Critical Reflection
Calum Warren-Piper, Graphics and Data Editor.
(I have styled this reflection into 3 parts: Before Election, During Election, and Post Election.)
Work prior to GE2K15
When in January I confirmed my intent to be involved with the graphics and data journalism of the General Election, I immediately got to work on researching styles that would help make our production look both eye-catching, suave and professional. This required a fair amount of time and effort so as to accommodate the varying views of the three decision-makers (namely Mirjam, Chris and I) but we reached agreement efficiently.
Whilst Mirjam, being a second year, worked as graphics editor for WINOL, it gave me the freedom to work on my own projects such as Politics and Power. Having already created one episode of the show back in November, Alex and I were eager to follow that up with an ‘Eastleigh Special’ which focused on just what makes Eastleigh such an important “swing seat” for all parties. The graphics work for the show had largely already been created and new work was required only for the ‘Coming Up’ and the specific ‘Eastleigh Special’ intro that I created for the show.
This meant I had more time to focus on making my data package for the episode, which I wanted to focus on the issues that dominated the recent 2013 By Election. These topics were: Immigration and Employment. This meant conducting my own research into these topics. The most time consuming element being an in-depth trawl through ONS PDF files to get statistics on immigration levels in the South (generally) and then Eastleigh and Southampton (specifically). This is one of the skills I’ve picked up very quickly over my time working in graphics and data. This ability to scan through complex data and then distil it into easily understood information packages is pivotal to success. The work I did in turn helped give Alex some extra background information that he would be able to use for his constituency profile work.
Finally we created a post-election Politics and Power to finalise our series before we passed it on to the 2nd years. This gave us the ability to voice our opinions on the election as well as recap all the work that went into the production of the show. The idea of this show was to be a supplement to the election, with reviews and a look into the future including the post-election reshuffle of the now Tory-only cabinet. This episode was the hardest to make, as we had an extremely tight deadline to work to, with the filming and editing all being done on Monday before our Tuesday deadline. It required focus, good planning and extremely fast editing skills to get it out for later that evening.
As well as this work on P&P that I did throughout the year, I also began working well ahead of the election on template ideas with Mirjam so that we had these “in the bank” & needed only to refine them to make them usable on election night. I really believe that this early pre-work and my determination to have as much prepared before the deluge of the final election run-in was a vital ingredient of our team’s effective time management. By completing much of the work in the first semester we created the capacity during the election period to work effectively and with minimized stress.
Although not essential to my role in the election, I kept a weather eye on the state and fluctuation of the polls (YouGov, Survation etc.) which I believe was crucial to understanding just how tight the election could be as it got closer and closer to election day. By understanding the swing levels that would be required to change the ownership of each seat coupled with the key issues in each constituency significantly paid out because the team where pre-briefed to an extent that they could better assess the impact of new variables as they arose on election night itself..
In April, I went to work on data packages that I found personally important, these were on: The Student Vote and the strength of Manifesto releases compared to the TV debates. To accompany these I wrote corresponding articles, here and here. I also believed these VT’s would be invaluable as infills and to help space out the Election show in the earlier hours of the morning when there were hiatuses and gaps in the news flow.
The work I’ve chosen to submit prior to my election work is the work that I contributed and created for Politics and Power. A project that myself and Alex Delaney created back in September.
For this project I was in charge of all graphics as well as all data journalism, which meant making data packages for both episodes on topics relevant to the theme of the show. The first episode only had a loose theme that was based on the run up to the General Election, whereas the second episode was centered on Eastleigh. Together we worked on production, which helped broaden our skills in editing and sound/lighting.
The work that I made for this project/show is some of the best work I’ve created since my time at University. Graphically the work is stunning and HD, the process of creating it meant self-teaching myself Adobe After Effects which I am now confident with.
The data work gave me the freedom (as co-producer with Alex) to go in my own direction with how I wanted the green screen to look and how I wanted the package to look/be styled. This freedom in itself taught me more about the technicality of Final Cut Pro but also, and more importantly, taught me more about the process of simplifying complex data.
During the election
The work we (Mirjam and myself) made on the night was miraculous in my opinion! The work templates that we had set up prior to the night meant that the speed we could churn out graphics, specifically the scoreboard, was unlike anything that we have made before.
Early on into the night, 7:30pm, we filmed and edited the Winchester exit poll with data we got from Jon Morrison, this gave us a valuable package to use throughout the night prior to having the BBC exit poll to use for our next graphic. By 9:30pm we had set up the studio and templates on the computers so that all we needed was the BBC data from the exit poll and then my PTC in-studio for us to pull onto the timeline and then give to the production team.
I’m extremely proud of the speed that we managed to do this, which meant fast editing and a great amount of patience, focus and communication from us both and safe to say Mirjam didn’t let anyone down.
Between the hours of 10-12pm, the need for graphics wasn’t a priority so I worked on informing myself of all the data from around the country whilst keeping an eye on the twitter feeds to await the first results to add to the scoreboard.
From around 2pm, a steady flow of results started coming in from around the country, and so from then, I held a discussion with Brian to decide the timeframe that production would want/need graphics (scoreboard/map updates). This is once again another example of great communication from the whole team all night.
Now with a set time frame, Mirjam could update the scoreboard progressively every 40 minutes before transferring it to me where I would have the updated Map graphic that showed the results from one of the many constituencies we covered on the night. This system meant the production team could focus on filling up empty time whilst knowing when the next graphics would be ready and when to fit them into the timeline.
We worked like this all morning till around 6am, by that time we had updated the scoreboard/map over 17 times as the results flowed in from not just around the south, but around the country. I then went to discuss the data side of the election live in studio with Zeena and Alex.
I think this showed my ability to perform an array of different tasks, from running the graphics team and ensuring that we stuck to our required schedule as well as going on camera to discuss and essentially help fill time till we could get our OB from Winchester.
Discussing with the production team after we has stopped broadcasting, Nicole and Mimi was grateful for the graphics as they helped give a visual aspect to what all the discussions between Henry and the presenters were about. I think that was an important goal that we achieved with the graphics; helping to space out the show so that it wasn’t packed with just discussions and ad breaks but had some data, which I believe gave the show much more substance.
Statistically we made huge successes across the night. We had a post reach of around a 1000, throughout the night, with our live blog gathering around 700 views an hour which is a huge increase from the usual WINOL statistics. With our live stream on a constant 100 on our live stream, without taking into the University’s IP’s, overall the show achieved a huge number of views, even in hours where views would be expected to drop as it got later and later. The whole team were extremely active on twitter and social media, which I can only think helped further the shows views and the attention brought to it.
Reflecting on the whole semester:
Although I obviously didn’t create as much content as I did in the first semester when working on WINOL, the work that I did create had a greater focus dedicated to it due to the time and attention I put into every project from General Election. Having set out to make a 3-part series of Politics and Power, Alex and myself achieved this and to a high standard with ground breaking graphics and content such as adaptable green screens and WINOLs first ever 4-way live debate in the first episode. Each episode had a clear plan and script, which we ourselves devised and re-wrote every time we made the show. That being said, we had a set template for the show, which made it easier to devise themes and topics for the show, but I still am proud of the considerable work we put into the production each and every time.
Alongside that, as previously mentioned I, with Mirjam, set up and created all the graphics for The South Decides programme. I think the content created for the election was extremely impressive, Mirjam’s work on the exit poll, advert breaks and scoreboard were unbelievably well made and the time she dedicated to making them, even more impressive.
Regarding Politics and Power, I don’t have any improvements that I believe could have been made to the way the show was conducted and created. However, having been such a fantastic success (in my opinion) I would only reflect that I wish we had created more episodes and more content. I believe the show gave us a fantastic platform to create a student based politics show that could be enjoyed by both adult and young viewers which in itself is an achievement.
Overall, I think the work that I’ve created this semester, similar to semester 1, has drastically helped improve my skills as an aspiring data journalist but also helped increase my interest and knowledge of politics in general. I have also improved my technical skills, interview conducting etc, whilst making the Politics and Power. Reporting and working on a General Election was a huge achievement and taught me a lot about time management as well as dealing with the responsibility of running a team and synchronising work done inside of the team. Politics and Power is by far the work, which, from my time at university, I am most proud of. I think it encompasses all the work I have focused on from, Local Government/National Politics to complex data journalism, which I will now be focusing my career towards in the future.
Calum Warren-Piper Journalist 