Do's and Don'ts in Radio
- What is a good microphone voice? Being able to pronounce strong 'R's and no signs of speech impediments (lisp, stutter).
- Most common regional accents heard are Scottish, Welsh, Irish and English. The likelihood of Brummie, Glaswegian or Geordie accents is unlikely due to the risk of them not being understood nationally.
- Most new stations have journliasts who can read, write and report as oppose to having seperate people for different roles.
- Must be able to convey the correct tones, empthasis and speed.
- 'Approachable authority' - the ways of presenting bulletins are merging. Bulletins need to compliment the formats of the programmes around them.
- You must understand everything you read. Read through the script throughougly to avoid tripping up on unfamiliar words, foregin places or super long sentecnes.
- Ask questions - is the audio cued properly? Is it in the right order?
- Use space before recording to breathe, exercise larynx before. A nervous voice usually rises in pitch (people link to lacking calirty and authority) so relax.
- Sound authoritive yet natural and informal.
- In recent survey - Radio Four averged 183 words per minute whereas Radio One averaged 228, reflecting the pace of the programming.
- In order to stress certain words without sounding biased, ask yourself what about the story is interesting, unusual, new or unexpected.
- Many sentences have an 'axis point' whislt this is happening 'here', this is happening 'there'.
- Pause slightly before a stress word, let it sink in for the listener. Quotations also need stress. Take small pause before and after reciting.
- The BBC has a Pronociation Unit which you can phone for advice.
- 'Aircheck' your bulletins - record yourself reading a bulltin and listent to it to monitre your performance.
- Some newsrooms have a 3 - 5 minute 'gate' before a bulletin where the presenter must be in the newsroom in order not to miss a cue.
- You can record with one headphone on and one off to here how your voice sounds naturally.
- In most instances, the presnter will have the most control of the newsroom.
- Start confidently, with one hand ready to touch the computer play out for the first piece of audio.
- Screen will give you countdown of remaining audio clip so prepare yourself to speak again
- Sometimes you may have to finish on a 'clock end' - exactly five minutes past.
- Keep top two stories near, incase you have extra time with nothing to fill it with.
- 'Copy taste' - Conituning to read one story aloud whilst reading over one thats just come in.
- 'Tread water' repeate information you do know whilst gathering new facts.
- A 'personality reader' someone who reads the news in a converstational way.
- 'Zoo' formats of news - lots of presenters in one newsroom each having their own contribution.
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