Author: lydiaduncan
Graduate Project
Social Media Placement
A mandatory part of my Media Production degree was to complete a 4-week industry placement and mine was at Sky TV in the Digital Entertainment department. In July 2018, I joined the Social Media team and helped them plan, create and upload content for their various online platforms, however, my main responsibility was to help kickstart the launch of the new channel, Sky Witness.
Sky Witness was created because of some audience research conducted by Sky TV. The study taught them that consumers like watching programs such as Grey’s Anatomy and How to Get Away with Murder because it gives them entry into different ‘real-world’ lives, ones that they would never experience themselves. Audiences enjoy watching a life they aren’t apart of and therefore gain insight. This is what drove Sky TV to rebrand their channel Sky Living and launch the new channel Sky Witness.
Along with the rebrand, Sky commissioned three new TV programs to debut on this channel with the celebration of the launch. These programs were 9-1-1, For the People and Instinct and they all needed to be promoted. This is where I come in. I helped the social media team create a backlog of content so that they could readily upload assets for these programs when needed.
I watched the first seasons of all three programs, took notes of funny pieces of dialogue and scenes and then created memes out of them. I mainly used Adobe Premiere Pro and Illustrator to produce boomerangs, GIFS, videos, and images. I ensured the assets correlated to the team’s social calendar and I received good feedback on all the content I made.
See below to view a selection of the assets I made:
Sky Sports News Editor
After my Fast Forward Internship in the SPS Department at Sky TV, I spent 3 months training to become a freelance editor for Sky Sports news. I’d had experience with this team previously and really enjoyed my time there and they were happy to welcome me back.
I trained 5 hours per day voluntarily and spent my time learning how to use the editing software Quantel. I was taught on a 1-1 basis by a very kind colleague. He gave me his time and taught me everything I know now which I am very grateful for.
Eventually, I became confident enough with the workflows of the team and the work they created that I was taken on as a freelance editor. I was 19 at the time so this was a fantastic achievement and something I am still proud of today.
The team didn’t hesitate to throw me in at the deep end though. My first professional 12-hour shift happened to be on the day that Muhammad Ali passed away. This was one of the biggest pieces of sporting news in the world and I was the main editor on shift having to handle the obituary video and convert 4:3 footage of Ali’s past fights. I stayed calm and managed to do what was needed but it was definitely a memorable experience, to say the least. Looking back, the time flew by so I must have been having fun!
My other shifts didn’t quite compare to that first one but I still loved them all the same. I mainly created teasers, highlights packages, and news features for football, tennis and upcoming sporting events. I gained invaluable experience working with top Sky Producers and became adept at fast turn around editing. It was such a fast-paced, buzzy and exciting environment and I really felt like I was part of something important and doing what I loved. I really enjoyed my time as a freelance editor.
See below for a couple of examples of the short-form work I cut together (both of which went out live on Sky Sports News):