Outbound Learning

Outbound Learning

2019-20

Visit to Media Houses

To supplement classroom theoretical learning with practical experience of a media industry, the first and second year MA students of mass communication visited four media companies based out of Bhubaneswar and Cuttack on 31 August 2019.  The industry visit was organized by the course instructor, Prof. Alwyn Rodrigues SJ as part of the courses on Media Entrepreneurship and Media Management and Economics. They visited Kandoi Kraft productions in Cuttack, Sarthak FM, Sarthak Music and Sarthak TV located in Cuttack, Radio Chocolate, Kanak News and Sambad Newspaper printing press located in  Bhubaneswar and Prelude, an Event management, PR and digital ad agency in Bhubaneswar.

Students gained first-hand experience of management of TV production house, Radio, TV News channel, Printing press and Event Management, Digital PR and Advertising company. The students learned different verticals within an organization, process followed in the industry for production of content, management structures, technology used in the industry, economics and business models followed by each organization and future opportunities of each company.

Students were also taught basics of new equipment used in the industry today like the FM radio console, phone in demo, color grading through DaVinci software, using apps for monitoring online audience, different software used for editing audio, video and text content etc. Students also got some theoretical inputs on copyrights issues, business models of radio and TV stations etc.

Students gained many essential and valuable insights about various media units during the day long trip. Industry experts speaking from their experience and exposing students to current practices in the media field, gave our students true and real time feel of how the media houses operate. Different domains of media were seen, observed and understood which helped students to choose an appropriate field as a career option for their future internships and work. The industry visits also gave a glimpse of opportunities available in the media industry to start a media start up in the future.

Visit to PR Cell at NALCO Bhawan

On September 24, 2019, 16 Mass communication students were accompanied by Prof. Jyoti Ranjan Sahoo, visited PR Cell of NALCO Bhubaneswar. Students were exposed to various PR, human resource, brand management, and corporate communication activities as a part of the course.

The first session was addressed by the Director (HR), NALCO followed by students sharing of their specific objectives of the visit. Addressing questions, he emphasized that corporate communication is the key management function in any industrial set up. In line with human resource, corporate communication is equally important and significant for brand management and corporate image.

Further, PR team of NALCO showcased one short film highlighting the major contributions, various new initiatives and programs, activity and achievements of NALCO. Besides, they screened a documentary covering CSR programs such as “NALCO KI LADKI” a new initiative undertaken by NALCO.

Deputy General Manger PR, Mr. Lalatendu and Mr. Ashutosh shared various PR activities handled at NALCO such as crisis management, brand management, website management, role of digital media in PR, new and social media functions, stakeholder relation, press release, brochure and the use of various PR tools. They discussed and narrated various case studies showing how NALCO had managed crisis situation in the past.

Exposure to Mumbai Media Industry

To balance the fulcrum of theory and practice, School of Communications has always provided ample scope for extensive fieldwork to its students. In the current academic year, School of Communications faculty members had accompanied the undergraduate and post-graduate students to Mumbai to provide them with the necessary industry exposure in the form of industry visits. The outbound learning tour was spread across January 25, 2020- February 2, 2020 where the students were taken to the Mirror Now studios, Film City and to Redefine, a US based animation studio.  A tour of Mirror Now provided the students with the knowledge beyond the basics. Besides the exposure to news gathering to live telecast, the students had the opportunity to interact with the Managing Editor of Mirror Now Mr. Vinay Tiwari, Executive Producer Mr. Venkat Raman and newscaster Ms. Tanvi Shukla.

As part of the Film City tour, the students also visited the sets of four popular television soaps– Kahaan Hum Kahaan Tum, Yeh Rishtey Hain Pyaar Ke Patiala Babes, and Shubharambh in Mumbai.  Students observed how to design a set for an audio-visual production; how to place props and objects for a perfect mise-en-scene. Students gained knowledge about the positioning of lights in a film set and their function to capture the perfect tone of a scene.  Apart from technicalities, they had an acquaintance to know the work culture of the film industry. They understood the situation of working in the film industry through the interaction with multiple stakeholders of those soaps, such as Director of Photography, Directors, Assistant directors, and technicians.  Students were offered a sneak peek at the shooting of those soaps. During the course, they learnt the handwork of each person to achieve that perfect shot.

The final tour was that of Re-Define the animation studio, which has several popular Hollywood and Bollywood movies to its credit. Motion graphics, visual effects, 3D animation and graphic designing are the areas that Re-Define specializes in. The students were given a tour of the animation studio, live action studio, lighting and colour correction studio, the rendering department and finally the preview theater. The roles and responsibilities of each of these divisions were thoroughly explained.

The outbound learning tour proved to be a fruitful one as the students were able to bridge the gap between classroom learning and practical application.

Sarthak Fm and Sidharth TV

Sarthak Fm and Sidharth TV

2018-19

OUTBOUND LEARNING ACTIVITIES IN 2018-19

On September 1, 2018 the first year B.Sc. Mass Communication students visited ISKCON Temple, BMC Mall and Unit I Market to study evolution of culture, art and heritage.

On August 24, 2018 the second year B.Sc. Mass Communication students visited the headquarters of one of Odisha’s leading vernacular press units, Prameya at Bhubaneswar.

On September 14, 2018 the first year students of B.Sc. Mass Communication visited Radio Chocolate and had an interaction with Radio Jockeys, Script Writers, Radio Drama Presenters, Sound Engineers and Editors. The senior RJ Komal explained to them the sequences such as the spontaneous ‘cues’ and ‘links’ she generates, sign -in and sign -out  of the specific program.

From January 23 to 28, 2019, the three batches of Mass Communication students (I & II B.Sc. and I M.A.) visited Ramoji Film City, Hyderabad for interactive sessions at Studios. Significant learning outcome from the visit was – lectures on Editing, audio engineering, Lighting for audio visual production, News processing and broadcasting, besides cultural tour of the film city and important heritage sites in Hyderabad.

On February 15, 2019 the entire School of Communications student body got involved in conducting three PR campaigns on campus such as preserving Odishi Art forms, Coping with Depression, and Honoring LGBT community.

On January 29, 2019 students of School of Communications attended Indian Film Festival at Bhubaneswar to critically analyze conventional and non-conventional cinema, watching films such as Edda, Famished Road, Thhayi Sahebi, Paddayi, and others.

School of Communications organized its exclusive out bound learning programme for the students of BSc first and second year and MA first year students. A total number of 44 students participated in the programme. The three-member faculty team Dr. Jolly Jose, Prof. Nirmalya Fr. Donald D’Silva organized the programme along with a student’s core team. Fr. Alwyn Rodrigues also accompanied the six days visit to Secunderabad. The students visited Humming bird studio where they were able to see the latest equipment and the recording procedure used in high end quality audio production. Mr. Hudson Tailor who is also the guest faculty of School of Communications oriented the students to the studio.

Exposure to Television News studio of NEWS 18 was another unique experience for the students to take a close tour to the whole procedure of Television news production. Gathering of video news feeds, processing of multiple information with its visual significands, use of audio and graphics, sequencing of information, the working of programme control room and news reading in actual were new experience for the students. Mr. Rajesh Raina, the CEO of News 18, addressed the students emphasizing the basic requirements to become industry persons having both in-depth knowledge and technical skills. Several other experts at work also interacted with the young learners. 

The students had another exclusive two sessions on Film Editing and Lighting by the industry experts organized at the Ramoji Academy of Film and Television. The exposure also included visit to Ramoji film city where they could see and feel different film sets used for the production of films, like the important locations of the country and abroad, and popular film sets such as Bahubali, Chennai express etc.

The exposure also enabled the students to get a feel of the major historical places of Hyderabad, Charminar and Golkonda fort. Number of them also used the opportunity to exercise their photography and video skills at different locations. Journeying together and being responsible and living in group was another added experience the students gained through the 6 days programme.