Introduction to the news (1)

I watched a news broadcast from the BBC called, “BBC News at one” shown first on the
19/05/20221. The news channel I chose (BBC News) reports on national news which includes
news from the whole of the UK and some stories from around the world which affect us.

At the beginning of the news broadcast the news presenter briefly goes through all of the
stories that will be covered and the order of which they will run. In this specific broadcast
the stories and order are as follows; the lockdown breaches in downing street of which
there were six; UN global food shortages are predicted; the ongoing Rooney vs Vardy case
and a couple from the UK won the lottery.

In the starting sequence there are mini clips of each news story and a quick rundown of
each of them. This is then followed by an intro/title card with a beeping sound which
symbolises hospitals and danger, the colours also symbolise similar things being red and
white this is also very clinical which implies the precision needed to report on the news and
the detail of research they need.

I chose to focus on the ‘Lockdown party fines’ story, the report cut to many different sides
to the story and professionals some live, and some were pre-recorded, this was so that the
viewers could get different arguments and make up their own mind about where they stand
on the issue. The report states that there were 126 fixed penalty notices from 8 dates for 28
individuals who received between 2 and 8 fines each. The presenter speaks to a man named
George Eustice MP (Environmental secretary) about his views on the subject, it then cuts to
Helen Ball (acting deputy commissioner) who gives a small rundown on the investigation
who says they made an “impartial investigation” into the lockdown parties, it then cuts to
Sir Kier Starmer labour leaders perspective on the story who thinks that Boris Johnson
should resign and it seems that he thinks that Boris is incapable of running the country
efficiently as the cost of living crisis continues to worsen. The presenter then speaks to
Daniel Stanford (Home affairs correspondent) who is outside Scotland yard and then Helen
Catt (Political correspondent) who mentions the “political fallout” that is predicted to come
from this.

The met police were represented as authoritative and competent in order to convince the
public that their investigation was completed to the best standard, and that they didn’t look
upon the government in a favourable light. Boris Johnson was represented as both
incompetent and apologetic shown by two viewpoints, Kier Starmer implying that he is
unable to run the country and George Eustice MP who stresses the prime minister’s apology
on the subject. The experts are represented as knowledgeable to the subject as they are
direct and straight to the point with facts and statistics.

1 https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m0017g87/bbc-news-at-one-19052022

News readers address their audience directly to make the story seem urgent and
interesting, but also to create an emotional and personal atmosphere in the viewers homes.
They are usually seated at a table looking straight on to the camera which stresses urgency.
The role of the news presenter is to read out the news in an unbiased and a way that
stresses the importance of the information without scaring the audience. A successful news
presenter needs to be likeable, listen and talk at the same time and not mix their words, and
think on their feet in order to keep the audience engaged and switched on.

A field reporter is a person who goes out to locations to report the news and to collect
footage to go alongside it. Other personnel involved in a news broadcast are; news editor
who decides what gets on the news and dispatches reporters and meets with the news
team; producer creates the order of the news makes sure everything runs smoothly and
makes sure it fits within 30 mins.
News ordering is a term that means finding a list of possible stories and putting them in an
order likely to be shown on the news, the final order is completed by the producer. The
term given to the list of stories likely to appear on the broadcast is a news prospects list. The
story likely to be shown first is the most serious story, something that affects people either
emotionally or directly to keep them switched on and create an impact.
The ability to think and act quickly is important in news because news is always changing,
and it doesn’t stand still. A slow news day is a day with little news to report. The final news
story is often called an “and finally” story its function is to end the broadcast on an uplifting
happy note to inspire a little hope in the audience, it usually takes the form of a human-
interest story which creates an emotional response for the audience.
News values are a criteria that influenced the selection and presentation of events as
published news first written by Galtung and Ruge first wrote about them.2
‘UK heatwave: Temperatures to hit low 30s as heat-health alert issued’3 as you can see this
predicts something that is likely to happen which makes it an example of a consonance
headline one of Galtung and Ruge’s news values.

2 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/News_values
3 https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-62084934

Another example of Galtung and Ruge’s values is ‘Boris Johnson: Tories vie for leadership as
race to replace PM begins.’4 This is an example of a Continuity headline, because the
government have had continued spotlight in the news especially since the Coronavirus.
And finally, ‘Man's fingerprints 'match those of US fugitive Nicholas Rossi'.’5 Which is an
example of a threshold news story, it is a big piece of news which holds importance for
many people.

6

Actuality footage is usually lasting no more than one to two minutes, showing unedited,
unstructured footage of real events, places, people, or things.7 Stock footage, also known as
stock video or B-roll, is pre-filmed footage that can be purchased and used in a variety of
projects and films. Stock footage can be licensed and saves filmmakers the time and money
of shooting original material.8

4 https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-62088847
5 https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-glasgow-west-62082965
6 https://www.shortcutstv.com/blog/new-media-news-values/
7 https://www.moma.org/collection/terms/actuality
8 https://marketing.istockphoto.com/blog/complete-guide-to-stock-video/