Competition Headlines
Related Articles
Take a Poll
| A Look at the Audio/Radio Production Competition | | Print | |
|
2009 represented the fifth year of existence for the SkillsUSA Audio/Radio Production contest. We’ve increased the number of teams participating in the contest each year and last year’s contest was no exception. With 16 secondary and two college/post-secondary teams, the 2009 competition saw the largest number of teams participate. Last year we partnered with the American Jazz Museum in Kansas City. Participating teams were challenged to produce a 60 second radio spot to promote the museum. On the first day of the contest teams spent three hours at the museum gathering natural sound, conducting interviews and recording voiceovers. On day two of the contest teams had four hours to edit their spot and burn it to CD. The team members also had to take a written test over audio/radio production knowledge after they turned in their spot. Last year was the first year the Audio/Radio Production contest has done a spot for anything besides SkillsUSA or TECHSPO and it was very successful. The All of the spots from last year’s competition are available for listening on SchoolTube (www.schooltube.com) or TeacherTube (www.teachertube.com). We hope you enjoy listening to the spots. If you are a student or advisor considering participating in this contest we strongly suggest you listen to the spots before you participate. You should also look over last year’s contest prompt. In addition, everyone participating this year should make sure they read the 2010 updated contest standards. This year’s standards put more emphasis on the need for portable digital audio recording devices with REMOVABLE recording media, strongly recommend use of laptops on day two for editing, and will have several textbook suggestions for you to use to prepare for the written test. We still have teams that show up who want to use their laptops on day one for gathering audio AND on day two for editing. This simply isn’t allowed. Teams must have a portable digital audio recording device with removable media. The removable media must be turned in at the end of the first day. We are encouraging use of laptops for editing on day two because they are fairly easy to transport and generally allow for a quick set-up and breakdown. Looking ahead, we hope to continue to increase the number of teams participating in the Audio/Radio Production contest. This is especially true with the college/post-secondary teams. We’re willing to listen to any suggestions you may have to help increase our college/post-secondary numbers. We want to welcome our new Tech Chair for this year, Ric Viers. Ric has a tremendous background in audio production through his ownership of the world’s largest independent sound effects production company. He is also a published author in the area of sounds effects production and has two more audio production books on the way in about the next two years. He seems as excited about taking on this contest as we are to have him involved. Bill Cooper and I will continue to assist in the operation of the Audio/Radio Production contest. We’re very much looking forward to working with Ric this year. If you’re an advisor and would like to join the National Education Team please follow the NET directions on the SkillsUSA website (http://www.skillsusa.org/compete/net.shtml). If you work in industry and would like to join the technical committee please contact SkillsUSA (www.skillsusa.org). The more help we have the better the contest can be in the long run. Finally, if you participated in last year’s Audio/Radio Production contest we hope you enjoyed it as much as we enjoyed putting it on for you. Feel free to contact us with any input or questions you have. You can reach us through SkillsUSA. You can also get information to us by replying to the 2009 contest post on one of the SkillsUSA website forums. We’ve posted information about the spots being available online on the advisor, alumni and student forums. Good luck this year. Eric Millham |
museum’s staff was very impressed with all the participants and praised their performance. The judges were also generally impressed with the spots. They commented that all the spots hit their mark. The only negative comments the judges had concerned choices with music, sound effects and basic editing mistakes. They also said last year was the best year for our college/post-secondary teams. In future contests, expect to more spots for off site “clients.”
