An Eye for News Chapter 19
Se Cai shrugged Xu Ran’s
hostility off. “Director Bai, I know you have complete faith on Zhang Xin Yu’s
capability and she has a shining track record, so you really don’t need me
there,” he pleaded.
“Listen to me, Se Cai. The time
is ticking and I won’t allow any mistake to happen. If let’s say today Xin Yu
slips up, we’ll be wasting another 20 minutes, do you have any idea how serious
that will be?”
Director Bai warned in an
uncharacteristically stern voice. Se Cai lowered his head in defeat. With script
in hand, he knocked on the dubbing studio’s door.
“Come in.”
Xin Yu said as she put down the
heavy
Xin Yu stumbled across an
unfamiliar word in one of her scripts and she was researching its p.r.o.nunciation
in the dictionary.
The anchors we see on tv exudes
confidence and fluency in their language but that comes from intensive
behind-the-scene research.
Se Cai realized this had become
such a force of habit among the anchors that they would flip out their phone to
check an unfamiliar word in everyday life.
“It’s you?”
Xin Yu fixed a level gaze at Se
Cai as he walked in. She added coldly, “You left your hard-disc in here, take
it with you when you leave.”
She surrept.i.tiously kicked a bag
deeper into the shadows under her table.
Se Cai enhanced eye sight saw
that it was the bag he sat on that morning.
“It was really an accident what
happened this morning…”
Se Cai found himself explaining
again.
“Save your explanations. Give me
the script, I’ll call you when I’m done.”
The rebuff annoyed Se Cai.
He had tried multiple times to
offer explanation but she refused to listen, plus at the end of the day, he did
save her once, couldn’t they just call it even?
He was indignant but replied as calmly
as he could, “Do you think I wanted this? Not everyone is like Xu Ran, ready at
your beck and call. I’m here because Director Bai wants me to supervise you, to
make sure that you don’t do any mistakes.”
“You? Supervise me?”
Xin Yu spat contemptuously, “Your
Standard Chinese is barely presentable, I doubt you can pa.s.s the exam with B1
grade and he has you supervise me? You must be kidding.”
Xin Yu wasn’t just picking
fights for no reason, her expertise was acknowledged by the whole station.
Previous anchors tend to slur,
stutter or slip during tapings and they would have to conduct repeat takes to
compile a presentable reel. Xin Yu though was a consummate professional. Even
Manager Wei joked she could be doing it live.
“Even a broken clock gets the
time correct twice a day. Who can really say I will not be of any use. Plus
this news is going to the central station so can you hurry it up?”
Se Cai dropped his civility and threw
the script on her table. He pulled a chair and crossed his legs, making a show
of his impatience.
“Fine!”
Xin Yu’s temper flared in
response.
However, her professionalism quickly
took over. She took a deep breath to calm herself. Scanning the script, she
stood before the microphone ready to start.
“Be careful don’t get the names
wrong. Especially the commissioner’s. G.o.d knows he’s not someone our station
can slight.”
Se Cai added.
“The new commissioner? Do you
think I would perform rookie mistake like p.r.o.nouncing his surname as Jie?
Please.”
Xin Yu snorted in derision.
To her surprise, Se Cai tutted
and shook his head, “It’s not p.r.o.nounced Jie or Xie, but Sai.”
“Sai? I remember that’s a
surname for a minority race northern-west side of the country, are you sure?”
Xin Yu frowned and she asked, “The
commissioner has been here for more than half a month, everyone, including the
current news crew calls him Commissioner Xie. What makes you say it’s called
Sai?”
“The fact that it’s common doesn’t
mean that it’s correct. It’s in fact because people kept calling him Xie that
he had no choice but to accept it.”
Se Cai sighed, “I got all these
from his driver. That’s all I’m going to say, it’s up to you whether you want
to believe me or not.”
After that, Se Cai stood up and
left the room.
Se Cai was filled to the brim
with anger. It was out of the kindness of his heart that he gave Xin Yu the pointer.
She not only didn’t thank him but suspect him? Se Cai tried to push it out of
his mind because at the end of the day, it would not be him that will be
questioned on the p.r.o.nunciation.
However, when the voiceover was
completed and Se Cai heard it, he found out she eventually took his advice by
calling him Commissioner Sai.
Se Cai threw himself into the
rest of his work and the little incident was quickly forgotten.
“Se Cai, the liaison department
is rushing us, quickly send them the news!”
After some time, Se Cai picked up
his phone and heard Director Bai yelled at him.
His heart skipped a beat. The
fact that the liaison department was rushing them meant that the news was
definitely going through to the province tv station.
Since Xu Ran gave up on joining
the script, this meant that Se Cai had full ownership of the writer’s
remuneration.
If it was any other day, Se Cai
would be beside himself with joy since this was the first news of his career to
get broadcasted on province news station.
However, their aim for this
particular piece of news was the central news station. As long as the central
news people didn’t arrive with a message, Se Cai knew it was still too early to
celebrate.
“I got it, Director Bai. It’s
almost ready, rendering the film as we speak!”
Se Cai yelled while sitting at
his desk. He was doing finishing touches on the newsreel’s editing.
With a background in computer science, Se Cai
had no issue handling the different editing software.
The news producing process
starts with the reporters heading out to gather information, then script-writing,
and amending. After that, it’s dubbing by the anchor followed by compilation of
the newsreel by pairing cut footage with the dubs. The product is the rendered
film.
Of course, the rendered film
still had to go through the attending press supervisor before it could be used
in broadcast. Se Cai was on the last few legs of this process.
In bigger stations, there would
be clear segmentation of roles. The reporters handled the material collecting,
while compilation was left in the hands of the editors.
However, since County S Tv
Station was so understaffed, they only had 2 editors. The reporters had to do
the additional work of rendering their films before the editors would start
with post-production like adding subt.i.tles.
“The film’s finished rendering!”
Se Cai let loose a long sigh.
After copying the film into his hard drive, he ran as fast as possible to hand
it over to the editor.