UNIT 2:

SYLLABUS:

Unit-2. Television: Television as Medium of Mass Communication, Characteristics, Ownership, organizational structure of Doordarshan, Satellite Television channels, Cable Television, Educational Television, Commercial Television, Television Script Writing, Basic of Television Production, Television Reporting, News Bulletins

Television:

Television, often referred to as TV, is a visual medium that transmits moving images and sound to viewers. It consists of a combination of audiovisual elements such as programs, commercials, news broadcasts, documentaries, and more. Television content is transmitted through electromagnetic waves to television sets, allowing viewers to access a wide range of programming options.

Television is the most popular form of media today, attracting more viewers than any other medium. It appeals to people of all ages, backgrounds, and social statuses because it combines sight and sound to create vivid, immediate experiences. Through television, people can share common experiences, making it a powerful tool for communication. Television works by converting real-life scenes into electronic images, just like how radio converts sound into signals. These images are transmitted through space, picked up by antennas, and displayed on television screens. This technology has transformed television into a persuasive mass communication medium. In India, television has played a significant role in showcasing the country's cultural heritage and diverse perspectives. It has reached remote villages and tribal areas, bringing information and entertainment to people who previously had limited access to media. Over the years, television has evolved technologically and expanded its reach, becoming a vital tool for education and community development. Television offers flexibility and mobility in its coverage, making it a family-friendly medium. It can depict complex concepts through visual and audio presentations, making it suitable for educational programs, documentaries, and entertainment shows. Additionally, television serves as a source of credible information and is considered trustworthy by viewers. Since its inception in India in 1959, television has undergone significant developments, from experimental educational programs to commercial broadcasts. It has been instrumental in promoting scientific knowledge, rural development, and national integration. With the launch of channels like Kisaan Channel, specifically for farmers, television continues to evolve as a powerful medium for disseminating information and shaping public opinion. In conclusion, television is a sophisticated mass communication medium that serves a diverse audience with a wide range of content, from educational programs to entertainment shows. It has the potential to bridge the gap between urban and rural populations, disseminate valuable information, and influence social change on a large scale.

Television as Medium of Mass Communication:

Television is a vital medium of mass communication, connecting millions of people worldwide with information, entertainment, and cultural content.

1. Visual Communication:

   - Television communicates messages through moving images and sounds, making it a powerful visual medium. Viewers can see events, people, places, and emotions unfold in real-time or recorded formats.

   - Example: Viewers watch news anchors reporting breaking news events, actors performing in TV dramas, and athletes competing in sports broadcasts.

2. Wide Reach and Audience Engagement:

   - Television reaches a vast audience across different demographics, including age, gender, socioeconomic status, and cultural backgrounds. It has become a common fixture in households worldwide, providing access to diverse content.

   - Example: Families gather around the TV during prime time to watch their favorite shows, creating shared viewing experiences and discussions.

3. Variety of Content:

   - Television offers a wide variety of content genres to cater to diverse viewer interests. These include news programs, TV series, movies, documentaries, sports broadcasts, reality shows, talk shows, and educational programs.

   - Example: Viewers can switch between channels to watch a cricket match on sports channels, a cooking show on lifestyle channels, or a historical documentary on educational channels.

4. Entertainment and Cultural Influence:

   - Television serves as a primary source of entertainment, influencing popular culture and shaping societal norms. TV shows, music videos, and advertisements reflect and contribute to cultural trends, values, and beliefs.

   - Example: Bollywood movies and TV serials portray Indian traditions, family dynamics, and social issues, influencing fashion, language, and lifestyle choices.

5. News and Information Dissemination:

   - Television plays a crucial role in delivering news and information to the public, keeping viewers informed about current events, politics, weather forecasts, and global developments. News channels provide live coverage and analysis of breaking news stories.

   - Example: Channels like NDTV, Aaj Tak, and Times Now broadcast live updates on elections, natural disasters, and major political events, keeping viewers informed and engaged.

6. Advertising and Commercialization:

   - Television serves as a platform for advertisers to reach a mass audience and promote products, services, and brands. Commercial breaks interrupt programming to air advertisements targeted at specific consumer demographics.

   - Example: Brands advertise their products during popular TV shows, sporting events, and reality competitions to capture viewers' attention and drive sales.

7. Educational and Informative Programming:

   - Television offers educational programming aimed at informing and enlightening viewers about various subjects, including science, history, nature, and technology. Documentaries, educational channels, and children's programs foster learning and curiosity.

   - Example: Educational channels like National Geographic, Discovery, and History Channel air documentaries and informative programs on wildlife, space exploration, and historical events, expanding viewers' knowledge and understanding.

In summary, television serves as a dynamic medium of mass communication, offering visual content, engaging storytelling, and diverse programming to entertain, inform, and influence audiences worldwide. Its widespread availability, accessibility, and cultural impact make it a cornerstone of modern media and communication.

Characteristics:

1. Visual Medium:

Television communicates information, ideas, and entertainment through moving images and sounds. Viewers can see and hear the content simultaneously, enhancing their understanding and engagement.

2. Mass Reach:

Television has the ability to reach a vast audience, spanning across different demographics, regions, and socio-economic backgrounds. It can broadcast content to millions of households simultaneously, making it a highly influential medium for mass communication.

3. Variety of Content:

Television offers a wide range of content, including news, sports, entertainment, documentaries, dramas, sitcoms, reality shows, and educational programs. This diversity caters to the varied interests and preferences of viewers.

4. Real-time and Pre-recorded:

Television programs can be broadcast live in real-time, allowing viewers to watch events and shows as they happen. Additionally, pre-recorded content can be aired at scheduled times, providing flexibility in programming.

5. Visual Storytelling:

Television excels in visual storytelling, using a combination of moving images, dialogues, music, and special effects to convey narratives and evoke emotions. This makes television programs engaging and immersive for viewers.

6. Advertising Platform:

Television serves as a significant platform for advertising, allowing businesses and organizations to promote their products, services, and messages to a large audience. Television commercials, sponsorships, and product placements are common forms of advertising on TV.

7. Entertainment and Information:

Television fulfills the dual role of entertaining and informing viewers. While entertainment programs offer relaxation and enjoyment, news, documentaries, and educational shows provide valuable information, knowledge, and awareness on various subjects.

8. Influence and Impact:

Television has a profound influence on society, shaping opinions, attitudes, and behaviors of individuals and communities. It can impact public opinion, cultural norms, political discourse, and social trends, making it a powerful tool for social change and advocacy.

9. Accessibility:

Television is accessible to a wide audience, including those in remote areas with electricity and broadcasting infrastructure. With the availability of cable, satellite, and digital television services, viewers have access to a diverse range of channels and programs.

10. Family Entertainment:

Television often serves as a source of family entertainment, bringing households together to watch favorite shows, movies, and events. It fosters social bonding and shared experiences among family members.

In summary, television is a visual and influential medium of mass communication that offers diverse content, reaches a vast audience, and has a significant impact on society, culture, and individuals' lives. Its characteristics make it an essential tool for entertainment, information dissemination, advertising, and social communication.

Additional:

Television's Unique Characteristics

Television, with its special qualities, stands out as a remarkable medium for reaching a large audience. Let's explore its distinct features:

Audio-Visual Medium

One of television's standout features is its ability to combine both sound and visuals. This dual sensory experience helps create strong impressions and emotional connections with viewers.

Mass Medium

Television is particularly effective in transmitting messages to a broad audience. In countries like India, where there's a wide gap in literacy levels, television becomes crucial for spreading social messages to diverse audiences.

Example: The Swachh Bharat Abhiyan, launched in 2014, gained significant traction through television, promoting cleanliness and influencing public attitudes.

Educational Medium

Television has long been recognized as an effective educational tool. Initiatives like the Satellite Instructional Television Experiment (SITE) and the Countrywide Classroom Programmes have used television to educate people on various topics such as health, agriculture, and national integration.

Borrowed Features

Television combines elements from different media forms, such as movement from stage performances, cameras from films, and microphones from radio broadcasts. This integration creates a unique medium with diverse capabilities.

Wide Reach and Credibility

Television's extensive reach and credibility have transformed the world into a global village. Its ability to convey diverse ideas, from politics to sports, has made it a powerful tool for shaping public opinion.

Glamorous Medium

Television often showcases glamorous personalities, fashion events, and celebrity lifestyles, captivating millions of viewers. However, its allure can also lead to addiction among some audiences.

Medium of Close-Ups

Television's small screen size makes it ideal for close-up shots of human faces, expressions, and interactions. This intimacy enhances storytelling and engages viewers on a personal level.

Domestic Medium

Unlike cinema, television can be enjoyed from the comfort of one's home, fostering a sense of intimacy and connection among family members.

Democratizing Medium

Television democratizes information and entertainment by catering to people from all walks of life. Its programming reflects the diverse interests and concerns of society.

Medium of Immediacy

Television's live broadcasting capabilities allow it to capture and transmit events as they happen, providing viewers with real-time information and visuals.

Influence of Advertisers

Television serves as a powerful platform for advertisers to promote their products and services to a wide audience, making it a key driver of consumerism in modern society.

Ownership:

Concentration of media ownership means that fewer and fewer people or groups are taking control of more and more of the mass media, like TV, newspapers, and websites. Recent studies show that this trend is getting stronger, with only a handful of big companies dominating many media industries.

Media ownership is like having a lot of power over what information people get, either directly or indirectly. When one media company buys another, it's called a media merger. And when just a few big companies control most of the market, it's called an oligopoly.

There exist some very basic ownership Patterns.

Different Ownership Patterns

Individual Ownership Pattern:

In this type of ownership, one person has control over a media company. They make all the decisions and are responsible for everything. This setup works well for small media businesses like local newspapers or news channels. For example, "The News Today" is a newspaper in Chennai that covers various topics like news, politics, and travel.

[Advantages] The owner has full control, which allows for quick decision-making and a strong connection to the content.

[Disadvantages] Lack of employee involvement, owner is solely responsible for debts and losses, limited room for growth.

Partnership Ownership Pattern:

Partnership means two or more people share ownership of a business. There are general partnerships where all partners share equal responsibility and limited partnerships where some partners have less responsibility. Red Chilies Entertainment, led by Shah Rukh Khan and Gauri Khan, is an example of a partnership in India. They produce and distribute movies and have various divisions like film production and television shows.

[Advantages] Responsibilities and costs can be divided among partners, diverse talents contribute to company growth.

[Disadvantages] Selfish motives of partners can harm the business, disagreements may lead to losses, business continuity may be affected by partner deaths.

Corporation:

A corporation is a common ownership structure where a group of people, at least five, form a legal entity separate from its members. BBC is an example of a corporation, operating across web portals, television, and radio. While corporations allow for easy expansion and flexible control transfer, they face corporate taxes.

Group/Chain Ownership:

This ownership type involves one organization managing multiple media outlets without a common holding structure. For example, HT Media owns Hindustan newspaper and channels like Aaj Tak and Headlines Today. Centralized management reduces production costs, but divided management raises questions about stability.

Employee Ownership Pattern:

Here, employees own a significant part of the company and make decisions. An example is VOICES, a community radio advocacy group in Bangalore. While this fosters a sense of ownership and faster issue resolution, it can hinder new hires and quick decision-making.

Vertical Ownership Pattern:

An organization owns or operates various media or enterprises under the same ownership. For instance, India Today Group owns magazines, newspapers, and TV channels. While promoting diverse enterprises, management may struggle to prioritize, and some media forms may lack attention.

Prevalent Ownership Pattern

(The prevalent ownership pattern refers to the most common ways in which media organizations are owned and operated. It includes various types of ownership structures such as conglomerates, companies, and trusts, which are widespread in the media industry.)

The 3 types of prevalent ownership patterns are Conglomerate, Company and Trust.

1) Conglomerate Ownership Pattern:

A conglomerate combines two or more companies from different industries under one corporate umbrella. A media conglomerate, for instance, owns various media businesses like TV, radio, and internet platforms. Examples include Viacom, Living Media Ltd., and The Walt Disney Company. Viacom, for instance, owns Nickelodeon, Paramount Pictures, MTV, Comedy Central, and VH1. While diversification reduces investment risks and balances downturns in one area with successes in another, lack of focus and cultural clashes can impact its value due to additional layers of management.

2) Company Ownership Pattern:

In this type of ownership, a company directly owns the media. Such companies usually have shares listed on the stock market. For example, HT Media has shares in stock exchanges like BSE and NSE. Companies like Reliance have stakes in media entities such as GBN (Global Broadcast News), which operates channels like CNN-IBN and IBN7.

3) Trust Ownership Pattern:

A trust holds property for the benefit of others. The Tribune Trust, established in 1881 by Mr. Sardar Singh Majithia, is an example. It's managed by five trustees and publishes newspapers like The Punjabi Tribune and Dainik Tribune. Trust ownership focuses on welfare rather than profit-making, emphasizing real news over sensationalism. While it promotes harmony and minimizes clashes, it may face funding shortages and take longer to reach audiences as it avoids promotional activities.

Media Ownership Concentration

Media ownership concentration, also called media consolidation or convergence, is a process where fewer individuals or organizations gradually take control of more of the mass media. Recent studies show this trend is increasing, with many media industries now dominated by just a few big companies.

Mergers:

Media mergers happen when one media company buys another. When only a small number of firms dominate a market, it's called an oligopoly.

Risks to Media Integrity:

Media integrity is threatened when a small number of companies and people control the media market. Media integrity means a media outlet can serve the public interest and democratic process well, resisting corruption, influence from the economy, conflicting interests, and political manipulation.

Threat to Net Neutrality:

When big companies merge in the media industry, it can put net neutrality in danger. Net neutrality means there are no restrictions on internet content. But when these big businesses support political campaigns financially, they can influence what gets shown on their platforms. They might favor their own political views or restrict access to opposing views, which goes against net neutrality.

Issues: Freedom of the Press and Editorial Independence:

Johannes von Dohnanyi, in a report from 2003 by the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE)'s Office of the Representative on Freedom of the Media, said we should keep a close eye on media ownership concentration. When ownership is too concentrated horizontally (in one area) or vertically (from production to distribution), it can be bad for media diversity and make it hard for new competitors to enter the market. To protect free and independent journalism, we need rules that guarantee editorial independence, better job protections for journalists, and independent organizations to make sure the laws are followed.

Deregulation:

Robert W. McChesney says that media ownership concentration happens because of deregulation, which is when governments relax rules to let businesses make more money. This allows media companies to merge, which makes them more profitable, lowers risks, and helps them stay ahead of competitors. Some people think deregulation is good because it removes barriers that stop businesses from growing. But others say it hurts consumers and prevents countries from building their own strong media companies because of cultural barriers and subsidies.

Critics of media deregulation worry that it will make information less diverse and hold media companies less accountable to the public. They think when media companies become too big, they'll only provide information that won't challenge their power, leaving people less informed.

Media Pluralism:

When a few big companies own most of the media, it makes media less diverse. This means fewer different opinions about politics, culture, and society. Media pluralism isn't just about who owns the media, but also about things like freedom of the press, how journalists are treated, and whether different voices are heard. Pluralism can happen inside one media company, where they show different views, or outside, where there are many different media outlets. Media ownership can make it hard for pluralism when owners control what journalists say, but in a free market, owners have to make choices to stay competitive.

Organizational structure of Doordarshan: 

About Doordarshan

• Doordarshan is a Public Service Broadcaster under ‘Prasar Bharati’.

• It provides Television services in the country in Terrestrial as well as satellite mode.

• Television was separated from the All India Radio (AIR) in 1976.

• Doordarshan is one of the media units of the Ministry Information and Broadcasting, Government of India.

• Doordarshan was established with a motive of public service broadcasting, whose main aims were to inform, to educate and to entertain the masses.

Motto of Doordarshan

The motto of Doordarshan is “Satyam Shivam Sundaram” which translates as: The Truth is The God and The God is Beautiful’.

Fundamental of Doordarshan

Doordarshan is headed by a Director General (DG), who is an ex-officio member of Prasar Bharati Board. Currently, Supriya Sahu is posted as the Director-general of Doordarshan. Engineering activities in Doordarshan are supervised by Engineer-in-Chief (E-in-C), assisted byAdditional Director Generals (ADGs). Doordarshan is an Indian public service broadcaster, a division of Prasar Bharti. It has a 3 tier programme services- National, Regional and Local. Doordarshan is presently operating 26 channels. 

Three-tier programs service of Doordarshan

 • It has three-tier programme service- National, Regional and Local.

 • The National Programmes include news, current affairs, services, culture magazines, sports, music, dance, drama, serial, culture magazines, sports, music, dance, drama, serial and feature films. 

• The regional programmes are produced in the language and the idiom of the particular state.

 • The local programmes are area specific and cover local issues featuring local people.

Explanation of organizational structure of doordarshan

• Director General of Doordarshan is responsible for the overall administration of the Doordarshan network.

• Doordarshan is divided into four wings: Programme, News, Engineering and Administration and Finance.

•• Programme using deals with all aspects relating to programme conception, production and procurement at the national, regional and local level.

• News wing puts out news bulletins and other current affairs programmes at the national and regional level.

• Engineering wing deals with all the hardware requirements of the entire network including the space segment and the studios, transmitters etc.

• Administration and Finance using deals with the administrative and financial aspects including general administration, personal management, budget and plan coordination.

• The overall head of all the departments in doordarshan is Director General.

• The rank of the Director General of Doordarshan is equivalent to that of the Director General of All India Radio, while earlier it was not the case.

•  In Doordarshan, the Director General heads the Department of programme and Administration.

• His main job is to supervise, guide, govern and control the entire functioning of the department.

He is assisted by

• Additional Director General and Deputy Director General (Development)

Deputy Director General (News and current affairs)

Deputy Director General (Communication and film)

Director (Finance and Personnel control).

Deputy Director general (Production and Transmission)

 

In addition to that there is a large number of staff in Doordarshan which are directly associated with pre-production, production and post production. These staff members are- Programme producer, programme executive, video engineer, vision control operator, Lighting engineer, cameraman, vision mixer, studio engineers, Make-up supervisors, script designer, program Assistant, production assistant, Audio control manager, MIC boom operator, script writer etc.

Satellite Television Channels:

Satellite television is a service that delivers television programming to viewers by relaying it from a communications satellite orbiting the Earth directly to the viewer's location. The signals are received via an outdoor parabolic antenna commonly referred to as a satellite dish and a low-noise block downconverter.

A satellite receiver then decodes the desired television program for viewing on a television set. Receivers can be external set-top boxes, or a built-in television tuner. Satellite television provides a wide range of channels and services. It is usually the only television available in many remote geographic areas without terrestrial television or cable television service. Satellite television (satellite TV) is a particular kind of broadcast delivery based on using space satellites to deliver signals. Companies make use of satellites that have been sent out of the Earth's atmosphere by beaming a signal up to the satellite and delivering it to individual customers via the use of receiving equipment.

The basic setup for a satellite TV involves a satellite dish, also called a "parabolic reflector antenna," along with a "low-noise block down converter" and a receiver. Satellite TV helps deliver signals in areas where customers may not be served by cable television or "terrestrial" broadcasting.

Satellite TV generally uses two different frequency sets to deliver signals. One is the Ku band, a dedicated channel for satellite TV communications. A type of satellite TV known as direct-broadcast satellite TV (DBSTV) often uses the Ku band. Other analog "big dish" systems use the lower C band, which is also used for certain other kinds of technologies. Although the Ku band is the dedicated channel for satellite TV, the C band can help signals withstand some interruptions, such as signal disruption from inclement weather.

The satellite TV channels flow to your TV through a satellite placed into orbit course on the curved path of the axis of gravitation around the earth. The axis is the imaginary reference line which is fixed around the earth through which it rotates once every 24 hours. This is why enterprises curve the dish, or the parabola to gravitate the waves of signals from the satellite to flow through it to the receiver and then the receiver transmits them to the TV.

So, the satellite is a space station, or a space capsule, which is an artificial celestial body that works technically for this effect to take place. However, it effects in other different matters, such as the development of sciences and spaying, which effects our lives daily.

The use of satellites has exceeded nowadays everything they are supposed to do. Some of them are placed on that spot for observing, tracking and predicting. Others are for optimizing performance of many scientific elements. Some are for computers and televisions.

Technology:

The satellites used for broadcasting television are usually in a geostationary orbit 37,000 km (23,000 mi) above the earth's equator. The advantage of this orbit is that the satellite's orbital period equals the rotation rate of the Earth, so the satellite appears at a fixed position in the sky. Thus, the satellite dish antenna which receives the signal can be aimed permanently at the location of the satellite, and does not have to track a moving satellite. A few systems instead use a highly elliptical orbit with inclination of +/−63.4 degrees and orbital period of about twelve hours, known as a Molniya orbit.

Satellite television, like other communications relayed by satellite, starts with a transmitting antenna located at an uplink facility. Uplink satellite dishes are very large, as much as 9 to 12 meters (30 to 40 feet) in diameter. The increased diameter results in more accurate aiming and increased signal strength at the satellite. The uplink dish is pointed toward a specific satellite and the uplinked signals are transmitted within a specific frequency range, so as to be received by one of the transponders tuned to that frequency range aboard that satellite. The transponder re-transmits the signals back to Earth at a different frequency (a process known as translation, used to avoid interference with the uplink signal), typically in the 10.7-12.7 GHz band, but some still transmit in the C-band (4–8 GHz), Ku-band (12–18 GHz), or both. The leg of the signal path from the satellite to the receiving Earth station is called the downlink.

Direct-to-home and direct broadcast satellite

Direct-to-home (DTH) can either refer to the communications satellites themselves that deliver service or the actual television service. Most satellite television customers in developed television markets get their programming through a direct broadcast satellite (DBS) provider. Signals are transmitted using Ku band (12 to 18 GHz) and are completely digital which means it has high picture and stereo sound quality.

Programming for satellite television channels comes from multiple sources and may include live studio feeds. The broadcast center assembles and packages programming into channels for transmission and, where necessary, encrypts the channels. The signal is then sent to the uplink where it is transmitted to the satellite. With some broadcast centers, the studios, administration and up-link are all part of the same campus. The satellite then translates and broadcasts the channels.

Cable Television:

Cable television is a system of delivering television programming to consumers via radio frequency (RF) signals transmitted through coaxial cables, or in more recent systems, light pulses through fibre-optic cables. This contrasts with broadcast television (also known as terrestrial television), in which the television signal is transmitted over-the-air by radio waves and received by a television antenna attached to the television; or satellite television, in which the television signal is transmitted over-the-air by radio waves from a communications satellite orbiting the Earth, and received by a satellite dish antenna on the roof. FM radio programming, high-speed Internet, telephone services, and similar non-television services may also be provided through these cables.

The abbreviation CATV is often used for cable television. It originally stood for Community Access Television or Community Antenna Television, from cable television's origins in 1948. In areas where over-the-air TV reception was limited by distance from transmitters or mountainous terrain, large "community antennas" were constructed, and cable was run from them to individual homes.

Cable-television systems originated in the United States in the late 1940s and were designed to improve reception of commercial network broadcasts in remote and hilly areas. During the 1960s they were introduced in many large metropolitan areas where local television reception is degraded by the reflection of signals from tall buildings. Commonly known as community antenna television (CATV), these cable systems use a “community antenna” to receive broadcast signals (often from communications satellites), which they then retransmit via cables to homes and establishments in the local area subscribing to the service. Subscribers pay a specified monthly service charge in addition to an initial installation fee.

Distribution:

To receive cable television at a given location, cable distribution lines must be available on the local utility poles or underground utility lines. Coaxial cable brings the signal to the customer's building through a service drop, an overhead or underground cable. In the most common system, multiple television channels (as many as 500, although this varies depending on the provider's available channel capacity) are distributed to subscriber residences through a coaxial cable, which comes from a trunkline supported on utility poles originating at the cable company's local distribution facility, called the "headend". Many channels can be transmitted through one coaxial cable by a technique called frequency division multiplexing. At the headend, each television channel is translated to a different frequency. By giving each channel a different frequency "slot" on the cable, the separate television signals do not interfere with each other. At an outdoor cable box on the subscriber's residence, the company's service drop cable is connected to cables distributing the signal to different rooms in the building. At each television, the subscriber's television or a set-top box provided by the cable company translates the desired channel back to its original frequency (baseband), and it is displayed onscreen. Due to widespread cable theft in earlier analog systems, the signals are typically encrypted on modern digital cable systems, and the set-top box must be activated by an activation code sent by the cable company before it will function, which is only sent after the subscriber signs up. If the subscriber fails to pay their bill, the cable company can send a signal to deactivate the subscriber's box, preventing reception.

Modern cable systems are large, with a single network and headend often serving an entire metropolitan area. Most systems use hybrid fiber-coaxial (HFC) distribution; this means the trunklines that carry the signal from the headend to local neighborhoods are optical fiber to provide greater bandwidth and also extra capacity for future expansion. At the headend, the electrical signal is translated into an optical signal and sent through the fiber. The fiber trunkline goes to several distribution hubs, from which multiple fibers fan out to carry the signal to boxes called optical nodes in local communities. At the optical node, the optical signal is translated back into an electrical signal and carried by coaxial cable distribution lines on utility poles, from which cables branch out to a series of signal amplifiers and line extenders.

Other Cable Based Services:

Coaxial cables are capable of bi-directional carriage of signals as well as the transmission of large amounts of data. Cable television signals use only a portion of the bandwidth available over coaxial lines. This leaves plenty of space available for other digital services such as cable internet, cable telephony and wireless services, using both unlicensed and licensed spectrum. Broadband internet access is achieved over coaxial cable by using cable modems to convert the network data into a type of digital signal that can be transferred over coaxial cable.

Another feature offered by more and more cable operators is two-way channel capability, which enables subscribers to communicate with programming facilities or information centers within the system. Using the cable connection, home viewers can, for example, participate in public-opinion polls or call up various kinds of written and graphic materials (e.g., citations from reference books, concert schedules, and recipes). The latter feature is offered by systems called videotex.

Cable TV penetration in India:

The TAM Annual Universe Update – 2012 indicates that India has over 148 million households (out of 231 million) with TVs, of which over 126 million have access to CATV or Satellite TV, including 42 million households which are digital subscribers. In Urban India, 88 per cent of all households have a TV and over 70 per cent of all households have access to satellite, cable or DTH services. Households with TVs have been growing between 8 to 10 per cent, while growth in satellite/cable homes exceeded 9 per cent and DTH subscribers grew 63 per cent. CATV households could be higher because of unaccounted for or informal/unregistered cable networks that aren't taken into consideration during mainstream surveys. India now has over 500 TV channels covering all the main languages spoken in the nation.

Educational Television:

Educational television or learning television is the use of television programs in the field of distance education. It may be in the form of individual television programs or dedicated specialty channels that is often associated with cable television in the United States as Public, educational, and government access (PEG) channel providers. There is More... There are also adult education programs for an older audience; many of these are instructional television or "telecourse" services that can be taken for college credit.

Many children's television series are educational, ranging from dedicated learning programs to those that indirectly teach the viewers. Some series are written to have a specific moral behind every episode, often explained at the end by the character that learned the lesson.

In the social aspects of television, several studies have found that educational television has many advantages. The Media Awareness Network, explains in its article, The Good Things about Television, that television can be a very powerful and effective learning tool for children if used wisely. The article states that television can help young people discover where they fit into society, develop closer relationships with peers and family, and teach them to understand complex social aspects of communication.

Since the beginnings of television, educators have endeavored to harness its power to educate a mass audience. This entry examines educational television programs with a particular focus on how to maximize their effectiveness. Researchers have generally defined educational television programs as those programs that focused on academic content areas that are taught in schools, such as reading, mathematics, science, and social studies. In contrast, prosocial television programs have been considered to be those that taught positive social interaction skills, self-control and achievement behaviors, and creative fantasy and imaginative play. Some researchers, however, have defined educational content broadly to include both educational and prosocial programs.

Role of Television in Education:

Television is adaptable and can follow different approaches when used in the different educational situations. The medium is used for formal, non-formal and informal education. To support formal education, television usually function as supportive and reinforcement tool. Television can be attached with school curriculum and time tables. When systematically organized it takes the form of school broadcast. In non-formal education, television has a more specific role to play. When used as a part of multi-media communication tool, television can directly or indirectly teach the subject matter.

Role of television is neither fixed nor easily tangible and measurable. The role is directly related to the question of how the planners are serious and determined to use television. The role could either be enormous or, on the contrary very meager depending upon the specific tasks and available resources. Generally, television can help to achieve the following objectives:

a)      Social quality in education

b)      Enhance quality in education

c)      Reduce dependency on verbal teaching and teachers

d)      Provide flexibility of time and space in learning.

e)      Stimulates learning

f)      Provide mass education opportunities.

The history of “Education Television” in India

When the lockdown happened for the first time, government, public and private schools eventually felt the need for online classes. It was more comfortable for the private schools to ask students to buy gadgets to attend online classes. On the other hand, asking the same to the students from lower-income families would not have been apt for the government schools. At that time, Doordarshan and Swayam Prabha came to the rescue.

The concept of Educational Television is not new in India. It dates back to 1975 when Satellite Instructional Television Experiment (SITE) started transmitting programs to the special satellite-linked TV sets installed in a few villages and towns. Under the program, the common man got access to a range of television programs in different categories, including environment, agriculture and school education. Entertainment was also an important part of the TV programs since the beginning.

Though the response to the set of educational programs was enthusiastic, lack of funding combined with irregular power transmission and lack of proper equipment or trained staff resulted in shelving the project by the end of 1976. TV started to gain popularity among the masses, and eventually, in 1987-88, it reached the peak of popularity at that time due to the telecast of Ramayana serial.

At that time, the demand for education programs rose again. Educational Media Research Centre (EMRC) telecasted educational programs between 1 PM to 2 PM. The programs mainly targeted college students and covered several subjects. These programs were not only loved by the students at home, schools and colleges also held special sessions on their premises where students can watch the programs. Some institutes started to run the programs during break time.

Gyan Darshan channel

Gran Darshan is a joint venture of the Ministry of Education (Previously named as Ministry of Human Resource Development (MHRD)), Ministry of Information & Broadcasting (I&B Ministry) Prasar Bharti, and Indira Gandhi National Open University (IGNOU). The 24-hour educational channel was launched in 2000. The programs on the channels cater to the needs of pre-school, primary, secondary and higher secondary students, college or university students, youth seeking career opportunities, homemakers and working professionals.

In 2016, Doordarshan and IGNOU signed an agreement to telecast four Gyan Darshan channels. Webcast of Gyan Darshan channel is also available on IGNOU’s website. Doordarshan not only has channels for school and college students, but DD Kisan is also among the most popular channels for information related to agriculture.

Swayam Prabha:

Launched on 10th July 2017, Swayam Prabha is a Ministry of Education initiative that provides 32 high-quality educational channels via Direct to Home (DTH) services 24×7. The course content of the programs covers diverse disciplines of distance education. The main aim of these channels is to provide quality learning resources across the country’s length and breadth. Though online classes are happening in every corner of the country, some remote areas do not have access to the high speed or even 2G internet.

Every day Swayam Prabha Channels broadcast new content for at least four hours. The rest of the day, they repeat the previous programs to watch the program as per their convenience.  The content on these channels is provided in association with NPTEL, IITs, UGC, CEC, IGNOU, NCERT and NIOS.

Swayam Prabha channels cover content in various disciplines, including arts, science, commerce, performing arts, humanities, technology, engineering, medicine, agriculture, law, social sciences and more for under-graduate and post-graduate levels.

The state-specific education channels

Doordarshan has regional channels such as DD Uttar Pradesh, DD Chandana (Karnataka), and DD Bihar, among others, that beam educational programs for the children. Some of the channels stream the programs live on YouTube as well so that the students can see them any number of times as per their convenience. These channels are just indictive, and other states, including Tamil Nadu, Kerala and Punjab are doing exceptionally well in providing television-based education to the students.

Commercial Television:

Commercial TV stations are owned privately. They get their money by selling advertising time.  TV stations broadcast commercials every ten minutes. Commercial TV focuses on entertainment, like soap operas, dramas, game shows and reality television. Many of them have their own talk shows, where guests appear and discuss certain topics. Most commercial TV stations offer short news summaries of the day’s events.

Public television stations are owned either by the government or by non-profit organizations. They get their money by collecting fees from their viewers. But they have commercials as well.  These stations offer their viewers a wide range of programs – documentaries, current affairs programs, cultural and other information programs. They show concerts and other big events.

Commercial broadcasting is primarily based on the practice of airing radio advertisements and television advertisements for profit. This is in contrast to public broadcasting, which receives government subsidies and usually does not have paid advertising interrupting the show. During pledge drives, some public broadcasters will interrupt shows to ask for donations.

While commercial broadcasting was unexpected in radio, in television it was planned due to commercial radio's success. Television began with commercial sponsorship and later transformed to paid commercial time. When problems arose over patents and corporate marketing strategies, regulatory decisions were made by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to control commercial broadcasting.

Commercial broadcasting overlaps with paid services such as cable television, radio and satellite television. Such services are generally partially or wholly paid for by local subscribers and is known as leased access. Other programming (particularly on cable television) is produced by companies operating in much the same manner as advertising-funded commercial broadcasters, and they (and often the local cable provider) sell commercial time in a similar manner.

Impact of Commercial Television on our Society:

Between the 1980s and 2000s, commercial television had a profound and wide-ranging impact on our society and culture. It influenced the way that people think about such important social issues as race, gender, and class. It played an important role in the political process, particularly in shaping national election campaigns. Commercial Television helped the society to build its living standards and to maintain their lifestyles. Finally, television helped to spread Indian culture around the world.

At some point, Commercial TV doesn’t have that much of a great impact because after some time, gaining TRP due to the nice and appreciable contents, most of the TV channels starts focusing more on the paid broadcasting and money making through commercials and less on the matter of the subject and content, which results in negative reviews.

Also, now a days Commercial News Channels are having a negative impact on the society because they are mainly focused on money making aspects of the business and less on the real reason of their work, which is to provide knowledge to society with truce in it. This commercialization has also led the news channels to be biased with the news and to alter the news if its not in the favor of their Wallets.

Television Script Writing

Television writing is the art of writing a TV show. Television is an exciting medium for writers because they get to control everything from the stories that are told to how the sets are built. TV writers develop stories, write scripts, make edits and revisions, and help determine what an episode looks like. The TV script is applied in television such as the news, commercials, television sitcoms, and infomercials.

Scriptwriting is the art and craft of writing scripts for mass media such as television productions. It is often a freelance profession.

Scriptwriters are responsible for researching the story, developing the narrative, writing the script, screenplay, dialogues and delivering it, in the required format, to development executives. Scriptwriters therefore have great influence over the creative direction and emotional impact of the screenplay and, arguably, of the finished film.

A freelance television writer typically uses spec scripts or previous credits and reputation to obtain a contract to write one or more episodes for an existing television show. After an episode is submitted, rewriting or polishing may be required.

A staff writer for a TV show generally works in-house, writing and rewriting episodes. Staff writers—often given other titles, such as story editor or producer—work both as a group and individually on episode scripts to maintain the show's tone, style, characters, and plots.

Television show creators write the television pilot and bible of new television series. They are responsible for creating and managing all aspects of a show's characters, style, and plots. Frequently, a creator remains responsible for the show's day-to-day creative decisions throughout the series run as showrunner, head writer or story editor.

As in the land of features, if you want to break in, you’ll need a “spec” script. This is a script written “speculatively” that showcases your talents and can be used as a calling card.

In TV, there are two main types of spec script:

• “Spec episode” for an existing TV show

In the world of TV script writing, a “spec” usually means a sample episode of an existing show. It’s also known as a “TV spec”, “sample episode” and “spec episode.”

A spec script is a TV script written speculatively, meaning it was not commissioned by a network. Writers use spec scripts to demonstrate talent and creativity. An easy way to write a spec script is to choose a current TV show you’re familiar with and write a sample episode.

Writing a spec episode is the traditional way writers use to break into television writing. But it’s less in vogue now than a few years ago. This entails writing an episode of an existing TV series that showcases your ability to write current characters that people know and love. In a way that feels real and familiar, yet fresh.

It means writing characters with pre-set voices and personalities in order to demonstrate that you’re a powerful writer with imagination. But also one who can follow the rules. This means following the show’s formatting structure and overall “voice” of the show.

• “Spec pilot” for an original TV show

This is a TV script written on spec for an original show you’ve created from scratch and is also known as an “original spec”, “sample pilot” or simply a “pilot.”

It’s easy to imagine that writing a TV show that’s compelling and original is as simple as writing a feature screenplay, but shorter. Unfortunately, you’d be wrong on two counts. Not only is writing a feature about as difficult as it gets but writing a television pilot is in some ways even more difficult.

Sure, the page count is slimmer. But the reality is a pilot functions as a seed for the series it’s jumpstarting. And in order to write a pilot that works as both a writing sample and a potentially saleable series, you have to consider the rest of the tree before you even plant the seed.

There are three things you’ll need in order to pitch it to network executives:

A treatment. A treatment is a document that provides an explanation of your TV show’s setting, main characters, and storyline. Every treatment should include a title, logline, synopsis, summary of episodes, and character bios.

A pilot script. A pilot is the first episode of a TV series. Your TV pilot needs an opening that is going to grab your viewers and says something important to your audience about the show they are going to watch. Without a compelling pilot, you don’t have a TV show. Pilots are crucial for hooking an audience and setting up your characters and storyline for an entire season.

The pilot script is the building block for your entire series. People have to read it and be able to see the potential moving forward. The best pilot scripts set incredible expectations for what is to come from a series.

You have to be an incredibly skilled writer to craft a well-written pilot. TV studios buy hundreds of shows a year, but only a handful make it to air, and even less make it past the first season.

A pilot script is a valuable tool. Not only can you use it to get an agent or manager, but you can also use it as a sample when staffing season comes around.  

You’ll need to write an outline —a breakdown of the story and characters—but a bible can wait until you’ve garnered some interest in the pilot TV show. When you really need to give people something more concrete.

A show bible. A show bible, also called a story bible or a series bible, is a document that contains the history of your characters, an outline of every episode in the first season, and how you see the show expanding into future seasons. Writing a show bible forces you to think beyond the pilot episode and can help you see the bigger picture of your show idea.

A bible, also known as a show bible or pitch bible, is a reference document used by screenwriters for information on characters, settings, and other elements of a television or film project. Bibles are updated with information on the characters after the information has been established on screen.

Ultimately, the show bible is a selling document, and you need your bible to stand out from all the rest. Most bibles are text heavy, too long, and are fairly boring to read. Use your bible as an opportunity to express your writing skills, to excite the reader about your idea as much as you are, and to leave them wanting more.

 

Writing a TV comedy, or sitcom, is a different process from writing a TV drama.

Tone: TV sitcoms are funny, tackle lighthearted topics, and intend to make viewers laugh. Dramas are more serious and take time to develop a story rather than telling jokes.

Story Arc and Pace: Sitcoms have a quick narrative pace, they focus on the build to the climax, have less act breaks, and introduce the conflict before the end of act one. The more time the characters spend solving a problem, the less room there is in the script for humor. Dramas are paced slower, have more act breaks, and spend more time developing the story, building to a climax, and arriving at a conclusion.

Run Time: Sitcoms run for approximately 21 minutes without commercials, while dramas run for about 43 minutes without commercials. One page of a script in Final Draft equals about one minute on air, so a 21-minute sitcom script should be around 20 pages long, and a script for a 43-minutes long drama should be about 40 pages long.

 

Basics of TV Production:

TV production involves various elements that come together to create a successful TV show.

The Production Team: This team includes: producer, writer, director, actors along with the technical crew. Each member of the team and crew has various responsibilities. For instance, a producer is responsible for developing and executing the idea for a show along with planning the budget. The production manager on the other hand is responsible for production elements including handling of equipment and crew. While the production designer, is responsible for constructing the set innovatively.

Pre-production: Pre-production formally begins once a project has been greenlit. At this stage, finalizing preparations for production go into effect. Financing will generally be confirmed and many of the key elements such as principal cast members, director and cinematographer are set. By the end of pre-production, the screenplay is usually finalized and satisfactory to all the financiers and other stakeholders.

During pre-production, the script is broken down into individual scenes with storyboards and all the locations, props, cast members, costumes, special effects and visual effects are identified. An extremely detailed shooting schedule is produced and arrangements are made for the necessary elements to be available to the makers at the appropriate times. Sets are constructed, the crew is hired, financial arrangements are put in place and a start date for the beginning of principal photography is set. At some point in pre-production, there will be a read-through of the script which is usually attended by all cast members with speaking parts, the director, all heads of departments, financiers, producers, and publicists.

 

Production:

Production is the actual taping of the TV show or shoot. Cast and crew are assembled, and the director will orchestrate the taping and work to shoot as quickly as possible. Production may take place in a studio or on location. Location shooting is almost always more work, as production equipment needs to be brought to the location along with the cast and crew. Most TV shows prefer to use established sets since this makes the production process easer.

Photography: Television shows are generally shot using two basic methods of photography:

Single film production:  Single camera production is a mode of production where one camera operates at a time and the shots are done in the most economically efficient order. Single camera productions are not live and include a lot of editing and takes. • "The single-camera setup, or single-camera mode of production, is a method of filmmaking and video production. A single camera—either motion picture camera or professional video camera—is employed on the set and each shot to make up a scene is taken individually. • As its name suggests, a production using the single-camera setup generally employs just one camera. Each of the various shots and camera angles is taken using the same camera, which is moved and reset to get each shot or new angle. The lighting setup is typically reconfigured for each camera setup."

Multiple camera tape production: The multiple-camera setup, multiple-camera mode of production, multi-camera or simply multicam is a method of filmmaking and video production. Several cameras—either film or professional video cameras—are employed on the set and simultaneously record or broadcast a scene. Generally, the two outer cameras shoot close-up shots or "crosses" of the two most active characters on the set at any given time, while the central camera or cameras shoot a wider master shot to capture the overall action and establish the geography of the room.[1] In this way, multiple shots are obtained in a single take without having to start and stop the action. This is more efficient for programs that are to be shown a short time after being shot as it reduces the time spent in film or video editing.

The first one is generally used for dramatic series and the latter is used to produce talk shows, game shows or news.

Post-production: It begins with the completion of filming and continues until the project is delivered to the network for airing. The most important aspect of post-production is editing. The director, producer and the networker view the film from the daily shoot. These films, also called as ‘dailies’, are then broken down and assembled into scenes by the editors.

The post-production phase of creating a film usually takes longer than the actual shooting of the film and can take several months to complete because it includes the complete editing, color correction, and the addition of music and sound. The process of editing a movie is also seen as the second directing because through post-production it is possible to change the intention of the movie. Furthermore, through the use of color grading tools and the addition of music and sound, the atmosphere of the movie can be heavily influenced. For instance, a blue-tinted movie is associated with a cold atmosphere and the choice of music and sound increases the effect of the shown scenes to the audience.

Television Production Process

There are many equipment and machines required for the production of TV programmes.

 Camera: The most basic equipment in any and every production is the camera. The camera is principally designed to convert the optical image, as projected by the lens, into an electrical signal, often called the video signal.

 Lights: lighting is done for the following achievements.

• To provide the television camera with adequate il lumination for technically                          

   acceptable pictures.

• To show the viewers what the objects shown on screen actually look like

• To establish the general mood of the event.

 Microphone: Microphone converts sound waves into electrical energy or the audio signals.

 Sound Recorder: The sound recorder essentially re cords the sound picked up by the microphone. With a sound recorder, you can:

• select a specific microphone or other sound input

• amplify a weak signal from a microphone or other audio source for further

   processing

• Control the volume and ensure the quality of sound

• Mix or combine two or more incoming sound sources

 Videotape recorder: While the sound i.e., audio is recorded on sound recorders, visuals are recorded on video tape in a videotape recorder. Most of the tele vision programmes that we see are recorded on videotape or computer disk before they are actually telecast.

 Post Production Editing Machine: The post production editing equipment/machine helps to edit the programme after it is recorded.

Key Professionals Involved in Television Production

• Producer: He is the production head who is in charge of the whole process. The producer manages the budget and coordinates with the advertising agencies, actors and writers. The producer is also responsible for all the people working on the pro duction front and for coordinating technical and non-technical production elements.

• Director: The Director is ultimately responsible for transforming a script into effective audio and video messages.

• Production Assistant: Assists producer and director. He facilitates all that is required for the smooth execution of the television production.

• Script Writer: A script writer is the person who writes the script for the programme. The script gives all the details of the programme such as the dialogues, the list of actors, details of the costumes, the mood required to be created for each scene and their respective locations.

• Actors: Actors are the personnel who perform dif ferent roles according to the requirement of the script.

• Anchor: A person who presents a programme on TV.

• Cameraperson: Camerapersons operate the cam eras. They often do the lighting also for smaller pro

• Ductions. They are also called videographers.

• Sound Recordist: Records complete sound & give background music.

• Art Director: In charge of creative designs like set works and graphics.

• Property Manager: Maintains and manages the various sets and properties used.

• Floor manager: In charge of all activities of the floor. Also called floor director.

• Costume Designer: creates various costumes required for the shoot.

 

Television Reporting:

Television reporting refers to disseminating current events via the medium of television. A "news bulletin" or a "newscast" are television programs lasting from seconds to hours that provide updates on international, national, regional, and/or local news events. It also includes additional material such as sports coverage weather forecasts, traffic reports, commentary, and other material that the broadcaster feels is relevant to their audience.

Television reporting is very visually-based, showing video footage of many of the events that are reported; still photography is also used in reporting news stories, although not as much in recent years as in the early days of broadcast television. Television channels may provide news bulletins as part of a regularly scheduled news program. Less often, television shows may be interrupted or replaced by breaking news reports ("news flashes") to provide news updates on events of great importance.

Television reporting organizations employs several anchors and reporters to provide reports (as many as ten anchors, and up to 20 reporters for local news operations or up to 30 for national news organizations). They may also employ specialty reporters that focus on reporting certain types of news content (such as traffic or entertainment), meteorologists or weather anchors (the latter term often refers to weather presenters that do not have degrees in meteorology earned at an educational institution) who provide weather forecasts – more common in local news and on network morning programs – and sports presenters that report on ongoing, concluded, or upcoming Packages will usually be filmed at a relevant location and edited in an editing suite in a newsroom or a remote contribution edit suite in a location some distance from the newsroom. They may also be edited in mobile editing vans, or satellite vans or trucks (such as electronic news gathering vehicles), and transmitted back to the newsroom. Live coverage will be broadcast from a relevant location and sent back to the newsroom via fixed cable links, microwave radio, production truck, satellite truck, or via online streaming. Roles associated with television news include a technical director, floor director audio technician, and a television crew of operators running character graphics (CG), teleprompters, and professional video cameras. Most news shows are broadcast live.

News Bulletin:

The news bulletin is a short piece of information about breaking news.

Some TV stations may make overuse the news bulletin format for breaking news, sometimes every hour. But, according to the Associated Press (AP) the BULLETIN is usually 1 to 2 sentences announcing breaking news.

There are three classifications for important, breaking news: URGENT, BULLETIN and FLASH.

• A good, short bulletin might include:

• 2-3 local or national stories

• 1-2 international stories

• something quirky or light, like an odd-spot, to balance out all the bad news

• 2-3 very brief sports stories (with a variety of sports, local and international)

• a gossip or entertainment news story

• today’s weather, with a brief forecast for the week

• a quick traffic report (road or public transport)

TV shows with bulletins on the hour will often include headlines on the half hour. Give people the gist, usually just the first sentence from each of your stories. Don’t treat this like a teaser – people aren’t going to stay tuned for another half an hour just to hear you read the full news.