So, I’ve spent the last two weeks interning at the Australia Talks program at Radio National. My cunning plan to not post anything until the last day has got some of you wondering what I’ve been up to, I can see. So…on with the show!

I was a bit worried after my first day, as I didn’t really have any program ideas that could last for a whole hour. But as the fortnight has gone on, I’ve done a lot of work chasing up guests, and also finding them for myself thanks to Twitter and a service called Sourcebottle which all journos should know about.

I’ve done a fair bit of work on a program about gap years. This included finding two of the guests myself through the Sourcebottle service, and going to the University of Queensland to do some vox pops with students. That vox pop went to air – you can listen to it here. This one minute of radio took about five hours to produce.

I also had to find the material for and plan two montages of clips from 3D movies: one montage was from old films, and one from modern ones. Once again, each one took hours to do. I worked closely with Karin Zsivanovits (who was our guest lecturer in the last lecture we had in the library before the mid-semester break) on these – she showed me a LOT about how to get them sounding very good. This was very helpful for me; I’ve done a fair few audio clips for Triple Z but nothing this complex before, and I learned a lot about clip quality.

The main things I’ve done have been background research, coming with with ideas for questions to ask and lining up guests – I’ve personally spoke to and lined up five guests, and come up with ideas and contact details for another nine or so potentials.

I’ve also done the first drafts of some promos to be read on air.

I’ve had some great feedback – Karin said I’ve been able to deliver more than was expected, which was great to hear.

Right now, I’d better get back to what I’m doing: I’m drafting a plan for an entire show. Sweet.