The shift in what is possible production wise today, compared to barely three years ago is mind boggling. Not just from a technical aspect, but what we are capable of doing that just seemed – well – impossible in the past.

For example, I have just finished an interview with Karla Grant, the Executive Producer and Presenter of Living Black on SBS television. It was all done via email and phone, and although the full time frame was over 6 weeks due to commitments at both ends, the actual ‘real’ time was possibly less than two hours.

That’s a double page spread with images destined for Australasian Camcorder magazine and also its web site.

That was last Friday. I had been chasing an interview with another personality for some weeks as well. He’s a little hard to pin down due to the nature of what he does, but after leaving some messages on various phone numbers I had, later on that afternoon he rang me, totally out of the blue. The next thing I know is that I am on a Qantas flight to Broome in the far north of Western Australia to interview Malcolm Douglas, the well known filmmaker and crocodile farm owner. In fact, I see him in just over an hour.
That’ll be another double page spread at least, with pictures and hopefully some video I can place on line.

Sitting next to me on the plane was the WA Police Commissioner. It just occurred to me that, whilst in reality he was deep in conversation with an offsider for the two hour flight, maybe with my run of luck, I could have asked to do a story on the Police Video Unit.

So what has changed? It seems more people have become aware that their exposure to other than ‘trash mags’ and tabloid TV is now important. It is also true that reduced airfares in particular have made it easier to get around (just this week Singapore Airlines and then Qantas slashed return airfares to London via Singapore to $1400 return. That’s half the cost of an ad on outside back cover).

But access to small portable mini DV and HD cameras, good mics and editing facilities in laptops have also contributed a monstrous benefit.

I mean, this piece has been penned by the pool and sent via 3G. How good is that!