The "citizen journalist" and "bittergate"

Hi fellow Poynterites --

I'm curious as to everyone's thoughts on Mayhill Flower's surrepitious recording of Obama's speech at a closed fundraiser and all the defenses/criticisms that have sprung up afterwards.

It's providing a fine teaching moment (I'm having my students do an in-class debate discussing this episode, as well as the behavior of the ABC journalists during the debate.)

Here's my take. I'm not surprised by the "there are no rules; everyone has a role" defense being tossed around by Jay Rosen, Jeff Jarvis and others. They have their talking points down pretty well by now. I worked with Rosen on getting NewAssignment.Net off the ground and have had some involvement with "citizen journalists." Overall, I think the jury is still out on whether the concept can work. There are moments when it does, such as the efforts by the Fort Myers News-Press. And, I agree with Mindy and I don't think that this is a time to be discussing "who is a journalist" -- lots of air has been spent on that in past years.

Here's the rub for me. Credibility is the one and only chip that journalists, citizens or otherwise, can bargain with. The behavior of journalists in recent years, thanks in large part to the demands of the 24 hour news cycle, has done little to build on that credibility. Not too much trusting going on out there.

What has always helped journalists in this regard is identification. Rule #1 in Journalism 100 is to identify yourself. That way people know that what they say and do is subject to reporting, recording and could end up on a blog, Web site, cable, etc. Fundamentally, identification comes down to fairness.

I'm not sure that happened here. Having read what Fowler had to say about the whole identification process, it's not even clear Fowler knew what the ground rules were going in, and certainly Obama's people thought Fowler was not acting in a journalist's role.

And, what about the role of Fowler's editor? Did the editor know about the murky waters surrounding identification? I recall working with one "citizen journalist" at New Assignment and explaining that submitting his story to the source for pre-publication approval was not a journalistic norm. But then we get back to the "no rules" thing.

So, when Rosen, Jarvis et al say the rules no longer apply, does that mean that identification is no longer needed? We can now all go skulking around trying to obtain meaty sound bites that we can immediately throw up on a Web site to gain a little notoriety? I'm not too sure that's a good thing. Saying there are "no rules" just seems a little simplistic and naive. Don't we need rules in order to be fair and balanced -- no matter how you define yourself on the journalistic spectrum?

Hope all is well,
Fox

Rights-free music

Anyone have good sources for getting free music for slideshows? I want my students to post their pieces publicly but can't do that if they're stealing copyrighted tunes.

5th anniversary coverage?

I'm pulling samples for class on coverage of the 5th anniversary of the invasion of Iraq. I'm a big fan of these two:
- Reuters' "Bearing Witness" -- to me, a great example of what we can accomplish in multimedia
- Milwaukee Journal Sentinel's "5 Years in Iraq" -- to me, a great example of what local news ought to be and how you can effectively localize a major international story. It has its limitations (long cutlines on slideshows, not enough self-directed audio), but I do like the inclusion of polling and Meg Jones' blog. She always has seemed to know exactly why she was over there.
What are you seeing, liking and disliking?
Also, does anyone have links or screen captures from the 5th anniversary of 9/11? I'd like to compare the two.

Check out Blogging Basics

If any of you are encouraging your students to blog, you might find my latest blog - Blogging Basics - helpful. I created it for a workshop I did a week or so ago on the basics of blogging. I've tried to link to several sites that offer good information for beginning bloggers.

Regina talks multimedia

Here's my video of Regina McCombs talking about what makes a good multimedia story. Feel free to link to it or use it in your classes (OK - maybe as an example of poor video quality but she has good advice!) I've finally posted it on my class blog as well if you want to see that.

Digital manipulation

Here's a fantastic site documenting famous manipulations of photographs, dating all the way to the civil war. It's an excellent resource for classes.

Portraits

I sent my students out to do election interviews while we were at Poynter, and asked them to come back with some portraits of their sources. Their shots were not bad, but Denise McGill helped me advise them on how to make the pictures. Thought I would share with you guys what she said:

First off, there are a million ways to make a portrait, and millions of photo books and samples, and lots of philosophies and approaches. I show them lots of good samples, and we have a long conversation about treating photo subjects with respect, issues with shooting nudes, etc. I explain that in the non-journalism world, you always need a model release to publish a photo, so I make them get their photo subjects to sign a release.

OK, so what actually makes a good portrait?

 Get to the essence of the person. Use good composition. Study the light.
 Off-camera light is always better (ie, window light is better than the little flash on your camera, but your little flash is better than no light at all.)
 Look at the shadows. Make sure the eyes aren’t sunken in deep shadow pockets.
 Always focus your camera on the eyes.
 Backgrounds should be black or as uncluttered as possible.
 The photo should tell us something about the person.
 One good technique is to get the photo subject to lean in toward the camera. It gives a feeling of intimacy and intensity. Also, use your lens to zoom in, as this is a more flattering lens angle.
 So even on a pocket camera, you can use the zoom to zoom in and step back, which is better than using wide angle and staying really close.
 Wide-open aperture is often preferable, because it blurs the background and focuses all the attention on the face.


Before going out shooting, you ask:

__ Do I have film/digital card in the camera?

__ Is it properly loaded?

__ Do I have fresh batteries?

__ Is ASA set right?

__ Are the quality and other settings the way I want them?

I find something to take pictures of.

__ Am I in the best location? Should I get closer? Move around?

__ Do I have the right lens?

__ Is subject in focus?

__ Am I metering correctly?

I get a meter reading.
Have I adjusted it for:

__ backlight or special conditions

__ depth of field (aperture)

__ camera movement (shutter speed 1/60 sec. or faster)

__ subject movement

As I take the picture:

__ Am I standing solid?

__ Am I squeezing without shaking the camera?

__ Did I write down my settings and get caption information?

Also, check out these two links:
http://digitalphotography.tipcentral.net/

http://www.picturecorrect.com/photographytips/portraits.htm

-- Sue Robinson

Here's One I Like...

This Boston Globe multimedia package on prison suicide does a neat trick of embedding the links to other multimedia segments (letters, maps, etc.) in the video segments. It's the first I've seen like this.

Poor Use of Panos

The Washington Post has obviously put a lot of time and effort into this multimedia presentation ahead of the Texas and Ohio primaries, but it frankly doesn't work for me.

I don't "get" the use of the panoramas combined with the audio. I don't think one illustrates or supports the other, in either direction. And I HATE that the audio ends before the pano in most of the entries I looked at, leaving me to sit in silence watching an image spin around.

This totally strikes me as production for the sake of production, not something that advances the story at all. And what did we learn? When the production overwhelms the message, it's a problem.

SB

"Welcome to South Carolina"

Hello fellow Poynterites --

So about an hour into my flight home, the cabin began to fill with smoke, a flight attendant ran from the back of the plane to the front (never a good sign) and we began a rapid descent into South Carolina. But, the flight attendants kept to the script, with a "Welcome to South Carolina" as we banged onto the ground. And, yes, there was the inevitable passenger who whipped out his videocam and took shots of the firefighters as they boarded the plane.

Anyway, it's snowy in Amherst and I wanted to bring you all up to date on efforts to create student chapters affiliated with the Online News Association. I've been involved with ONA for a few years and it looks like this year we may actually be able to get some traction on making this happen.

But, until the formal chapters happen, I was wondering whether we wanted to create some sort of informal network for our students to talk about online journalism. We could use this blog or we could create another one?

Thoughts?

Hope everyone is well.

chrs,
Fox

student paper in trouble

those of you advising student newspaper eds might want to offer this as an object lesson. imho, dean paul voakes (disclosure: a sweet friend of mine) is handling it well with respect to both freedom and climate.

A cool interactive graphic

The Detroit News did a very cool interactive graphic when the Detroit Institute of Arts re-opened after extensive remodeling. It has many layers and reminds me of going to a hands-on museum (without leaving your computer).

ethics and infographics

good piece on ethics in infographics.

cool interactive infographix?

anyone have links to excellent examples of interactive infographix? looking for lecture samples. we used a few at poynter that i had already been showing. any others?

need Michael Cheers's contact info

Hey, all -- I didn't get a name/number/address for Michael Cheers, from San Jose State. I know his university went through the accreditation process recently. We are, too. I want to get some input from him.

If someone has contact info, can you send it to me?

Thanks!

SB

Amazing online

My students often tell me one of the key elements of online is the space to do more than you could in another medium. This is an amazing and heart-rending illustration of that. I'd love to see them go beyond the blog now, to put some depth to the breadth, particularly by using audio or video to give voice to families that have so often been invisible. I think it's also interesting how on-scene reporting can deepen the kind of data you'd find in everyblock and how race played in different ways for the audience.

Fodder for ethics discussions

Hi guys,
It's Saturday night, and I'm finding myself happy to be home but really missing you guys. What fun it was to be 100% engaged 100% of the time with people who share your passions. It was like being at the best of wine tastings (and no, Joanne, you better not repeat that prank on me!)
Anyhoo, if you haven't already, check out the ethics storm brewing at Northwestern. Fascinating on so many fronts.

wanted: multimedia news classroom template

In addition to creating blogs, I would like my students in "Writing for Electronic Journalism" to re-write (I guess the buzzword is "repurpose") their daily broadcast stories for a website. This would be the first baby step toward bringing our student TV show (which is already aired on the local cable station) to the internet. IT has given us a classroom page on the server, but I need to make it look like a real news site, so that we can post text and embed video and audio Is that wheel already invented, or do we have to slog through a design process that is really outside the parameters of our writing class?

By the way, in the small world department, at 8:3o last night my bus from Boston was winding its way through the white mountains. One of the kids in front of me had a Scottish accent. She was sitting with an Australian student, by the sound of it. So naturally I asked them who they were and why they were on this bus in very rural New Hampshire. Turns out the Scottish kid, named Pamela, is in Steve Fox's class. By the way, Steve, she was the only one in the group reading a book for school.

It's 3 degrees here in Vermont. I miss the Florida warmth--and I'm not just talking thermometer. So nice to have new friends who can make teaching a lot easier and more rewarding.

Carry on. . . .
Charlotte

Three words: Sue took video

I'm posting this in case any of you want to use it as a teaching tool. You could use the content - story focus tips from Al Tompkins - as a good example. Or you could use my weak video-taking skills as a "how not to do it" lesson! Or you can just enjoy.

Exercise for student newspapers

Like some of you, I advise a student newspaper and I'm planning to do a multimedia exercise, based on the discussion we had with Regina McCombs' about what each medium does best, at our editors meeting next week.

I've described it on my blog. By the way you'll also see Sandy's photo of Regina there. (Thanks, Sandy!) The photo credit is at the bottom. Does anybody know how to put captions and photo credits on blogger?

Text, Video, Photo -- What Each Does Best

If you all would like a text version of the "media strengths" lists that Regina made in her multimedia story session, I typed them all out and posted them today.

I really enjoyed hanging out with you folks! What a great, optimistic, energetic bunch of people you are!

My one colleague will not let me whine about how far behind I am in my regular work because the first thing I said to her when she asked, "How was Poynter?" was:

"It was a lot of fun!"

THANKS...AND WATCH FOR FALLING BOULDERS!

Dear Fellow Followers of Al:

It's rare for me to go to a conference/seminar where you meet so many smart, motivated, fun people willing to share their thoughts and ideas. I was really taken in by the open exchanges and how everyone was willing to help each other out. I go back to snowy Mass. with the spirit of Al and the support of the Poynterites!

I've never been a big fan of goodbyes, so here's to seeing you again down the road. Be well and thanks.

chrs,
Fox

Notes From the Curriculum Committee

Like much of my life, this is stream of consciousness note-taking -- I'll clean up later....

There was some talk of how to work design into a J program and whether some sort of template could be created.

Susan discussed her faculty mentoring role at Arizona and how that role was built into her job description. She has a course reduction and the position is very informal, evolving nicely over time to now people come to her seeking advice.

The mentoring role has very much set the tone for collaboration at Arizona.

Set the tone with collaboration – evolved at UA

Penny – such an idea as to evolve over time.

There was some discussion on the value of teaching multimedia by deconstructing and reconstructing stories on the web.

Scott – raised concerns about depth and how we can all train students to continue to find ways to dig deeper.

We need to focus more on in-depth work and critical thinking – how to go deep into paper trail;
Also, how do u develop assignments without teaching final cut?

Susan – spoke abot the idea of teaching to multimedia – break down and build assignments along the way.
Have other teachers come in to edit the stories; others focus on the tech side
Grammar test and U-Md and Oregon
“When Words Collide”

modeling collaborative exchange of ideas – what did we learn
course meetings?
Setting up course meetings to exchange ideas;

Don’t need to be jack of all trades but need to know how to relate to all trades – susan
Send out on an assignment – is this an audio story, video story, text –
More framing – textbooks that outline what a multimedia story is?
Better curicculum at how to teach this

Here are components of different stories – give some structure
How much context is in the piece

Telling multimedia stories –

Blogs –
Scott – use as a way to draw in students –
Have conversations about readings on the blog

Susan – depth, storyboard with multimedia pieces
Get them outside doing different things – intro class – hands on but learning multimedia
Susan – let them go ahead and turn in crap at the start of multimedia – similar standards to what we have for writing
Part of job description – do multimedia; examine web stuff

Sue's notes on Al's tips

Here are some of the tips from Al about recording video in the field. This is a random assortment of tips. I am hoping I wrote all this down correctly. Please feel free to add or subtract. The stuff in caps is the most important.

? You want to have a large number of shots (or sequences) of all kinds: wide, long, medium, close-up, super close-up. But in general, medium shots are boring.
? Work as close as you can to your subject, and zoom out if you need to (as opposed to starting longer and zooming in.
? HOLD EVERY SHOT FOR A MINIMUM OF 10 SECONDS
? Stabilize. Use your body as a tripod, spread your legs and use your body/trunk by holding the camera next to you. Or use the ground, the back of a chair, whatever. If your shot is bouncing around, you've got nothing even if you hold it for 10 seconds.
? Always establish the opening setting by taking a wider, long shot to show the context of whatever you are trying to show.
? When you want to pan, you start with your body squared to what will end up being your END shot, so that you start turned (when you are less stable), and slowly pan until you are square with the final shot. This limits motion in your shot.
? ALWAYS BE ON THE SHADOW SIDE, meaning if you have someone where the light is illuminating one side of a person's face, you want to be shooting from the shadow side. This will add drama to your shot. OR, get the person into a gentle shadow where the light is more diffused.
? If the subject has dappled sunlight on it, you must have the reason for that dappling IN the shot (like a tree). Otherwise it just looks strange.
? Pick a 180-degree line and stick to it. Choose this carefully. The idea here is that the line represents the natural line of your eye.
? MAKE SURE YOUR CAMERA LENS IS CLEAN.
? COMMIT TO A SUBJECT. So do not shoot something where the viewer is left guessing what the shot is about (that tree? That bush? The people in the middle?)
? Frame your shots in thirds, using the trees, the lines of the landscape, people.
? Shoot the subject off center.
? ALWAYS LISTEN AND WATCH, keeping ears and eyes open for possible shots and interesting layering for your stories. Be aware of the under-thread of the audio (such as airplanes, traffic, etc.)
? Don't be afraid of moving the subject around, helping them look good, positioning them under lights, etc.
? Have the sun at your back whenever possible
? Think about your opening and closing shots. For example, try to let people walking out of the frame to conclude a piece. Let the interviewee hang up the phone, sort to speak.
? You want the motion to lead the shot (In other words, the motion has to have a reason for being there)
? Start with the shadows and move to the light.
? You will need cutaways. Shoot these first
? Be careful of aesthetic interruptions in your path (such as a stair railway coming into the shot from the left. Move your shot over)
? Reflection is good
? If you do a close-up, you need the viewer to understand what that close-up is of. What are we supposed to be seeing? So if you were to do a close-up of the statue in the courtyard, you would want a shot of the man with his newspaper, before doing a shot of the newspaper and his face reading the newspaper.
? Make the shot say something.
? Fill out the frame, using objects in the shot, so that your eyes have some kind of line to follow, some place to go in the photo. Also, related, be aware of how much "real estate" (or empty space) you have in your shot such as expanses of water (not all that interesting)
? You want the camera to be the eye for the viewer
? Do not fight the light. Work with it.
? Make sure you are on AF for Auto Focus, rather than Manual
? Make sure your mic is on
? To conserve batteries, use the eye lens, not the view finder (which you have to store)
? Make sure the lens cap.

Tips on Video Field Tips

soundslides discounts for academia

Hi all,
Donna (the former birthday girl) here.

Like some of you, today was my first exposure to Soundslides. I e-mailed Joe about getting bulk pricing and this is what he said:
We do offer educational discounts for academic computer labs.


** Educational price for Soundslides Plus: **

Regular price is $69.95

10 or more: $55.96 each
20 or more: $52.46 each
30 or more: $48.96 each

The quote for a 30-seat Soundslides Plus license is:

$1468.80



** Educational price for Soundslides **

Regular price is $39.95

10 or more: $31.96 each
20 or more: $29.96 each
30 or more: $27.96 each

The quote for a 30-seat Soundslides license is:

$838.80



We can also output a single consolidated registration key for all licenses, which should make it easier to manage in a lab environment.

If you're interested, let me know which version you need, and I'll setup an online order form.

Let me know if you're interested or have any other questions.

Best regards,
joe

Flash for fun

Check out the amazing stuff real animators can do. It ain't journalism, but it's way cool

Flash tutorials

Here's Mindy's link to her 10-minute Flash tutorials.
She advises having students watch them before you begin any training. Go through them in order.

Paging Ms. McAdams

Here's how to get to the exact spot in Mindy's site to grab the content she used with us Monday night.
You also can grab stuff she's given other groups.