Are cut aways necessary?

Mindy McAdams whom needs no introduction. Ok then, well respected renaissance prof in the media in the US and author of Flash Journalism, which I recommend you must buy left a response to a post.

I have posted it here as it raises a number of points which are worth looking at in so far as TV versus New Visual or even say Videojournalism is concerned - though VJ as term is open to so many different interpretations.

I know Mindy and admire her work, and I'm not perfect.

The piece Mindy's referring to is Why Video stories work VII
++++++++
Mindy writes

Yeah but David those cutaways to the serious-looking reporter (you) standing there are totally lame. So TV news! So fake!

And what's with that intro with the siren? There was no siren and no yellow police tape the day of the interview. I think you needed either a VO intro or cut that whole bit with the siren, eh?

She's a great talker, you're right about that.

David writes

Hey Mindy How are yer?

Cutaways in situ are still the visual construct that drives the visual narrative.

After what's now been called the Yentob saga, where it was first thought this BBC senior figure inserted himself into his film which he discovered he didn't C/As came in for a bit of a bashing.

One network even dropped them.

But as a VJ or TV bod it's still the device that will get you in and out of an interview when there's little picture, plus it brands.

The looking serious is exactly how I felt listening to her talk about her day - again in situ effect.

The siren and pictures at the top is the window into the piece. That's both my arc and mis en scene.

It's a direct reference to the event which she was a part of and visually sets the scene.

I can see your point, yes there was no siren on the day of the interview, but I know you're not saying don't use archive or create "windows"

That interview took me about ten minutes to do and just as much to post.

Time wasn't the factor, but it's what I call "kill what you can eat".

It's also something I still advocate. I have got limited time - secs for users' attention.

A V/0 may have worked, but to those unfamiliar with my interviewee, I'll ask myself visually what gets their attention, her or incident.

* If I had copyright use of that iconic phone pic from the tube, I might have used that, but I'm free to use the siren pictures shot by one of my former brill students Corrine from the US last heard of in Iowa filming the Caucuses.

I left a response to, perhaps, this area we're playing in on Andy's blog talking about the various levels of VJ

VJ for tv e.g. interview with
Chatham House Director
VJ for VJ e.g.
Reuter's Phone story and some more that tear up the rule book. e.g. 8 Days

There's lots of things about TV News I'm not a fan of - and I have got a lot to say about that.

*I'm also aware on my VJ travels that a lot of VJs/Trainers eschew c/as, GVs, WS, PTC or stand ups et al, whilst developing their own house style e.g. award winning VJ Ruud Elmendorp whom on occasion does the odd PTC.

* Here's an interview with Ruud in Berlin at the International VJ Awards.

Yet the language of TV news or say cinema has some things as a VJ we build upon.

Personally done well,( and that's a point in itself) the insert construct ( C/A) I believe won't disappear.

But in the end it ain't about me, gonzo or TV mode. If I feel I can get a user to the end of an interview, then job done.

:)

* not on original post to Mindy's post

News at Ten marks out of ten

NB See posting two day ago to get an idea what I'm talking about

Didn't catch the beginning by a few seconds to hear the opening.

"We are back..."

But well they're going to run out of superlatives soon after all the firsts they're bagging.

This show probably cost a small fortune.

Problem is they've raised there own bar; so can they keep it up?

LOL, now they're deep underneath the ice - yes Bill Nealy had to tell us again.

Is this the Day Today?

Oh yeah finally, something futuristic a video blog!

Oh there's me thinking Vincent their sports correspondent would get an English reply from the English Football Coach in another er, not quite exclusive.

The last piece - ITN's trademark report "... and finally" was more drama than dreamy, but it involved a daring rescue and some chopper reporting.

Verdict - Slick, better lighting in the studio and location, signature tune's been updated, but how would you separate the show from the same one four years ago.

Has news production moved on? Has the language changed? Is this appointment TV in tune with our radical changing needs?

These are some of the things I'll be talking about at DeMontford University's Cultural eXchange Programme.

I'll post more details soon

Bauhaus Video Journalism

Few academic institutions have had a profound influences on the creative arts such as architecture, design, film and graphic design, like Bauhaus.

Founded in Germany in 1919, it's style focused on geometric designs and a minimalism which has become a trade mark in furniture design.

Next month I have been invited to deliver a paper/seminar of video online at Bauhaus University.

Just like a trip to the Guggenheim in Bilbao last summer, I'm certain I'll be inspired.

Wierdly Video journalism at an advanced level feeds of the Bauhaus mantra: strong lines and simplicity without looking simple.

Hopefully I can make a short film about the excursion

News at Ten - the come back er kid, no grandpa returns

Reassuring, velvety, cosy and the right sort of boyfriend if it were one to bring home to mum and dad.

Some traditions are hard to beat and next week an institution returns like the prodigal son to make us feel greatly British again.

News at Ten in its hey days commanded British news' attention like the British did with its empire circa 1900s.

But then they the execs tweaked, tinkled and eventually put the programme to bed, permanently, or so we thought.

Apart from keeping us molly cuddled, News at Ten gave other network bosses ulcers.

me even argued News at Ten delivered big audiences because of the bouquet of programmes before it; the legacy of a film's audiences bode well.

But then the presenter Sir Trevor Macdonald - a mild mannered, thoroughly decent veteran broadcaster in the family of Cronkite and Alistair Cooke - could stake his claim for the show's huge appeal.

We loved and love Trevor.

Oh boy we loved him.

I was once introduced to him once back in 97 when I worked as a freelance producer on ITV's lunch time and 6 O'clock News

We loved him so much so that the coup de grace for the incumbent News at whatever time it's at.. what !

10.30!

10.30?

Yes, 10.30

Where was I, yes the coup de grace of the news at the moment should not hurt.


The mac is back

So News at Ten is BACK.

We could write a thesis about this.

ITN despite its many relaunches resurrects an old favourite seeped in nostalgia and that key word used in news world: TRUST.

News at Ten ran from 1967 and 1999, reappeared in 2001 and then was finally laid to rest (poor ratings) in 2003.

It's signature was the gongs and the carbon template style of US news presentation - a single anchor made to look like the joint chief of staffs - the pulse of the world in his fingers.

It won't be the first time programme managers have awoken the dead and won't be the last.

But this is a gamble worth watching.

Because when News at Ten reigned we were but a cell, no a mitochondria, in the web, never mind web 2.0's awesome publishing galaxy.

Back then we would still wait patiently to see the world at Ten, rather than as it happens.

And the world was nary compressed from all the satellite and streams of news feeds doing the rounds.

If its broke say news execs, fix it.

News at Ten is launching in the middle of an information war, where paradigms have imploded in black holes and no one, exec or otherwise, has the Midas thing to guarantee huge audiences.

If News at Ten gets the numbers watch out for a raft of oldies coming back.

Dr Who - you ain't seen nothing yet.

If it fails to live up to the hype, there will be eggs gushing of the face of many execs and someone somewhere who came up with the idea will fall on a whacking great sword.

There will also be mirth and much dancing behind ladles of wine and rum from frienemies (friends who are in fact your enemy.

Ask any news exec in the UK at the moment about News at Ten's relaunch and a majority will welcome it with open arms, and a dagger hidden in their belts.

You see they'd be willing it to work, so they can bring back their old brands without taking the hits if it fails.

On the other hand they wish it wasn't back, at least till they could relaunch their shows, but won't because of fear of failure.

Yep News is merciless.

News at Ten is the old gene pool in a Darwinian pool world


Will it be a success or failure?

So will it be a success or failure?

Nope! Can't read the freakin tea leaves again; doh!

But this is certain, the dynamics have changed, and five million per night will be welcome to the ten million it attracted not too long ago.

It's trade mark.. "and finally"- a homage to amusing sometimes witty stories which is to news like I am an Inuit (shoosh don't tell anyone) will be lifted to youtube even before the final credits run.

Sir Trevor will receive hordes of messages welcoming him back, one of which from his bosses will be a healthy wad of...(mustn't get vulgar now)

Will News at Ten work?

New studio,immersive video wall, star trek presenter's desk, new lighting..it's almost all been done before.

News at Ten, News anywhere may not be the problem, but the language of engagement, the lingua franca of its communication visually and literally.

[For an idea read the cinema and the effect of indie cinema circa 80s/90s and its revival]

Will it work?

Sadly not as much the bosses might hope, because those halcyon days, those golden days of the news brand is the stuff we read to our nieces and nephews at bed time.

News at Ten rearranged to News (on the) Net might be a different proposition.

But then that means I have got another 300 words to write.

Flash for film makers - Gripe

I have worked with Flash since 3/4 and by and large have found it one of those k.apps for building sites.

I know, I know, some of us can't get our heads around.

Wait ! I'm about to join you.

Flash, and you must have been living under the floor boards if you don't know this is an animation - design tool.

It can be used to quite frankly do some amazing things.

I have it them to make promos - which you can email to clients at a minuscule 200k as well as start to build sites such as this New Nation Rising.

CS3 - Flash now under adobe makes a radical departure for non Flash folks.

I don't doubt it will have raised the bar for Flash designers making their skill that little bit more invaluable,but if you're a non Flash user or film maker, get ready to do what Flash want you to do - spend some money on training.

The interface more or less looks the same as Flash 8, but some crucial easily employed functions have been deprecated.

"stop sounds" are now behaviours and loading movies takes a different route.

It's so less intuitive as I see it that it almost removes the ideal of teaching journalists.

Perhaps after a bout of training that may change, but that's not the point.

I imagine I'll arrive on campus to find CS3 installed.

My immediate thoughts at the moment will be to stick to CS2 (unless you've got some serious flash stuff to do), but deploy CS3's FLV encoder.

Stick to CS2 or below unless that is you want to do serious

CS2's dreamweaver, equally powerful and I'll be using that for CSS design.

I haven't opened CS3's dreamweaver yet.

Heaven help me!

Going back to its roots

When I first published viewmag the idea was to mash up and create a sort of visual magazine and I guess it said something in taking a Batten award, but then I think it lost its way aping the now accepted design aesthetic of newspapers.

Colour is so significant in design for it denotes from the onset what your publication is or attempting to be.

White a universal colour or non colour to be abstract gives space and openness and is ideal for newspapers and to some extent magazines.

It's strength is in minimalism.

If you look at the Times, there's a fantastic illustration of the rebirth of online newspapers with colours e.g lime green which previously many newspaper execs would have ignored.

Black as a design is equally universal, but has the disadvantage of seeming impenetrable.

However it is a classic.

Say what you will about fashion, we'll keep coming back to black because of its inherent chicness and no nonsense aura.

But it has to be done well, and that's not easy.

But by next week hopefully I'm hoping to take viewmag back into a news magazine feel, with a few new things, which I'm borrowing from my radio days.

Secondary changes should take a while, but eventually envelope the whole site which should revert to how it was when I first published.

Hope we like it :)

Where you should be today as a Journalist

I can't think of a better place to be today if you're a journalist.
-EMOTIONS AND JOURNALISM at City University, London.

This is a comprehensive 15 month study into an area of journalism so far removed from the job.

Last July I met the principle researcher Gavin whilst I spoke about working alone, sometimes as a VJ in away from home e.g. South Africa 1992/3.

But the area I would have most been interested in would have been this from their own literature.

Unfortunately I can't go as 'm in the middle of some monster marking.

From EMOTIONS AND JOURNALISM DOCUMENT

14:15 Session 4: Rage in cyberspace: is it farewell to dispassionate journalism?

"Reports on political conflict, sex abuse and violent crime have always stirred strong passions in audiences.

Now with the internet, readers and viewers have new avenues for publishing their opinions and making their feelings plain to journalists.

Trolls and flaming havebecome new words in the journalistic lexicon. Does the web amplify strong emotion, creating an ecology in which there is less space for more emotionally nuanced positions?

And does this mean that journalists in the future will also need to bring more of their own feelings and stories into their reporting, if they are to be heard above the crowd?"

Speakers to include:
Vicky Taylor, Editor: Interactivity, BBC News
Stuart Allan, Professor of Journalism, the Media School at Bournemouth University

Is Bourne new cinema or queasy movie making?

Peter at Shooting by numbers picked up this post - an interesting discussion over at Vanity - about Bourne and whether it has raised the stakes in movie making or is queasy movie making.

Some of you may remember I had been in talks with Greengrass' PA about an interview which at the last moment fell through, but I'm hoping to be lucky in the future.

Not quite Bourne, but this month I'll kick off the big interviews on the subject of multimedia with a key figure and an interesting, I hope bent to the interview process.

Anyway that's for another day


Bourne Magic or Sleight of hand

I'd say to a growing band of visual story tellers, video journalists and indeed film makers I know (very few :)) Greengass' work represents something significant.

That it attracts a wide array of opinions, more often than not evoking discussion about the craft of film making, is part testimony.

Film making irrefutably is a living art and every director possesses a DNA, unique or recombinant, which either adds to the gene pool or not.

Pudovkin and Eisenstein which was raised as a post on Variety's post and is often wheeled out when speaking genres isn't contestable alongside Greengrass.

They are the Eves or Adams, much studied and dissected in film schools and in which thousands following have paid hommage one way or another e.g. BattleShip P. and The Untouchables.

The kinetic-aesthetic look Greengrass rides us along in Bourne has strands from a milestone visual shift in the 90s with US drama Homicide - Life on the Street (handheld) and Bochco's NYPD Blue, where the plane of filmmaker frees up again and the viewer appears almost to be onset caught up in the frenzy.

Peter Yates' Bullitt freed up areas of film directing before and many others have done since.

Hit TV series 24 does handheld, in some parts even with a DVCam - see if you can spot it.

For videojournalists like myself , Paul and his team up the ante.

There's a photojournalistic quality and an added energy within the lens (those movements), let alone the scene, that has a visceral quotient a bit like Marmite (British spread) you either absolutely love it or you absolutely don't.

Personally, I am hugely wowed, as are students from the Masters programme I teach - a position which obviously won't be the same elsewhere.

But just as other directors and movies have influenced a genre, Greengrass has done something with the spy narrative and dramatic film (U93) that will yield comparisons alongside other directors and films I reckon for a long time to come.

Videojournalism for Managers

Management can often have an ambivalent cosiness with video journalism.

At power breakfast meetings the banter will be around who’s doing what.

And quite often video akin to either a venereal disease or v for victory is splayed across the table.

"Jim over at the Claxton Daily is doing what, video?"
"Damn it!"

At some point in the ensuing weeks, your manager will either call you into their office or better still you’ll arrive at your desk to find a shiny box and clothed bag with the outline of a 12 bore shotgun which will make you think whether your boss has been taking Get Carter too seriously.

There will hence be a lot expected from you because frankly video, well, it’s easy.

Just point the camera and blow tape; you know how to blow, don’t cher

Because on your first exasperated shoots, having read the manual from back to front and again, your package will often set you back a week; a day if you’re really up for it.

Truth is it’s not that video is difficult and your IQ isn’t on par with Madonna ( she’s reportedly a 150 plus by the way – yep that’s way good) but you’re having to get used to alien concepts of electronic media that not less that a few Christmas’ ago had a whole communion of disciplines involved.

More frightening, your managing editor will ask you why it’s taking too long to produce that report on the city’s biggest murder in between the feature piece and banging the phones-English media expression for chasing media experts.

It’s a discordant existence between those with a vision and those who have to carry it out. And wearily it might have you questioning the whole advent of multimedia into the newsroom.

So rather long overdue here’s a rough guide to videojournalism for management in the newsroom.

1. Consult at some point with staff first about your brand new scheme and why you need it.
2. Why because if you’re not adding value and your video isn’t well produced you're not really doing yourself any favours.
3. Ask around what vjism is and enquire about resources and workflow before purchasing inventory.
4. Resources: are we buying Pinnacle, Avid or Final Cut. And cameras is it Sony Cams or Cannon because some systems are more intuitive and geared towards the solo journalist.
5. Re-work the rota if you’ve bought into the dynamics of the newsroom. Should journalists be responsible for tasks outside of producing video
6. Determime what house style to adopt. If you look at ITN, Sky and the BBC there are significant differences in their televisual language. There are also significant differences in videojournalism.
7. Give your staff room to experiment and develop their strengths. Often that means time to produce features and jump off the treadmill of news.
8. Where possible facilitate gatherings for videojournalists from your newspaper group to meet and share ideas.
9. If there are top up schemes around don’t shy away from spending some of the kitty’s spare change for staff to pick up new ideas: training is ongoing.
10. Pick up a camera yourself and go out on a shoot. Former Sky news editor Nick Pollard who was managing editor of London’s first videojournalism station did so attracting admiration from staff which was reciprocated.

And for good measure introduce regular viewings of your own VJS' work and what other are doing. And do remember to praise your VJs for their good work.

It can be a lonely pursuit at times

Ask not what videojournalism can do for you, but for your readers

Pam grabs a shot to the nose of her package

I had the pleasure of sharing ideas with some senior regional journalists: pam, Catherine. Malcolm and Gareth (have I got this wrong) in the mystic art of video journalism.

I say mystic rather tongue in cheek because it’s easy to to assume Videojournalism is a universal term across the media.

Go on lean over to the colleague next to you and ask.

Chances are if they have heard of it it’s nothing more than video-on-line, a perception that doesn’t discriminate across status.

But as the four editors demonstrated in an enjoyable mix of practice, theory and media banter, there can and is a distinction from merely producing video copy online and something more bespoke.


Videojournalism's different personalities
Broadly speaking there’s videojournalism for TV, videojournalism for videojournalism and videojournalilsm for the DIY

Television exercises its fail-safe version of videojournalism by replicating the nomenclature of the crew team.

"See mum I can do the work of three people!"

It’s like a scout with a pocket knife being asked to fell a tree for an evening fire.

As a scout you might ask whether there are better alternatives to hacking at a tree and that frankly you're resourceful enough at achieving near same aims via different means.

Meanwhile Jim’s still hacking at the tree with his saw,electric or otherwise, into tiny manageable pieces you’re around a camp fire roasting the second round of those chestnuts.

Being nimble and thinking creatively has its many advantages.

Within bespoke videojournalism other formats are beginning to crystalise.

Non-invasive which lends itself to observational form and the more authored gonzo whether the visual and literary narrative attempt to separate themselves from the bulk of the crowd.

Videojournalism then becomes the writers visual pen; the correspondent with an evocative line or visual code which makes you rethink the status quo.


News you can use
If videojournalisms had a mantra it might be that it’s all in the detail, or news you can use, because what it it attempts is a micro reportage of macro news: the scale down of a 21 inch TV screen to the new improved 600X330 online makes the visual language point.

Dump the Wide shots and go personal, closer up and still at the point of the FBCU.

Here now Videojournalism cheekily borrows from new alphabet soup of evolving arts like motion graphics and indie films.

And those changes fall alongside the cultural changes print personnel are going through, whilst not being saddled with the ways of old - the aging vernacular of TV news some 60 odd years old.

Pam, Catherine. Malcolm and Gareth will be some of those to watch – Sorry guys, no pressure LOL

BUT any number of journalists might argue there’s a hidden VJ hand in the equation and in the swelling ranks of newspaper VJs' success. Management.

And that’s what I’ll look at tomorrow.

digital newsrooms and journalism

Reading through the guardian this morning I enjoyed the read from Roy Greenslade who's been touring the digital newsrooms and Jeff Jarvis who's been pioneering a few digital experiments of his own in the grey area of journalism meets marketing.

One can't be downbeat, but whilst Jeff is able to call on NY suits to assess start-ups from his cohort, it's an unusual scenario within universities here.

I can't talk for all universities, but that's a generalisation from my role sitting on the professional journalism - University media course body, The BJTC.

At UCLAN, Mike Ward amd his team continue to blaze a trail with their industry tie up and MELD.

Watch this space this year as many univeristies including where I lecture, the University of Westminster, have since attained Skills Sets's academy status.

Jeff speaks of CPM, CPC and RPM - Ad speak such as cost per click etc. highlighting the oft repeated, but dodged point: "how do you intend to make money?"

Google's wrapped up this area aligned to its SEO - something else journalist will have to get their heads around - but more time spent with business grads over the next building should germinate new ideas.

Meanwhile Roy's excursions around the digital highway of newsrooms throws up some interesting conclusion.

One of them regional newspapers being at the forefront of cultural change.

In my role as videojournalism consultant I have witnessed the same.

In the last couple of years I have been privy to the going ons with regional journalists from our VJ contacts and the rest, and with nationals such as the Telegraph and Financial Times have mixed it with some of their new journalists.

The FT presents a case for more multimedia offerings with some new multimedia and videojournalism staff; it's last one about counting the cost of food was a blinder.

Soon the Telegraph's new multimedia journalists, the first of their kind in the UK, will be back within the Telegraph from working around the regions.

It'll be worthwhile taking a moment to see some of their new methods and techniques at work.

How to build a network

This was posted on the Editors Forum,but I'll tie in some new things with a follow up from some cool new things over the weekend.

The great media paradigm shift

Is that it? What now?

It's a phrase oft-repeated in Hollywood flicks when the lead's heroic act to bring about worldly change falls flat.

In the non celluloid system following a frenetic period of hustle and flow, execs huddling execs, conference attendants lifting open secrets from competitors, scene 45 take one has grind to a monumental halt.

Damn!

Conclusion: you now know what they know and what they know everyone knows and no one knows anything new, at least as a critical mass utility for the mean time.

I mean where's the fun in that.

If you're a media exec get ready to exhale as you tick of the following: twitter, blog, pod, VJ, multimed,scrobble, ASP apps, flikr, Myface.

Yep, It's Hammer time. How did the track go"

"You can't touch this; you can't touch me".


Five compressed years
In the last five years, two more like it, there's been a shift in thinking.

No!

We use the word paradigm rather liberally, and I am no different over at viewmagazine.tv.

But has there really been a change so radical to mirror Gutenberg's Press, which after all wasn't just about producing a printing press per se, but an attitudinal change to new information?

Yes!

No!



The P word
Paradigm seems such an explosive action: a community believes totally in one set of rules, a few have different ideas and cause the others to shift, abandon their ways entirely.

A new paradigm shift, fundamental thought process stirs a colossal way of life to abandon its belief.

See the earth is round, its round: It's a bloody sphere. You're all wrong. Flat my arse! ~ anon.


Big New thing
No one could deny there hasn't been a round of teutonic changes and frankly the Oxford dictionary should add "the Net" as a synonym for Paradigm.

But what about the way we do things: the media, press, TV?

If we look back on the breakthrough of broadcasting and wireless it was the Irish's 1916 use of a wireless ship broadcast to inform anyone sailing close by to tell the US press of their plight, that is cited as broadcast turning point.

The broadcast pros hadn't yet figured the commercial sense of radio and broadcasting.

And if it hadn't been for that grubby set up between wireless/TV, the electronics industry and some fairly powerful officials, then broadcasting could well have turned out to be a many-to-many exercise - the very thing that has us belly-aching with joy about the Net.

And film?

Well that's still film delivered in a manner which is as old as film.

If the cryogeneticists could hurry up a bit and get Eisenstein back, d'you figure the daddy of film and montage wouldn't chuckle a bit at what he sees?

"Oh yes I am Legend is a bad film and how did you do that?" he might say, "but yes that's a montage, and that's a montage and that's a two shot and that there is my favourite conflict arc".

There's a reason why dye-in-wool media folks can leave their places of employ and still find work, as opposed to those poor monks who had to throw their quills away when the printing press arrived.

Has there been a radical change?

You've got to watch this again. Sublime!



What's the question?
We still largely watch linear TV, which has been lifted hook line and youtube to the web and newspapers still deliver a version of what they do in hard copy coupled with the existing paradigm of what constitute news.

"Ok what we need to know here is what happened, who it is, why it happened, when and where...how?"

Every one's now doing news: the actors have changed, perhaps the philosophy, the technology adds some finesse, but the model of the product has more or less stayed the same.

"We bring you the news" dah dah dah
"Ours is the unbellished news" deem dum dee
"When you hear our news, you'll never want to hear what others say". dala dah
"This is tomorrow's news today" de dum de do
"This is the news that you want" dom dom dom

We're still wedded to a powerful model of info flows that has not changed.

And why should it?



Web n+1
Web 2.0's radicalism hasn't usurped a way of life, has it?

It's been incorporated into the body politik of what we do, a bolt on to the status quo.

Perhaps in developed economies it has to be this way.

There's just too many zeros at the end of that market cap to truly entertain something new.

Just as drug enforcers could never quite rid the world of illegal drugs in one fell swoop, even if they could and with all the right resources because of the legitimate economy it supports, web 2.0 has to make do with the here and now.

Could it be so different?

Conjecture?

The new new thing
So 40 years on from now about the time when newspapers have been pegged for history's waste paper bin, will that generation look back to 2004-7 and say with alacrity:
"Now that's big, that was a paradigm".

Or what possibly could they be working with that lends them to say the converse.

A three D dimensional web as the norm?

Could information become so interstitial that it in intelligently gathered around us?

And how might we be compositing information e.g. news that's so mind shattering, that its construct leaves you breathless - if you look back on this period in 2050.


There are no radical changes
There's a wonderful footnote in paradigms greatest gaffs when some respected figure, a Lord, proclaims physics has reached the end of the road in knowledge.

Then some bloke called Einstein says something considered weird and wonderful that collapses a good part of Newton's laws.

I mean the cheek of it!

So what of these new new things.

Day dream
"Oi Gyimah would you stop staring out of that ruddy window"

I used to get that a lot when I was a kid; I'm doing it now.

But what would we do without day dreams, cooked up bizarre inventions, oddball moments, cranky thoughts about the moon being made of cheese.

Imagine that you only read and viewed information that was so necessary that it really was news you can use.

How about a speech recognition device that pinged you anytime someone mentioned your name anywhere in the world.

Or that if you needed info on anything it was literally a breath away.

Or how about a machines that rendered all other media publishing devices obsolete

"I wonder what's happening in South Africa with the ANC and how the election will shape".

Google bot audio super spiders collate key word references (electrical signals in the air - think radio) and decipher priority as an immediate answer to your question and more if you should so need and tell you on the many devices where you can access this.

Every now and then you get a flashing light on your wrist device; someone's talking about you.

If it's red a negative word has been detected; if its green a positive word.

"Would you like to turn of halcyon to negative connotations Dunkley Gyimah", it asks

Hail the thought police have truly arrived.

But how far off from these are we?

A couple of things I have seen point to some of these and tomorrow I'll continue this conversation.

Making the promo Reel 2007/8

Promos - the stuff that sits either at the top of a prog, as a break within it, a pop music montage and in many cases a show reel.

Here's one I made for 2006/7 which is in need of an update.

I'll talk in more detail about promo making in a future in areas such as - the emotional and cinematic context, how different music affects the tone, the formula behind making a pop promo, and the big no nos.

But here's a 3 pointer tip

1. What's the purpose
I. What are you selling a company, someones on screen work ???
NB At one of my former jobs, they never looked at showreels that had music and fast cuts
If its for a journalism job, all you need is three items: one presenting, one interviewing and then a report wrapped up in less than 5 minutes

2. The music comes first
I look for music -sound - with an emotional draw
II avoid cliched music or that associated with something e.g. It's the final countdown.
III.Promos are like flares and date badly; the wrong music electro funk won't do you favours unless it's a send up

3. If you're using type - as in typography
I what message are you trying to get across
II Noooo to twirling type - unless you have the 80s in mind

4. Visuals need to be strong, comped in cases and processed for tonality; it's all in the feel.

Iowa - why there's nothing else!

US videojournalist Corrine L. McDermid is off to cover the Iowa Caucus with one of those "get me in front of them" passes meanng she'll be interviewing some heavyweights

Frankly if you work in the media in the US who isn't.

So she emailed me to see if she could get an international perspective.

Truth if I asked 100 people on the street I reckon only a tenth would know what it was.

It just doesn't sit on the UK news radar.

Fancy that!

Biggest story going in the US and we'll only get a whiff of it a couple days run up to the big day

But I sauntered over to Uptake.org whom Corrine's reporting for and really enjoyed citizen joe Chuck Olsen clear, a tad humorous non fussy report.

One of the things we're all getting used to is the increased level of video reportage.

And yes some will be adding very little to the saturation coverage, but some like this one will add a personal quick bite touch.

2008- Training, hyperlocal, China & the BBC

In three weeks time I will be interviewing a key BBC figure on News, News Futures and Multimedia.

All I'll say in the meantime is you'll unlikely to see many one-on-ones with him ( If any, particularly outside the news belt) so I'm very pleased. Thanks to those e.g. Paul Brannan, Peter Barron etc that helped out on this.

The inteview will be used for

A feature on Multimedia now previewing on Viewmagazine.tv

Presentations at Cultural Exchange and World Press Association

and some work on a PhD

But I have an idea which I hope we can share in.

I'd like to invite a video question from you which I will put to my interviewee and I'd like to use your question in the feature, but will also entertain posting your segment to you, if you want.

There are a couple of caveats to make this work really neatly.

That hopefully it'll be a good spread for use on an interactive map.

That you're a video shooter/ vlogger so that I can link to your story/vlog. Who knows we might even get a vlog carnival going.

That I'll probabably take about 6-10 questions, so you'll have to be to the point.

I'll come back to this again with more details closer, but in the meantime if you want to email me to talk about this please do so on davidg@jounalist.com or my viemagazine account. Just to save any spamming, if you're a viewmagazine.tv viewer you'll easily find it.

So there we are.

It's a mad, but clear idea for collaboration.

Just please don't ask how you'd make a living doing things like this. LOL

China
A couple of details to sort, but my colleague informs me that we should be off to Peking University mid year. He, Kienda Hoji is a visiting professor there in music and law and is some way in learning how to speak and write mandarin.

I have barely scratched the surface and will be picking up the odd tip from some of the Masters students at Westminster.

This year it won't be lost on many that this is China's year, and not only because of the Olympics.

If you attended OFF event in New York, which a good friend Rob Chiu presented at you would have come across the incredible Leonard Shlain who wrote the Alphabet and the Goddess, the conflict between word and image.

Inside Leonard talks about how different parts of the brain are developed from reading linearly ( western) and Chinese characters, which has provided Kienda and me with thoughts about working multimedia with our hosts.

It's all a germ of an idea, but I'll come back to it after some clarity.

Hyperlocal
Two years ago you'd still be ooming and arming about video; not any more.

We're all film makers, but does that mean saturation in subject matter etc.

Of course not.

But one area that has recieved a lot of attention but not much action is hyperlocal; I'm talking UK.

So this is going to an interesting year for hyperlocal news: News you can use.

I''ll make the links on this pilot/draft site fully active soon.


Training
And less I forget, training, training, training.

But this year, I expect to see some fairly non conventional outfits take to video, videojournalism and multimedia either as a way of documenting their work or teling their own stories.

Hillman Curtis, Flash Guru turned Award winning film maker has made a wonderful film on Pentagram; the tones and textures are just drop dead gorgeous, plus his depth of field comes across as if he were using a swing and shift lens.

Take a look for yourself.

You can see the interview I did with Hillman here, which I hope to update when I next get the opportunity to bump into him

But back to videojournalism, expect to see more museums and municipal bodies get involved.

Look Back - rummaging through Viewmagazine.tv

A look back at some of the items that have stirred me/viewmagazine.tv to thump our crate at our own little slice of cyber speakers corner.

For the next two days viewmagazine.tv's front page will have its front face changed more times than ... than.... Oh Gosh who can I not libel.

This post will be updated throughout the day.

Since the morning it's been an IM6 - Interview with Chatham House Director from 2001-2006 that took centre stage.

Then a a report: Is Television Killing the Arts?.
Commentary and viewpoins from punters down at the South Bank Centre talking about TV's relationship with the Arts

From 2 GMT onwards be a multimedia Videojournalist - promo from Cairo in the style of Bourne - er sorry it looks mothing like it.

From 5 GMT 8 Days - the film about the UK's first journalist to become videojournalists using the Press Associations ground breaking scheme.
To date it's trained scores of newspaper journalists

Then sevenish Robb Montgomery and David in Cairo with a podcast that has us gabbering on about videojournalism and visual storytelling.

Penultimate change playing a little flash diti which bookends to How to Podcast - similarities with radio using experience working at the BBC World Service and the BBC's radio station for London.

And finally for the day - how do you become creative:
"....While the arts has come to be recognised as a repository for the creative thinker, joined by science maths, and architecture , it's not a word associated with journalism.."



Meanwhile my teenager nephew is on habbo. He's in this pic with the red bandana- just gate crashed a party VIP, he says. It's second life of sorts for TEEEENS ( somebody's going to scream now and say "no it isnt!)

He's just off to a club called the majestic which I'll show some pics later.

I've just asked if I can do a profile of a hip teenager, though "hip" yurk I'm showing my age.

So profile of an alright teenager

Ok - top five tunes

1. Grime
2. Grime
3. Grime
4. Grime
5. Grime


Top things to wear
1. Combats
2. Era hats
3. Air Max 90s
4. Hoodies
5. t Shirt


Top thing about the opp sex
(he's shy)

1. Dunno, he says

Top things about grown ups
1. Don't listen to what you have to say
2. That's it basically


Top thing about Habbo

1. Meet people
2. Have fun
3. Teenagers only
4. Make your own room
5. Doing what you wanna

Lets give it up for Omar Tackie -

Noooooooooooooooooooooooo

Staring vacuously at the hidden pud tucked behind the marg in the fridge, which family did not see, and thinking... Err Naah.
( Fridge door closes)
(light on Mac coms back on)
And another post is completely out of the question - get a life boyo!
Anyone for scrabble? Few Friends in living room.
(Everyone staring at me vacuously)
Feel Bourne Triology coming on...

Why video stories work VII

Perhaps one of the most gripping pieces I have produced recently was talking to Rachel North.

Gripping has nothing to do with me the producer but the person being interviewed.

There are many technical reasons, as opposed to its creative elements, why video works and it can sometimes be taken for granted.

If you watched Brit TV features in the 80s and 90s there was a huge safety net for why video/TV should always work.

I recall so vividly how at BBC Reportage (1992-93) we would:

1. Bash the phones - searching for stories/ contacts- often sparked by the newspapers.

2. Search approp. contacts and literally write up mini books about what they said.

3. This would be shown to an editor who would drive us into the area she/he felt yielded good SOTs ( sound on tape)

4. Go out and shoot - looking for those same sots.

5. Come back and have secretaries transcribe.

Point 5 will perhaps bring on the biggest gasp.

From 8 pages of transcript you'd comb through picking out those vivid sots.

"So as I looked out of the window I felt a pain. It was sudden, and then I started to bleed. I blacked out and then I'm told I lost all time and when my mum came home and saw me, she took me off to the hospital and there they said I was lucky to be alive, because I had accidently drunk poison that should have killed me. I'm not sure how that happened, but I thought at the time it was just a stomach ache....


Now circa 92 what might have been edited would have been
(1)"I felt a pain. It was sudden, and then I started to bleed. I blacked out..


(3)"I accidently drunk poison that should have killed me"

With a voice over supplying the bits in between.
Jane was discovered by her mother x hours later. At the hospital doctors were amazed she was still alive -- insert (2)

The system worked because the programme had a sizable budget to play with, and accuracy rather than speed was the driving currency. ( though the two are never tradeable)

But what people said suddenly became interesting in another guise; nuances, choice of words, semantics.


Pushing Video's sot content
Yesterday, BBC local news led with an item about the tragic death of a policeman, but started off the piece saying the commander of blah blah police force has sent his condolences..

Uh! Yes this might be news, but not as the lead in this case when scant knowledge has been said of the event.

Similarly, journalese e.g hhospitalised, medicalised truck - heard that one yesterday - and "a car has collided with a tree" take on new meaning.

But I digress.

Turning over a news report or feature piece in the hustle and bustle of 24news accords no such time luxury, so you learn to drive a live conversation homing in on the good bits, waiting to further explore, and intervening when it goes flat to pick it up again.


Do all the hard work in the field
Cutting down time in the news arena before even getting back to the edit is one of the keys to help you unlock Gonzo VJism.

And added to that the conviction of knowing what your piece is about.

If you've got the SOT, why waste any more time. Leave. Say thank you.

I'd pursued a member of parliament all day, and when he agreed to an interview as part of a press corp, I only had two questions for him.

"Do you intend to resign... why not....."

He was a bit perplexed: "Is that all!", he quipped.

I ran all these together.

I didn't see the point of a fishing expedition asking 30 questions when I only had space for 40".

Average time of a sot depending on your territory 4-8 secs, 8-15 seconds, 15-25 secs, 25-40 seconds, though clearly if you're in the latter then you're verging on docs.


Christmas Game

It's not a bad pasttime game.

Close your eyes and see if you can pull out the sots of your partner or parent talking to you.

Nice for Christmas too if your mum can finish a five minute oratory with you staring down at the Christmas pud and still know what she was talking about.

"That would be Mr Bell, mother... you know Mr Bell, that's who you're talking about..the one with different sized feet"

Listen out for the dip in intonation (break). That's the edit point.

Then if you can find any of Margaret Thatcher's old tapes (youtube) try it again.

Thatcher it was rumoured knew how to control her inflexions so effectively she kept on rising in tone until she finished her point.

Real bummer to edit as it sounds incomplete and you're forced to take the whole 40 secs.

So the interview below is an example of a quick knock together video that er works: Rachel North, who survived the tube bomb blast, needed little intervention.

Let her tell the story - that's the best part of radio as well.

Animated voice, paints pictures with words, and speaks in 15-25 second chunks.

Whoops! 30 seconds gone, lets pick up the inflexion to arouse secondary interest.

Three different cut aways drove the visual narrative.

Time taken about 10 minutes for the interview in which I originally posted with perhaps one edit.

Here's part one - 1.40 odd seconds for part's two and three you can find them on viewmagazine.tv here

Have an original idea - the people you love to hate

You know them, they quote the Bard, Joyce's Ulysses, and claim to have understood Rushdie's Verses, even though they'd never read em.

You shoot them daggers eyes and mumble something like F@£%%$£ and p^%**.

I was working at Channel 4 News at the time, when The Satanic Verses was released.

Ok, Ok, I'm a simpleton, but I didn't get it.

There!

But then in yesterday's post I mentioned: Alan Kay, Ted Nelson and Vannevar Bush.

And anonymous posted a comment:

"The difficulty with this article is knowing which part of it to leave out of a submission to Pseud's Corner...."

He could have been refering to other areas.

But I posted a reply agreeing in part...


The trouble...
The issue I have with the opening para of this post is the unfamiliar names.

Well not entirely, if you get what I mean, but the bit that forces one out of their comfort zone so much that a whole piece becomes inpenetrable can be a pain.

Then there's the equally sinful quoting said figures in succession of each other to support a skewed point.

But worse is when you realise aftewards that the author hasn't said anything worthwhile. They've not had an original thought.

Yahh!

The last one gets me, cuz whilst I believe a lot of what I like talking about is rooted in the past: cameras - degeurotype; the web-memex, it's tiring hearing all that pat again, if you've heard it the first time.

What I like...

What I like is a repository of ideas discussing the new new things, with context, but with a fresh take.

Furthermore I'd prefer if it wasn't so abstract: Mathematics and Multimedia, getouta here.

Though... though... there's a wee point in this: "Wanna know about water don't ask a fish"

Paul Brannan, BBC Exec would make me laugh when I'd extend an invitation for him to pop over to the universty to talk to students.

"Oh good", he'd remark, "I might be in for some original ideas, which I can lift and claim are mine".

The last bit he was joking about.

But original ideas.. yes

We're for ever lifting ideas and remoulding them. This very post is here courtesy of anonymous, but I guess it's the level at which we quote chapter and verse that can become irritable.

Rework ideas, rework em.. that bit at least i hope showed its crown from yesterday's post.

In the end it's that mantra that keeps coming back and that which you feel impassioned and passionate about.

K.I.S.S.

Verbosity is...
I had a teacher in the boarding school I grew up in Ghana.

He used to say "Let taciturnity and serenity be achieved in this architectural edifice".

Effectively, be quiet in the classroom.

We'd never laughed so hard, but soon stopped with wry smiles when we discovered he meant it. That's the way he spoke.

Can't say I have ever quoted Joyce et al in an article, and never will, but the idea of tieing up different thoughts to make a point stick is the stuff of PhD thesis, which ( hick) puts me in a wierd space or not according to the last piece.

But this post/blog is no place for self aggrandisment, but as I've said a notebook of scribbles and ideas; brain dumps, a sort of functional Tourette's Syndrome.

But it's also about engaging and truthfully sometimes it (post ) works and sometimes it doesn't.

And when it doesn't that's when the fun really starts, because that forces you to ponder, rethink those ideas, refine them if possible and perhaps discover something new.

"I exhaust my ideas so I'm forced to think of new one" I claimed in this 60" promo.



"Yeah I can hear you, but not rubbish ones mate" LOL

Ideas..that's why I write this blog for that thing.. that thing.. ideas.

p.s. Yer can't take yerself too seriously