David M. Green: Purveyor of fine humour

Tag: television

  • 31 Questions iPilot 2.0

    Six thumbs up? Or a bunch of well-dressed criminals getting ready to surrender their fingerprints? You decide.

    Yes! The 31 Questions Re-pilot, Pilot Mach 2, or iPilot 2.0 if you will, was successfully recorded to tape on June 29, 2011.

    The evening at RMIT University’s fabulous Studio A went very well. The set looked great. Wonderful lighting. All the mics and cameras worked. The crew turned up (well, most of them). The gags worked (well, most of them). The questions were just the right level of difficulty (unlike last time – way too hard!). And most importantly, it was a fun night of TV-making.

    It’s community television, so it’s virtually impossible to avoid using the term “shambles” at some point. But we embraced our shortcomings and kept on with the show.

    That’s right folks! 31 Questions. The show that keeps the mistakes the other game shows cut out!

    The day before the rehearsal, which we had the previous Wednesday, our original score-keeper and glamorous assistant, Minky Cooper, decided to quit the show (via Facebook. A sad sign of the times…). So we had less than 24 hours to find a replacement.

    Incredibly I was able to find the lovely Melanie Valentine at extremely short notice to take over the role. And considering it was her first time inside a TV studio, she did very well.

    Alasdair “Al” Tremblay-Birchcall also gave a fabulous performance as the official moderator. That guy cracks me up.

    Special thanks also to our very talented, and forgiving, contestants: Julia and Andrew. They were both an absolute pleasure to work with.

    And a big thanks to the 16 or so strong crew. Without all you we’d just be making a silent film in the dark.

    But most importantly, THIS pilot went SO, SO, SO MUCH BETTER than our first pilot back in November. Instead of 4 pages of post-show improvement notes, this time I only had 6 key points. And they were all procedural or organisational issues, not to do with the fundamental concept of the show.

    The pilot is currently being edited by the talented Anthony McCormack. We’ll soon be handing it in to the good people at RMITV Student Television and Channel 31 Melbourne for their approval.

    And hopefully they’ll let us film 12 more!

    I’ll keep you updated.

    But if you’d like more immediate updates, or you want to check out more production photos, make sure you LIKE 31 QUESTIONS ON FACEBOOK. It’s all up there. And SUBSCRIBE ON YOUTUBE. All episodes (& some extra bonus material!), that’s where they’ll be.

    Kind regards
    David M. Green
    Mayor of TV-Land

  • Popping voxes for RMITV

    The other day I swung by my alma mater, RMIT University, to record a short promotional video for RMITV Student Television at the university’s O-Day celebrations.

    And I had a freaking fantastic time!

    Basically I walked around with a talented camera-operator named Emma (didn’t catch her surname), doing vox-pops and joking around.

    We recorded about 40 minutes of footage, 15 of which was really good (in my opinion, anyway).

    Someone else edited together a 7 minute video for the Student Union website, which featured some fancy cut-away footage spliced in there and a “best of” the day’s vox-pops.

    They also did that thing where they cut to a second camera that I’m NOT looking at, while I’m doing my PTCs (pieces to camera), and which, if I can be honest, I absolutely hate.

    It makes it look like I’m presenting on Video Hits or some teen show where they assume the audience is so depraved of an attention span you need to keep putting in cuts to the same thing from different angles. Sometimes they change it to black and white or put it in slow motion as well. At least RMITV didn’t go that far…

    Seriously though, great edit. It’s far more swish-looking than I could manage. It’s supposed to be on the Student Union website, but I can’t seem to find it… Little help?

    But anyway, I acquired permission to upload ALL the good footage to the Internet here so YOU can see the good stuff that didn’t make it to the official video.

    So here they are separated into three easy-to-digest videos!

    #1 – Who are you & what are you studying? (Keep your eye out for a cat and a giant bowling pin…)

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    #2 – Are you a member of a club or society? (I make two Thai girls sing their national anthem in this one!)

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    #3 – Have you heard of RMITV? (Turns out some people understand television better than others…)

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    I think I displayed just the right amount of smart-arseness. What do ya reckon?

    Everyone there at the RMITV stall was a pleasure to work (and slack off) with. I wish I could do this sort of thing everyday!

    Kind regards,
    David M. Green
    And that was a damn fine shotgun microphone.