If you turn on you television set (to a local station) today from 6:00pm to 10:00pm, you will most likely land on a local production. This is largely because Kenyans want to have programs that they can relate with, enjoy and those that they deem culturally relevant. One of these local productions is Tusker Project Fame. In this paper we shall give a critique of 10 episodes of this program. However, we shall first begin with a brief history of the show and an introduction to its format.
1.1 History of the show
Tusker Project Fame was launched in 2006 with contestants from Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania. It was hosted in Nairobi, and has been hosted here since. Since its’ premier in 2006, there have been three subsequent cycles of the show. The first cycle was won by Valerie Kimani (Kenya), the second by Esther Mugiza (Uganda) and the third by Alpha Rwiranga (Rwanda). Currently, the contestants from Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Rwanda and Sudan are battling it out for the fourth title.
This show is a creative way of advertising and publicizing East African Breweries’ Tusker brand in the eastern Africa region. It is an archetype of a phenomenon called brand entertainment. A viewer, who is watches for entertainment value, is constantly bombarded by Tusker’s name, slogan, and trademark. Furthermore, the beverages being served to the judges and staff are from the same company (East African Breweries Limited). All advertisement spaces are also taken up by the company.
1.2 Format of the show
Tusker project fame is a local reality television show. It is a hybrid of the infamous Big brother and the Idol series. This is because contestants are under surveillance in the house as in Big Brother and they are in a musical competition as in the Idol series. The show airs in all five countries seven days a week. There are highlights of what happens in the Tusker Project fame house on Monday to Friday at 8:30pm - 9:00pm and live performance shows on Saturday and Sunday starting from 8:00pm and 7:30pm respectively.
The competition runs for eight weeks and four contestants are placed on probation every week. The next week one (who is not saved by the public, fellow contestants or teachers) is evicted. The trend continues until there is one final winner and that winner gets prize money and a record deal.
2. General critique
Below is a critique of the 10 episodes watched. Since most of the episodes were similar in their setting and production, they have the similar critiques. To avoid redundancy, I have clustered different shows into three categories namely:
i. Auditions
ii. House highlights
iii. Live shows
2.1 Auditions
Tusker project fame conducted rigorous auditions in the five countries participating this year. They recorded these auditions and then made highlights of the more entertaining pieces. These were played before the contestants selected to enter the academy were chosen this was done to prepare the audience for the show and to raise awareness of the fourth season of this program
All the audition shows began with the signature tune and a montage displaying the shows’ glitzy logo. These were then followed by a series of shots of landmarks and famous sites of each of the countries and possibly their towns. These cover shots were accompanied by music and Sheila Mwanyigah’s voice over. Then there was a crowd welcoming the viewers to that town. After this, there were highlights of the auditions.
First, the camera shots, angles and movements were very creative. For example, they took an extreme close up of a woman gutting fish as part of Kisumu’s intro. They also had a tracking shot of a boda boda, streets and an elevation shot and Moi’s memorial rungu in Nakuru. In Uganda, they had very good framing of fishermen which applied the rule of thirds and tilt up shot of Uganda’s Independence monument.
The best of the shots was the introductions of the Judges. They followed a judge (from the back) using a full shot and then did a close up on their feet as they walked away. In the next shot (LS), they are seen to be walking toward the camera. Then they have a close up, the screen is frozen and they have their names appear on screen.
The auditions were shot mostly indoors, with exception of Uganda. This posed a major problem in lighting. It cast shadows on the faces of the contestants when the sun was overhead and caused the banners to glare later in the day. Another lighting problem caused by the location of the set was glare from and window behind the contestants. The other countries had generally good lighting apart from the occasional glare.
The set was made of Tusker Project Fame banners both behind the judges and contestants. This worked well because of portability and branding but the colors were often too bright especially when contestants wore white. This was especially a problem in Sudan because the complexion of most of the contestants was very dark and looked even darker with bright yellow and gold behind them. In some cases, the camera operator did not frame the shot well and one could see the set behind the banners. An example is Uganda where one could see the wall and door behind the set.
Another component of production well handled was the sound. Judges used hand held cordless microphones. These were suitable as they did not have the clumsiness associated with microphone cables when they are passed around. Contestants did not have visible mics; however, boom mics were probably used because there was fine sound quality. However, in Rwanda, some of the judges did not wait for the mic to be passed to them and they repeatedly spoke off mic. In Tanzania, some of the contestants continued to sing even after being signaled to stop. This lead to the judges speaking over the signing and the sound was irritating.
Overall the audition shows were very well done. The shows were enjoyable and highly comical as they tended to feature those who could not sing and those who had ridiculous presentations. The major problems were lighting and monotony of shots during the actual auditions. Another problem was in the positioning of Citizen’s logo. Many at times it landed on the head of the contestant. The names of places and judges had too short a duration and one could not read them. Generally the auditions we well produced and funny.
2.2 House Highlights
As explained earlier, the contestants were under surveillance in the house. Those recordings produced 30 minute highlights of each day. These highlights included their training sessions, their mealtimes, leisure times and their practice sessions.
The recording was done indoors (within the academy house) with exception of one time when they went tree planting. The house has an array of colors with different intensities each. This greatly affected the color of the final picture as there was little hue balancing. The lighting too was unsatisfactory. The colors of the lights within the house were mostly sharp and cold. This greatly added to the poor color quality of the picture as it made more evident the color differences. The worst case of poor lighting was date night. The contestants were to sit in pairs and have a quiet romantic dinner. To create the mood, the lights were dimmed. Though this might have looked nice for the contestants, it ruined the picture quality as the cameras had insufficient light. The contestants looked blacked out and you could not see their expressions.
In the house, contestants wore lapel mics the whole period. This made them audible but the sound was not always sharp. At times there were echoes and other times the sound was muffled. At times during the dinner, the music drowned out the contestants’ speech and you could not make out what they were saying. This lowered the quality of the production especially since people were excited to hear the conversations.
The camera shots in the house were poor. This is because people were waking in front of cameras and there was slow coordination between audio and camera. It was especially seen in the Monday (on the 27th October) session when the vocal trainer was reviewing the Sunday night performances. She would ask a question and the camera would get to her mid-sentence. Also, the camera would not focus on the person speaking but would be on the others in the room. This was confusing as one would wonder who was speaking. At times, the furniture blocked the subjects of the shots and this looked clumsy.
However, not all shots were poor. There was good use of the rule of thirds especially when R-Kay sat at the piano during training sessions. Another very good case of picture composition was when Paleki whispered to Prudence about her crush on teacher R- Kay. The camera zoomed in close enough to get their expressions and then gradually zoomed out as they went to sit in different places.
All in all, the house highlights were unsatisfactory due to poor lighting, hue balance, repeatedly poor camera shots and movements
2.3 Live Shows
The live shows were the most dynamic in terms of production. There was a myriad of camera movements and shots, lighting techniques and special effects. We shall begin by first looking at the set. The stage was decorated by strings of CDs hanging from the stage roof. There was also a large LCD screen on the left side of the stage. There are lights fixed o rails in the ceiling and some on the bottom of the stage. There were also audio monitors on the stage.
There were numerous cameras on the set. This was evidenced by the numerous angles of shots seen. There was also one camera on a rail that would rotate the lower end of the stage. Additionally there was a camera mounted on a crane evidenced by the aerial shots of the contestants. The shots had a great variety and they were effective in creating the feel of being in a concert. They zoomed in during expressive moments of a presentation. They took shots of the judges as they assessed the performances and as they commented on them.
There were however a few problems with backstage lighting. This was seen when the two hosts would have shadows on their faces and at times they would cast shadows on the contestant being interviewed. A good example of this is when Mitch was interviewing Gaelle. The shots taken with the LCD screen as a background were not hue balanced. Additionally, the dynamic background was distracting to the eye. A good example of this is when Sheila Mwanyigah was asking the judges about Gaelle’s performance on 21st November.
The sound was very good during these performances. Both the judges and the contestants used cordless microphones. In some few performances, there were microphone stands and these were for the back up singers. The mics were probably omni-directional to minimize on the noise from the cheering fans. Sheila and Mitch wore studio talkback ear-pieces and this helped them coordinate the shows flawlessly.
Overall the live performances were the most spectacular of all the shows. This was due to the variety and number of cameras, the lights and the sound. They created the feeling of being in a concert and the shots were very effective. With exception of a few shadows and some few shots with little head room, these were the best shots. This kind of show has raised the caliber of local productions.
3. Proposed Improvements
Some proposed improvements are:
i. Better lighting in the academy and choice of colors of the house to be done with the shooting in mind.
ii. There should be better choice of sites for auditions to avoid lighting issues like those seen in Uganda.
iii. There should be keen interest paid to lighting to avoid casting shadows.
iv. When having music in the background, the music should be at appropriate levels so as not to drown out conversations.
v. The selection of set should not bee to bright to avoid glare and blacking out contestants.
by :09-0018
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