Warrior Weekly - ID# 471

Maine West
News Program
Entry Description

This is an episode of our weekly news show, Warrior Weekly!

Copyright Info

Recent Teacher Comments

  • 4/24 6:09 am - Sports anchor has some good energy. Nice b-roll and interviews in the Environmental Science class segment. In the Maine Minute it would be nice to hear where the meetings are located. Interesting show. To bring this up to the next level, start having the reporters do a stand up at the event. People like to put a face to a voice, and it is just so easy to just record a VO after the fact.
  • 3/4 3:08 pm - I like the cold open and tease of stories to come. The anchor with the button-up shirt with no tie looks a little odd, consider a tie or maybe unbutton the top button. The video seemed staged for the first story on cell phones. The cutting between anchors who are sitting in the same spot on the screen was jarring. The anchors have a nice delivery style and looked comfortable. Tossed it to flag football, but didn't mention who the reporter was. Rule of 3rds on interviews for flag football. I liked the water quality story, but again rule of 3rd. The reporting is solid and the soundbite we very strong. The story went a little long and started to be repetitive. BRoll was good for ASL story, interesting. The Mane Minute is a good idea, nice job having some visuals.
  • 3/1 4:58 pm - Anchors do a nice job presenting the material. Jump cut happens from one anchor to the other- need to mix up the backgrounds to avoid that jump. Anchors are centered on the screen- make sure to use your rule of thirds and add some corner-insert graphics to add a little touch to the news. Soccer highlights really didn't show much- just a guy kicking the ball. Include the last names of your tennis girls! Flag football audio and interviews sounded great. Add some variety and camera angles to the b-roll, as most of the shots are long-distance establishing shots. AP Science story looks great! Good b-roll, interviews- nice story! At the start of an interview- keep the person on a bit longer so we get to see their nameplate- you cut so fast to the b-roll that we cannot read the name. Nice story on ASL- very interesting! Mane Minute- good idea since most people don't like to listen to the announcements- get them over in one minute! How about adding a 60 second countdown in the corner? Nice idea to showcase some musical talent- but you sure didn't give them much time! Let them play longer, maybe while your credits roll? Overall a solid show.
Judge 1

Positives: Excellent packages on flag football, environment and ASL. They were shot and edited well, and the sound was really strong. Every school broadcast should copy the Maine Minute - very clever idea that was well executed.

Improvements: The first story on giving up the cell phones was too short. I would have liked to have heard from students in that. and the intro could have been more creative, such as "Imagine giving up your cell phones for a day. 25 of yours classmates did". and speaking of intros, when I hear an anchor say "Here with the story is so and so" I think i'm going to see the reporter on set. which i didn't. Just say, "Joe Jones has the story."

Judge 2

Positives: Neat touch by adding the subtitles! Cool use of the green screen and augmented reality features with the over the shoulder shot.

Improvements: Consider breaking down the flow of the show with the anchors in a different way. Strange to see them individually and then back together. As a viewer, I can tell that they were sitting individually for those tapings and then randomly back together...try to play around with this. Perhaps use the over the shoulder shot like featured at the end of the newscast with the main hosts. We didn't see a package or your "top story" until about 2 minutes into your newscast...perhaps try leading with something off the top. Get to the most exciting or eye catching thing to hold someone's view.

Judge 3

Positives: The news packages on girls flag football, AP Environmental Science class and sign language were solid. Great b-roll, very thorough and the use of a field reporter (instead of just stringing together interviews) helped move the stories along and created cohesive packages. The inclusion of family photos in the sign language segment showed impressive research. One finer point – while these were great overviews of the subjects, try focusing on one element, such as one student’s journey, to bring in an engaging story. This was a well-rounded newscast. Your program included anchor-delivered stories, news packages, and sports and student announcement segments. The students performed well with each style and the variation kept the newscast interesting.

Improvements: The news stacking (order of the stories) needed rearranging. All of the transitional news content should have been before the sports segment. The flag football package should have been introduced by the sports anchor as part of the sports segment. The Maine Minute was correctly placed at the end. This order would have flowed better. The portion of the newscast delivered by the anchors would have benefited from higher production value. Over the shoulder graphics would have added professionalism. Without them, these portions felt bare.

Judge 4

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Judge 5

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