A woman among men

I covered the NCLR convention one week ago at the Convention Center on Miami Beach. Since I was there working for uVu I was positioned on the platform for six consecutive hours, but I had the chance to shoot presentations by both Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama.

But for me the interesting part about this shoot was the reaction of the cameramen around me on this narrow press platform. Was it my skirt and low heels that made them look at me as an outsider? Or the diminutive size of my web-cam compared to their gigantic cameras? Or simply the fact that I was a woman among men?

At this event it seemed that from every television station in South Florida through to the national outlets... reporters, cameramen and photographers were mostly men. And except for occassional comments about the small scale of my equipment and the "well-intentioned" patronization in the form of "Honey, how do you get your sound," or "Be aware of the guy standing next to you, he seems sweet but will push you if he needs a good shoot," I did not receive a bad welcome...I was just not part of their group.

Cameraman seems to be one of those jobs where the  term itself defines the profession.  When one of them asked me "What are you doing behind the camera?" I realized that I did not belong, and it was perfectly fine by me. I just didn't talk very much for the next five hours, but I did what I came there to do...film.

Ultimately one of my colleagues became curious enough to break the gender barrier and inquire about uVu. After a short explanation, he congratulated me on the project, and even complained about the fact that he was standing there for hours so that perhaps one minute and a half of his footage would be aired on his station. I proudly explained that this was the whole difference between uVu and the regular news on television. You can watch the whole speech, pause, watch it again and leave comment about it...I hope you will.