Spent the afternoon honoring a shoot for Filmminute.com against a backdrop of other work.
The mission?
Filminute wants to develop its aggregated content into a fully fledged show, with the added caveat of making it "edgy" using the VJ Way, shot on a competitive budget.
I'd previously advised on some drop-in segments from the filminute team in various regions around the world.
Those were segued into a show format devised with one of the show's executive.
Then time to record some links to bump against the core content of the show; the finalist for this year's comp.
Their key partner, Selfridges has built a customised cinema in the store's lounge showing the films on a loop, which provided some good appropriate backdrops.
That went on for best part of the afternoon, with the show's exec proving to be an adept presenter.
Job done.
My rucksack, despite a huge improvement on my previous life in broadcast where we'd be hauling around blondes and redheads ( rigging lights), mini jib, digibeta, and vinten tripods etc., still felt like a sack of potatoes.
Though I might put that down to the hardback books, the equivalent of an A1 slabs, I had been carrying to varsity to devise new modules in multimedia.
I'd been looking forward to catching my Phd colleague, Dr Rachel Armstrong, presenting on her cytoplasmic theory, but for the life of me couldn't find the venue on Tottenham Court Road, somewhere called The Store.
Then there was a cataclysmic breakdown in the trains on the way home, which resulted in a circuitous series of buses.
Grrr.
I'll post some shots from the shoot over the weekend when I get to edit it.
By the fourth time vanguard video journalist RuudElmendorp had sought an answer from one of the Lord Resistance' child soldiers, their eyes glazed with nothingness, two thoughts cross your mind.
Ruud is either being very reckless or very clever.
As a seasoned hack and video journalists, Dutch-born Ruud wears the experience of working Africa with such aplomb; he demonstrates he knows the area, its people and is highly respectful.
Question answered.
It was no small wonder the film took a major award, and garnered many critical reviews.
And here evidently lies two core values of video journalism on display.
1. The ability to unearth stories - a quality many of us possess. 2. The ability to on-the-fly film and weave together visuals in which the sum of their parts tell a compelling story - something many of us are learning.
One of the biggest assets for video journalism is how its widening the visual documentation of stories, from areas previously overlooked by mainstream.
But also, and this is equally big, how it can fundamentally redress the way we tell (news) stories to give them a boldness and to make you the viewer sit up and care about what you're watching.
That human endeavor, social reaction, our fears and hopes are universal and whilst Africa [ a figure of speech] may be 1000s of miles away from where ever you are, thus dimming our care quotient and appropriate response, the skill of the VJ is to make you care.
These are stories that are often unapologetic and devoid of celeb culture, hiding the template of good strong film making.
You've either come across them, just the characters are different as well as the contextual profoundness of the issues relative to their origin, or they take the mind on that mysterious journey good films are capable of executing.
Poverty in Africa? But you wouldn't have to search hard enough to find poverty in and around the big cities we occupy. The destitution is relative.
Today one of the richest banks in the world filed for bankruptcy. How can that be?
Context and relativity!
You've seen it may times, when the same networks pitch at the same stories, yet their final product differ. Many times they might almost look the same.
If news is about relaying contracted events, which in story telling shrunk to the point of anorexia, then video journalism is about restoring news stories as must sees, the film maker as the loquacious technician.
A film maker who understands how to arc the film to keep you tuned will not be worried by the fixed stanza of 1.20 minutes or 2.20.
If it's online, it should be as long as it is, in the same way a skilled film maker can have the boldness to take you up to three hours if the material is compelling.
We're wearing old clothes sown for us in a different era. Nostalgia and our parents telling us there's no more money to buy new ones, keeps these ill-fitted covers on our back.
The truncated duration of news and its a la carte delivery arose by default, then re-enforced by pollsters' audience research.
In the 90s BBC Director General John Birt insisted on a style broadcasters jokingly referred to as "Birts mission to explain".
A package should be all but self-contained. Aha the formulae.
The skilled visual broadcaster might not have adopted this but was masterful at grabbing your interests. Go back and listen to Fergal Keane in South Africa and Rwanda.
The newspaper inverted style of writing which would impact radio and TV News stories arose out of a basic necessity.
Stories were wired via telegraph from the source to their final destination, but the telegraph lines had a habit of going down, so it was both necessary and prescient to get the most important information at the top.
If the line disappeared during transmission you could count on the fact that the best part of the story got through.
Film makers, with their own canvass, have no use for the inverted triangle.
Meanwhile News could get x nunber of ad breaks in an half hour so making them 1.2o was ideal.
We're not bound by those constraints any more, at least online. And inspite of the cultural attention span we, netizens, have adopted, the belief is we can rewrite the rules.
Those incredible films you're seeing unfold online are a slow gathering testament to that.
Films that are crafted, not shot from the source of which we term "open wide" where the camera records uninhibited, a skill itself, but video journalism is about the craft.
Video journalism is about factual digital film making, "factual" - the operative word.
The banking industry senses a fundamental correction following this era of economic unrest. Lets hope so. Corporate greed has unleashed enough demons.
The fundamental correction to the media landscape may be in progress, but I'm still unsure it's had its big bang.
So my boss walks in the door and puts this box on the desk.
"There you are he says. When can we see something"
For the last fortnight I have been bricking it. Three newspapers surrounding our patch are posting video.
The bosses are getting nervy. You'd think their jobs are on the line.
In meetings they give it some welly, you know we must be doing video, but no one's told us quite how.
So we've taken to watching videos, lots of them; sometimes as much for an hour, and the truth, a lot of it is pretty shocking.
I wouldn't mind but the site our boss cites as the standard looks like that lot from South Park having a laugh.
Can't be that difficult though: point and shoot, a mate told me.
Yesterday, we heard from the local nick ( police) a VJ from another newspaper had been arrested and cautioned. He was filming outside a school, where it's alleged a local paedophile stalks.
The journo wanted to show what the perv sees, but a teacher nearby called the police, believing he was a perv.
His NUJ card didn't help much. Police referred him to some law governing the filming of children and gaining consent. Apparently he didn't know
Police cells stink of sick. urghh!
What's the point in all this? Came across a brilliant site, names escapes me, which spoke about increasing the diversity of stories, the ones mainstream fails to cover, but the piece also noted that if its not done well, you might as well not have bothered in the first place.
Jumped up TV ******* some of them, but tomorrow we're getting a TV guy in who's finally going to be teaching us video journalism.
Looking forward to this.
Tales of a video journalist, is a fictional account of a video journalist gleaned from feed back of more than 200 video journalists and their own stories, which will appear on Viewmag.blogspot.com.
The upshot of our exchange is that in a couple of weeks I'm pitching a film idea at a script session organised by Steve that includes producers from the hugely successful working title.
As Steve put it, you'll get some very good feedback, if you're up for it and I'd like to work with you on the script.
The brief is essentially a video journalism feature piece, but I'll be using tried and tested methods within video journalism to up the ante.
And in case you're wondering, the three act tale with arcs, so much a feature of film making has been part of video journalism for the best part of ten years, is one of them.
For about 20 minutes we stood in the court yard ping-ponging film talk at each other.
Steve: As far as scripts go, it's not one of the classic thriller script but what makes Bourne work is the editing and Greengrass' sense of tension. For classic thriller go see Marathon Man.
Me: Yes, but its his tagging and blocking - derived from documentary making- also a feature of video journalism, and dramas like Homicide that makes Greengrass's stuff edgy.
Steve: the docu drama look - if you look back at some of Cecil B DeMille's work you'll see this at work.
And so it went culminating in Steve asking me to come and speak to a group of film makers about the video journalism approach.
What we all share in common, I suppose is, character development and the metronome of story telling.
By the way when I say character development, it's in part a reference to the central characters in a piece and whether or not they're suitable for the piece.
Internal reviews and policy implementations are an ongoing affair within any media outlet.
Often its a genu-reflective of their direction and how management need to stem the hemorrhaging of viewers and readers.
Sometimes it can be an exercise in self-indulgence; ignoring the obvious signs as scaremongering. This thing called the Net, it won't survive, was the tune being sang by many a management in the early days.
Now, mainstream media has more or less adopted the free-for-all tools of participatory info flows, but that might not be nearly enough.
There lies an inherent attitude thing. What do our viewers think about us?
First you've got stop your readers from drifting, then you've got to up the ante, get bullish and win them back, then drive the numbers up.
The two require different strategies and due to the nature of the wisdom of crowds, require constant attention.
The problem Labour are going through reflect that as much: first we've got to stop the rot, then steady the ship, then drive the new message. Place the wrong one in front of the other and you're in danger of being ridiculed.
In the 70s/ 80s and 90s, specialist pollsters were almost exclusively responsible or judging the health of a network and prescribing medicine that ran along the lines of: counter programming, tent polling and hammocking - a process of running a new show or item between two successful shows favoured by NBC.
The net rendered the more austere of these redundant, though many schedulers still work around similar processes.
In the last couple of months the BBC in particular has been pushing its offline to the web with regular announcements on radio and TV of added value online.
Not just an extension of the same but by a neat trick of changing the direction of a story at the last few seconds of the item, and then telling the listeners there's more on line.
Digital experts refer to this as a second shift aesthetic.
Within the BBC and a number of broadcasters it has not been lost on them that newspapers are making heavy inroads into web audiences, so the debate is skewing to how do we ( media) extend the shelf life per item of our correspondents.
How do we use the web for more breaking stories? How do we keep the audience in our garden.
Watch out at some point for perma links on TV, more cross talk between the online and offline teams in hand overs and perhaps another new favorite of "ploughing".
The latter I'll explain in a visual theme I'm working on very soon.
David during his News presenting days - more pics on front of viewmagazine.tv and at bottom of posts
Bidding for a politician to come on your new network is one of the most pressing functions for broadcasters. For any researcher and producer given the task it amounts to a sacking or favoured son/daughter moment.
Once at Newsnight I remember pleading to the point of desperation with my government spokesman to come on the show.
Tim Gardam, the editor at the time, made it clear: get the spokesman in the studio.
So here's my play guide at Broadcasters interviewing politicians.
1. Before the good old days of instant audience feedback and blogs, programme makers worried very little about what the audience thought. They likely still feel that way. About the only thing on their mind is what rival broadcasters think.
2. Making a bid for a politician means talking to their party machinery. First the personal secretary or press office depending on what number you have or better still if you know the party chief strategist, pulling in a personal favour.
3. At the time of bidding, the team are also vetting you. Who's going to give them a good run? The arm chair approach or the confrontational.
4. First time out, as a newly elected, the team are looking for a soft landing inteviewer. Some one who won't be rude, will not want to be scoring points on banana skins and understands the game.
You can be firm, but cross the line and you're exclusives are out. See you in the pool and then some.
During the 2001 general election in the UK, Channel 4 political programme powerhouse ran an item I'd produced around national insurance contributions. It imagined a "what if" NI hike by labour. A senior labour spokesman being questioned by the venerable Michael Brunson, called the item twaddle or thereabouts claiming labour would never put up NI - which Labour had never pledged. Ooops!
Labour's leaders, Blair and Brown, refused from then on to take any questions from the Powerhouse team in news conferences. Funny thing was, the editor of Powerhouse was Andrew Brown, Gordon Brown's brother, here providing me with a glowing reference.
The Powerhouse team though did wonder what Sunday meals must have been like with the Browns at home. 5. Some call it the Apollo syndrome. When the expeditions first started NASA needed the air time, but then Apollo missions became bland and the networks turned off. That is until disaster struck and the networks needed the exclusives.
The Network needs the politician to deliver ratings so a tacit agreement kicks in about what can and cannot be talked about. It's a barter. Anything off limits and that's it you're done.
Interviewing the Tory's Secretary of state for transport, Brian Mawhinney, during the Major government I was warned by his team I could not ask about the M11 motorway expansion plans.
After my second question I ran out of ideas, so asked the question. The interview was near stopped.
6. In the bid you'll put forward the presenter likely to be doing the interview. At some point you'll put your journalist on the line with the party machine. They'll talk for several minutes.
7. On interview day, you arrive with crew and whilst you're setting up, your presenters prepping. Often that means talking to the interviewer, smoothing over how it'll start and the direction. Specific questions are not spoken about, but the strategist will be conferring with you researcher and producer about off limit subjects as well as gauging what you're looking for.
Journalists like Jeremy Paxman don't do small talk, as far as I recall working on Newsnight. He might just about say hello, but then that's it.
8. The politician has been coached how to deal with journalist:
rule a) Call him or her by their first name. It destroys any notion with the interviewer that this is confrontational and if it does go that way, the audience look on thinking " how could that SOB do that to that person".
b) Always look at the presenter. If you don't know the answer to a question turn it into a question. It'll buy you time and in some cases the nice presenter will fill in some gaps for you.
c) If you don't know an answer pose the question and don't fill in the silences. TV presenters get paid to fill in silences otherwise it aint TV. Likewise if you want to make a point and you're talking across each other, don't back down. TV presenters get paid to back down otherwise it aint good TV.
9. How much research did you pass by your presenter? Loads, you handed your presenter the Magna Carta. Unfortunately there's only a set number of minutes available and because there's no one issue to hammer, it's likely the interview will be expansive merely touching various points.
And unless that is your presenters is wired up with an ear piece to an off camera editor, the presenters on their own. Even the most skilled presenters need a good editor/producer to help them zone in on answers usually glazed over.
10. When the interview is completed the party will ask for a copy. Don't give it to them until you've broadcast otherwise they'll want cuts and lean heavily on you with future offerings if you don't.
Also watch out for the freebie exclusive tickets to Tennis, and the inner sanctum. There are many ways of thanking a presenter for a "great interview".
You've just played the interview game. No blood on the floor. Your reputation in tact and your interviewer fights to see another day. Even become vice president- when you get pay back.
Meanwhile your interview gets syndicated and agencied to every broadcast around the world. The politican shuts the gates to all others: "Sorry no more interview at the moment". Unless that is you can promise us something....
p.s I got my spokesperson in the studio who spoke about government action in Child abuse cases.
It might have been Britain's Prime Minister, Gordon Brown, (no not Tony Blair) throwing a hand of diplo-doodoo into the US election race with an article that endorsed Barack, whilst ignoring any crumbs of comfort about McCain.
McCain's campaign team cried : "foul".
Or that swines around the world started bleating in unison to an almighty din. Lipstick!
A dash of lipstick on porky goes a long way and we'll not hear the rest of this, particularly as in some back yard somewhere the Society For the Protection of Lipsticks on a Pig, will soon be convening their first meeting.
Pigs have feelings too.
However as Big Bangs go, this almost suffocated the real news of the day of a giant matrix built in Geneva looking for the meaning of the universe.
Whilst, the back chat was: "we're all going to die - from an enveloping black hole", Sex and the Politics was almost seen as far riskier.
Barack's comments (faux pas); Palin's lipstick comment, (amusing); then the BBC's PM radio news programme retrieved a McCain comment from recent archives with him poking lipstick on a pig (not faux pas).
What is it about lipstick on a pig, which is now up to 580,000 googleentries and rising by the piglet?
Media boredom? There's no denying there's so little in the way of howlers that if you're a network news producer you've got to find something on any candidate, even finger-drilling their ears for dry wax.
"The big story today: Obama is trigger happy. The nuclear codes are unsafe. Here's why".
Experts of the diplomatic persuasion might tut tut: words, dear boy are our weapon of choice, so one must choose them carefully.
Obfuscation often is preferred to what you really think, and mind you it's all in the timing dear boy!
US politics, as else where is a collection of leaders from the straight talking types -tell em like it is, to the carefully chosen worders. And it's often believed the electorate crave a change in negotiating talk after long periods.
In the UK, PM Brown was supposed to the Labour leader of choice after years of Blair, the slicker worder.
But from recent news pollings the party is zombing to its demise at the next election.
Critics of police interviewing techniques, adopted long ago by the media, refer to it as "shaping".
Making a pre-conceived suggestion about an event, which if shaped well comes to adopt the meaning the interviewer intended.
It's one reason in live interviews, politicians very rarely answer an interviewer with the question they posed.
At a distance, making something seemingly harmless stick is what editors might called juxtaposed editing.
In Eisenstein's famous BattleShip Potemkin, two seemingly unrelated events when brought together provide new meaning. One an arm action, the Second a cut eye.
The result: somebody just had their face slashed.
Lipstick on a pig ~ slang for when someone tries to dress something up, but is still that something. usually used on ugly broads, when they put on a skirt
High Drama High drama!
Here, in conversation at the Uni ( who cares what Brits think?) there is a collision of awe and incredulity in this live poker election game.
It is by any stretch of a scriptwriter's imagination the best film that's never been made relegating Melannie Griffith's Working Girl to something dreary and tired.
"From Put to President" - the tale of one hard working hockey mum from a small town becomes the most powerful woman in the world.
Even the connoisseured Palm D'orcould not conceal their tear-drenched handkerchief at its premiere.
My favourite though is "lipstick on a pig- the docufilm drama" - made by one of the US' favorite Video Journalists _______________ ( stick name here)
November 6th McCain is President
March 15th McCain goes in for a routine check up and is held in for tests. Media report Whitehouse says there is nothing wrong with McCain.
March 15th: Media Reports: Russia says new evidence that US played a role in Georgia breaches international diplomacy. Its military warship Peter the Great just outside US water fires unidentified war head in what US claims is provocation.
US tells Russia to cease all activities otherwise there will be consequences.
Hollywood star Samuel L Jackson's playing agent Wayne on L.O.P says the film's a hit because it mirrors society.
There's a scene in Roger Donaldson's 13 Days, when military brass are leaning on President JFK to meet the Soviets head-on. Cut to a naval chief being berated because he doesn't quite understand the subtlety of a missile fire being an intricate diplomatic chess move.
It's a message, high in stakes of double dutch speech amongst the learned types.
If as the fear factor amongst millions of Americans is Palin does becomes president by default, could you believe she'd be in the decision-making chair, and not the special aides and policy wonks of her immediate circle?
Hail the real vice presidents turned decision-makers: middle-aged, grey suited men, insiders of Washington and some. That much Palin owes the party, for the fact she's made her piece of history, now let us do the right thing.
No president is bigger than the machine, unless they've a shed load of past contacts from Capital Hill to create their own machine. Which is why as an outsider it's nay impossible to make your own decision, cuz "you just don't understand how at the higher echelons we work".
Meanwhile the US's rogue states will be playing their own "diplomatic games". Take on the president in a bluff game, observe the reaction. The less experienced the person is the more likely they'll take a while, silence sows doubt, then let the US media pick up the act: Who Governs the US, screams the headlines.
The best weapon of diplomatic confabulation is confusion. Confusion is next in the diplomatic dictionary to "Implosion". You just have to sit back and watch.
That much I have come to observe in international relations either attending one of the UK's revered foreign affairs clubs, Chatham House, since 1994 and putting some of them on air.
By the time I get to visit, Chatham House, so busy haven't been for almost 2 years, I'm hoping the speaker can shed some light on the international diplomacy question.
Professor Paul Green, Director of the Institute of Politics, Arthur Rubloff Professor Policy Studies, Roosevelt University; Political Analyst for WGN Radio, Chicago is a nationally recognized political expert who has attended every major party convention since 1984 will give an analysis of the 2008 US Presidential race.
Meanwhile back to the media.
Question? Are there some things that might be off limits for the media?
And does integrity matter above ratings? In other words if you're a network trying to book the presidential runners and their deputies are there some things you won't touch on because you burn your future bridges if you do?
The greater good is getting them into your studio again, and again, and again.
And come the election who is Bin Laden likely to play to to the US audience?
Who will Laden endorse given his craving for scrapping for an open fight with the "Evil One"?
Tricky one and how will it gets spun, but get ready he's done it once.
In the run towards South Africa's epoch election in the 90s, a political insider told me a story.
I could never verify it but I trusted him.
Rumours were circulating of Mandela's ill-health and in the country to meet the great man was one of his idols, Ali.
The press demanded a photoshoot and whilst Mandela's aides were reluctant to get him out of bed, they needed something to quell the rumours, which my insider claims he hand a hand in advising his aides.
The picture duly appeared in the papers the next day: Mandela clenched fist with his idol looking a picture of health.
And that's the status quo . The US media's column inches and reels generated in this election run will hardly tell you anything, unless someone cracks under pressure.
There is a tacit understanding of how "we can work together".
Maggie Thatcher ( no, she's no longer Britain's prime minster) hated being interviewed by the public. You know the clip I'm talking about.
Every thing's so staged managed, that it looks almost implausible to come any great TV, that is unless the unpredictable happens.
It may not have counted for much, but more PM Brown big bangs may reveal more about the candidates and whether anyone of them rants about pigs.
This is a great story. Even more fascinating as I was merrily going about my web business when a colleague asked if I'd seen this film on BBC about Akii Buah
You know how when you're deep in something you're not really thinking...
"No", I said.
"Oh it was a beautiful film", he replied.
So we googled, but the original BBC film on i-player had been taken down.
Then my colleague Rob proceeds to tell me this extraordinary story of this extraordinary athlete from Uganda who broke the 400m record at the Olympics, whom trained with weights in his jacket.
He never defended his world record. Years later Uganda did not take part and the US's Moses would capture the limelight.
Akii had to flee the country and ended up in a refugee camp in Kenya, my colleague proceeded to recount the story, and there one day a journalist came across him, utterly baffled looking on in amazement.
One of the world's greatest athletes with not a penny to rub together, slumming it.
Akii was rescued and subsequently moved to Germany.
He passed away in 1997.
Now it's a great story in itself but it brings it even closer after my colleague Rob Ojok says...
"Oh yes he's my uncle"
"your what?"
" My Uncle. He used to come round my house haranguing me for not wearing puma gear his sponsors when I was heavily into Adidas. My dad would say "why are you so obsessed with Adidas when your uncle is giving you this puma gear for free".
You know what I mean and there are a long list of people we ferret out who do this.
Been under the bonnet again, using an application brought to my attention by one of my Masters students Ying.
Saw it on Apple, but like most things now, I suppose if you know where to look you'll find the code.
It's called Lightbox and you can see how Ying uses it here on her final project.
It's very easy to use with a good forum for feedback.
Effectively it defocuses the background with a black mask to make your picture more prominent.
Apple uses it with video on its trailer sites.
It was Social Media Evangelist JD Lasica whom made a point a while back about the availability of 3rd party k.apps and assortment of css cum widgets being within reach for all.
That way then we could focus attention on the language and changing culture of story telling.
Well I suppose that wish is all but answered.
Revolutions and Solostream Word Press can make any avarice content provider compete with the big uns.
The look and feel is almost worth jetisoning your own web ambitions for an off-the-shelf layout.
We're fast forgetting the days when it was spit and polish.
Video circa 2001 I remember how I laboured through love to put video online when the only code was via swfs.
As a result quite a few legacy pieces on viewmagazine have rubbed the wrong way because of a lack of video playback.
That's now changed with flvs and action scripting 3 that allows you to stream from servers with controls.
What was once a pinning pursuit with brightcove is no longer off limits. There are so many players, you ask how they stay in business.
And with bandwidth premiums gradually becoming a thing of the past, there's scope for greater innovation.
Which leads me to a feature on the BBC's click about hyper local coverage and community correspondence.
Bloggers et al contribute to around 20 mico sites which are all but self sustaining.
Last year they grabbed the online community and consumer prize in the association of online publishers awards which included the BBC and Sun newspaper.
The BBC is in the throes of considering hyper local.
The model sets up an interesting value system in bringing in revenue. If it becomes invaluable in, to use Channel One's phrase, "News you can Use", consumers will pay.
Hyperlocal's paymasters Couple of days ago I posted a commercial I made for my local tax advisor.
And in hyper local you can see how the local bakery, mechanic and landscape gardener can fork out comparatively a couple of pounds to get themselves out there.
Ask not.. but what you can give. This week Julian Aston, a name that may not mean anything to you, holds a party to celebrate his retirement and being self reverential his reinvention.
Julian Aston alongside Sir David English was the figure who pushed video journalism's uptake in the UK in the mid 90s.
I'm thinking he can afford a huge sigh and the thought that he has given much to video journalism and where we are today.
No one as yet though has replicated his revolutionary juke box play out system, but then would you with the web.
Well John, It's a fair process, but here's an outline:
Consider:
Capital investment and running cost models
marketing (TV/Online/print?) and advertising revenue
inventory - output -web/cable/triple play/ agency
recruitment and training
model and growth forecasts are some of the key areas to consider. Compared to tv the outlay is fractional, but you'll be calling on more innovation and cross-relations to penetrate the market in a relatively short time.
Furthermore consider
what you're covering and why may seem like the obvious, but that's where many fall short after cash flow probs and resort to traditional norms relying on agency feed to stay afloat.
Will you be the provider or will others contribute and if so what's you value or zeitgeist quotient?
Consider what for instance makes the ff: OSTN , Current TV, The Real News, Yahoo's Kevin Sites attractive or otherwise business and consumer propositions (not outright VJ stations per se, but using VJ models).
They share common ideals in UGC etc, but distinguish themselves in several areas, not least by different tech-cultural usage.
And mainly are you pursuing VJ for TV or VJ for VJ - there's a difference. It is a more comprehensive work flow of events.
Hope this helps. I'll probably blog some more details on this in the future
These guys deserve to be on terrestrial-satellite, Dave, perhaps.
Seen this once some time ago, but the second time around is even better: irreverent, highly informative, and they're having a great deal of fun.
I'll sound like a broken record, but those who've been on VJ training courses with me will have heard me talk about how Video journalism is closer in many respects to photojournalism than TV News Camera work IE if you're shooting VJism, not with TV in mind.
Enjoy this as the crew reveal some of their tricks of the trade.
David works about 15mins away and I'm looking forward to mixing it with him in the future.
As my mate Rob gets ready for Camp VJ 2 in the US, I'm thinking about putting something on here in London.
Language is a dynamic media constantly changing, whether that's visual or literary.
So what might work now in video journalism may see a bit dated in time.
We know that much from looking back on period films. There are classics from which we borrow, but styles and language have changed: I won't say evolved; changed, more like it.
I get asked whether I hold any close contact training of my own. I consult for clients e.g. corporates and newspaper groups, but have considered weekends for an at-your-pace learning zone.
So I'll take some more soundings, but the areas I'm interested in for an advance VideoJournalism would sweep through exclusive video from 1994 onwards, and include:
Exposition: there are stark differences between US and UK news reportage in how a story is told. There are emerging differences emerging in Video Journalism too.
Editing: knowing how to edit, but when and what to: the emotional cut, the syntax cut, juxtaposition
Effects: Just as in editing how can we use effects, minimum or otherwise to convey meaning in a story.
Shooting: tagging and blocking, movement and creative lens - the language of composition.
Multimedia: ignoring the timeline: Thinking spatially
And telling a story through Radio and TV and changes in radio broadcasts over the years that can be fed back into other media
Very rough cut of 4 min section of multimedia journalism film exploring multimedia - this is going to be turned into a hyper video film.
features Ozwald Boateng, Riz Khan, The Telegraph, its new super journalists I was involved in training and the very talented David Berman of Sitbonzo ( Croydon Advertiser)...Other additions to ff: Peter Horrocks, leading computer scientists, Dan Gillmor etc.
Posted here a highly compressed 480X270 70mb HDV film
Look no walls: Dental Nurse Convention lunch time. For most of the time, this all women convention had the windows to the hall blacked out, whilst all you could hear was raucous laughter.
I have been under the bonnet of css and html all day.
I'm presenting a short strand to faculty about Mashers.
The title of the preser is "Learning without Walls" and is intended to reflect the notion of students studying across disciplines and what some do.
I was struck as an undergrad that while Chemistry appealed to me, I was really interested in Economics.
In fact a day before my 3rd year exams, I was busy getting my head around "the law of diminishing returns" - my friend John still jokes about.
Eight years on I had my wish at the LSE for a couple of months studying global finance - marveling over the UK's penchant for "Boom and Bust" economics - loved it
Today, cross-discipline learning extends past any love affair; as a journalist it's almost a must.
In the corridor at uni, a heckle away are graphic information design students; below us, photography; to the left, film students and over the corridor Computer Science.
Diversity is the name of the game They're all united by a common cause, but separated by these invisible walls. Graphics is graphics and journalism is journalism.
Yes, No?
There's a debate.
Graphic design into our multimedia era strives further for the art of telling stories, and communicating through pictures, words, music et al. You might almost say the same thing for Journalists, and then why stop there.
knowing a bit of what everyone else knows is the edge to get ahead.
The graphics students that approached me for an interview with their design for an e-newspaper with models left me slacken- jaw for several minutes.
But I still wondered how much more might they have done if they had a student journalist attached to their project.
Couple of years ago, I rounded up a couple of cross discipline students to pitch an idea to Richard Deverill, now a controller of Children's TV at the BBC.
It was that rare opportunity when different minds came together, tentative, not knowing anything about each other, but in a couple of weeks dreaming up the most imaginative ideas.
Learning without walls Learning without walls is a bit like standing at speakers corner and saying it doesn't have to be this division of labour for learning and that we could learn a little more from each other: designers, coders, journalists and fashion, plus a whole raft of other disciplines.
In essence that's the space many agencies, heads of practising and educational journalism departments occupy, or would want to.
Here's where I should have played a clip from the BBC's Head of Multimedia Peter Horrocks.
In Final Year Projects, which I posted couple of days ago (you really must just take a brief look) online students push themselves pretty hard. Their briefs alone make for an hours reading.
Learning without walls is a sub culture many many of us, including students, already occupy; this is just to acknowledge what can be achieved and to see if there's room to provide further support to student mashers.
NB. Views expressed by David here in no way reflect that of the University or any reference to figures associated with it.
I feel like being down one just now with a sea of ideas around me.
I took the pic at a Sunday Pub Lunch somewhere in Warwickshire. And yes there were bore holes that looked like drilling sites from these fluffy creatures.
Rabbit Hole - an idea with good intention but proving unproductive. hic!
Elsewhere there are shake ups at the BBC - huge ones, so one idea I had has to be put on hold.
Sabaa's one minute film festival is doing well with a new mention from Wired Magazine. I'll post some more on this later, but meanwhile go visit and vote.
Could this be the future classroom?
It looks like this now on paper at the uni where I work.
And in a couple of weeks the new set up should allow all manner of digital digiratis to go on - all with the purpose of improving the experience for students.
Skyping with other lecturers into a lecture, having remote control over the screens... plus some mash ups with different disciplines.
I'll be showing some historical moments e.g. Second World War, 911 video journalism footage to a new generation of burgeoning journalists.
Finally the brilliance of Holovaty's Crime.org reaches British shores with the Mayor Boris Johnson deploying a crime-grid using google's engine and police data to London suburbs.
This is an altogether different one though Holovaty was the first I known of to point to data being used in such an innovatory way. Watch the report here 1995 National Press Club
The Mayor says it will help them target crime pointing to how it helped New York.
You can find out the best and worst of London by going to www.maps.met.police.uk and inserting your postcode.
My area came up "below average" .
Estate Agents, however are nervous as now you will now be able to log on and discover the worst areas in London.
My local tax advisor, Guy, is brilliant and I wanted to repay him for his services so I made this VJ commercial piece for his company taxfile.
Shot on A1, I have left it fairly lean on post production and it's more of an advertorial.
But it sustains enough, I hope, for you to contact him if you need assistance.
Commercials and Ads using small crews is said to be at the heart of the drive for new business online.
This film could easily have been quite a chunk of change, particularly in using 24p, lighting, and prime lense cameras to mirror 16mm.
It's also worth noting that while the gear may be DVCam the creative counts for something , which is why David Lynch, Director of Dune, Blue Velvet, and Mulholland Drive can pick up a nice earner for a spot he made for Playstation2 with the PD150.
There's an interesting story behind this which I'll talk about some other time.
And yes, I'm no David Lynch, but just a thought which segues into what Claudio and Scott Rensberger - two accomplished director/cameras - emphasis.
Deconstruction Spent about 2 hours there. Filmed judiciously so I had about 20 min of tape.
I set up the the shot for him to walk into his office with two passes, altering the focal frame on different passes.
You might even see how I cut through his "sequence- plane" the equivalent of the 180 line, which offers a clean aesthetic sequence.
I interviewed him for five minutes and edited something I believe reflected a broader canvas of who they are and what they do.
There are quite a few dirty shots, that means I've deliberately blocked my line of sight and often gone a little abstract to strengthen the visual grammar.
It's been reedited three or four times. Often the first pass is the scribble and the subsequent cuts refine.
It's been slightly washed through After Effects to bring up the luminance and crush the blacks.
Because I did not want to use music and introduce any visual effects, I have deliberately let the atmos bleed into the film. You might here the sirens, you might not.
I have shot a fair number of commercial/promos including: a "how to" for Livestation, through a friend which involved more aggressive shooting and some time ago Lennox Lewis, XTP- London Underground and a 30" spot aired on CNN International.
It really shouldn't take that long, but one of the sites I work on is buggy, so I find myself editing in code, which it gets very touchy about.
By the afternoon, in between marking papers, writing up a new online programme and filling in sections for my own dissertation, a security issue arose.
Comng back from a meeting, I'd previously spotted two men in a car in what looked like Phishing; running numbers across their screens. I couldn't help but ask whether they were the police (doh) before alerting the police.
Fortunately the group I was seeing have wifi WEP, protected, though I advised on WPA, which we looked at installing.
Then time to look at this legacy piece I'd promised a friend who also happens first to be my tax advisor. He wanted a piece and I spent about two hours with him. The result is something I'll post shortly and deconstruct.
By the day's end at 3 in the morning, that was it 15 hour day.
I used to be good at these "death marches" memories of dotcom 15 hour working habits.
This in an interesting a piece on free running on the front page of the BBC home site, provided by Newsbeat - Young persons' ( Radio) news programme. Here's the link as a stand alone
It's all conducted on location; little scene change; the colour's flat ( DV resolution) no reporter V/O and by BBC standards the background sound is fighting the interview.
These aren't criticisms per se, but observations, given Newsbeat's audience and relative resources: relative to BBC News.
It's a fairly easy hit piece. Could you do any better?
I say that because the piece asked for a different visual creativity because:
of the Sport: Remember the Bourne scene through of Jason jumping through the window. No, no you don't have to put up a rig and get elaborate. Go buy a headcam for 200 dollars/ or smaller DVcam and let one of the jumpers become the defacto filmer to give you their perespective.
it's meant for a young person's programme. The BBC could really do with creating a more contemporary version of Reportage which I worked on in the 90s. Hint my diarys filling up!
It's a VJ piece, and it's not hard news.
Try not and ape TV In essence this was a VJ piece cut for TV. meaning the TV stanzas have been maintained and the huge difference is that instead of a crew of three, one person ( cum assistant perhaps) has taking over.
Now truthfully I do not abs know whether this was shot by one person etc, but there are a number of clues that give that away.
Irrespective, enough info comes across in this almost 3 min feature, likely made by Newsbeat team, rather than BBC News.
And it's good to see a major broadcaster giving its prime estate over to 'experimental' pieces, particularly geared towards its younger audience.
That young chap's popularity will have reached a good slice of the the target audience - the power of online video huh!
By the time James had picked up his camera, paused to inspect its array of galactic buttons then train his eye on the view finder, the panel of three had pretty much made their mind up.
You can teach a young man to fish, but there must be instinct and curiosity, otherwise all the will in the world will fail to yield a profitable worker.
Holding the camera upside down didn't help either.
It makes you ponder.
It sounds unfair but with 100 more applicants to filter, that will do.
The attractive presenter who entered the fray would probably not have known, but she barely had time to stoop. It was the blahnicks wot done it.
She might have taken a cue from a friend in DC who turned adversity into admiration.
Walking up to the interviewers in her points, she stumbled, toppled over from snapping her heels and immediately remarked to fits of giggles: "Well I made a right heel of that then didn't I ?"
She got the job she wanted and wore sneakers almost all the way through her contract working as a fairly active press officer.
City recruiters hiring for some of the posher traders around London's Thread Needle Street know a thing or two about your footwear.
Your shoes are a mirror into your soul and leather soles ala Grensons and Blahniks say more about your fiscal ambitions and a penchant for the good life. In the emerging world of video journalism, you'd do well with more practicable footwear.
Ones that allow you to show a quick set of heels trailing that rogue defendant outside the courts for a quote.
The beginnings of a multimillion pound industry? Video Journalists aficionados and practitioners gather at the 2006 VJ Awards in Germany. Top upper left corner, David filming the event. For the 2008 awards and submissions go here
Are you a video journalist? The application says "Video Journalists Wanted" and often lists a string of personal skills, qualifications, knowledge and experience one must exhibit.
" We're looking for reporters who can film and edit", one newspaper editor told me.
"Filming's not so important, we can teach them that, but tenacity and an enquiring mind is what we want" said another at the Press Association's Video Journalism Training camp in Howden.
The criteria is loose - a reporter with the obligatory film skill plug-in.
Of course there's some logic here, but its weak spot lies in assuming the new shiny video journalism training is about re purposing reporters, though understandably many are trained this way.
It may work short term, but for the long term it renders video journalism's where next trajectory stifled.
Managers often believe you can unbox a videojournalist just as you can his or her gear that has just been delivered by UPS.
You could draw an analogy with newspapers making their text available for their print edition and the web.
Until recently, many editors believed, and some still do, that 50 word paragraphs culminating in 2000 word articles that appease city commuters, will equally do for the web.
Step forward Jakob Nielsen, who's been proved right so many times, it's any wonder his name hasn't become a verb. "Can you Jakob that mate? You know make it tighter".
Today, the emerging consensus is different. We read differently on the web compared to the physical print.
It's a fairly level playing field at the moment as most recruiters do a fair bit of groping around for what they actually want.
Plus, really, the terms of employment are for the now, more or less, happening in-house with reporters, designers and photo journalists being trained up.
But it won't always be so.
Just as broadcast networks ask specifics for their reporting, producing and whatever other jobs, and newspaper eds want examples of your clippings before testing your knowledge of Mosley Vs News of the World, Video Journalism will soon get busy.
I made this, but then how could you be sure? 20 second sting for interview with the BBC's Peter Horrocks, Head of News and Multimedia Newsroom.
A showreel illustrating short and long piece and stand up may be a pre-requisite, though as Channel 4 executive Stuart Cosgrove talking about the value of showreel for reporters said to me some time back: "They can be of relative little use, as you've no way of verifying who really made it".
Surely, in today's open-access self policed net, you'd have to go to some lengths to disguise what's yours and what isn't, though you'll always find those driven enough to fake it.
VJ Camera mounted on a weighted pod or manfroto with some practise provides the perfect steady cam effect to provide floating shots for stand ups/ piece to cameras. More from the video journalism Manifesto.
Difference in Video journalism The two broadly speaking VJ packages call on different strengths: one for fast turn overs, the other for considered, well-honed pieces.
Broadcasters make that distinction within their own parish: the news reporter's 1.20 min package makes them King and Queens of the complex issue turned simplified package, though not everyone makes the cut.
Video journalism circa 1995 from David's archive - a one paragraph note in a civic newsletter prompts David to talk to a local citizen who has won a major battle with her council to remove road humps.
Whilst the doc feature maker is the maestro of the complexity and confusion of the exposition made accessible. Both are as similar as chalk and cheese.
The latter is akin to watching hetero cyclic chemistry breaking down into its constituents on a good edition of hit US drama CSI
Sorry! I remember doing that as Chemistry undergrad: it's left an impression on me for life.
So Video journalism begs schizophrenic quality. Can you do long and short? And are you a natural on screen.
Never mind soon also specialisms will become part of the landscape e.g. Gardening VJ, and Crime VJ to name a few.
Though I'd argue the distinction between whether you're a one or 15 minuter producers appears to me to be less onerous for seasoned video journalists, and for a reason.
A synergistic working relationship exists between photojournalism and video journalism. Here in Germany where video journalism is practised extensively by newspapers and broadcasters, it's easy to spot pieces inspired by a photo journalistic bent, rather than a broadcast one.
Reporter or Camera operator DNA If you cast around, many of the more prominent video journalists who've made names for themselves most exhibit particular traits.
While front of camera work requires screen confidence which can often lead to the "celeb-ego", behind-camera work is about letting the film speak for itself: style and substance.
It may be a generalisation but most admired VJs place a higher quotient on their film work.
Celebrated one man crew Scott Rensberger would prefer if being on screen wasn't always an ask.
"Sometimes I'd have to go wash, get a new shirt on then get back on location to do the stand up" he told me at the EUs regional TV Summit.
Video Journalists, tend to be comparatively less image conscious: you only have to place the photo journalists in your organisation alongside the reporter to know what I'm talking about.
Either way being humble helps a load, firstly because frankly there is no one descriptive methodology for video journalism packaging, so frankly no one holds the golden fleece. There's technique yes, but a multitude of emerging styles; some good and some, er, leaving room for improvement.
You would not have Spike Lee tell Clint Eastwood he's a rubbish film maker even though they clashed, head's buttin,g over Flags of our Father.
But a fair few VJs enjoy a public scrap over films. Personally, it's just not cricket.
Being humble, the hallmark of veteran media personnel, does not underscore other traits: namely a quiet steely confidence; the self starter; the go-it-alone or team worker who can do marvelous things in the most trying of circumstances.
Being industrious is a huge boon.
After her camera seized to work from shooting a piece in sub zero temperatures, one Channel One Video journalist used a hair dryer to get 5 Min's of work time before the camera sized up again.
How to shoot a piece in 5 Min's?
It's doable just as I'm forced to create a piece from the standard 3 minute EktaChrome cartridge stock from my Nizo Schneider Super 8mm. What a mouthful of a camera!
Vicky and Andy represent the norm for the next generation of video journalists. Formerly both print journalists, after a fruitful period as newspaper video journalists, they've moved over to television, Setanta Sports and Border TV, where the VJ format, particularly in sports, allows for greater creativity and maturation, if so be, into directing long formats and promos. etc. More from the video journalist revolution
Watching out for the nascent video journalist Asked about books or novels you admire, most of us wouldn't struggle for an answer, citing the novelist to boot.
But questioned over your favourite film and then the director how would you score?
If you're one of those that has to be kicked out of the cinema because you're still reading the credits for the director and DP and Editor, then you're a film buff, even a nascent video journalist.
If you can cite your favourite reporter as well and why, then your Brownie points are on the up.
If you can take a decent photo and know how to bring it alive, then you have the "kwaa".
These might count as identifiers.
To know how to play football, you've got to play football.
"Bo knows football"; he was passionate about what he did and you could tell.
If you're a reporter going into video journalism drop the mac coat and the "reporter alert" halo.
Working low key or even stealth will often bring you better results, if not more verity from the event.
Award winning photo journalist Yannis Kontos is all of 6.4", but appears invisible to his subjects, working so fast and appearing so unassuming, where as the archetypal sound bite set up shot in broadcasting can often eat into your schedule and look staged.
This is a profession that requires getting into the trenches sometimes and getting your hands dirty. There's nothing glamorous about it, even when you're covering the glam stuff like film premiers as Sky's LA correspondent Dionne Clark will tell you when she Vjed Dream Girls for Viewmagazine.tv
Exciting yes. Glamorous uh uh!
At Al Jazeera to see friends, an impromptu interview for a job takes place around me, with managers asking how I might package a report. Often when any new technique fails to confirm a professional's own reporting style it can be dismissed out of hand. Video Journalism interested the managers, but they couldn't see what it might creatively offer.
Recruiting ads and methods differ. The Telegraph's trainee super reporters go through a rigorous psychometric test, not as their executive put it so they're all the same, "but to eke out different leaders, so even if we get one nutter in there we won't be displeased, we want them to be different".
With the maturity of video journalism, candidates moving about jobs will most likely be required to show a level of creativity and workpersonship ( tis a word?) unknown at present.
"One thing that has surprised me about the award winning VJ work I have seen is how conservative it is - in aesthetic/stylistic terms. Especially in light of the explosion of creativity in cinematography in TV and the movies.
Unfair to criticize a nascent craft for not pushing the envelope obviously. But without a new aesthetic is VJ condemned to just look cheap? Is innovation the provenance of the big bucks brigade: Top Gear, John Adams etc?"
FT.com Editor James Montgomery sees this too and acknowledges that in time it'll develop; he wants video journalism at the FT to mirror the standards and style of the newspaper.
And that visual gene is one which will become prevalent amongst many outfits with video journalism at its core.
Only question is what footwear will you wear at your interview?
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Footnote: if you're interested in online teaching as a video journalist instructor for one of the world's most renowned photo agencies and you've the relevant experience drop me a line in early September and I'll pass your details on.
David Dunkley Gyimah is a VJ Trainer who has trained broadcasters and newspapers all over the world since the mid 90s. He is set to consult for FilmMinute - the 1 minute international film festival, which is looking to become the biggest online film festival in the world
I'd been looking forward to catching my Phd colleague, Dr Rachel Armstrong, presenting on her cytoplasmic theory, but for the life of me couldn't find the venue on Tottenham Court Road, somewhere called The Store.
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