers as far away as Europe watching the competition.

Be sure to check out our photo gallery of the event!  You can also check out the complete event coverage on Justin.tv.

We have more live projects coming up in the near future, so subscribe to our RSS feed, or follow our Twitter account, @bcittv to be notified of our new productions!

Students have been out practising the camera, audio, and composition skills they’ve learned over the last few weeks to produce short segments about some of the trades and technical students at BCIT.  We’re looking for proper technical control of the camera (focus, aperture, white balance, audio levels), proper use of microphones (which mic to use, where to place it for optimum pickup), and how to compose shots to make it interesting for viewers.

After shooting, we head back to the broadcast centre to spend the afternoon in the edit suite with Final Cut Pro, putting all of the footage together so we can do some critiquing in class and learn about what worked and what didn’t.

A fairly busy day, but great hands-on experience!

Using the built-in microphone isn’t an option for high-quality sound capture.

Did you know that you can use an inexpensive adaptor to feed microphone audio directly into the phone via the headphone jack?

Jeff Geerling has a great article up on his website that details exactly how to go about making everything work by creating a portable kit that can be used for capturing high-quality video with decent sound.

There’s another excellent on his site that focuses specifically on audio recording.

Having shot a number of videos on the iPhone 4 during my recent trip to Shanghai, the other major factor is that you will require a tripod or stabilizer.  The phone itself is just too small to hold perfectly steady when you’re trying to shoot something.

First up is a new install for TV Audio 2 to replace the old audio board with something a bit newer, including a new iMac 24″ for playback.

“Complicity” won for best Drama.

Written and Directed by Dylan Adkins, Produced by Lauren Weidel, Edited by Justin Li, Director of Photography – Jordan Lee, Assistant Director – Courtney Dunsmoor-Farley, Audio Supervisor – Denis Falardeau.

Judges’ Comments:

• Initial impression- STYLISH!
• Great sequences with good composition
• Superior use of music to create tension
• Excellent editing, music transitions/fx and timing
• Lighting was very good
• While the story was slightly campy and silly, it still grabs your attention, keeps you involved and is well constructed.

And their mockumentary, “Shadow Hands” won for Best Comedy!

Written by Denis Falardeau and Dylan Adkins, Produced by Courtney Dunsmoor-Farley, Directed by Denis Falardeau, Edited by Justin Li, Director of Photography: Jordan Lee, Assistant Director: Lauren Weidel, Audio Supervisor: Dylan Adkins.

Judges’ Comments:

• Great delivery- were they professional actors?
• Excellent!  Drew me in after the slow beginning
• Professional Actors?  Well crafted and good storytelling
• Very well done, truly enjoyed it!

It’s worth noting that their second production, Complicity, was shot in HD on the Canon 7D, our first production to use a digital SLR for a major project. Very cool!

Shadow Hands: A Mockumentary from Zut Alors on Vimeo.

Complicity from Zut Alors on Vimeo.

We’ll have the HD versions of these commercials coming to Vimeo in the near future as well (they’re uploaded in standard-def 16:9 widescreen on YouTube for the time being).

Standard Def Commercials ( January 19 to March 11 )

Hi-Def Commercials ( March 16 to April 8 )

Hi-Def on Vimeo

Day 1 - Telus World of Science - Centre Stage

So what’s this about Science?  We had the opportunity to take our production on the road and head down to the Telus World of Science to do a live production of their Centre Stage science education show.

This was our first live event production using the new Broadcast Pix production flypack that we’ve been introducing the students to this semester (check the blog history for info on our practise events back at the school).

We are actively looking for projects that students can produce with our equipment to get additional production experience.  If you have a project you’d like to submit, please feel free to contact us.

Day 2 - Our "Control Room"

Details:

• 4 camera shoot (2 x Sony DSR 370, 1 x Sony DSR 400, 1 x Panasonic AG-DVX100BP)
• Broadcast Pix Slate 100 Flypack
• Crew (15 students, 3 Instructors)
• Load-in 10:30, Full Facs 12:45, Showtime 15:20, Wrap 16:00

I have linked a copy of our SW Technical Production Manual that includes some project planning details for aspiring production staff out there (some contact information has been removed for privacy reasons).

We expect students to provide this type of documentation (and more!) when planning their projects.

First off on Tuesday was a spot for helping asthma sufferers using the “Buteyko Breathing Method“, where a couple spending a nice warm summer day in the park deals with an asthma attack using a special breathing technique.

On Thursday we made our way to Tsawwassen and onto the Boundary Bay beach to shoot a commercial for Kayotics Skimboards.  Our actor made a fairly quick transition from his day-to-day work in a cubicle to a more exciting work locale.

First up was SoftMoc shoe cleaner.  Shot in-studio and on location, showing the product and giving an example of the real-world messes it might have to clean up!

Next was a commercial for Jim Beam Bourbon Whiskey – illustrating the hazards of attempting a romantic encounter when alcohol is involved…