If videojournalism can do anything, which involves readdressing our notions of what we think, and what is, then it goes beyond that of merely the cheap one -wo/man-band recording of events. And if it can dare to seek out its own aesthetic, we may have underestimated it. And if we can create bespoke site experiences, then there's no need to plead with the detractors.
Videojournalism can lay claim to its own Bauhaus. See Videojournalism definition on Mrdot here. Presenting at SXSW, I spoke about "the film is not enough" which I'll repost. There's still a lot of work to be done.
PART I
SXSW The film is not enough - Presentation at SXSW - annual gathering of creatives attracting more than 10,000 people in its week. Thanks to the many people, such as Tony who rated the session as one of their best sessions.
Fear/Love is a new short film I(Rob Chiu) have been working on for the past couple of months. We recently completed a hardcore 3 day shoot using two Red One cameras. Currently in post production Fear/Love is a story of identity, fear, and self destruction. Written and directed by Rob Chiu, produced by Lincoln Waldron with an original soundtrack by Ben Lukas Boysen aka Hecq. Coming Soon!
You know I'm really pants. I mean I do the odd thing here, then mix up something there and have a rest. Then I get a call from a friend, who's shooting his first short.
No! Do not leave this page. Do not leave this page because I said first short. Thank you!
Last week we sat down at the South Bank as he showed me the rough cut. I-am-pants.
What a beautiful piece of ...oh wa what..a..a what.. wow.
( you mean you liked it then?)
Like it? It's everything we often think in our head we'd like to do.
The story's profoundness is all the more, er profound, because more than enough directors, commercial makers of videojournalists having a stab at depicting teen angst, drugs, crime, get it wrong.
There are half a dozen on Brit TV at anyone time or even posters in Brixton that play on clever wording and imagery, but in reality, they're made for the suits and accountants.
"You see here teenager, that is a gun, and that is drugs and when you mix the two, you get into trouble, go to jail and your life is trully ******ed"
Brilliant campaign becry the suits.
But the very audience it's intended for watch 1 sec, smell how numpty it is and miss the message.
What Rob Chiu has made is something more deeper, less dialogue, a play on ifs and maybes. There is no constructed message. It is ambigious. You're unclear to the point that you start painting your own demons.
But every scene is recognisable.
Rob: Hey David are you on then?
David: Yeah, where?
Rob: Camberwell Estates!!
So I shot the behind the scenes of the making of this story and soon, when he's cut his final version, we'll mix it up. But I'm hoping I can persuade him to show you the cut first.
And if you don't like it, I'll give up videojournalism.
There is art in this thing we do, a non-quantifiable asset often hard to describe.
Some see the words, others see the spaces in between that connect the words. Many see what the eye records, but the artist sees the syllogism, past the obvious, reinterpreting and finding new meaning.
Can it be learned, studied ? Why oh yes! But often it comes from study, that insatiable and tireless habit to know why.
There are few geniuses in this world who can tilt the power of transaction, cause and effect, to be asymmetrical.
In life you get out what you put in.
Many through dexterity and greying hairs have become masters of their trade, but have not forgotten the respect for their craft. The writer chews over every letter, syllable, that emerges from the tips of their frayed fingers to the keys and magically finds itself on the screen.
But today we ask for the Master and Jack of all trades. It's not uncommon. Renaissance was coined centuries ago.
But have we become arrogant in those ways? New journalism does not prescribe old journalism as dead. For without one you cannot have the other. Without the foundation can we build sky scrapers that touch new space?
And have the masters also forgotten that at some stage they too must relinquish their crown? Time moves on, but deference to them must remain. And we're not simply talking about the Cronkites.
There is art in this thing we do, but it is one honed through late nights, early mornings and a bid to see past that where many will tell you it can't be done.
For all the great writers, many of whom had lean years, there are countless others clamouring to get to the top. For all the great videographers, another tier of peers awaits the chance to proclaim their prowess. For every multimediaist, there are countless more playing with form who say they have seen the future.
There is art in this thing we do, but often art does not seek a common consensus. It is the confidence of you and appreciation of others. It is the he or she that sticks their neck out for others to throw invectives.
It is he or she who dares say something that many of us find preposterous, only to realise eventually the haste in our reply was ill-thought.
Camera in eyes, full site streaming at 1gb, gesture video calling up by voice recognition: the hapless thoughts of fantasists.
There is art in this thing we do and sometimes when you're not deluded, you're the only one that knows and sees it. Till others see it as well. That is the greys in your hair, solemnity in your voice and the skill of your pen and video.
When we first introduced computers to the newsroom, no one liked it, now we can't take it out of the journalists' hands. So what's to say in the future we're have trouble taking the camcorder away from journalists Wadih Tueni, IT Manager An-Nahar Newspaper, Beirut
Beirut Videojournalists is a videojournalism feature about videojournalism. It's a snapshot of one leading independent newspaper in Beirut, An-Nahar, their new videojournalists and trainer David Dunkley Gyimah's (publisher of viewmagazine.tv) overview working with them.
An-Nahar's IT Manager Wadih Tueni recruited three young former film students from forty applicants to head the online station which is building a loyal base with stories that extend beyond the daily diary news agenda.
The feature is a personal account of videojournalism and Beirut where David spent three days training with the newspaper. So what you see are the in-between moments David snatched in compiling a videojournalism piece. Nothing here was set up.
David, a former broadcaster with a background at the BBC, Channel 4 News,World Wide Television News and ABC News tells a story about Beirut, a city which would have needed little introduction into the problems it's faced in past wars.
However it's rebuilding its image from once being described as the "Paris of the Middle East" and recently nominated by the New York Times as one of the forty best tourism destinations.
Beirut Videojournalists illustrates what An-NaharTV is pioneering and what David brands as cine-videojournalism in reporting societal and people stories.
2. Wadih, the indefatigable driver of videojournalism at An-Nahar
3. Suburbia Beirut. The traditional and new live cheek by jowl.
4. Images taken by David on his super 8mm which give the city that 60s feel.
5. An enduring image of past conflicts - the Holiday Inn riddled with bullets and shells.
6. David reporting from Germayze street - one of the popular haunts for the young, tourists, artists and about anyone else, which comes alive around 10 pm.
7. Tinia, who completes the trio of videojournalists getting the hang of the "snatch-and-grab" stand up or piece-to-camera
"There is a world that lies between art and what is beyond the artist's imagination, a place where laws are defied and nature grows in your living room. Surpassing design, luxury and anything that meets the eye it can be yours. Discover a world beyond".
Pic taken by David in Beirut
Immediate use
A combination of free framing and visual gut instinct - is what it boils down to - when constructing stories on the hoof.
Sometimes an innocuous image may carry significant value later in the film process. It may not seem like driving an F1 ( far from it) but the process of quick thinking and rethinking is required to fashion a narrative, when at face value it's nothing more than a closed event.
This is one method how David goes about creating videojournalism films. It's part a mimetic art, part muscle memory from one's past, he says, but the key is to capture the "sign-sentence"- which David has been developing as part of his PhD thesis at the Smart Lab.
A lot of brilliant film makers I know find it difficult to explain the process. Not the physicality of say the rule of thirds and crossing the line, but the kineasthetic and its phenomenology.
That's the part I'm interested in the same way for instance if you place four people with no apparent relationship together, as I did three weeks ago lecturing to a group of Chinese University students, everyone automatically starts making symmetrical groups out of them.
You have to ask yourself why this is?
Videojournalism and Artistic practice David has been translating the surface art of his work into areas such as:
IMVJ -Integrated Multimedia Videojournalism. Brings together bespoke online site building with videojournalism. See soon current crop of Masters students he's been supervising
The Cinemaphome - which he's currently developing with other areas of visualisation at the SMARTlab PhD School
etc.
This year he commences an artist in residency at London's leading cultural and arts centre and Europe’s largest centre for the arts, the South Bank Centre.
Previous residents have included Orchestras such as:
David runs viewmagazine.tv - which is an example of IMVJ - which is his labour of love. He has trained or lectured extensively in places such as Podgorica, Montenegro; Norway, Chicago and Miami and recently in Beirut- where he's completed a videojournalism film about videojournalism.
Image from Beyond Broadcast Media Futures 2000 - in which David is dues to put together a feature looking at the future of broadcast
You don't always need to plan, but you can still come away with a film of value, that's the beauty of videojournalism says David Dunkley Gyimah.
Award winning videojournalist, university senior lecturer and videojournalism trainer David spent four days in Beirut with one of Lebanon's leading independent newspapers, Annahar, swapping ideas and training tips with their videojournalists.
Annahar which prides itself on its innovation and independence is one of the first Lebanese newspapers to adopt videojournalism, hiring in ex-university film graduates.
Says David: "There are a number of skill sets I feel a videojournalist should have and the brief couple of days training provided an opportunity to make the team aware of them".
Wadih Tueni, Annahar's IT Manager, was responsible for setting up the scheme, which provides his videojournalists with the remit to report on lifestyle, society and people issues.
He invited David over after the pair met in Gotheburg, Sweden where David was presenting at the World Association of Newspapers.
Wadih says videojournalism answers a promise he gave to the former newspaper's editor Gebran Tueni, (also a relative), to put the paper at the forefront of technology.
Whilst in Beirut in between training, David snatched some shots which he's used to compile a 15 minute report that gives an overview of Annahar's plans and the course of videojournalism, which newspapers elsewhere may face. His report also provides a backdrop to the city recently named one of the best tourism destinations by the New York Times.
A three and half minute preview cut can be viewed on Viewmagazine.tv with the full version posted on the 6th of August and also offered to Annahar TV
Ends
Continue here: David explain how one facet of videojournalism works and more on his background, which includes working for Newsnight and Channel 4 News
The video provides a privileged view of how one major independent newspaper, Annahar is pushing ahead with videojournalism.
In many ways the concepts and thought bubbles at this paper are not so different from what I have experienced training in the UK, specifically a substantial number of regional newspaper journalists, the Telegraphs superjournalists and the Financial Times to name a few.
It's the value added which will often resolve other questions such as why a newspaper or broadcaster is taking on videojournalism, what it means for existing jobs and what it means for our outfit.
They're all emotive subjects invariably splitting views, and passionate ones at that.
Videojournalism's value added
(slide from one of the speakers whilst presenting in Podgorica)
But in the value added conversation there's always one question which comes up again and again. How can I be different from television and different from that other group there?
Because videojournalism's basics are such a low hanging fruit: put the camera here, shoot according to the rule of thirds, don't shoot into light, that after a weeks training, you could quite easily train others.
Fact is those that come to the Press Associations videojournalism training programme often do. Saves the company on multiple fees and many have indeed been successful training other staff.
But while the chords on a guitar can be easily memorised, jamming into a session when someone like the late Buddy Miles kicks in a drum beat takes a little more doing.
Comprehending the different approaches to the components of videojournalism, in say filmmaking such as Iranian Abbas Kiarostami to Bollywood, to news reportage of Ed Murrow and modern day less disciplined soliloquys is crucial.
Videojournalism is a creative art and is by no means a one-size-fits all and it's also a body of sharing, otherwise the disservice is cloning everyone to be the same.
By all means for someone starting out, here are the basics, but if your intent is to find your own identity swiftly, then it is the trainer's job to help you find that.
I often cite in my lectures with Masters students, "the wisdom of crowds" and thus at some point soon, the independence that they try things, which in turn spur new threads.
Essentially improv, testing my ability to find where they're going and make a contribution to that.
"OK that's very mimetic of Elia Kazan in East of Eden playing around with angular composition and space" or " OK the visual intelligence of stability plays a huge part in trusting you, so looking confident and smart pays off".
These however in the end are all choices, journeys of dual discovery, so I often call training regimes an exchange of ideas, because no one method if sacrosanct and even the best of rules awaits to be broken.
What's need in videojournalism training is the same thing I'd say for any other self expressive art.
It is the notion of helping develop the actor's voice, the videojournalist's eye, the confidence to be exposed to an array of goodies - from directing, producing, voice overs, editing, post producing - all core skills for broadcasters.
But videojournalism begs for more from TV broadcasting, so requires that bit more work. What's needed in videojournalism is the opportunity to work with the very trainers who can enrich your existing dialect.
It takes time. And truth this journey for news auterism is still in its infancy.
What's needed in videojournalism is...... you know the answer by now.
end.+
David Dunkley Gyimah has been a videojournalist for 15 years and worked in the media since 1987. He is a Senior Lecturer, Artist in Residence at the South Bank and researching as part of his PhD Videojournalism's creativity. He's looking forward to his first open videojournlism session being planned for the future for two days.
"You mean journalism as art", one of my journalism board members emailed me.
I replied, "Well then you'd have to define journalism, then art!"
It sounds an incongruous pairing. Gene Hackman's character Brill in Enemy of the State says it:
"You're either very brave or very stupid".
Well its worth chuckling at the thought, but it's neither. Journalism and Art have cohabited for as long as...
Dandyism, Flaneurism, Addison and Steele, one of the Britain's first recognised journalists, circa 18th century, combined the adeptness of writing with being literati consuming the arts.
Indeed Tatler, the magazine was something of an arts magazine, not art, but the arts.
Film Director and professor of cinema studies Peter Greenaway who's appetite for innovative film making is only surpassed by his eye for the artistic in his many installations and Julian Issac who's seminal film about Black UK in the 80s, Young Soul Rebel, demonstrate crossing boundaries.
Many BBC execs often leave the corporation to fulfill other roles such as running the arts.
I am neither of the above. I only mention them because I know and it adds, if anything, an interesting ellipse to any conversation on videojournalism and art practice.
But videojournalism dyed in news, awash with all its semiotics, is hardly a contender for the arts?
Well here's where I beg to differ in a big way.
Video is art For the practice of shooting with a video camera was long, long exercised by artists, and yes it was news.
What art often achieves news fails both in substance and longevity and when news of a kind is able to break into the psyche, we often attach the references reserved for art.
It is not the arts' place to explain, is the patter, but to evoke, cause reaction, make us consider, be reflexive and question the context of what we've seen and its impact on us.
An Inconvenient Truth is art personified within the walls of an environmental essay empowering us with richer knowledge to choose. What more could you ask for?
Art, Videojournalism and Beirut My trip to Beirut to train some videojournalists also yielded a short ( 20 mins, ooops) film I put together on-the-fly. I blogged while I was in Beirut about how I am reminded of my first trip to South Africa.
Oh the ignorance. In my first visit to South Africa on the second day I was in Soweto being scared witless coming up against a Caspir (armoured truck).
But I was amazed at every turn. Soweto was right on the heel of Johannesburg. It had a BMW plant. There was a middle class base. In Yeoville a a new youth, graduates, more sure of the prize were forging ahead. It went on. The news I'd watched. The programme I used to present on the BBC did not equip me for all of this.
In Beirut, similar internal gasps. The city needs no introduction. Its wars are well known. 2006 and then further back. Those remnants still exist. Monuments left as reminders to those who are no more.
But the city's vibrancy is electric. The youth run are visible, strangely unlike the UK !@$$@. I did not have the time to venture far - something I hope to do next time - but my snap shot impression was some matrix.
There's a heady mix of the "beautiful people" who know how to beautify themselves. It's not for nothing, Beirut was once dubbed the Paris of the Middle East.
And, and there is an incredible thriving arts scene.
If you've watched the news lately you'll probably not know there were elections. No, because Beirut was not featured in full regalia on the international news front. By regalia I mean Before and After.
So that's where the job of a videojournalist comes in. Not me per se, but the group I trained with, already carving out an assortment of diverse stories.
If what we produce can in some way spur others to think and rethink again, then it may not be your classical definition of art, but it is without a doubt something that merits being called art.
And yes art can be in the eyes of the beholder. Here's where I quote Kant and his treatise on beauty. No, another time.
So what do I have planned for my tenure as artist in residence. Quite a lot, but that's another self indulgent post. Art huh!
Andrew (Masters Students) works through the user-flow of his site with Tanja, a visiting lecturer at the University of Westminster's Final Online Project
It's about the story stoopid - to paraphrase Bill.
So even at the best of creative times when creating that 'thing', it's the story that goes with it that counts.
The Ferrari is the dream and the conjured stories of who might see you; the house is all the good memories you want to share living inside; and the website, it's the chance to buy that cheap ticket to a holiday destination - and the indelible stories that may follow.
I still remember Falaraki 1994 like it was yesterday.
When it comes to websites, notwithstanding the technical, creative and strategic thinking that holds it together, for journalists the overriding theme is to create and know how to 'sell' stories.
The electronic 'double glaze sales person', selling a product most people could do without, but can't resist once you hit that psyche nerve.
Why else is Britney Spears' life combed over by scribes and photojos. Hers is not an essential commodity, but one that when spun creates a 'glance-want-need' relationship.
So this year's final project with our International Masters students, the emphasis changed to how to create stories online rather than the notion of building a website.
And er no Ms Spears does not feature.
It makes common sense to say as a journalist focus on the story, but the online component of journalism can often be weighted down with the technical.
Fortunately, the Masters students get a good sense of that building websites such as these between January and April - combining CSS, Net architecture and visual thinking, some flash and above all how to write as journos and SEO spiders.
Multimedia?? The word "multimedia" doesn't do the students' justice, because their present task was about understanding the workflow, user behaviour and principally how to sell a story online as the sole producer.
It's in part understanding the story dynamic; when users are likely to leave and how you might make them stay.
It's about getting to grips with the visual intelligence of online journalism, which increasingly will be driven by the aesthetics and impact of the visual push to the story.
It's about leading the site with a story strong enough to draw the user to follow breadcrumbs and access the site and then other stories.
I know I have said this before but this is something the Hollywood film studio sites do very well.
In lay terms a splash video followed by a link deeper into the story then perhaps the team behind it and I often use The Kingdom's ( Jamie Foxx) construct elements a a good example.
But it's a little more complex than just shoving video or some multimedia product at the top.
The proof will be when they submit their sites next week for assessment and post them online, where I'll give the links and you can have a look to see whether the students (graduating v. soon) pull it off.
Personally I think they've done a good job getting under the skin of creating and selling stories.
Thus far, the best of broadcast news aims to impartial and objective. We've come to expect it that way and if you're not pushing for reaction in your piece, it becomes: he said, she said.
If you're a broadcaster with deep pockets and no accounts sheets to demonstrate commercial success, you can afford to do this. The BBC being a good example.
Other outfits though may depend more on their constituent for reaction; thus those (broad/narrow) casts may veer towards being subjective but impartial.
The latter may become increasingly so, so we'll need some kind of impartiality/subjective detector. That's doable, but how far do you push?
Advocacy journalism was once shunned as the lesser verite of the two. On the surface that may be so, but there's room for open transparent broadcast journalism to work and the very nature of the artist, yes negates obvious objectivity in the first place.
It started off as a hobby, demonstrating what could be done, but then most of that's now easily doable, so it boils down to the content and aesthetic.
The aesthetic embraces many themes, so if you're curious about solo programme making, how radio reportage is a central plank to good pods, how programmes can leave the online environment to occupy other spaces, then you might find the odd easter egg inside viewmagazine.tv
If anything it says it can be done, that me, you can take an idea, any idea (video, online, interactive, mobile) and turn it around: whole series, music videos, hard politics, interviews with the likes of the CIA, film premiers on the red carpet, travelogues to Egypt, Greece, and Beirut videojournalism training.
How to produce ads, write SEO articles with good journalism, visual design - probably the least known to journalists.
This September I'm looking forward to being part of the Knight Batten team training in South Africa, but not before some training in Spain and finishing off videos in the Future of broadcast.
And there's the projects taking shape, and the new deals in sharing ideas and experimenting further with the form.
If you're whizzing around online and you can stop over at viewmagazine.tv for a coffee, and then lets talk shop later.
News: the net generation - more digital knowledge is akin to hyper-hydration if you have not given yourself some room to acclimatise. Teachers, lecturers, trainers and speakers will know instinctively what I'm talking about.
first published in the UK's Press Gazette in 2005. News the net generation. Click to enlarge to read
And so the scene was set as the young apprentice faced Knowledge at the summit of that long and arduous climb.
"Please Knowledge can I have some more?", the apprentice requested.
"And what", Knowledge asked, "do you intend to do with this new knowledge?"
"Seek some more", the young apprentice intoned. "many others are outwitting me".
"Come to the edge" Knowledge said. "Come to this edge".
The apprentice came, hesitantly, reached the edge and then Knowledge pushed the apprentice over the crevice.
And then the apprentice flew.
"When you have exhausted your existing knowledge and tested its flaws, climb the summit again. I will be here, where you may acquire new knowledge and appreciate its currency", was what the apprentice could hear in the distance.
Time to learn For all the net's fantastic qualities, its Achilles is the notion of immediate gratification, that it must be so, here and now.
We live in such a truncated, metro-data driven, restless society, that the fix we require from knowledge has become so intense, we've forgotten how to gestate, to frankly, chill.
We have forgotten how to let those ideas brew, simmer, produce new nodes and richer thoughts.
After a while, that conference you're going to: different setting, different people maybe, but the message broadly will be the same. If anything the conference-fest is differentiated by the nuances of the personalities.
After a while as we've discovered even the bankers go bankrupt. Prompted by the Her Majesty the Queen's question: why didn't the bankers see the crash, they apologised in so many words claiming they just didn't
In rare cases, the collision of experts, location and juxtaposition of ideas yields genuine discourse as in this video here from SXSW featuring Clay Shirkey and Henry Jenkins Convergence Culture. And where I humbly had 50 minutes to develop my ideas of multimedia videojournalism.
But alas the blog you write can no longer be sustained as a repository of new ideas, if you fail to replenish your own. You may succeed on the surface, but might you think you're now processing, regurgitating tired slips of others ideas?
The new multimedia journalist is one such debate.
The new multimedia journalist - Blue Print magazine - a well known architectural and design mag, where David DunkleyGyimah wrote about the new digital multimediast in 2001.
Please can I have... My niece asked for a glass of water. She's three. She did not say please, so her mother requested she ask again.
"David, please can I have a glass of water, quickly!"
At age three she's already learned to seek out her wants "quicker". Okay it's an amusing illustration, but is sums up a state of where we are and where we're likely wanting to be.
Until four years before he came to London, Tamal, now one of Al Jazeera's most dynamic reporters, did not know what videojournalism was. He was a fast learner and today broadcasts out of Gaza to millions of fans, rightly; I'm one of them.
He may not have had the "knowledge" when he came to the Uni, but truthfully, Tamer already had step-in knowledge -which he tested over a year as a postgrad. He had already been a producer and fixer for the BBC. The leap was not so big.
Step-in knowledge is the next step towards your goal, separated only by one or a couple of other steps, as opposed to a whole flight. As Jude Kelly OBE, one of the UK's most respected thinkers in society and the arts says in this video, to get to where you want, it's easier if they're small steps.
Experience and Knowledge What's my point in all this. That the knowledge you require needs time to be road-tested, to find, as a former Applied Chemistry grad, what we would call "Aha".
Those "Aha' moments stem from getting those small steps right and often taking the odd cataclysmically wrong.
I hope some of my former International students won't mind me saying; some may even be cursing me, but after acquiring that new knowledge and literally and metaphorically been pushed to the edge, its time to fly - and they do.
It's time to test where you are in your own sphere of influence and knowledge - the one where you can affect change, without seeking more new knowledge; ideas yes, but better comprehension. Give yourself some time.
We can still be a Jack of all trades and master of them all, but experience now should be your next teacher. Experience craves time. It is the reason why knowledge (you) may often pay deference to Experience ( your tutor).
Your tutor isn't that bound inside the walls of a university; but is that blog, kiosk, or wise counsel you visit. And experience is unrelated to age, but length of time.
Lewis Hamilton, at 23 years of age, became Formula One's youngest world champion last year, but he'd been driving since he was eight.
Aggasi, Williams sisters, Tiger Woods etal all honed their skills over years.
Trouble with our system of education, is you'll find yourself post graduation - in your early 20s - before you'll take the media plunge. And as intense as any programme is, you need that innings behind you.
Mimetic Media So the professor walking the corridors, may not have twitted before, but blogged on compuserve's platform and wrote wire copy and headlines at a news agency, so has an inkling of what's involved.
That producer, director with an understanding of story telling, and an appreciation working a camera to tell a stories, may well be able to simulate videojournalism.
That workflow of a newsroom, from years of working there, you've acquired generalised knowledge of the dynamics which may inform the new paradigm of net news flows.
Perversely, but not entirely efficient, there's something in serving an apprenticeship with experts before you're left to your own. Mine was the BBC etal
Have you noticed how many creative are polymaths? OzwaldBoateng, an old friend and super stardom men's designer, is now also making films.
Creatives, with experience, often also with a dose of failures, are highly tuned to what works. That thing called hunch, gut feeling is informed by variables including experience - and yes it doesn't always work, but enough times it does.
So if you're trawling through blogs, books, emailing inquiring thoughts to others in the face of this present environment, I wouldn't despair. Give IT ( knowledge) time to to become acquainted with Experience - and you'll be richer for it. That much I believe I have come to know in my own practice and as a senior lecturer and videojournalist.
When I'm often asked about training in cine-videojournalism. I often reply that I'll need some time teaching the basics in videojournalism. And then, we'll break all the rules that makes cine-videojournalism work. Small steps.
Question is are you giving yourself that much needed time? Or are you also wanting a glass of water, quickly?
The ubiquity of video is as necessary as Darwinism, which is why broadcasters and newspapers needn't really panic.
Those that have a pedigree and are talented will always find kindred souls attentive to their station.
Video's flurry though is being played in an environment of short term gains and commercialism.
A small blip in any institution's balance sheet will have huge knock-ons as many of us are witnessing from the present sick economy.
But just as speech is on tap, the ability to write spread like a virus, our notion of meritocracy and the commonwealth ideas firmed, there are still defining principles that govern us and those that are good at what they do like an organic nucleophilic reaction continue to fizz.
We're attracted to the aesthetic, the sublime and the incredulous and we hanker information - the antithesis to sitting in a room mind-dead. Immanuel Kant famously coined our definition from the former, aesthetics.
Aesthetics Why do we look and admire something we have no intimate relationship before hand?
It's stood the test of time and is so profound it will serve as the alpha of how we perceive that which continues to arouse our senses.
We're also creatures of trust. It's immanent, exist as an index which cannot be bought. It's there. Sometimes it arises by association, often it's worked through overtime. Brand loyalty is the ethereal currency.
This year many students will graduate unsure of their next destination. The rational word from conversation shops is don't panic. Cold comfort, but this scenario is not without precedent.
This year higher education applications are up. In times of recession, further studies or even buying good time have good purpose.
My own experience back in 91 annoyingly at the time led me to do something I never contemplated doing, leaving the UK. It's not an easy and available option. And then seeking further studies years on at the LSE.
Playing the long game in today's break-neck speed society, which isn't easy, may provide the time to develop your own aesthetic and where possible nourish the mind.
The recession has become the bogey man, but the ubiquity and low-hanging fruit paradigm of today's digital garden would have compound matters anyway and will continue to do so in this fluid dynamic state.
McLuhan in Understanding Media gives this a perspective:
After three thousand years of specialist explosion, and of increasing specialism and alienation in the technological extensions of our bodies, our world has become compressional by dramatic reversal"
If everyone can do what you can do, where is the value? They said that about speech and writing as well, they'll soon say that with videography (which means writing with video) and videojournalism.
Seeking the aesthetic in its phenomenologically sense, may not be a bad start.
This combines the technical skills the new journalist will need (plus the old ones), new ways of collaborating with audiences and journalists across the globe; and most importantly an entrepreneurial edge to create an army of “creative entrepreneurs”. more
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Very nice Adam,
But then you've been sparky from the go.One thing whilst the use of the word "journalist" is appropriate in situating your argument, could it be that the finder of news will not be called a "journalist" - an arcane word?
And could it be that if The Media Standard Trust et al work through a trusted-kite mark system to acknowledge journalists who meet the new "standard", it's likely they'll be further fragmentation, such that old style journalism will persist, new will hold its own and then there's the unknown?
The unknown presents an interesting scenario. I remember working in the dotcom boom of 2000 in Soho and whilst we knew web Mk II as we called it would happen, we couldn't envisage this.
Now, if we trend extrapolate, much of what we see now has intensified in the last five years of the web's more or less populous 15 years and the next disruption/liberation could be even more startling.
For IM6's, one of the names I have given it :Game theory; News grids; 3d web (metaverse) facilitated by game graphic cards; new non sequential narratologies, and greater filtering could be the norm. And the delivery of news could increasingly occupy public spaces.
In 2001 Viacom asked our company then to work on something called XTP ( Cross track projection) - visuals on the underground. Public space, also was a key point in Beyond Broadcast- Media Futures 2000.
Professional filters seems to be something lecturers will become, according to one former Vice Chancellor advising the UK government. I have got that link somewhere.
SMARTlab's ethos of practice-based learning is captured in Kate Sicchio's performance at Stratford, East London. Here for her amazing showreel.
"What's it like?", he asked. There was a hesitant pause.
"No, really what's it like?"
In between the question and the actual answering, several contemplations computed, like the flapping time-change mechanism of a train station's timetable.
Either way you wouldn't understand was the final thudding-to-a-stop thought.
"It's OK!"
But that's such a cop-out, such a disinterested lie.
In the film The Matrix, Morpheus says to Neo: "Unfortunately no one can be told what The Matrix is. You have to see it for yourself".
That readily sums it up: "Unfortunately no one can be told what a PhD is. You have to experience it yourself".
Welcome to the house of pain you %$£!*&^$£@@!***!
Apologies!
There is no experience I can share with you that comes close to the emotional and physical ride of this study programme.
It does not discriminate. It does not favour. It hurts your sinuses as if you were tussling with nature's elements and it leaves you exhilarated when one of its several summits has been breached.
At this point there are two broad reactions to this description. This moment where you are in reading this text you can either say: stop whining or phew.
Frankly both work. That's why this programme is unique.
You hate it, love it, would quit, would push further, and those feelings are wrapped in a big ball of energy, that releases unpredictably. A Nova of sorts.
SMARTlab week
SMARTlab morning warm-up sessions. A stand-up massage on each other in the lab's space.
One giant step.. It's been a week of that. Small steps, and the one large one, working towards finding a new plateau for creativity.
For the last year and half we have gathered. Some have been gathering much longer, much much longer, but the motive is the same.
To scratch that itch. The question: Is what I'm doing, what I am about to tell you about, does it constitute new knowledge?
Can that knowledge, your epistemology, can it stand the rigorous bludgering of others - those with bigger shoes before you.
PhD student Will Pearson takes five, before the next programme.
The answer is not yet forthcoming, but the belief matched by physical work is what will provide a window of exploration.
No one can tell you what it's like.
There are many programmes, but I can tell you of only one, and draw on comparative hearsay and the grapevine: SMARTlab.
SMARTlab is The Matrix. It is the matrix of the most incredible people you will ever come across. Not just, as I'll explain in what they know, but, and this is crucial, in what they give. SMARTlab is the gift lab, run and managed by extraordinary people, whose head Prof Liz Goodman, for the uneasiness of sycophancy I shall just nod and say enuff said.
The ethos draws people from different strides of life; many accomplished at something over many years, thirty is not unusual, at their peak.
And now they are trying to wrap that in theory. When we stand in a circle, it's very easy, as many have testified to say: "Frankly I don't know why I am here".
The Meaning of Life
Bruce Damer, like everyone else embodies this selfless learning, a figure whom on the other hand will leave you in awe and utterly breathless. His background includes NASA. His PhD addresses quite literally the meaning of life.
Bruce is creating the EVO grid which will simulate the beginning of life and how we came to be.
That line in the Matrix rings in my head when Cypher exclaims: "Jesus", after asking Neo if he knows why he is here.
Chrissie Poulter researching theatre games unpacks one of four bags replete with books to demonstrate the level of work involved in away weeks at the SMART lab
A glance to the left and there is award winning Cathy O'Kennedy, dancer and choreographer, researching The Devine Normal. I cried at her presentation this year.
It was so, so beautiful as she spoke about her influences, her own journey and read out her mission in what reached my ears in poetic verse.
Minutes earlier she had danced mellifluously. The dance alone I would have paid to watch in London's West End in the same frame of mind not to long ago I watched the acclaimed Sylvie Guillem & Russell Maliphant's PUSH at Sadler's Wells Theatre.
Steve Cooney's research in Melody and Rhythm eloquently deconstructs music, to show how he has devised teaching aids to understand scale, how the Beattles used chords to set the mood followed by those meaningful lyrics, where in Steve sighed to say that's the brilliance of song writing.
A day earlier Steve had been playing with Sinead O'connor . Here he is on the right in this video with Sinead.
"What was the set up like it Steve?" I asked.
"Oh there were three of us on stage playing to a big audience. I imagined big as an understatement, something more Glanstonburyish.
And it goes on forty to fiftish cohorts at full strength sharing this space, presenting to each other critiquing - all with the aim of adding something that little bit or lot more to what we know about what we know so far.
All the while we are guided by a team of experts.
Interactive videojournalism And somewhere in there I'm wrestling with my demons, 25 years of media condensed into this singularity of studies aided by many extraordinary supervisors, particularly Dr Chris Hales and Dr Sher Doruff.
Can I show how video through various constructions induce different emotions? No that's not the PhD, but an aspect of solo videojournalism wrapped around an individual with the skill set of online innovative spatial production.
We've just completed our annual retreat, one of three in the year at UEL, living off 4 hours sleep for the last five days - 6 hours the previous weeks prepping thesis chapters and the rest.
So this is in way an introduction to the group, and a journey,and something I intend to come back to again and again in the hope of continuing that ethos that drives us all; creative journey's that expand the mind.
Not enough will be said today that captures the greatness of Walter Cronkite who passed away at the age of 92.
To a generation before the 70s, the name won't mean much. But as the eulogies flow, some of which I imagine I'll keep ( I have cuttings from Alistair Cooke), it's a moment to reflect on the stirrings of journalism.
Bombastic and supine now, wrapped in commercialism bereft of objectivity and values, the journalism Cronkite et al created was anything technical as we've come to know journalism.
It was so natural it was more an honest conversation.
Working at ABC News in the mid-90s, I was introduced to another bastion of the art of story telling, Peter Jennings. I recall it well, as I would not let his hand go.
There were things they did, some I imagine by default, but it served the profession well.
Cronkite, Murrows, Jennings, Bradley spoke in a tone that you understood and followed. The average speech speed is three words per second.
These news doyens shaved around 2 +. That didn't make it 'plonky' - an uninvited term for broadcasters because they knew how to sell a story through the sonorous power of the voice.
And when that didn't work, the odd tilt of the head, gesture telegraphed their understanding.
Shout Journalism Today, much of journalism is about shouting the loudest, literally too. It's often said on the hustings, that journalist broadcast to other journalists and editors seeking their next job.
Complex arithmetic sentences obscure true meanings when simpler language would do.
The Cronkites' were folk of the wire service. Words cost in the transmission, so they needed to be judicious. Furthermore, their copy often left the bureaux with little or no change the other end.
You try telling the tragic story of an event, delivered in that inverted pyramidal style, where there are no changes. It's Amadeus in journalism.
Yes the world has changed, and it started slowly, that is the decline of journalism, from the day they let the number crunchers in. When accountants started to run networks.
But there are still those we trust who bear the crest of the old guard, who respect the rules and tell us their truths, that we often agree with.
And no matter any number of tweets, blogs, their word stands tall in a sea of sometimes, almost often, white noise.
When I grow up I'd like to become a reporter just like them. Being honest and humble is probably a good start. The journalism bit you can learn.
End
David, a former broadcaster has worked for the BBC, Channel 4, WTN and ABC News ( South Africa). In 1994 he became a videojournalist. Today he is an Artist-in-Residence at the South Bank. You can find his latest video on his site www.viewmagazine.tv
How many times have you heard it said to a young person:" Stop mucking ( playing) around.
We get so wrapped up with ourselves that our own values : seriousness are foistered on others.
Play is an important constituent of child growth, but when and why does it stop?
Our propensity to play is counterbalanced by accusations of immaturity.
Today, I had a rather playful session with Chinese student and academic from our own China media centre.
The theme, the difference between seeing and perception which sits at the heart of visual intelligence.
The power of the image Here's an observation I'm fascinated by at the moment. Given how image-based we are as a 21st century community e.g web, tv, posters, mags etc, it's remarkable how little we are taught about visual perception.
So today I played out a series of test to show for instance, the power of association: things that look the same are grouped. things that are stable are accepted.
What's really pertinent about all this is the notion hat we could be on the cusp ( could be 100 years, 10 years or less) on a higher consciousness.
We got it in the 13th, 17th and 20th century and as we approach a critical mass in visual literacy. It will happen, we may leap frog a means of communications that makes a nonsense in what we're doing at present.
I find that riveting and had a lot of time and books to eat into whilst on a walking holiday in Wales.
It rather underpins what at the moment is either the norm for you or something to be in awe of ie videojournalism.
I rather guess the next level of visual journalism playing about with semiotics ie language et al is already taking shape, but rather slowly.
The point where journalism - a fixed narrative - opens up to the provocation of reaction through art. It may not seem as barmy as it appears, for montage almost a 100 years old was conceived as cinematic art.
I have had this itch for a while, and further more have rationalised how my applied chemistry past could play an important role. So there's a message at hand.
Unengaged - photo taken at Art Gallery opening in Beirut. Why does this work? And how does the videojournalism need to be informed? Bit more space to the right.
If videojournalism gave over itself to qualitative empiricism we might tap into something science has known for millenia.
OMG! It is the phrase that proceeds the sight of wonderment.
As an Organic Chemistry graduate, I'd mumble it almost every week we entered the lab.
Benzene, the equivalent of Final Cut, waited patiently for a new substrate to come in contact with it.
Then it did its magic, often on its own in the right conditions, sometimes requiring the right intervention, the deft editing hand pushing video clips around that would yield the right film.
Benzene was also the Jack the Ripper of the chemical world, highly elusive in its manifestation.
In basic chemistry, we know oxygen and hydrogen makes water and is fairly stable. We can simulate the molecules with lego bricks enough to make a 6 year old understand.
Benzene was a different matter. To grasp it you had to as Kekule did be highly creative, even a bit mad. You see Benzene exists in a dynamic state of flux between two similar but different chemical structures.
Madder still when you left the practice of the lab and went metaphysical talking nucleophilic reactions, you entered the philosophical world of chemical reactions. OMG, there I go again.
And then you learn that power of empiricism. Science got better by testing and retesting. And each time a "rule" came along, there were others looking to finesse or even break them putting themselves up for peer scrutiny.
Beirut by night, Cheek by Jowl. Commercialism rubs shoulders with the legacy of Beirut's struggles.
In videojournalism we can go molecular as well. How do you get good pictures for instance. The trainer you're working with will tell you "rule of 3rds". But why is it 3rd and not 5th?
And might it be considered that the rule of 3rd was a matter of convenience for George Field one of the progenitors that lent the rule, which really is a guide.
That's not to say the technique isn't invaluable and is responsible for some of the best images around but packaging as it is makes good commercial sense.
The rule of 3rds is benzene inside the lab. So what happens when we go to the drawing board?
For that we have to indulge in cognitive reasoning. The science of seeing and perceiving. You see words on this page, but what you perceive is something different. How do you make sense of these words, and why will its context mean different things to different people?
See you next week
+++++ David is off to the Welsh valleys for some RnR and great walks across the felds.
Been a busy couple of weeks and there's no let up. A number of things are planned which may have some currency.
I was at the Beyond Broadcast conference and interviewed some of the key speakers. web TV launches are nothing special nowadays but Don Boyle's venture has the element of station launch about it, so what is Hibrow TV?
Rob Chiu, one of the UK's most talented and young motion graphics artists. He regularly presents at Flash on the Beach and OFFF, shot his first short story with a crew and high end production gear which included Red cameras. I shot a behind the scenes and should put that together soon.
Why online tv makers fail to understand audiences. There's something like the law of diminishing returns here in that the nuclear proliferation in video and videojournalism non curated appears to be baffling for users.
Dipping in and out of a service like Youtube may be fine, but many still want a dialogue with the brand. Simplicity is good. That explains the ipod and bbc iplayer. I'll be returning to my own site and deconstructing it for this purpose.
And fusing video and online narraritives. this year I have set the Masters student the challenge of telling stories to pull in interest, how are they doing?
So just some of the things I'll be looking at in the days ahead. Not to mention material from Beirut and an important discussion on leadership from one of the UK's leading innovative leaders.
As a young girl Jude Kelly would stage plays and charge family and friends to attend. She wanted to be a director. She became one, a very successful one.
But she says it was not about her per se, but about the act of giving something to others.
Her beliefs have made her one of the most sought after directors and personnel in the arts, not to mention the works she's accomplished as the cultural director of the London 2012 Olympics.
In front of a collective that nurtures leadership qualities, she offered a candid and personnel testament of leadership and what's expected from good leaders.
This could quite easily have been a TED talk, inspiring in its content, deeply illuminating in its delivery.
"I purposefully today wore clothes so you could see my body shape, because line of sight is important in judging people", she said at the beginning.
Leadership, very much like the arts is about innovating, finding spaces and creatively filling them, she concluded.
You can watch the film I shot about her this event in a couple of weeks.
