My product is a radio news bulletin that lasts for just over five minutes. Over the duration of the formation of this news bulletin, I have constantly been listening to a variety of radio news bulletins. By doing this, I have carefully noted down the main structure and techniques to ensure that my bulletin fits the conventions of the real media product.
I have researched several local radio stations, including WISH FM, Rock FM, and XFM Manchester. Using http://www.rajar.co.uk/, I have been able to discover the population of the areas these radio stations cover, the reach that the radio station has in thousands over the area, the reach percentage and the average hours per listener:
102.4 WISH FM broadcasts over the towns of Wigan and St Helens with a target demographic ranging from young teens to those in their late 30s:
Population: 463,000
Reach (000s): 82
Reach Percentage: 18
Average Hours per Listener: 11.00
97.4 Rock FM broadcasts over the whole of Lancashire and is aimed at a younger target demographic of young teens to people in their late twenties:
Population: 1,320,000
Reach (000s): 295
Reach Percentage: 22
Average Hours per Listener: 8.40
106.5FM Central Radio broadcasts over Chorley, Preston and the Leyland area:
Population: 214,000
Reach (000s): 41
Reach Percentage: 19
Average Hours per Listener: 8.40
97.7 XFM Manchester broadcasts over Manchester and the surrounding areas and is aimed mainly at young teens and those in their twenties that like Indie and Alternative styles of music. This is quite a niche audience:
Population: 2,792,000
Reach (000s): 184
Reach Percentage: 7
Average Hours per Listener: 4.70
By listening closely to many different news bulletins for several local radio stations and have gathered that there seems to be a general structure to them, which is generally followed according to the beliefs and popular representations of the social groups that it reaches:
1. A jingle, which is usually light and cheery and includes rhyme or a tune, introduces the radio station. Jingles have the single function of being catchy and memorable so that those who are listening will have no problems remembering which station they were listening to later.
2. The presenter[s] introduces themselves, telling the time as they do so. They begin with an extremely serious, usually globally-affecting news story and, to add range to the story, have some form of outside broadcast or vox pops. This tends to be the most important news
3. The next story is serious, but less so and there could be vox pops on that as well, to establish the public opinion. It is more national than global.
4. There is another serious story that follows this. Not much is usually said about this and they move on quickly.
5. The story that follows is more localised and tends to be lighter and a little more fun.
The target audience for my radio news bulletin is late teenagers to those in their early thirties that live around in the local area and are affected by things such as local deaths in the Wigan area. However, because the news is being broadcast at 6am on a weekday morning, there will be a higher percentage of older listeners in that age range and items such as the raised petrol prices in Chorley will be a main concern to them. Due to this cross-section of listeners, my news bulletin is broadcast in a casual, non formal mode of address, with people who have a slight local accent.
News bulletins are also generally prioritised according to the views of the target demographic. I have used this convention and sorted my news items into an order that will address their concerns and beliefs. The first item is about the economic downturn, which is globally affecting and will be important to many local people living within the community, especially the majority of the audience that will be listening at that time in the morning. The next item is about excessively raised petrol prices in a petrol station in Chorley which is something that is of more concern to them than a sunken oil tanker - the following news item. Not only is this done in order to attract the audience by relating to their values and address the concerns that they have, it aims to represent their views as a social group.
The conventions that I have observed are commonly used in local radio news bulletins and are only altered to fit their target audience. For my media product, I decided to use and develop on these conventions to create a realistic five minute news bulletin that would be seriously broadcast on a local radio station. For example, as a jingle, I used the sentence ‘Your morning wake up call with 105.4 Radio Electric.’ with the sound of an electric buzz in the background. It was too difficult to find copyright free music that suited the jingle, or even to make a jingle of my own, so I just used the rhythm of the sentence to try and make it as catchy as possible.
Another convention that I followed was by having background music as a part of my radio news bulletin. The music is not a major part of the bulletin, however it is still emblematic and would be recognisable to long term listeners of the radio station, despite not being closely listened to. It adds variety and makes the bulletin, which is essentially just a list of news items, nicer for the audience to listen to.
WISH FM, Central Radio and other local radio stations that I have used as part of my research are all a part of the UTV Radio Company. This company specialises in local radio stations and would be the type of media institution that would distribute my radio news broadcast, as a part of one of the local radio stations that they distribute.
Whilst constructing this radio news bulletin, I have learnt how to use the studio to record the presenters talking. The studio is equipped with professional recording equipment such as microphones with pop filters, a control board with sliders to control the sound levels and a computer to record clips straight onto there. I have learnt how to control the sound levels, differ the sound according to what needs to be recorded and how to save the files as WAV once they are onto the computer.I have also been using Adobe Premier Pro. Using this programme, I have learnt how to shorten audio clips, alter the audio gain and piece clips together. I also learnt how to use Audacity to record sound clips off the internet to be used directly into Adobe Premier
I used this equipment for my preliminary task, although there are many things that I have learnt in progression from that. In my Preliminary task, the voice clips weren’t very smooth in their progression from each other and there were many sound problems, such as clicks when tracks overlapped. Also, for comedic effect, we had the person being interviewed with a funny accent. This made my Preliminary Task sound very amateur, especially in comparison to my radio news bulletin, which I approached a little more seriously.
In order to know whether my radio news bulletin had been constructed successfully enough for my audience, I have asked several people to listen to my news bulletin and comment on the construction and items within the news bulletin:
Martin Hurst, who is in the higher end of the target audience, thought that my news bulletin was very smoothly laid out and the pieces of news ran very quickly one after the other. However, there were small things that he thought I could change. For example, the sound of coins jangling in the background when it talked of the economic downturn didn't seem suitable for the effect that I was trying to create. This is only a minor part of my news bulletin and, overall, he was satisfied that it suited his age group.
Chris Oldfield is in the lower end of the target demographic and also thought that the overall structure of the bulletin was very smooth and snappy. He thought that too much time was spent talking about the economic downturn than other problems, which was news that didn't really affect his age range especially since, at 6am, he would not be in the main percentage of those listening. However, items such as the humourous news on Boris Johnson falling off his bike were more aimed at his age group and he appreciated that.