The launch of London's newest station, London Live and the ghost of Channel One

"Details have been revealed of London’s first dedicated 24-hour television channel, London Live, which will go on air in the Spring of next year". 

This opening paragraph from the Independent newspaper proclaims the arrival of London's own television station, and one that has been long overdue.  

£15 million is to be spent on this digital frontier, bolstered by the Evening Standard providing huge resources to furnish the stations news,  and a daring programme schedule which includes short films according to Broadcast.

At this point, you should be hearing the record scratch to a halt. No fault of London Live. We've been here before.

Cue, 1997  at the UK's gathering for the TV industry, a former BBC director turned managing director told the television industry audience how new television Channels must be different to succeed.

Aston managed a TV station called  Channel One TV. It was London's first 24-hour television station launched in 1994. The station spent £12 million a year - not far off from London Live.

And like London Live, it sought to rely on a newspaper for help. Have you guessed who? Yes The Evening Standard. Except back then in 1994, the Evening standard was owned by Associated.

Like London live, Channel One too had bold dreams. London Live will use video journalists (apply here),  Channel One Television pioneered videojournalism. It was the first 24-hour television station to use videojournalists in the UK.

Author working at Channel One TV 

Channel One folded in 1998. It lasted four years. Its demise is attributable to several reasons, including the lack of cable's penetration, which the managers were relying on.

But there were other pressing issues, which my six years PhD research interviewing management and staff has revealed.

The money ball of Channel One was how videojournalism reduced the spend per storytelling to a fraction of the cost the BBC and ITV would pay. This you might presume would show in the difference between the quality of programming.

You'd be partly right, but from Aston's speech to the Financial Times New Media and Broadcasting Conference there was a twist to this assumption. Aston stated:

In November 1995 the cable industry commissioned RSMB Television Research to undertake the first major survey of broadband cable television households and it found that Channel One is The Most Popular Cable TV Channel in London. 

Channel One is Number One in the ratings according to TV watchdogs, the ITC. In results announced in September 1996, researchers for the Independent Television Commission found that 97% of people surveyed liked it, with many expressing "surprise" about "the high quality values and quality of presentation."

There was something the station was doing, a risk in the way not only programmes were made, but in the styles they adopted. 

In today's digital disneyland of TV stations and the web, launching a station in London is going to require a strategy which will have to predicated on what next, rather than what now.

Formal television being launched now is in danger of sinking those millions, which is why the BBC  is adopting touchcast ( see my insider report here), but more importantly that a prescient attitude to 21st generation programming is considered.

It's a heady mix. It's not YouTube and it'll be hard pressed to beat a BBC rejuvenating itself with #BBCwherenext.

So what's in store for London live? They are presently hiring, according to the Guardian newspaper.

Next week. More on launching a station...

David Dunkley Gyimah is completing his PhD which looks at Channel One TV and the future of television. He is a senior lecturer at Westminster University and a practising videojournalist who is completing his most recent story travelling to Southern Turkey 3 hours from the Syrian Border. David is an RTS juror, artist-in-residence at the Southbank centre and a former Newsnight, Channel 4 News and ABC News journalist. He has won various awards including the prestigious Knight Batten in the US and trained the FT, Chicago SunTimes and Press Assocation. You can find out more about ho here at Viewmagazine.tv

video journalism - Lost advocates, techniques and some.

Channel One TV was a 24 hour video journalism driven station. 30 VJs drove the station, 12 working on any one day making a host of programmes from cars, cookery, fashion, politics, travel and it was done rather well.

I found some archive and you'll be hard pressed to determine whether its crew-made or VJ- made.

On the news desk, 6 VJs per day, like Rachel Ellison ( now an MBE) filed stories, sometimes two/three times a day.

Each had a pool car, a beta 100, vinten tripod, senheiser, lapel, night spot lights (deedos), scrim and an assortment of gadgets in the back.

The beauty of the betas back then compared to the not so resolution-ready hi-8s is that you learnt everything you needed to know about bending light, back focus, blacks and whites, to get a good image off.

Bad thing, they weighed a ton.

Often the newsdesk rang in otherwise you had your own feature you'd convinced your editor you were working on.

The station ran a revolutionary video jukebox, which a producer had access to build a programme and news wheel.

Though as a viewer you thought you were watching a live show, presenter links were made minutes, sometime seconds, before the wheel's timing caught up with real time.

This gave the producer greater flexibility in creating a programme schedule. It also meant you'd never see a clanger (mother of all mistakes) on Channel One.

Because we were NOT scheduled to hit specific news hours, we introduced some novel, in fact innovatory ways of working.


How a news package was worked
Take a new item on hospital bugs at the time - a salmonella outbreak.

The news desk were looking for a news package - anything from 2-5 minutes.

• I'd go to the hospital for an interview with the Chief Executive. This would be a Qand A with me IV (in-vision). Remember one of the basic element of a news package is the interview, but it's also the news package in itself, but will only visually sustain interest if the mis en scene changes ie cuts between you and your interviewee, with where appropriate drop-in shots.
  

• e.g. this is an interview with blogger/ journalist Rachel North. There are 3 basic angle shots from here and six if you're a VJ you can work through. And there's a host of shots you could float in.

• Rule 17 working network news, know when to float pictures over GVs to lift the package.
  

• Given the plethora of news stations it was important to have you, the reporter, in shot. Effectively you were branding your item.
  

• NB: if you're going out and out with VJism and you abandon this, you're cutting your nose off to spite your new media face. This technique works well and there's a contemporary way of doing this like "Bourne" in the edit to make it look really slick, particularly when you shoot loose.
  

• I'd then do a "Track and Rushes". From the interview I knew my entry point using GVs/b-roll from my interviewee and had an outro as well, so I could put my voice over on tape. If you're writing to pictures, rather than the other way around, you'll get a stronger intro/package. The newsroom would then send a bike, or we'd go to a parked sat truck park or in the latter stages of C1 head for a designated T1 and ASDL ports. Today its the Net and a sat pack.

• I'd continue with the package, finding an affected party, a pressure group and a department of health interviewee.

• The newsdesk would put my initial Q and A on air. Today you'd be looking to prompt greater viewer comments than we did.

• As I'm pulling elements of the package I'm gauging how much info it adds to the next cut i'm planning. If a government spokesman gave me an interview, that gets added to the Q and A. Sometimes I could ring into the show to break the pre-recorded news cycle. Today we'd use a any number of software to go live.
  

• Because I had an idea of some of the packages my colleagues were doing, I could call one or two up working on the other side of London for them to work an answer for me. A package looks much better if there are a broad range of voices and locations.

• I'd be back at the office for around 11 and within 40 mins to an hour and a half the package would be ready for air and I'd be getting ready to go out again.

• Most often if it were a running story, I might still be looking to see how I can build on the morning package, whilst working on a new subject entirely.

In one year it was not uncommon to clock up 500 news packages.

Innovatory working practice
Why was this working practice innovatory?

Because a small team could keep the news ticking over and had developed a system that enabled them to build up a story during the day, whilst releasing elements as the day matured.

The year was 1994. The Internet had just arrived carrying data at the sonic speed of 28k/s

And whilst it was easy to hurumph stating well Satellite TV was doing that. Channel One TV operated below any margins any station could work on, with smaller staff.

Later today I'll be posting on viewmagazine.tv some of the working habits of the lost records of Channel One TV.

In today's broadband environment the blue print of Channel One would be unquestionable.

Here's a piece from 1994, which was worked through the day and then picked up at night. This final piece for the day is a feature, the day stuff which I have not ben able to locate was the Q and As package with different parties.

Health and Safety:
This is the night shoot. Though it's not mentioned much night shoots come with particular risks for VJs and as I recall I had a stand off with youths unconnected to this scheme wanting my gear on returning to my car.

Channel One swiftly abandoned night shoots ( 8 pm - 9 am) when it was deemed too much of a risk particularly for women video journalists.



p.s reason it's so dark in places, compression messes with your gammas

M2V - Videojournalism for anti-conformists

More than a little earnest for many of today's matter-of-facters, but Cicero on history:

"History is the witness that testifies to the passing of time; it illuminates reality, vitalizes memory, provides guidance in daily life, and brings us tidings of antiquity." Cicero

Gosh!

But then this VJ evolution, I'm in the midst of completing a couple of pages on viewmagazine that pieces together some contemporary historical going-ons that as a VJ, exec, or academic you may find useful.

Less about what it is... grief, done that. But the pitfalls, work-to-rule, quelling staff revolts (oh yes!) and really what next, when the sheen dulls.

In line with that I'll be bashing together a feature M2V which will be a sequel to Digital Diversity.

The video shot of the Telegraph ( top) and its multimedia studio, will be accompanied by some interesting thoughts from managers and the Telegraph's new super journalists.

Why no one else is doing this is interesting, but imagine 12 lucky young graduates put through their paces over the course of a year to learn everything there is to know about this new journalism.

Some investment huh?

For the first time you'll hear their views, plus some original archive from Channel One TV's broadcast, with an interview with ex Sky TV's head of News and former Managing Director of Channel One TV, Nick Pollard.

Channel One TV was the first and only VJ station in the UK in the mid 90s.

See you Monday

After a Career in Video Journalism Part III - The Crunch

Make no bones about it the Video Journalism crunch will appear some time.

The market place has simply expanded too fast, exploded beyond anyone's perception that the pro (paying) sector of this new industry will need a "correction".

In part market forces will play a role as newspapers start to level out costs.

Those making video because their rivals are will find reasons to trim back; something's got to give.

The advertising cake will only allow for so many cuts.

So whilst the 90s held to an arcane system, the TV industry treating VJs as lepers: "They didn't understand TV enough" one ITNer said, today the concept is welcomed with open arms.

On the one hand creating a new tier of news makers is a mightily good thing, on the other hand it could quite easily create a false sense of our own worth.

VJ: "Yeah I'm a VJ"
EXEC:"So how much do you bench?"
VJ:"4 minutes average, 40 views"
EXEC:"Nice"

Furthermore, what's the point of producing a new breed of journalists, if their modus operandi and news agenda coverage mirrors that of old.

Regional newspaper publisher Northcliffe takes the above point in attacking the BBC for its pending launch of hyper regional online TV, claiming the BBC will not add any new value to what existing newspapers are already doing online.

The greatest travesty to video journalism is how narrowly it's being used to chase what might be construed as traditional stories or that it's used to produce material in a tried, yet tired format.

One of the most powerful yet overlooked models for video reportage would be to marry Pew Centers late 90s discursive insight into news gathering in Civic Journalism with Video Journalism.


Le Crunch
The VJ crunch will get managers thinking in different ways.

While TV does Mipcom and Vegas selling formats, only a few newspapers focusing on cross content, will sleep well knowing their product has legs: the triple play, Online, TV and mobile.

What happens when you launch your piece? If it's not exactly peripatetic, well...

The badge of video journalism, should be one of the most envious from other professionals and in the 90s it held that ambivalent monocle.

Journalists might ridicule it, but quite a few envied the format's independence.

Where else would a journalist have so much power to craft a piece from start to finish.

Standing on the college green, next to the Houses of Parliament interviewing politicians, one news maker openly remarked how envious he was that we could pick and choose who we wanted to shoot without the wait.

Video journalists, by default, are the decathletes of modern media. That's not a boast for supremacy, just as a decathlete would deem to be no more superior than a 100m sprinter.

It's comparing apples and pears. But the myriad skillset is a pre-requisite to doing extraordinary things.

Rather tongue in cheek if you could apply the talents of a decathlete in a survival game: run, hurdle, long jump that river, pole vault that fence, visualise that escape route, that would be something.

Similarly, a VJ should be able to read this: "Entry into Guantanamo Bay has been allowed, but you will not be able to interview detainee and many areas will be off limits" and see the film unfold.

This was the basis of Bachenheimer's award winning report

Better still, as the visual theme for your film starts to go belly up because the authorities aren't being so cooperative when you get there, plan B, C, D and so on should kick in.

There's no opportunity here to ring up the programme producer; the director; or camera operator and ask for help.

Small wonder that some of the best Video Journalist's I have come to know, also shoot long format, commercials and docs.

The Channel One trait

Inset pic VJ Julius Ceaser, 1994, now a top Ecomomics presenters at the BBC

The new crop of VJs that sprang onto the market in 1994 attempted to buck the notion that you could be a jack of all trades and master of all.

But short termism almost got in the way. Many of the VJs from Channel One could have done away with the hierarchy of TV making, but then had to eat pie.

At Channel One's demise, many went into television.

Few of us would practise VJ any more.

If VJ had given anything it was was a lingua franca to speak to different sectors of the production process.

Could you pull focus? Could you L cut that and crush the blacks? Your inflexion stress is on the wrong word.

Editors, camera operators, and reporters, now had a singular interpreter that could translate geek speak for everyone to understand.

Hooray!

In turn, Channel One's ex VJs got back into the hub of mixing ideas, exchanging views and learning from others.

The editor's editor, the producer's producer, the reporter's reporter, if any became your friends you knew you were strengthening your hand.

If you got to work with Charles Wheeler, Bruce Goodison or Paul Greengrass and scores of other talent, Christmas had arrived.

Note: (Paul Greengrass ( Bourne films) was a Producer on ITV's World In Action - an incredible current affairs show. Bruce Goodison is one of the UK's most talented documentary/film directors and the Late Charles Wheeler, a reporter was unsurpassable)

That's not to say as a VJ you need TV for validation, but you did, I felt and still do, need somewhere to replenish and swap ideas.

Video Journalism's current overlooked problem is it's become a one-size-fits-all.

You can be a VJ in the US, the UK or in Australia with altogether differing standards but hold firm views as a master video maker, though other territories might think you're pants.

If you "cross the line" in the UK, you'll get slated in the US. Nice huh!

In the UK if you're picture rather than chronological, eyebrows are raised.

These two observations are generalisations, but they show how TV's umbilical chord is nurturing video journalism. Good thing... bad thing?

Curiously communities of film makers, amateur or otherwise see creativity as integral to the script. Perhaps it's because film is working a more matured language.

As yet there are not nearly enough evangelists, though Rosenblum, Halstead, Streich, are up there.

And if I have unintentionally left your name out, apologies, but do correct me, the above list is a snap shot of those who have contributed by organising awards.

Also, something that perhaps needs looking at, there is no professional bodies safeguarding the interests of the movement, if that's what it is - a movement - and why should there be you might argue.

TV may have it's director and camera's guild, but VJ's, well don't be stoopid.

It's not serious news making is it?

But that's the rub.

How can Video Journalism begin to measure it's own success?

Competitions?

Yes! So when the ONA says it's setting up a VJ award that should be applauded.

When concentra hold their yearly VJ bash, we should all celebrate and when Sabine Streich dares to be the first to want to celebrate this new art form as she did in 2002 with her now acclaimed Video Journalism award, throw her own medal.

Awards at very least expose strengths and weaknesses.

It makes us privy to different genre, varying attitudes which in turn should lead to a healthy debate amongst practitioners.

So when Michael Rosenblum attempts to build an agency along the lines of Magnum for VJs, throw him a medal too.

Video Journalism where next?

Moby, a one-man band experimental musician, much like video journalism interviewed by David in Washington.

Surely we can have no idea of the potential of Video journalism, it's only a toddler or to the first wave, a teenager.

It may suffice as status quo video news.

And just as the front page photograph is bold and arresting, embedded video - though I had my own take at the Batten Awards - may become a standard, but it's the content of the film and its execution which will lead us to consider video journalism is a killer app.

Truth, though Vjism was a k.app the moment it hit the market.

Video Motionists
If you've been shooting for more than you care to remember you possibly occupy this rarefied ecosystem of seeing sequences unfold before you.

Human movement becomes particle physics.

You've probably acquired that sixth sense of marrying film, light, music and dialogue that makes you the Kitano Takeshi of Video Journalism.

Japanese multi talented film maker Takeshi is renowned for shooting three times as many scenes as other film makers, because he works so fast and often shoots one take.

Video journalism is in fact a misnomer, because at some point you're a DV film maker, a latter day Dogme.

But for the genre to push it needs to be allowed to be creative, make mistakes, test shoot, reinvent itself, do to for video what film makers do for film or the Moby, with his multiple synthesisers does for music.

It needs a coming together of idea sharing; it needs a mixing of different formats and it requires stake holders, distributors, young people to take ownership.

When video journalism first arrived on British shores in 94, courtesy of Rosenblum it had ambitious ideas.

It was not television, but at every turn executives tried to make it so.

Video journalism is the spoken word of TV or to pad out that analogy, it's the language e.g. English you'd learn from native speakers and not from a book.

Chinese visitor with English translation book: "Very nice to meet you. Please indicate how I get to Harrods edifice"?
Spoken word translation: "Hello there, where's Harrods?"

Video journalism is contemporary parlance that organically develops and it's still developing.

Maybe, it actually needs a crunch to sort that out.

Tomorrow, Video Journalism's new Art

David started his career for the BBC in 1987 before turning to Vjsm in 94. Years later he went back into TV: Channel 4 News, BBC Breakfast News and Politics programme PowerHouse, and then returned to Vjism with a passion.

If you'd like to to book David for talks, drinks, reminiscence- damn it - about them days, email him before he gets really boring.

Versions of the last post with video are on Viewmagazine.tv

Videojournalism 1994

Found this made in 1994 which I have dumped on viewmagazine.tv.

It's about youth crime - something I have covered extensively in my reporting career.

It got me looking at my tape stock and there, betas, A1 tapes and the likes, are hundreds of video stories that are sitting idly around.

But hey what's the point I think looking resigned.

500 vid stories that's not overly surprising since at Channel One we would often cut two stories a day, so if you worked 250 days of the year ....

Anyhow this report sits between VJ for TV and Gonzo.

If it looks dark, that's because the gamma goes all pear shape when compressing so a few areas appear more dark than they looked when transmitted.

The camera I used was the Beta BMW300 - huge washing machine of a camera - appropriate if you're a designated camera operator but a bummer if you're a VJ with a Vinten tripod and tapes to carry.

Cost, between 15-30,000 UKP. That was about 45,000 USD. They would later come down to about 8000 UKP. Large part of the greenbacks went on the camera lens alone.

Did I tell you the story of a colleague of mine doing a really nice shot on a bridge overlooking the Thames and the plate on his tripod slipped and woops 1000s of pounds of camera fell into the Thames, probably there today.

Any how here's the link
VIDEOJOURNALISM 1994
Crime, Crime, Crime. If you go out to London today you'll be in for a big surprise. The first of three reports on London's under current crime problem.