But God...............

This is a blog about my recent trip to Sri Lanka to Produce and Direct a Joyce Meyer event that was broadcast LIVE on GOD TV. I write it for 3 reasons:

- To simply tell you what happened so you can maybe learn what to expect if you are involved in similar endeavours
- To amuse you by the tale I tell and by what we ended up doing and how no one died :-)
- To show you how good God is and that despite the problems how He will come through as you trust Him and don’t rely on your own skill and abilities. And sometimes even surprise you when you don’t expect it.

OK, so where to start? Well let me tell you as a way of introduction that this is certainly not a new experience for me. I have produced LIVE and pre-recorded multi camera productions in many places around the world – and ALL have been challenging in different ways – India, Nigeria, Kenya and Uganda to name a few of the more challenging locations. I knew at the start this was likely to be a challenge which was one of the main reasons I went rather than sending one of my lesser experienced producers as this was an important and historic event and I wanted it to have the best chance to succeed possible – not to say it’s all about me BUT God has blessed me with an ability to work calmly in these kind of situations and I believe through that to get the job done and see the production succeed. In fact that is one of the major keys for me in these situations to achieve what at times will seem impossible TRUST GOD AND DON’T LOSE YOUR COOL! It’s amazing how much more you can achieve when you DON’T start shouting at people (however tempting) or resorting to killing them – equally as tempting at times – in fact I have seen personally that when others are in these situations and they resort of anger and frustration that simply rubs off on the people around and they close down and any help you may have got from them leaves – meaning you are in an even worse situation. The other thing that goes hand in glove with this is that TV is about team work and you need all the members of the team working together to accomplish the job – start shouting and you rapidly destroy the team dynamic – so don’t – go home and kick the cat if you need to (in fact do that anyway – I hate cats!!) but keep your cool.

As I stated this was an important production for GOD TV – we had been trying to do a LIVE broadcast with Joyce Meyer from an “exotic” location for a few years and had come close before BUT for various reasons that I won’t detail it never quite came together – but this one did. We were keen, they were keen and we had money available in the country to make it happen – all the ingredients were there – we just had to pull it off – which we knew would not be easy. We had never done a LIVE event from Sri Lanka before and our office who were there and would be helping us with the on the ground logistics also were new to this – so we knew at the start it would be a challenge.

We started on the process in December and I have to say our planning was not helped by the Christmas break. Our first task was to find a company in Sri Lanka who we could work with who had the equipment we needed for the broadcast. We quickly saw there were not many people who had – bringing in people and equipment from outside was not viable as this all had to be paid for locally for it to be viable. We ended up contacting a local company called TV Lanka – who are a broadcaster and had the Uplink capabilities etc. we needed and said they could get the TV gear we needed for the OB – so we let them put a package together – I thought it was their equipment BUT it wasn’t they were only providing the uplink. Now we were working through a 3rd party – never a good thing.

Certainly the uplink end of things we felt they could deliver on BUT we were not sure on the TV gear. Then Christmas came – and communication ceased. We got an initial equipment list BUT it was old gear that didn’t really deliver what we needed – then when for the week after New Year we heard nothing from them despite firing off multiple questions we decided to look elsewhere. We soon came across MTV in Sri Lanka who had BOTH the TV gear and the uplink facilities – they had a full 40 ft TV truck and we felt MUCH happier. So everything was confirmed – these were the people we would use – and we still had not heard anything from TV Lanka. I have to say had we used them I probably wouldn’t be writing this blog as things would have gone much smoother.

But it wasn’t to be – we ran into a problem. The location of the event was right by an army base and so we needed special permission to park trucks etc. on the site – and they would NOT grant one to MTV whose programming and content the Government did not approve of – so this was a no go. We later found out that the person responsible for providing the TV gear for TV Lanka was also the person liaising on security and permits etc with the government – set up maybe?

So we were back to TV Lanka who suddenly started communicating with us again. We went through equipment needs – 6 Cameras, all with CCUs - yes, a separate audio desk with 36 channels of active splits for the stage – yes, 2 jibs – one 40 ft and another 30 ft – yes, full crew etc – yes. OK so we have a solution. The next stage I wanted was to arrange a test on the satellite link – this was arranged for a few days prior to the event so if there was a problem we had time to resolve it THANKFULLY as there was indeed a problem. The space segment was booked by our usual people and passed onto TV Lanka who assured us they could broadcast to that satellite – which they did – apparently they nearly knocked it out the sky with the strength of the signal they put up (I exaggerate of course) BUT it resulted in many enquiries and lots of recriminations and our usual provider refusing to book space for us IF TV Lanka were doing the uplink insisting it was booked by Lanka TV so they had the responsibility if it all went wrong. So TV Lanka booked the space (now on a different satellite) and assured us all would be OK and we booked another test for the day before. However communication was not great and it took MANY attempts to get the full info from them but finally we did and I have to say overall this part of the deal was pretty smooth – we did have some satellite issues the 2nd day of the broadcast which I still don’t know the reason for but overall this ended up being the least problematic bit.

Moving onto the event itself, I got into the country as I always try to do the day prior to the broadcast, had a meeting with the guys supplying the TV gear at the site and went through some final details – including moving the “on site” time back from 10am to 8am (the event started at 6:30pm) to give us maximum time and then went off to bed – wondering what the following day would bring.......

Well, I decided to get to the site at 10am as I thought that would give them plenty of time to get the truck in place and powered up and start running the cables – wrong!! They were not there. LOTS of phone calls chasing up etc. with the usual reply of 10 minutes – that went on for the next 2 hours the OB rolled in at 12noon – I’d lost 4 hours of set up time.

So, let’s get the cables run then eh? Well from what I could tell they had about 8 people dedicated to setting up the jibs (more on that in a moment) and just 2 to do everything else!! And no one else to be seen. I knew by now this was going to be painful. Also, on the jibs – we did get the 40 ft one BUT not the 30, instead a small 10 ft studio jib showed up and we were told (again after lots of chasing) the other 30 ft would only be there tomorrow. Oh and after working for 1 hour 45 minutes they all went off to lunch – that nearly resulted in me losing it completely.

At about 2:30pm the people supplying the audio equipment arrived – they had the desk and a 12 channel splitter NOT the 36 that was promised – so we knew there and then that separate outputs would not be possible – very quickly one of Joyce’s audio techs offered a solution (not perfect) BUT we would have sound – he would give us group outputs of the band and the speech mics as separate feeds and we would run in our ambience as planned – at least it got us going BUT we’d lost more time trying to figure it all out. And for whatever reason the ambience was only run in right at the last minute and I’m not even sure they used it!

By about 4:30pm the cameras started arriving – and oh dear – they were nice cameras Panasonic HD cameras and a couple of Sonys - but all Camcorders NOT studio type cameras – no CCUs' tallies, returns etc. now I started wondering if we would have a show tonight this was NOT good BUT again – trust God Graeme!! There were other issues we had to sort on the cameras as we went along but I’d be writing a book if I went into all of that – oh and of course the cameras didn’t have any remotes, top boxes etc.

So things were not going particularly well – we were by now up on the satellite (I had booked a LOT of line up time thankfully). On the audio side I don’t know why they had wired it this way but the feeds from the front of house desk went into one desk – then it came out of that desk and into another desk and then to the satellite – I never managed to get an answer on why this was so, but for sure it was too late now to change it – however it did give us some major problems with levels and stereo etc. I still don’t know if we broadcast stereo or as I suspect stereo mono – I also had to phone our UK sound supervisor to find out how to generate tone for our line up as the audio engineer on site didn’t know – however even once we got it didn’t seem much use as it was way too high and only on one channel.

BUT we finally had a signal and could broadcast.

The rest of that night was interesting – we ran into the following problems during the broadcast:

- 2 of the cameras suffered intermittent faults on the cables and kept breaking up – not surprising as it was just basic co-ax they were using VERY flimsy
- The comms were suspect and I am not sure if half the time anyone was hearing me or maybe they simply couldn’t understand – but I only occasionally got the shots I was looking for – and without tallies or returns the cameras often moved when they were on etc.
- The audio levels and mix were all over the place – the guy running the desk seemed clueless – but we had sound and it (mostly) wasn’t distorted.
We got through the programme – by all accounts from the people watching - it came across OK – which was good considering the problems and chaos that seemed to be going on behind the scenes.

I went to bed that night exhaustedly frustrated BUT thankful that God still had come through.
The 2nd day was MUCH better – even though the crew and everyone still turned up 2 hours later than the agreed time it actually went pretty smoothly – we even had time to get the Joyce Meyer audio tech to come and do a balance on the feeds we were getting and it sounded SO much better. They also resolved the cable faults on the cameras and we got the other 30 ft jib. Even though it was NON CCU controlled cameras the overall pictures looked pretty good – and I have to say seeing thousands of hands go up in response to the Gospel was really cool – always makes it worth it.

We had great response from viewers throughout the world and so overall I was pleased with what we had achieved – despite the challenges and after all the crew we had been working with (many were Buddhists) were all keen to shake hands and pose for photos with the white guy – well the red faced guy who had stupidly got sunburnt the first day........................... waiting for them to show up.

A couple of things to pass on in terms of tips – that were vital for me – as well as the most important one mentioned above of keep your cool.

- Show respect to people at all times - they are trying to help so let them much better to have them on your side than against you.
- When in doubt and you need help ASK – even if it means calling the other side of the world, or having an experienced guy come and do a mix for you – admitting YOUR limitations is a good thing.
- Always always always have someone on your side and at your side who speaks their language BUT has your interests as their priority – many of the crew didn’t speak English at all and having David (who runs our office in Sri Lanka) and Booshen (who helps him on techie stuff) was invaluable – really not sure this would have happened without them.
- Know that God is in control – do everything to give him as much help as you can but trust Him with the results – and then watch him come through.

This was one of the more challenging shoots I’ve done for sure BUT I am pleased we achieved it and I know lives will have been changed through it – THAT is what makes it worth it and why I will gladly do it again and again and again despite all the frustrations.

Now here’s a side bar that really illustrates the title of this blog of “But God......”

TV Lanka in order to win back the business also agreed to pull the GOD TV signal down and re-broadcast it across Sri Lanka on their terrestrial channels – 2 of them – meaning the Nation of Sri Lanka had access to this event LIVE on their TV’s as well – not just the thousands who turned up to the event (which people said was one of the biggest crowds for an event ever) – BUT we only found out after when talking to the owner that TV Lanka ONLY broadcasts Buddhist content – it’s the premier Buddhist channel in the Nation (which is 70% Buddhist) – so the Gospel was broadcast for 2 nights LIVE across this predominantly Buddhist Nation on TV – and for nothing – now if that’s not God smiling on our endeavours I don’t know what is – I’m still buzzed by that!!!!