James Shield
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jshield.bsky.social
James Shield
@jshield.bsky.social
Audio producer/editor in London, making something new at BBC News • made The Wargame for Tortoise and Sky News • previously at The Times • hello@jshield.co.uk • jshield.co.uk
Pinned
The Wargame from Sky News and Tortoise is out today. Here’s a behind-the-scenes look at how we made it happen.

youtu.be/K6o8_onQrFQ?...
The Wargame podcast: What if Russia attacked the UK?
YouTube video by Sky News
youtu.be
Jobs like this don’t come up very often. The BBC is hiring a senior producer to work on the legendary Profile – in my opinion one of the best programmes on Radio 4 – and AntiSocial. Deadline 17th November: careers.bbc.co.uk/job/Senior-J...
Senior Journalist, Long Form Audio
Senior Journalist, Long Form Audio
careers.bbc.co.uk
November 4, 2025 at 7:46 PM
Reposted by James Shield
A House of Dynamite is a brilliant, terrifying film about making an impossible decision with scant information

A few months ago my colleagues did something similar from a UK perspective

The key difference was that we knew who was attacking us... But our options were limited
October 29, 2025 at 7:53 AM
Reposted by James Shield
The British Podcast Awards featured a strange “glitch” that everyone found amusing; but has interesting implications. Most of the winners were upstairs in the cheap balcony seats, meaning there was a few minutes’ delay on almost EVERY award as the winners went down the back stairs to the stage. >>
October 3, 2025 at 7:42 AM
Reposted by James Shield
BBC News has released the first episode of The Global Story, a new daily international news podcast exploring the relationship between the United States and the wider world.
podcastingtoday.co.uk/bbc-launches...
BBC launches new daily international podcast The Global Story
BBC News has released the first episode of The Global Story, a new daily international news podcast exploring the relationship between the United States and the wider world.
podcastingtoday.co.uk
September 3, 2025 at 1:41 PM
Jayne Morgan‘s review of The Wargame:

“In a podcast landscape that is currently dominated by the ‘two people in a room’ format, it strikes a blow for the idea that complex, original audio production is still very much worthwhile”

us8.campaign-archive.com?u=74b693fa81...
Podcast Spending and Frequency Splitting
us8.campaign-archive.com
August 22, 2025 at 2:47 PM
Reposted by James Shield
The Wargame podcast: Fictional British government faces a terrifying choice in final episode
The Wargame podcast: Fictional British government faces a terrifying choice in final episode
Under yet another attack from Russia, a fictional British government of former ministers and military chiefs face a terrifying choice in the final episode of The Wargame.
news.sky.com
June 24, 2025 at 1:44 AM
The finale of The Wargame is out tomorrow (or possibly tonight if you refresh your feed). It took a small army to pull it off. What a talented team.
podfollow.com/thewargame
June 23, 2025 at 6:17 PM
Five stars for The Wargame in The Times

“Frightening and brilliant”

www.thetimes.com/article/5b1c...
The Wargame review — a terrifying look at what a Russian attack would be like
As Tortoise and Sky News show in their five-star new podcast, if Nato didn’t help in the event of a strike on the UK, our options would be alarmingly slim
www.thetimes.com
June 19, 2025 at 8:34 AM
The Observer is hosting a spoilertastic event about The Wargame in its newsroom next month:
observer.co.uk/our-events/i...
Inside the Wargame | The Observer
Independent journalism | News, culture & style | Investigations, analysis, features, ideas, recipes, newsletters & podcasts that make sense of the world
observer.co.uk
June 17, 2025 at 7:51 PM
Reposted by James Shield
Episodes 3 & 4 of 'The Wargame' scheduled for release tonight.

Meanwhile, Russian state media coverage highlights that "they also have a person playing the president of Russia. This one. With a beard."
June 16, 2025 at 8:12 PM
For the audio nerds, here are two new techniques (and one old one) I used to edit The Wargame in Descript:

1) All of the scenes in the Cobra room are edited from video files, which were vision mixed live on the day of the wargame by a Sky News OB team and Spiritland.
June 14, 2025 at 4:12 PM
Reposted by James Shield
That new The Wargame podcast is utterly brilliant. Not had a god tier podcast for ages. This is definitely that.
June 13, 2025 at 3:20 PM
The Wargame from Sky News and Tortoise is out today. Here’s a behind-the-scenes look at how we made it happen.

youtu.be/K6o8_onQrFQ?...
The Wargame podcast: What if Russia attacked the UK?
YouTube video by Sky News
youtu.be
June 10, 2025 at 7:23 AM
Reposted by James Shield
Watch out for this tomorrow.
Date for your diary: on 10 June you will want to listen to this, especially if you are in the UK. @deborahaynes.bsky.social brought together a home team of former ministers, generals and top civil servants to game out defence against Russia. The results are interesting.

news.sky.com/story/the-wa...
The Wargame: New Sky News and Tortoise Media podcast series simulates a Russian attack on UK
Former senior politicians, including Sir Ben Wallace, Jack Straw and Amber Rudd, play a fictional British government pitched against an imagined Kremlin.
news.sky.com
June 9, 2025 at 6:29 AM
Had a nice chat with Dom Joly on Times Radio about The Wargame, which is out on Tuesday.
June 6, 2025 at 7:03 PM
I’ll be on Times Radio with Deborah Haynes from Sky News from 2.45ish to talk about our new series, The Wargame.
June 6, 2025 at 1:05 PM
Reposted by James Shield
This sounds great.

Former senior politicians, including Sir Ben Wallace, Jack Straw and Amber Rudd, play a fictional British government pitched against an imagined Kremlin.

The Wargame: New Sky News and Tortoise Media podcast series simulates a Russian attack on UK
news.sky.com/story/the-wa...
The Wargame: New Sky News and Tortoise Media podcast series simulates a Russian attack on UK
Former senior politicians, including Sir Ben Wallace, Jack Straw and Amber Rudd, play a fictional British government pitched against an imagined Kremlin.
news.sky.com
May 29, 2025 at 10:59 AM
Reposted by James Shield
Sky News and Tortoise Media are launching a new original podcast series, The Wargame, which simulates a fictional Russian attack on the UK. #skynews #tortoise
podcastingtoday.co.uk/sky-news-and...
Sky News and Tortoise launch simulated Russian attack podcast
Sky News and Tortoise Media are launching a new original podcast series, The Wargame, which simulates a fictional Russian attack on the UK.
podcastingtoday.co.uk
May 21, 2025 at 6:24 AM
Reposted by James Shield
Date for your diary: on 10 June you will want to listen to this, especially if you are in the UK. @deborahaynes.bsky.social brought together a home team of former ministers, generals and top civil servants to game out defence against Russia. The results are interesting.

news.sky.com/story/the-wa...
The Wargame: New Sky News and Tortoise Media podcast series simulates a Russian attack on UK
Former senior politicians, including Sir Ben Wallace, Jack Straw and Amber Rudd, play a fictional British government pitched against an imagined Kremlin.
news.sky.com
May 21, 2025 at 12:29 AM
Reposted by James Shield
The Wargame: New Sky News and Tortoise Media podcast series simulates a Russian attack on UK
The Wargame: New Sky News and Tortoise Media podcast series simulates a Russian attack on UK
A top team of former government ministers and military and security chiefs have taken part in a wargame that simulates a Russian attack on the UK for a new podcast series announced on Wednesday by Sky News and Tortoise Media.
news.sky.com
May 20, 2025 at 11:01 PM
From 10 June: Our new podcast series about a wargame that simulates a Russian attack on the UK.

Former ministers and military chiefs play the UK government, pitched against an imagined Kremlin.

news.sky.com/story/the-wa...
The Wargame: New Sky News and Tortoise Media podcast series simulates a Russian attack on UK
Former senior politicians, including Sir Ben Wallace, Jack Straw and Amber Rudd, play a fictional British government pitched against an imagined Kremlin.
news.sky.com
May 21, 2025 at 7:05 AM
I ran some very speedy audio field recording training this week for a TV journalist. Literally 2-3 minutes – it’s all the time we had. What else would be on your list?
May 9, 2025 at 7:33 PM
Been playing with SpaceBlender, a new reverb plugin, because that is my happy place. Free until 22nd May. Put it in interstellar mode and click the freeze button. It’s magic. And the gated reverb! Lovely. Already used it on a project.

www.soundtoys.com/product/spac...
SpaceBlender - Soundtoys
SpaceBlender is an experimental reverb that lets you create unreal and imaginary spaces. FREE thru May 22.
www.soundtoys.com
May 9, 2025 at 7:04 PM
I’m joining the BBC as an assistant editor in June, to help relaunch The Global Story as the BBC's audio ‘front page’ in the US for international stories. Daily narrative news podcasts are a fairly mature market now, but the BBC could still do something fresh and distinctive, I think. Wish us luck.
May 3, 2025 at 5:34 PM
On Radio 4 today at 3pm:
An episode of History’s Secret Heroes I produced last year is out on BBC Sounds tomorrow, and on Radio 4 next week. It’s about a man who risked his life for satire.

Presented by Her Majesty the Queen, Helena Bonham Carter.

www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m...
BBC Radio 4 - History's Heroes, History's Secret Heroes: Series 3, Curt Bloch and the Underwater Cabaret
A German refugee risks his life to ridicule Hitler.
www.bbc.co.uk
March 11, 2025 at 2:09 PM