June 09, 2023
2022 DocLabber Frazer headed to Dragonfly TV for his second placement
Everyone at the North-west Ambulance Service’s (NWAS) Parkway business Centre Calls and Dispatch rooms has a different way of getting through their long night shifts.
Frazer McClean at Dragonfly TV North. Thank you Dragonfly for supporting Grierson DocLab!
Did you know that coffee has a half-life of around 5 hours? This means that if you started your shift at 7pm and you’re finishing at 7am (as is the standard procedure) then you need to have your last coffee of the night at around 1.30am so that you can sleep properly to be ready for the next day’s shift. The team keep each other going with kindness and a good-humoured attitude when they were in between their jobs.
The reason that I was lucky enough to spend my time with NWAS is that thanks to The Grierson Trust and Dragonfly TV. I was given the opportunity to take on an 8-week placement on Dragonfly’s returning format Ambulance and, under the tutelage of the Parkway crew, I feel like I have learned a remarkable amount about the world of factual TV.
Spending my time at Parkway, I learned about setting up and putting away kit, handling equipment such as boom and radio mics and even getting to use the camera equipment. On two different occasions, I was allowed to shoot for Ambulance using the industry cameras on set. I felt that I was part of a large multidisciplinary team and that I was supported while working for Dragonfly and through the ongoing checks that I got from The Grierson Trust over the course of my placement.
When the shoot was over, I was moved onto the Liaison team where I learned the more administrative side of TV productions while conducting background checks and helping with frame-by-frame analyses of the offline edits.
Finally, during the last of the 9 weeks I spent in Manchester, I was given the opportunity to join Picture Shop to help the runners and have several invaluable shadowing opportunities ranging from audio to online editing. Post-production has always been my aspiration, so I felt that this week was an incredible opportunity for me to experience the part of the factual industry that I would love to find myself working in.
My time in Manchester has been an incredible adventure that has allowed me to determine what I would like to do in the future – all thanks to the Grierson Doclab program.
