Post 1 (9th October)
My original idea was to create a feature on female football commentators. After some research i decided it would be too restrictive with many working for the FA unable to talk freely about there experiences. I discovered WIF women in football this is an association trying to change the way women are thought of within the sport. They offer regular meetings and a support network for women within the industry. This year they are celebrating their 10th anniversary. This inspired me to widen my idea to all women within the sport from those on the field to up in the boardrooms of the FA.
I have already pitched to podcast and feature creators Abrupt Audio, They have already verbally approved my idea so looking to get a written commission within the next week.Once i have this i will then contact ‘WIF.’ to see if they would be interested in posting the content on their site once commissioned by abrupt audio.
I want to tell the story of how far women have come within the sport, stories from those within the game and the challenged they have faced and finishing with what is being done now and is it enough. I have already recorded short clips with Joe hart (England and West Ham Goalkeeper) and Eddie Howe (Bournemouth Manager.) I have a number of people in the pipeline to interview so will now concentrate on fine tuning my idea and making dates to interview those individuals.
Today (16th October) I received full confirmation of my commission in writing. Link below to PDF:
Post 2 (24th October)
This week I have spent mainly looking deeper within my subject area. I have been listening and watching lots of sports documentaries to get a feel for the general form. By doing this it has given me lots of ideas about how i was my final piece to sound. The sounds you get from the crowd during a match evoke lots of emotion so i want to use this within my piece accompanied by a music bed to build atmosphere.
I had confirmation from David Gerty (Head of Communications for the FA, Emirates Cup and Women’s FA.) After pitching my idea he was very keep to get involved within the piece. He also stated that he will also try and get someone who is extremely senior within the FA to chat with me also.
I attended a game last week so i have recorded some actuality which i intent on using. Currently looking at the next best game to attend at Wembley to go and record Vox pops with vans in order to get an unfiltered view no matter how honest. I would like to play some of these clips played to other interviewees as it will be interesting to get their reaction and responses.
Post 3 (31st October)
This week has been spent focusing on nailing down all of the contributors for my piece. I am pleased with my progress so far managing to secure interviews with two very senior members of the FA whom I will be interviewing on the 6th November at Wembley stadium.
I plan to interview fans of the spurs v. Real Madrid game on the 1st November. I have decided that I will take someone along with me who is male who will speak to some fans with questions I have already prepared. As I feel that fans will feel more confident giving controversial views on women within the game if they are speaking to a male. I have been in regular contact with ‘women in football’ association who are keen to get involved however there are some ethical issues regarding their members. Many of their members are given complete anonymity as they fear that it may cause them problems within their workplace. To get around this problem I have suggested that they send out an email to all of their members with my contact details and give those who feel comfortable the option to contact me directly or if someone high up within the organisation is free to give their views.
I have posted on several social media platforms asking those with a particularly strong view on women within the game to come forward. I am having an issue with many willing to type to me how ‘I do not understand the game’ or ‘is the documentary on girls or real football’ but are not willing to come chat with me and speak their view openly. I feel this is because they know that sexist views are generally frowned upon and are worried that meeting me would prove their points to be invalid. I am currently in talks with individuals from BBC Sport, providing coverage for majority of football events it will be interesting to see how programmers make decisions on gender roles and whether thy have noticed any changes within the game and how women are generally perceived by their audience.
I have also been carrying out research into more the figures side of the topic. For example how many are actively following women’s football, attendance of the women’s games in comparison to the men’s and also which proportion of the fans are men and women as many feel that men do not follow the women’s game.
Post 4 (7th November)
This week was spent finalising and pinning down contributors. In order to create a balanced documentary I want to cover all major areas within the sport. Below is a finalised list of contributors that i have interviewed or will, i have set myself a deadline of the 28th to record all audio from contributors in order to enable myself to have 2 weeks to finalise editing, structure and overall sound of the feature.
David Gerty: Head of Communications for Women’s FA Cup and Emirates FA Cup.
Marzena Bogdanovicz: Head Of progression for Women’s Football within the FA.
Lynsey Hooper: Broadcaster for Sky, TalkSport, the offside rule podcast and ex under 21 player.
Kait Borsay: Broadcaster for Sky, TalkSport, the offside rule podcast and Premier League News.
Anonymous Contributor: An individual whom contacted me through social media who has very negative views on women working within the game.
Football Fans: Vox ops recorded outside Wembley stadium before an England V. Germany Game.
Joe Hart: Goalkeeper for England and West Ham.
Eddie Howe: Manager of Bournemouth FC.
Emma Hayes: Head of Chelsea Women’s FC.
I went to meet the head of the emirates cup this week which proved very interesting and he had some very good points to make on my subject area. I have made sure to ask many of my contributors the same questions as i would like to montage the ideas on one topic during some points of the feature.
Post 5 (21st November)
I have one week until my proposed deadline to have all my audio recorded. I have my final 3 interviews confirmed for the 28th which is being done at Chelsea football Ground. I have been gathering a number of audio pieces and recorded actuality from games i have attended in the past few weeks.
Now i have a strong database of audio i have made a start at cutting small pieces together to build a bigger picture. I have outlined a main structure of where i would like the feature to start and end. However at this point with some interviews yet to be carried out the structure is not fully set in stone as one of the interviewees may say something which may change the course of the feature.
For the remainder of this week i will do some more in depth research on my remaining interviewees and listen to some sports based features to get some more inspiration for my final structure.
Post 6 (5th December)
This week was spent focusing on carrying out my final interviews. I was also able to make a proper plan of the structure now as i had all of my audio ready. Some pieces of audio i had to decide to cut from my piece all together as of time constraints. Two individuals that cut were Eddie Howe and Joe Hart as I didn’t feel they added much depth to the piece and other individuals had more compelling stories.
I have been ill this week so work was delayed slightly. I managed to get a draft completed by 10th December. I was pleased overall both thought more could be added to increase depth and production value.
Post 7 (12th December)
Having My second draft of the piece i played some to Aasiya to get feedback on a few points i needed a second opinion on. It was pointed out that although the transitions were smooth my voice needed to be added to a junction to give the story more context.
I recorded the link and added it into the piece as advised. I then listened to the audio multiple times both with headphones and in the studio to double check levels.