Posted on January 12th, 2012 by Deborah Potter
Working alone in the field can be a challenge, but it’s a challenge that Michelle Michael has mastered. Since 2003, she’s been shooting, writing and editing her own stories for the US Armed Forces Network. This year, she won the NPPA Solo Video Journalist of the Year award. What’s her advice to other one-man-bands? “If [...]
Filed under: 06. Multimedia Storytelling, 10. Delivering the News | Comments Off
Posted on December 20th, 2011 by Deborah Potter
I’m of the belief that planning makes stories stronger, and I often talk about planning as the step that comes between reporting and writing that is too often skipped. An outline like the one on the left–just a few words jotted down in a notebook–helps me stay on track. The longer the story I’m writing, [...]
Filed under: 06. Multimedia Storytelling | Comments Off
Posted on December 2nd, 2011 by Deb Wenger
For years, Soundslides has set the standard for audio slide shows, but it’s certainly not the only option. Andrew Lih, who teaches at USC, says he’s been using Final Cut Pro (FCP) to teach student journalists the same principles. He recently posted the following on the Facebook page for educators in the Online News Association: [...]
Filed under: 06. Multimedia Storytelling, 08. Producing for the Web | No Comments »
Posted on November 9th, 2011 by Deborah Potter
You’ve heard it before: to bring the impact of an action home, you need to shoot the reaction. Flames engulfing an apartment building have more impact if we also see the faces of people who are losing their homes. The clowns in a parade are funnier if we also see the grins and hear the [...]
Filed under: 03. Multimedia Newsgathering, 06. Multimedia Storytelling | No Comments »
Posted on October 23rd, 2011 by Deb Wenger
For those of us who have been working with video for a long time, the concept of wide, medium and close-up shots is a simple one. But when you’re new to visual storytelling, it’s perfectly natural to ask things like, “How wide?” and “What do you mean by medium?” Freelance journalist Mikki Harris worked for [...]
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Posted on August 15th, 2011 by Deb Wenger
The Murrow Award for writing “demonstrates excellence in writing that conveys the feeling and significance of events to the listener or viewer.” That’s the goal of great storytelling, isn’t it? To help make the news matter. Last year’s national winner in the small market category was Jason Lamb of KTUU in Anchorage, AK. In this [...]
Filed under: 05. Writing the Story, 06. Multimedia Storytelling | 4 Comments »
Posted on May 14th, 2011 by Deb Wenger
One of the best things about awards season is the chance to see incredible work produced by some of the best reporters and photographers in the business. This year, the Sigma Delta Chi Award for large market TV feature reporting has gone to some old friends of Advancing the Story — Boyd Huppert, Jonathan Malat [...]
Filed under: 05. Writing the Story, 06. Multimedia Storytelling | No Comments »
Posted on April 11th, 2011 by Deborah Potter
Should online video follow the same conventions as TV news? Adam Westbrook thinks not. In a provocative essay, he argues that several TV news conventions were developed to help journalists work faster and tell stories in less time–constraints that he believes do not apply to online video. That’s debatable, of course. I’m not sure most [...]
Filed under: 06. Multimedia Storytelling | No Comments »
Posted on March 21st, 2011 by Deb Wenger
If you’re new to video, you’re probably spending lots of time just trying to master the camera, remembering how to shoot sequences and following the rule of thirds. Now, here’s one more thing to remember – finding an angle is important in both writing and shooting. Too many journalists shoot everything at eye level and that can make a [...]
Filed under: 06. Multimedia Storytelling | 2 Comments »
Posted on March 9th, 2011 by Deborah Potter
Journalists are notorious for hating anything to do with math. If we’d been any good with numbers, I often joke, we might have chosen a different career. But it’s essential for today’s journalists to get comfortable working with data, and the good news is that more and more of them are. What’s changed? For one [...]
Filed under: 06. Multimedia Storytelling | No Comments »
