Production Plan
Aim, form & audience
We will produce a capsule podcast series to help current and future students of the School of Media and Communications (M&C) gain a clearer understanding of the industry they are about to enter. The series will be aimed towards second and third year M&C students who are beginning to think about their futures and are unsure as to how to go about breaking into the communications industry. Students will engage with the podcast as it will provide relevant and engaging content that will fill any gaps in knowledge about life after university that RMIT may already not provide, and ultimately further their career prospects. The series itself will comprise of four ten-minute episodes, published on a dedicated website that we will create. Each episode will be supplemented with online content to expand on the topics covered in the podcast and provide a reference point for students to revisit. By the end of the series students will have a clearer understanding of life after university, and have some of their most pressing questions answered.
How will you produce it and what resources are required?
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Recording equipment
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Plan A: Record in the radio broadcast studio in Building 9
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Plan B: Borrow Zoom recorders from the tech desk and record in edit suites in Building 9 Basement
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Plan C: Nat can ask Tess Lawley from SYN about the possibility of using SYN studios for recording (as Nat is affiliated with SYN)
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Group members who can operate recording equipment: Jess, Nat & Grace
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Editing equipment:
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Adobe Audition - accessible via computers in Building 9 edit suites
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Group members who can edit audio: Nat, Tien, Jess & Grace. We can teach others if needed
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Web content creation & website administration:
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Online software (accessible on laptops or computers in edit suites)
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Are there any copyright, legal or ethical clearances required?
As with all media projects, we will need our interview subjects to sign release forms. A copy of the release forms for this project can be found here. We will also need to consider the copyright terms of any music and sound effects included in the episodes. There is a wealth of copyright-free audio resources available on sites like Creative Commons, Archive.org and FreeSound.org. Where copyright does apply, we will contact the license holders for permission and only use materials where permission has been granted. We will also need to attribute the sources from our research that will help to inform the episodes in the series – this will take the form of a bibliography published on the podcast’s website.
What research is required?
Our initial research needs to uncover exactly what our audience wants to know about life after university and heading into the workforce. We can ask current students (our peers) direct questions to inspire us. This sort of research can help us determine the content of our podcasts but also the style our listeners would be more inclined to tune into. We will also look at the career resources RMIT and other universities already provide, and identify where there are gaps in the information.
We also need to research how to create an engaging podcast, and what kind of podcasts our target audience is already listening to. As a group we can look at other successful podcasts and analyse the techniques they employ, such as format, duration, music and soundscaping.
We will need to research if we want the episodes to be more informative, based around a theme or question, or more like storytelling, based around an interview.
Lastly, we need to research website formats and the type of media content we will have accompany the podcast. This research will also help us pick a colour palette and how we want it to be presented visually.
What are the milestones to produce the project?
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Research phase
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Planning episodes & complementary web content
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Determining interviewees shortlist
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Contacting interviewees to gauge interest in participation
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Setting times to record with interviewees
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Recording content
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Editing
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Publishing
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Creating website
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Creating web content
Who is responsible for the associated tasks?
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Research - ALL
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Writing questions & scripting episodes - ALL
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Liaising with interviewees & setting up recording times - Grace,Nat
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Booking recording spaces and times - Grace, Nat
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Recording - Nat, Grace
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Interviewing - Jess, Liv
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Editing - Nat, Grace, Tien
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Website creation - Liv, Jess
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Web content/ visuals - Liv, Tien
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Web content/ copy - Liv
What are the challenges you anticipate in the production process?
Like with any project, we expect that challenges and problems will arise that we must deal with to ensure the project's success.
Interviewees
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For our podcast series, we are relying quite heavily on people external from the group to be interviewed and give their perspectives. As such, we as a group will have very little control over how many people we manage to lock in, and whether they actually attend the interview sessions.
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To combat this issue, we will allow a large amount of time for recording incase rescheduling is required, and have a list of backup interviewees to use if any of our original subjects pull out. We will also have some backup podcast plans in place to record if we are unable to record with our planned subjects.
Recording spaces
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As we are trying to achieve a high quality professional podcast series, it is important that we source the best recording spaces and devices possible to ensure the best quality end result. However, due to their demand for these shared spaces, it may be difficult to secure them at our desired times.
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To face this challenge, we will try to work proactively and book in our recording studios and subjects well in advance. If any further issues occur, we will confer with the RMIT technicians to work out a solution with less in-demand portable equipment that will still enable a high quality recording.
Group member availability
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As this project is a group task, we hope to be completing as much of the work collaboratively as possible. However, each group member does have their own commitments outside of class, and we may have issues finding times when we are all available to work together on the project.
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To face this challenge, we plan to lock in one regular meeting for everyone to attend, and in this session we can break jobs up into smaller tasks that can be completed by the available members.
How will the project be realized with the available time and resources?
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Time management is crucial, every team member needs to keep on track and meet their respective deadlines. In order to do so:
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Each member will stick to the timeline mapped out in the project plan, and update their progress at least once a week
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Members will check progress and make themselves available to help others if people are falling behind
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Make sure to confirm interviewees a minimum of 24 hours prior to recording to avoid any cancellations. It is also important to prepare the guests to ensure they have an understanding of the interview’s scope.
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Resources: recording equipment (recording studios, microphones, headphones, recording and mixing software), interviewers, interviewees, website creation tools (online software)
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Book equipment and spaces will in advance to ensure availability
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Be prepared, always have backup plans in case of crisis or cancellations
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Set a realistic goals
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If we run to a schedule of recording one episode per week, 4-5 episodes is manageable
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If each minute of audio equates to 5 minutes of editing time, we should aim to keep episodes to ~10 minute duration
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Have other groups members prepared to step up and help with editing as this is a big task
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Project plan timeline
Presentation slides
https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1b6uo050AT1AqlMoeq2GjrCx8gOM8uJhuuYv4wBKO4Bs/edit#slide=id.p5