Category Archives: Self Initiated Project

Screenshot of Editing Process

To edit my short documentary, I am using Adobe Premiere Pro. I feel very confident using this software because I have used it many times before and know the basics of editing, such as adding titles and cutting bits of video and putting them back together.

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The above screenshot shows a sample of my editing. I have been to the museum and taken a picture of someone looking at one of the exhibits, but I have carefully made sure that he stands to one side as I can then fit the text at the other side. I have then used the titles menu to add a back box, fill it with text, and then changed the opacity of the box so it isn’t obvious (shown below).

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Museum cuts and funding – Script and Voice Overs

Here is the script/shot list and voice overs for my short documentary about funding cuts and how they have affected local museums. I am using the case study of Hull and East Riding Museum as my main topic.

Script/Shot List:
– Entry titles: “Museums and Funding cuts”, fade in “Hull and East Riding Museum”.
– Video shot of a “tour” around Hull Museum with voice over (1).
– Interview with Pete Mackie, ex-flint specialist for the British Museum, about what he used to do at the British Museum and his views on funding cuts. N.B: Cut halfway through the interview for a statistics on the subject with voice over (2).
– Shot of around the museum including narrative voice over (3).
– Interview with Simon Marsh, amateur archaeologist.
– Final voice over (4).
– End titles: “all footage filmed at hull and east riding museum filmed with permission from paula gentil” and special thanks: “with thanks to peter mackie, simon marsh, and josh baker” (photo in background of statistics).

Voice Overs:
1) Like museums all around the country, Hull and East Riding Museum has been hit by severe funding cuts. While some museums have been forced to close down, other museums, such as the Yorkshire Museum in York, have been forced to charge extortionate entry fees as a way of raising money for the funding. The British Museum is one of the museums who have been seriously hit, causing them to cut their professional staff, such as paleontologists and flint specialists, and are replacing them with volunteers.

2) Due to a recent survey, it has been found that:
– 49% of museums in the uk have experienced a cut to their income
– 37% of museums in the uk have cut a high percentage of their staff
– 47% of museums in the uk have increased the number of volunteers rather than paid staff
– 27% of museums in the uk have now started charging for events, reducing the number of free events on offer

3) Also suffering are the British Museum’s Finds Days, which sees professional archaeologists go around the country identifying and recording valuable antiquities for historical records. It is these Finds Days that help locate hoards and sites of historical interest, such as the Staffordshire Hoard, and due to the funding cuts, their staff has been cut and they are struggling to juggle the amount of finds to be recorded between very few people, meaning the amount of finds being recorded had been cut. This has caused some amateur archaeologists to argue that because people and their finds are having to be turned away at their finds days, we are losing important history.

4) There is speculation as to what will happen to our museums and our history in the future. Will Hull and East Riding Museum remain free, like many others around the country that are facing the same threat? Will the British Museum cut its’ finds days completely, and if so, what will happen to the parts of our history that still lay in the ground, unfound? Time can only tell.

Returning Email From Finds Liaison Officer

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This is the email from the Finds Liaison Officer.

She is not allowing me to film at the Finds Day because of reasons on the email, however, I have had another idea for the project.

I have a friend who was an archaeologist for the British Museum, who’s job was cut because they couldn’t afford to pay him. I will continue on with Hull Museum about the funding cuts as normal, but I will use the case study of our archaeologist friend Pete instead of the Portable Antiquities Scheme.

Journalism Day Speakers (20th March) Biographies and Questions

Rosie Millard
Rosie is a British Journalist and author. She graduated from Hull University, the London College of Communication, although she was educated at an American High School, with what she calls a “glee-style” education. She has worked freelance for a while, working between writing comment pieces, doing interviews and features in papers and magazines, and she has appeared on TV and on Radio. In 2011 she took part in a reality show, but was first to leave.

Stuart Heritage
Stuart is a writer for the Guardian, and writes about TV and Film, and he has written for NME and the Radio Times before. He co-author’s LUVandHAT.com, which is a blog about arguing. He has made some appearances on TV, but not enough, and blames his haircut for this. He has said that he has a literary agent and will one-day write a book, and is passionate about baking.

Damien Johnson
Damien is a sports reporter, who was born in Hull. He reports on Match of the Day, and Football Focus, and is a broadcaster working with the BBC. He started his career with a radio station in Sheffield, and sometimes presents the sports news on BBC Look North for East Yorkshire and Lincolnshire.

Robert Crampton
Robert is a award winning journalist. He joined the Times as a columnist in 1991, and writes Beta Male, a weekly column in the Times, every Saturday. He also writes features and interviews, his past interviewees including; Liam Gallagher, Sienna Miller, David Cameron and Kate Winslet.

David Banks
David is a media law trainer, who co-authored the 18th, 19th, and 20th editions of McNae’s Essential Law for Journalists. He contributes articles on media law to the Guardian, and works as a media law consultant. His clients include; the BBC, Northcliffe Newspapers, The Daily Mail, and The Sun.

Nick Petrie
Nick joined the Guardian in November 2010 and works as a content coordinator for the Guardian. He is also a co-founder of Wannabe Hacks, a website aimed at budding journalists who want to get into the industry.

Andrew Dixon
Andrew is the bid leader for the Hull City of Culture 2017.

Questions for Nick Petrie
1) How did you go from a co-creator of Wannabe Hacks to working at the Guardian?
2) Have you any advice for budding journalists on getting into the news industry?
3) What exactly is Wannabe Hacks and what does it do?
4) What do you do for the Guardian? What is a content coordinator?

Questions for Andrew Dixon
1) How did you get involved with the Hull Bid?
2) How did you get support for the Hull Bid?
3) What do you think Hull will improve with the money from the Hull Bid?
4) Do you think Hull will benefit from the Hull Bid?

Self Initiated Project Research into PAS and Budget Cuts

Due to funding cuts, the Portable Antiquities Scheme, a group of specialists from the British museum, have had to reduce their staff who visit the annual Finds Days at different museums all around the countries.

Hull and East Yorkshire Museum, an archaeological museum in central Hull, used to have two people from the Portable Antiquities Scheme attend their Finds Days, once every two months, but since the end of 2013, they have reduced their number from two to one.

Because of this, one representative from the Portable Antiquities Scheme has to sit and examine a large amount of artifacts that amateur metal detectorists take in to be identified. After she takes them away, the representative must properly research and identify the artifacts, and must write up a full report of what it is, before publishing it online. In total per two months, the one representative has to identify and report on approximately 700+ artifacts. Because of this, the Portable Antiquities Scheme representative has had to lower the amount of artifacts that she is allowed to take away from each person from as many as she can, to 12 per person.

This may seem like she can still take a lot of artifacts, however, nearly twenty people attend the Finds Days per museum, and the numbers begin to add up. However, since the amount has been lowered, less people are attending the Finds Days as too many of their good artifacts are being rejected, because the representative does not have the time and help of other staff to record everything. Because the amount of people attending the Finds Days has become less and less, amateur archeologists and historians are beginning to say that we are losing our local history, because if people do not take their good, important historical finds to be properly identified and recorded, the Portable Antiquities Scheme are missing the important finds, and therefore are not seeing some of our important local history.

Self Initiated Project Ideas – Museums and Funding Cuts

Due to my knowledge of the museums and how they have been hit by funding cuts, I am doing to create a short (five minutes approx) documentary about the different museums in Hull, mainly the Streetlife and the Archaeological museum, and how the funding cuts have affected them.

I am going to talk about how the Streetlife museum was hit and how it cannot afford to digitalise it’s exhibits. I will talk about the Heritage Lottery Fund, a fund for museums to keep them open, and will talk about how the Streetlife museum is asking for a donation in order to keep the museum free.

I will talk about how the Archaeological museum has been hit by funding cuts, and ask the question “will it always be free?” and I will go into the finds days that happen every two months. I will explain how the staff from the Portable Antiquities Scheme has been cut and therefore only one person travels around to the finds days and takes in items to record and identify. I will speak to amateur archaeologists about how they feel about the finds days only taking a limited amount of finds from amateur archaeologists and how some people feel that they are losing history, because people will stop coming to the finds days and will not record their finds, therefore we are losing history because the finds arent being recorded.

I will try and get interviews with the museum curator Paula Gentil, and possibly an interview with the PAS finds officer, and will try to get vox pops around or outside the museum, asking people their views on how they think the funding cuts are affecting the museums, if they know about it, and if they think museums should always be free.