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Concentration spans have gone to the dogs with the advent of the internet.   Minds race across a  variety of media content and digest small snippets to form judgements.  It’s rare people take the time to sit and come to grips with the more complex picture organisations strive to communicate in traditional printed reports or other publications.  To over come this, DCTV staff have assisted a variety of groups in making viral videos that present snappy and immediate messages that can command and grip event the shortest audience attention.

Coming in at the well reasonable €4,000 mark, these pieces make the perfect organisational tool, and they work on many levels.  People we’ve worked with have used them as the ideal jump off point for an induciton meeting, or simply as a “digital handshake” that permeates through out the social networks of their staff and members.

We’ve made such videos for the Dublin City Community Forum, SIPTU, National Institute for Intellectual Disability, Busy Bees, Front Line Staff Alliance, Disability Focus Group,  Computer Club House, Bike Polo Ireland, Dublin Food Co-Op, Aontas.

We’ve even been involved in some that were so effective we had to keep them out of the public eye!

In this age of high media turn over, the sound byte and the roar of celebrity culture – its quite difficult to hear any sensible debate take place in the main stream media.  With talk shows dominated by expert panels, talking heads and those in power, its rare to see people from the ground or marginal communities get an inch in to have their say.  Whenever they do appear, usually their contribution is already framed to suit a particular narrative or thread of discussion.  Often, this is totally against the wishes of the contributor – but that’s how the media plays it.  This course is dedicated to tearing aside the sanctity of the media and highlighting the game it really is.  Through a combination of collective class room discussion, and hands on role playing in our fully digital modern studio, this course arms participants with the critical tools and experiences needed to play the media at their own game.

Making television can be really complex – but as a whole range of community groups proved during 2009 with our Community in a Studio programme it can also be quite simple. We’ve put together a basic package that replicates the model of the studio discussion shows shot during this project at the low price  of €1,500 which can be added into your budget for a launch or a report. Add this to a hundred professionally produced DVDs for another €500 and you have the most effective member communication possible.  You can read more about this offer here.  Oh and if all that technical studio jargon daunts you, don’t worry we’ve got this handy little comic that tears away the mystery!

Community Television is a collective medium – we produce it together and are only too happy to hear about people coming together to watch, discuss and, hopefully, be encouraged to make their own media. As long as its non-commercial (i.e. you are covering costs but not making loads) we are happy for anybody to include DCTVs material in screenings. Generally we are also happy to help get someone to turn up and talk about the projects with a bit of notice. If you wanted to support the ongoing production of community television a collection or DVD sale on the night is a nice way to get people involved.  We’ve a wide range of content in our archive and there should be something to suit all themes.

Note: Have a look at our current projects page for projects that may already have screenings organised or to tell us about yours.

Sometimes when a conversation takes place, obvious faces are missing from contributing.  The exchanges and content is lost to all but those that participated directly.   Through our work with people in community and the adult education sector,  DCTV devised a mechanism that breaks down the studio space into something of more collaborative and horizontal form that can be used to capture seminars, mini-conferences, retreats  or free form discussions.   We did this by breaking out of the standard TV studio model where a panel a face a bank of cameras, instead trying to create a space that was inclusive and communal.

The centre piece is a 3 part circular bench that was purposely built for DCTV that facilitates discussions of up to 13 people. By using the full scope of the studio along with a ceiling camera we can film a larger group talking which, we feel, fits better with the idea of creating formats and spaces that are open to much more collective explorations of ideas and identities. The circle tends to hold the energy in the group and, with good facilitation, is a much more relaxed way to have a discussion show than standard TV formats. The benefits of using this format as a means of opening up conversations in your organisation to a larger set of participants should be obvious!