Joseph Agrenich: Unit 14

Explain the processes and technologies involved in producing a radio broadcast

In this picture of the right, I can see a workstation and a mixing desk in the sound room. This is the BBC Radio 4 studio where you can see a radio show is going on in the background in the other room, behind the glass. The workstation is mainly used for the playout system but is also very useful for monitoring, audio logging, file sharing and other things as well. A mixing desk is useful because it controls the various programme sources and puts their audios together. In the other room there is more equipment such as headphones and microphones. The microphones are used to record the audio for the radio programme while the people wear the headphones so that they can hear themselves or their colleagues while recording.

A digital cartwall is a jingle player that’s easy to use that provides multiple pages of instant audio buttons ready for quick playback or loading in a jingle. A digital cartwell is software that is used to put different sound effects or jingles into the radio show or radio stream. For example in a radio show the digital cartwell can be used to implement the main theme song or a quick chime. Many different people in the radio show, for example people behind the glass mirror like the producers or people can use a digital cartwell like the hosts or presenters can use them, as they will know the timing more accurately for different jingles. The digital cartwell is used on the computer so the sound engineers can add all the jingles that are needed and can play them throughout or the producers can play them whenever needed.

A playlist is a list of songs chosen for the day’s programme where they will have to fit those certain amount of songs within a limited time - the duration of their programme. In this screenshot on the right you can see the playlist of songs that are most commonly used throughout the entirety of the BBC Radio 4. This playlist was found on the website “media.info” these are probably the most popular songs whenever that playlist was released. BBC does this to then attract more people, so then more people listen to the radio shows. These songs can be listened to on Spotify, which then people recognise the songs on the radio shows and then listen to the radio shows which increases the listening figures for BBC Radio 4. This is a smart strategy from BBC Radio 4 which can increase how many people listen to the radio shows.

In this picture on the right is a digital playout system in a BBC radio 4 studio where they record the radio drama “The Archers”. A digital playout system is an automation and play-out system, including the video & TS capture, editing, storage and management, query
, broadcasting and supervision functions, which helps operators to manage plenty of programs more effectively. BBC radio 4 uses these playout systems to broadcast their radio shows, these use these to put on air or off air different shows. The playout systems are very useful to lower latency and timing to be the quickest possible, so that the show is live and there is no delay between the real life talking of the show and when it is listened to on the radio.

The Archers

The Archers is a soap opera radio drama, that releases every day at 2pm and at 7pm except for Sunday’s. On Sundays the Archers release an omnibus which is the summary of all the episodes that week into a 1-hour long episode. The episodes that are released everyday are no longer than 13 minutes. The audience of this radio show are most popularly white elderly women who are over the age of 50, and who live in England. The most popular people watch the Archer is on the BBC website or on BBC sounds. You can also watch this radio show through Spotify and TuneIn on your mobile device.

The show starts off with the presenter introducing the show then the theme song plays and then cuts straight into the scenes where the dramas play out. The scenes have some drama for example the electricians, but the scenes also do cut the other scenes and to different storylines.

With the BBC remit the purpose of this radio show is for entertainment and for education. As the main purpose being entertainment for the audience listening to it. But the education side would be with what factual things the characters say for example about cleaning and farming etc.

Episode: 29/01/2024

The content of the show is that it starts off with dialogue where the host Roifield Brown introduces the show and says where the audience is watching it on. Then a theme tune starts playing a jolly theme tune for about 20 seconds then straight away cuts into a scene. The scene was about two people cleaning and talking about electricians who aren’t doing their job quick enough because if they don’t someone’s show won’t go on. Another person enters the scene asking about the electricians, and asking to pass on a message to the person who’s the show was, to tell them that they can’t be a model anymore. And the two ladies won’t tell the show owner the guy’s message because they don’t want to get on her bad side so they tell him that he has to tell her by himself and then he shouts “Oh BLIMEY” as he is frustrated and knows that the woman will kill him. The scene then changes to a man and a woman in the pub talking about how, apart, from the electrics they will be able to start the pub back up, then changes to another scene of the same man and woman coming outside to see the two women from the start of the episode washing the woman’s car. One of the women is trying to splash the other with water saying that she hasn’t helped her and we hear her do so because of the sound of laughter and splashing noises assuming that the water is being thrown around. The two then get told that they will be able to open up the pub again and we can physically hear a sound of joy, making the audience listening at home feel happy for the pub workers as they eagerly say that they will go home and put on their work clothes while also spreading the word that the pub is opening again. After this display of joy, we then have a time jump, where we are now in the pub. We hear them talking about how they’re going to take the empty glasses out back and they then start discussing how they should announce the winner of the drinking competition, one of the men asks everyone to be quiet where he then promptly announces the winner. This ends the episode and it is then followed out by the end music which slowly fades away. Throughout the episode there are no breaks and no more narration other than the announcement at the very start, this gives the episode a more of a flow, where people can listen to 13 minutes about everything that is happening without any breaks and distractions, just a whole storyline for 13 minutes.

There are some meanings created by the programme but not many. There are some dramatisations, with all the sound effects of something clattering down or something doing something. It also is the background noise of what happens, so if it is windy if their outside or if its raining, or if there is shouting etc. The programme uses sound to give the effect that the audience listening is inside of the show and is with the characters in the scene.

The mode of address from the presenter the Host was the mild tone to introduce the radio show and announce what station the audience was listening on. The actors in different situations have different modes of address it just depends on what happens at that moment in time. So if someone was having a conversation with someone about something it was just be a normal conversation with normal address, no shouting etc, but if on the otherhand something has happened or someone did something bad there could be some shouting or some arguing, but in all actual fact there is usually the same form of address where everyone address everyone respectfully.

The Archers characters

A selection of major characters from The Archers.

· Archers - Brookfield Farm branch

Jill Archer

Played by Patricia Greene

Leonard Berry

Played by Paul Copley

Ruth Archer

Played by Felicity Finch

David Archer

Played by Timothy Bentinck

Pip Archer