I never thought ten years ago that I would wake up one day to find myself, well, a Video Journalist (or a VJ for short)... Shooting, editing, reporting and writing for a living? Really? Of course, only a science student would say that about writing, and yes that was me. A science student all my life. Living in Iraq I went into the science stream in high school, then to medical school for a couple of years before getting to Canada with my parents and in Vancouver I studied Biology at UBC, believe it or not!
Like so many of those tortured pre-med souls (well, the word 'tortured' might be a bit of an exaggeration, but hmm, ask any pre-med student and they'd tell you, medical school admission process in BC is basically a nightmare even if you're an A+ student!) I was strung through series of application processes year after year, until I said to myself (and excuse my lingo) SCREW IT, I'll try something else - well, at least for now, lol - and that's where journalism came in.
I always did love writing when I was little (in Arabic my mother tongue of course) but I never thought of it as a career especially as an ESL student. But I thought to myself, why not, let's give it a shot, and I was happy to get into the BCIT Broadcast journalism program.
I got into it thinking I will be a reporter, but in school we had the chance to work with a video camera and I got hooked. Attending a seminar by the amazing CBC Video Journalist Alan Waterman I was fascinated by what he does. A one man show.. all by himself, shooting, writing, reporting and editing.. Wow, how cool is that and that's when I realized I want to do this. I want to learn how to do all this, and be awesome at it!
I was lucky to get a job as a VJ with Shaw TV in Duncan, British Columbia. Duncan is a city of about 6000 people halfway between Nanaimo and Victoria. My job, however, was not limited to Duncan, but the whole surrounding area that's called 'The Cowichan Valley' where about 80,000 people live. With a lot of practice I honed my shooting, writing and editing skills. And that's how I got here, two and a half years later, now working at Shaw TV in Nanaimo and doing what I love to do most: Shooting, writing, reporting and editing, i.e. Video Journalism. After attending the 2011 Social Media Camp in Victoria this past weekend I got inspired to start my own blog about Video Journalism. That's what I'll be writing about in this blog (most of the time) so I hope you enjoy it and find it useful if you're looking to do video production or maybe even becoming a VJ yourself :)
Like so many of those tortured pre-med souls (well, the word 'tortured' might be a bit of an exaggeration, but hmm, ask any pre-med student and they'd tell you, medical school admission process in BC is basically a nightmare even if you're an A+ student!) I was strung through series of application processes year after year, until I said to myself (and excuse my lingo) SCREW IT, I'll try something else - well, at least for now, lol - and that's where journalism came in.
I always did love writing when I was little (in Arabic my mother tongue of course) but I never thought of it as a career especially as an ESL student. But I thought to myself, why not, let's give it a shot, and I was happy to get into the BCIT Broadcast journalism program.
I got into it thinking I will be a reporter, but in school we had the chance to work with a video camera and I got hooked. Attending a seminar by the amazing CBC Video Journalist Alan Waterman I was fascinated by what he does. A one man show.. all by himself, shooting, writing, reporting and editing.. Wow, how cool is that and that's when I realized I want to do this. I want to learn how to do all this, and be awesome at it!
I was lucky to get a job as a VJ with Shaw TV in Duncan, British Columbia. Duncan is a city of about 6000 people halfway between Nanaimo and Victoria. My job, however, was not limited to Duncan, but the whole surrounding area that's called 'The Cowichan Valley' where about 80,000 people live. With a lot of practice I honed my shooting, writing and editing skills. And that's how I got here, two and a half years later, now working at Shaw TV in Nanaimo and doing what I love to do most: Shooting, writing, reporting and editing, i.e. Video Journalism. After attending the 2011 Social Media Camp in Victoria this past weekend I got inspired to start my own blog about Video Journalism. That's what I'll be writing about in this blog (most of the time) so I hope you enjoy it and find it useful if you're looking to do video production or maybe even becoming a VJ yourself :)
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