I watched a video from AP about a sinkhole in San Diego. I thought it was informative and a good story, but it could have been improved with an interview from a nearby resident. The story explained that the houses around the sinkhole are in danger, but we don't hear from any of the neighbors who I'm sure have an interesting point of view.
Still, the story has a bigger impact by being a video that includes pictures of the sinkhole. The viewer can psychically see how close the sinkhole is to the houses. That makes the story much more interesting. If it were text only, it could not have as much of an impact.
Wednesday, October 3, 2007
Oldest Inmate is Ready to Confess. Sort of.
The video story I chose is from the NYtimes.com about the oldest prisoner in a New York state prison. Charles Friedgood, 89, has been in prison for years for giving his wife an overdose of medication 32 years ago. He is now suffering from a "catalogue of diseases," including terminal cancer.
There is an accompanying article which says essentially the same thing as the video, but I think the video adds depth to the story. The narrator is Sam Roberts, the New York Times reporter on the case. The video alternates between the voice over/interview of the reporter, and the words of Friedgood.
Friedgood's explanation, about a crime he committed 32 years ago, also give the story a more human element.
The video story is also aided by images of the prison, both banal and intense, as well as great audio of the cell doors closing. I think this gives viewers insight into the world of Friedgood, and other prisoners like him, way more than mere words could.
The coolest thing to me is how the story ended with "I'm Sam Roberts of the New York Times," followed by the closing of one final door. It gave the piece closure, and also added to its eeriness. Overall, I think the piece was very well done--both informative and entertaining.
There is an accompanying article which says essentially the same thing as the video, but I think the video adds depth to the story. The narrator is Sam Roberts, the New York Times reporter on the case. The video alternates between the voice over/interview of the reporter, and the words of Friedgood.
Friedgood's explanation, about a crime he committed 32 years ago, also give the story a more human element.
The video story is also aided by images of the prison, both banal and intense, as well as great audio of the cell doors closing. I think this gives viewers insight into the world of Friedgood, and other prisoners like him, way more than mere words could.
The coolest thing to me is how the story ended with "I'm Sam Roberts of the New York Times," followed by the closing of one final door. It gave the piece closure, and also added to its eeriness. Overall, I think the piece was very well done--both informative and entertaining.
SouthTown Peanut vendor
By J.J. Bailey
The video story I chose was done by the South Town paper in Illinois. The story focused on the job of a single young man, who has been a peanut vendor at U.S. Cellular field for 6 years. The story was presented well and the footage was interesting. The camera was used well with different points of view, different framed shots, different audio. The audio was rich with natural sounds and the main storytelling device was the subject's interview. That is the one area where I thought the story could have been better. I would have liked the reporters voice and perhaps one or two more subjects. However, the story did a good job of providing information and perspective on the life of a vendor.
The video story I chose was done by the South Town paper in Illinois. The story focused on the job of a single young man, who has been a peanut vendor at U.S. Cellular field for 6 years. The story was presented well and the footage was interesting. The camera was used well with different points of view, different framed shots, different audio. The audio was rich with natural sounds and the main storytelling device was the subject's interview. That is the one area where I thought the story could have been better. I would have liked the reporters voice and perhaps one or two more subjects. However, the story did a good job of providing information and perspective on the life of a vendor.
Current TV
We are working on a Current TV story that is really interesting about married couples in college. The hard part is going to be that Anderw F wants us to spend more time with an interesting couple. That just means that we are going to have to keep working after our deadline. We are all really excited about the story, so we will keep going, but before we submit to current its going to take a lot more work. I am also still working on the pinball story edits and the Missourian graphic but the editor has not gotten back to me yet. So, its going, but its just going slowly and with a lot of effort.
Tuesday, October 2, 2007
Solid video work from ESPN
ESPN.com recently posted a journalistic video regarding the New York Mets’ announcement that Willie Randolph will stay on as manager despite the team’s epic collapse over the last month of the baseball season. Truth be told, I loved the way the video was done. Just loved it. In a total of 46 seconds, without the voice of any reporter, ESPN allowed Willie Randolph, Omar Minaya (Randolph’s boss) and a lot of really good images to tell the story.
There was a caption atop the video that read “Randolph will remain Mets manager.” Beyond that, it was all speech and images. ESPN understands that those web surfers going to watch video at its site are largely more-than-casual sports fans who don’t need a ton of background information. Thus, the need for any sort of stage setting by a reporter was eliminated. There were two or three image cuts to Randolph and Minaya standing at the podium during the press conference for the announcement, and the rest of the video focused on images that perfectly encapsulated the Mets’ saga over the past month. Several different shots of players, fans and mascots were used, all depicting either the players screwing up or the reactions of various parties to the aforementioned on-field disaster. Audio from Randolph and Minaya ran throughout the video montage.
I have no complaints about the job ESPN did with this video. It was succinct and captivating both from an audio and visual standpoint. At ESPN.com, there was also a link to a text story about the Mets’ decision to retain Randolph, which, as predicted, delved into greater detail regarding the collapse itself and the history of Randolph’s tenure for the team. For a less knowledgeable fan in need of a bit more background information, the text story was the way to go. For the sports fanatic in need of a quick baseball fix before moving on to the next story in the world of professional athletics, the video did the job perfectly. Kudos to the folks at the Worldwide Leader for doing a great job on this one.
There was a caption atop the video that read “Randolph will remain Mets manager.” Beyond that, it was all speech and images. ESPN understands that those web surfers going to watch video at its site are largely more-than-casual sports fans who don’t need a ton of background information. Thus, the need for any sort of stage setting by a reporter was eliminated. There were two or three image cuts to Randolph and Minaya standing at the podium during the press conference for the announcement, and the rest of the video focused on images that perfectly encapsulated the Mets’ saga over the past month. Several different shots of players, fans and mascots were used, all depicting either the players screwing up or the reactions of various parties to the aforementioned on-field disaster. Audio from Randolph and Minaya ran throughout the video montage.
I have no complaints about the job ESPN did with this video. It was succinct and captivating both from an audio and visual standpoint. At ESPN.com, there was also a link to a text story about the Mets’ decision to retain Randolph, which, as predicted, delved into greater detail regarding the collapse itself and the history of Randolph’s tenure for the team. For a less knowledgeable fan in need of a bit more background information, the text story was the way to go. For the sports fanatic in need of a quick baseball fix before moving on to the next story in the world of professional athletics, the video did the job perfectly. Kudos to the folks at the Worldwide Leader for doing a great job on this one.
Journalism video from the WWW
I watched an AP video about how most of Mick Vick's dogs can be saved (http://usatoday.feedroom.com/). The story was pretty basic and I would only make minor changes. The reporter's voice was often muffled out by all of the dogs barking. So I would lower the audio level of the dogs so you could hear the reporter's voice and story better.
Also, this is picky and doesn't have to do directly with the video but I had to watch an advertisement before the video. I guess it's the wave of the future, as journalism needs someone to pay the bills. Now it's just online. I hope it doesn't deter audiences from watching the videos.
The story would be fairly similar if it were a text only story. But I do think it's important that I saw this as a video story. It brought more emotion to the story because you actually got to see the dogs that Vick abused. You can't express that in a story. The video helped make the story more humane.
Sure, a text only story could get the point across but it would be missing images of the dogs which give the story a different feeling.
Also, this is picky and doesn't have to do directly with the video but I had to watch an advertisement before the video. I guess it's the wave of the future, as journalism needs someone to pay the bills. Now it's just online. I hope it doesn't deter audiences from watching the videos.
The story would be fairly similar if it were a text only story. But I do think it's important that I saw this as a video story. It brought more emotion to the story because you actually got to see the dogs that Vick abused. You can't express that in a story. The video helped make the story more humane.
Sure, a text only story could get the point across but it would be missing images of the dogs which give the story a different feeling.
I looked on CNN.com for a story for which I could respond. I decided upon a story about a Topps beef contamination where a girl was hospitalized for ecoli (http://www.cnn.com/video/#/video/us/2007/10/02/candiotti.mystery.at.sea.cnn) This story touched on many techniques, and I could see room for improvement. The sourcing in this package was very well done. We heard from the attorney, the girl, her mother as well as a woman form the Center for Science in the Public Interest about meat trends. During the interview of the girl and her mother, the shots were very close up which was more intimate and gave a good emotional background.
I was disappointed with the diversity of shots. I saw a lot of buildings (almost every building involved in the story). I also saw a lot of the same hamburger package in several different shots. The one good shot was in the Topps processing plant and there were more opportunities for moving images here. I also thought that the reporter used a nice split frame between the three shots of the sources of the contamination. This provided a nice visual element to bring the story a bit more to life.
The story got the job done, but it lacked the elements to make it pop like more interesting shots as well as natural sound. There were not many opportunities for it in the story, but the reporter did not capitalize on the opportunities that he had. If this was a text only story it would have been pretty similar, but it would not have had the emotional element of the girl and her mother. Since these were used only at the beginning and very briefly, the impact of a text-only versus this story would have been pretty similar.
I was disappointed with the diversity of shots. I saw a lot of buildings (almost every building involved in the story). I also saw a lot of the same hamburger package in several different shots. The one good shot was in the Topps processing plant and there were more opportunities for moving images here. I also thought that the reporter used a nice split frame between the three shots of the sources of the contamination. This provided a nice visual element to bring the story a bit more to life.
The story got the job done, but it lacked the elements to make it pop like more interesting shots as well as natural sound. There were not many opportunities for it in the story, but the reporter did not capitalize on the opportunities that he had. If this was a text only story it would have been pretty similar, but it would not have had the emotional element of the girl and her mother. Since these were used only at the beginning and very briefly, the impact of a text-only versus this story would have been pretty similar.
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