VISUAL MEDIA: Videography
Sinkland farms pumpkin festival
october 2023
This project was about Sinkland Farm’s 32nd Annual Pumpkin, which took place in Christiansburg, VA. The event ran over the course of several weeks and is one of the largest pumpkin festivals in the state, so I wanted to highlight the notable event. The A-roll consists of the main organizer and owner, Susan Sink, and the B-roll consists of the playful environment within the festival, along with the mountainous landscape that surrounds the event. I produced this product by using a Canon T7i DSLR and Lavalier microphone and finalized it in Adobe Premiere Pro.
One of the most interesting discoveries I made while working on this project was developing a strong understanding of the video editing software in Premiere Pro. I am fascinated by the news industry and the visual elements that are involved in broadcasting a news show, so I highly enjoyed learning how to operate the editing workspace interface. This project allowed me to cut through the clutter of lengthy interviews and scenic shots in order to convey a coherent storyline about Sinkland’s festival. I adjusted audio levels and created an extensive amount of transitions and narration corrections, which helped add to the quality of the content that viewers can engage with.
One of the biggest challenges that I encountered while working on this project was physically operating and carrying around each piece of equipment needed for the assignment. Before this project, I had little experience working with tripods and microphones. In addition, I wasn’t aware of how mountainous the terrain was at Sinkland Farms, so I didn’t realize how much of a struggle it was to lug the tripod, microphone cords and wires and the DSLR camera around. The property of the festival is massive and changing the height of a tripod at every section of the event was far too tedious. I overcame this challenge by looking at this issue as an opportunity to take a longer amount of time at each activity of the event. While capturing the B-roll shots, I maintained a strong focal point to convey a clear subject matter and allow the viewers to fully understand the content that they are listening to and watching.
I will use what I learned from this project as I continue in my multimedia journalism major to practice visual storytelling and the fundamentals of reporting and interviewing. I have lots of experience working with sources and public speaking, however, I lack exposure to broadcast journalism. As I delve deeper into my major, I am approaching courses such as broadcast performance, multimedia reporting, and digital newsroom, so I believe that it’s critical to build on the skills I gained from this project. While I continue to record A-roll and B-roll shots, I am confident that I will be able to master the production of a compelling news story video.
