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The Production Manager - Animals and Small Children

July 31, 2009

Almost forgot to add my two cents this week. Here in New York it’s like everything closes down for summer, unless you’re on production of course, which I blissfully am not.

Although I have roped myself into helping out a friend on a show that needs urgent transcription, this is not something I would ever usually do. In fact I’ve been successfully able to avoid logging as we call it for most of my career, however a friend in need and all that.

So I’m logging tapes of an international house buying show and watching these rushes it is amazing, utterly fascinating to see how different directors work.

The first couple of shows I did were the work of the series producer and I was utterly impressed, particularly having worked with him previously, at how skilled he is at getting people to say what he needs. You can damn near hear him editing the show in his head as they speak. He’s also wonderful at making the people feel comfortable and knowing when to let them talk and when to push them in a new direction. It was almost a pleasure to do those tapes.

However I got roped into doing ‘just one more show’ and of course this one is the polar opposite. I almost lost my lunch watching the director attempt to interview a young boy, about 5 or 6 who visible shrank into himself under the weight of the camera pointed at him and with open ended questions like; what do you think it will be like when you live in X?

Anyone who knows kids knows unequivocally that open ended questions are not the way to go. Better questions would have been; do you like it better here or there? Anything with only two choices for the answer. Of course you can’t do one word answers which leads me onto the horror that was trying to explain the ‘say the question in the answer’ rule. I have to say that’s one of the first times I’ve really objected to anything I’ve seen anyone do on camera for a show I’ve contributed to. Interviewing a child to get a soundbite and putting them clearly under undue stress is pretty questionable. But not as damn questionable as having me transcribe it for them!

In case you’re interested, the only soundbite they’re likely to get from that one is ‘baguette’.

Next week: A look into the dangers of working with animals