Same Monitors, Different Pictures

I have spent the majority of my work life surrounded by video monitors. Whether standard definition or HD, whether on a control room wall or in an edit room, boxes feeding video have been my "wallpaper" for hours on end, so much so that I see in frames and shots and timecode, no matter where I go.

This week, however, I am shockingly aware of how much my monitor view has changed. This week, instead of seeing multiple camera angles of the same dramatic scene, I am seeing (and hearing, on assorted delays) multiple versions of the same news events. Speeches of which I would never have heard more than excerpts, fanfare much fancier than anything from a soap opera set. While I have worked in news for a few years now, this week, I find myself particularly struck by how my monitor view has changed--and yet, really hasn't.

Sure, the stories being told are radically different than those from soap opera stories (or are they? Really?).

Sure, the camera coverage is unbelievably different from anything we ever shot or edited on a soap (though I do recognize the tendency to see big events and stunts over and over from different angles!).

My monitor view is definitely different than it once was. But some days, when I look closer, I realize that maybe it is not that different after all. There are still stories being told, and events being seen from all sides. And while this may be fact and that may have been fiction, there are times when the lines are pretty blurred.

So I continue my life surrounded by monitors. Because there is always a story to tell. No matter which monitors surround you...