You wanna be a moderator?

2010-01-05T13:52:00.000-08:00

You think it’s just a matter of smiling into a camera and delivering some patter?

You’re exactly right!

The problem is, smiling into the camera and delivering some patter. Or rather: doing it so that it’s your smile and your patter. Because if it’s not, the viewer will KNOW, will feel you’re a FAKE, will SWITCH YOU OFF.

So, the first question you need to ask yourself is: do I feel comfortable as a salesman or saleswoman? Because that’s what moderators are. They sell information, whether it’s the news, babies nappies, gossip, or the weather. Of course, some feel more comfortable selling the news, others selling nappies. So, what kind of a salesperson are you?

But the first product you have to sell is yourself. Most people don’t feel very comfortable knowing that a thousand, or maybe a million people are watching them. The good news is, and this is the first lesson to learn: there is actually never more than ONE person watching. Joanne is watching, Bob is watching, Robin is watching. They’re all individuals and they will not judge you collectively (the critics like to think that that’s their job). So when you moderate, you’re free to choose your audience of one. Imagine you are talking to your best friend, your lover, your next door neighbour. Picture someone who is sympathetic to you.

The only exception to the above rule is when you’re performing infront of a live audience where there’s also a dynamic between members of the audience. That’s why some love live-moderation and others hate it. It can enhance or petrify you. And the audience will KNOW. Ask yourself if you are the live-type? Do you feel comfortable addressing a crowd? Are you relaxed and spontaneous enough to feed on audience responses, be they positive or negative?

On-screen moderating (especially) requires contradictory skills. Even if it’s a cliché: it’s vital to be yourself. At the same time you have to smile, smile, smile. You have to do smiletalk and very few people smiletalk their way through everyday life. So why do you have to smile so much?

Because the screen changes you. Smiling or not smiling are blown up to become statements in themselves. Smiling sends the signal: this person feels relaxed and knows what he’s doing. Not smiling sends the signal that you couldn’t give a damn and you’d rather be somewhere else. Even when nobody can see you and you’re talking into a microphone, people can FEEL whether you are optimistic and relaxed, or pessimistic and uptight, and this is not just a matter of the words you use. If you smile into a microphone, the listener can FEEL your smile. Ask any professional speaker.

So one of the greatest challenges is to be yourself while smiling more or less continuously. It doesn’t have to be a bombastic smile. It can be a hint of a smile. Or a chuckle. But it needs to be there somehow.

Unless you’re a newsreader selling death, destruction, and human interest. Then you need to be able to smile, look serious, smile, look serious, smile... Also an art.

And what do you do with your hands? The answer is: (if you are standing) you do things with them, roughly at belly-button level (where they don’t fall out of the picture). You touch fingertips, then move them apart again, hand touches hand, and apart...always bringing them back to „base“. But you never fold your hands together because it makes you look nervous. A television screen does things to you that don’t happen in a one to one situation. The camera sees EVERYTHING and interprets everything. You have to be aware of what the camera / the screen does to you. Do you look better facing the camera straight on, or do you need to move your left or right shoulder forward? What is your position in relation to the camera and how does this affect your image?

It’s slightly different for each person and the degree to which these rules apply vary from personality to personality (though most of these rules apply 90% of the time to 90% of people). Which is why you have to have a personality if you want to moderate well. You have to learn to use the rules to your advantage.

The only way to find out exactly what is right for you is to practice, practice, practice. Do it on video and watch yourself. Try to be detached and objective when watching yourself. If something looks good, ask yourself how you felt when you did it. What was your intention? Try to emulate this feeling on your next performance.

Make sure your movements are slow and smooth. The camera makes everything bigger, more extreme. The camera doesn’t like fast movements.

Do what the camera needs you to do. Michael Caine said: love the camera and it will love you back.

And always be yoursef, smile, be yourself, smile, make mistakes, smile, be yourself...

It’s hard work.

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You wanna be a moderator?