Video killed the radio star

More and more news stories have videos attached to them. It's all part of the online package.

But I don't find myself clicking on a lot of the links. There are several reasons. 

1. I'd rather just read
2. Video will not enhance the story.
3. The videos are not very good.
4. If the videos are standalone, they don't cover anything new or interesting.
5. Ads are annoying

There's not much you can do about No. 1. But Web sites could improve their content to try to improve on the other three reasons. They could take their cues from Washington Post's Travis Fox and the Des Moines Register's "Insight into the Candidates."

Travis Fox

Everyone has heard of the devastating earthquake in Sichuan province in China. But many of us cannot travel to China to see the destruction ourselves. Travis Fox's videos show us the deadly aftermath using a few simple shots and interviews. 

These videos work because they do not only repeat known facts. Rather they provide faces for viewers. One of the most powerful images in Fox's videos are a shot of a mother wailing at the site of a destroyed building where the body of her daughter lies.  

In addition the videos are shot very simply, such as tight shots of faces and very little camera movement. This allows the viewer to focus on what Fox wants them to see and hear, rather than having them be distracted by things moving in the background. 

The Web site itself is also constructed well. The videos are listed in reverse chronological order, with almost every story having a thumbnail. And there are no ads at the beginning of video segments!

"Insight into the Candidates"

This video segment by the Des Monies Register is very interesting and very well-made. As a standalone video, it has a very interesting subject — presidential candidates being candid. 

It is not just a news broadcast story that has been posted online. Rather it is its own piece with its own merit and one that generates interest. 

The video itself is spartan. It is simply a candidate responding to questions on camera. But what makes the video work is the content. I want to see this video because I want to know what these candidates are saying in a less controlled environment (aka a lot of PC answers... but a few interesting ones as well).

The entire Web site is a little crude and very texty. But it was easy enough to navigate and find the candidates that I wanted to here from. 

Plus, there were no ads.

CONCLUSION

I often think that videos are poorly constructed and therefore aren't worth my time. But more and more I'm noticing that videos are getting better. 

They are truly enhancing stories or exploring new angles. These are Web sites with good quality videos and great content. 

Perhaps the more these videos become popular, the more people will notice them and watch them. Aka people like me. 

Short videos speak volumes on the Web

In order to take full advantage of the Web, sites should tell stories using not only words and pictures, but also video.

Videos can convey a lot to viewers in only a matter of minutes. They allow people to hear the facts of a story while experiencing and surveying the scene themselves. Moreover, large images lure the attention of Web users, according to Poynter Eyetrack research. In the same way, videos effectively tell stories, making it easier for viewers to identify with people and associate faces with names.

Tips on making video for the Web:

· Keep it short. Video on the Web should not be much longer than four or five minutes. Most people on the Web are just looking to get information quickly. Youtube videos often run less than a minute.

· Simplicity is key. It does not need to have special effects and wild camera movements. For example, an Oregonian series called Living to the End features compelling videos that consist of no more than a woman speaking in front of the camera about her last few months to live.

· Use natural sound. Most videos include narration and people talking, but do not forget the importance of natural sound that helps place viewers in the story’s environment. Travis Fox’s “Portrait of Coney Island” demonstrates the effectiveness of natural sound.

Comparing Border Stories with Washington Post’s Travis Fox

· While the Border Stories site displays little more than images from each video atop a simple black background, washingtonpost.com provides useful summaries of each video so that viewers can easily find what they are looking for.

· The Border Stories images are larger than the thumbnails beside Travis Fox´s videos.

· The site exhibiting Travis Fox’s videos looks a little more professional as it implements additional components of a story such as a print version, pictures, and related stories.

· Videos on both sites employ effective storytelling techniques. They often focus on a central character to personalize the story.

The sites clearly have some differences, but this is not to say that either way is right or wrong. Each site is structured to serve its particular purpose. The Border Stories Web site should be straightforward. It focuses on one central issue, and therefore there is no need to clutter it with superfluous information. On the other hand, the Washington Post shows videos for a variety of stories, and it helps to include summaries and additional information.

Discovering the Videogenic

Videos are great – everyone loves 'em.  We're a nation of narcissists.  The American obsession with homemade videos, especially when there's a new child in the family, testifies to our desire to watch ourselves.  On the other hand, we also love watching other people – especially if they're doing weird, stupid or otherwise amusing things.  

Entertainment aside, video technology is probably most useful when it comes to news stories – especially online news stories, where longer videos can supplement written stories and photographs.  Let's look at the pro's of adding video to online news stories:

• Dimension: Video can add a longer visual element to the story.
• Options: Video gives lazy or illiterate news consumers the ability to just hit play.
• Familiarity: Video makes the story feel more real.

And the best part is that there are no con's to video.  I'll take a look at two online news video sites and compare their rather different implementations of this fascinating tool.  

Travis Fox on the Washington Post:

"In Vietnam, Old Foes Take Aim at War's Toxic Legacy" really lends itself well to video.  It's a story about families whose children are severely deformed or mentally impaired because they live in a Vietnamese town exposed to Agent Orange, an herbicide containing the extremely toxic pollutant dioxin, which the U.S. sprayed all over the area during the '60s. 

The story is sad, and it provides lots of information about U.S. officials finally starting to admit fault and make plans to clean up the area.  

But the video is what made the story truly horrifying.  Reading that someone has a "stumplike figure," is affecting, but actually seeing their miserable state is deeply moving.  Two videos accompany the story, both of which give the news consumer a close look at families' difficulties caring for their children, many of whom have been rejected by society because of their appearances.  The videos are well-organized, informative and look very professional without resorting to flashy images or dramatic music.

The second video ends with one mother saying, "We don't hate or even dislike the Americans. But they should do something," she says.  

Videos like this make people want to do something.

Border Stories: Fence Jumpers

"Fence Jumpers" doesn't lend itself so well to video.  It's an interesting story regarding the controversy about the fence erected around the San Diego border to stop illegal immigration from Mexico.  A second layer to the fence is almost completed, and the addition of a third layer is being debated.  The written story is very short – it doesn't even have a byline, because its focus is on the video.  It just briefly describes the fact that more than 200 people trying to climb over the fence between 2000 and 2006 have landed in Dr. Raul Coimbra's emergency room at the UCSD Trauma Center.  

The video mostly includes B-Roll of emergency signs, the trauma center, its equipment and the controversial wall.  Most of the B-Roll seems rather irrelevant, and the transitions are jarring.  An interview with Dr. Coimbra makes up its whole narration, where he complains about the amount of money being spent in the care of these illegal immigrants (about $18,000 per patient).  The interview is conducted under a dull, sickly yellow light; also, he is not very interesting and does not add anything to the written portion of the story besides a face.  In the end, he concludes that no further layers should be added to the fence, or else the problem will worsen.  He, too, is calling for action – 

Although this video, too, is a call for action, it more likely makes people want to go back on Youtube.  

Make It Personal

Interactivity is a big factor in online journalism. Videos can tell stories much better than print because moving pictures and sound have a quality that can't be recreated when reading words. Despite this quality, it's easy to forget that you still need to make the video story personal.

When a story is personal, I can remember it so much more. People's emotions are more visible on screen than in words. Videos don't have to be professionally produced - some don't look like they were - but when something is personal and touches a viewer, they won't care it wasn't professionally produced.

Washingtonpost.com: Travis Fox
Travis Fox's story on Johnny's White, a bar that's open 24/7, follows one patron who calls the bar his home. He has friends at every Johnny's White bar, and I'm sure the fact the one on Bourbon Street is open 24 hours helps him spend long hours with his friends. When he says the bar has become home, you can see his sincerity in his eyes and at the way he looks down at the counter.

This story is successful because:

• you can see all the different patrons who have been brought together by this bar
• these people's nonchalance towards Hurricane Gustav could not have been conveyed in any other way
• people talking and laughing is much more powerful than reading, "he laughed," "they talked"

Yet, this story isn't as compelling as the Tijuana: Staying Negative story because there isn't a variety of shots. Fox did what he could with the limited video, and I think he did a good job. However, looking at the same video and listening to the same person got a little boring after a while.

Border Stories: Tijuana: Staying Negative
This story focuses on how AIDS/HIV don't have a border. It's rampant in Mexico and the U.S. A group of people decided to create a mobile clinic that would help prevent the spread of HIV/AIDS. They have done this by passing out condoms and giving out clean needles.

This story is more interesting to watch because:

• There are a variety of shots. You see shots of them passing out condoms, shots of people in the flood gates shooting up, how poverty has affected the places near the border, etc.
  
• The narrative/dialogue is more compelling. When the doctor talks about how they can get people to forget they are HIV positive by promoting a happy environment at the clinic through soccer and fun activities, it's extra touching because you saw video of people playing soccer and laughing when she said this.
• You can see how heroin has affected these people. There's a close-up of one man who I'm assuming is high, and you can see it in his eyes and demeanor that heroin has taken its toll on him.
  

Both the Gustav and Tijuana story were told well because they focused on people. Both could have functioned well as a story that wasn't personal. They could have just advertised the bar or how HIV/AIDS is in Mexico and the U.S. However, they didn't. The producers found one person, even several, to help tell the story. Such a quality makes a story more memorable because I will remember a person's face more than a bunch of words.

Video meets the Downtown Art Walk

Using video in online stories

So by now we've all gotten used to the concept of using video to tell a story, but how does that concept change when you put video online? Simple answer; it doesn't.

Using video online does not have to be a frightening concept as evidenced by the myriad of online stories that have a video component to them. Take the Los Angeles Times for instance. This newspaper puts out stories each day in its print edition that were written with absolutely no video in mind. When loaded to the internet, however, the original print story is changed and transformed to encompass some sort of video that keeps the web site's visitors clicking and staying on the web page. A prime example is seen with today's print edition of the Los Angeles Times with the story "Tenative bailout deal is reached." This story was run in the paper and posted in the online edition with the addition of video, charts, and links sending browsers to other places on the Times' web page and keeping them clicking.

Video and the Downtown Art Walk

The video that I will be including in my blog posts about the Downtown Art Walk will run as a news brief in addition to the text that describes and details the Art Walk as an event. The video will serve as a visual component to the editorial description as it does with most online news pieces. This particular addition will have the basics of a regular news packge: plenty of B-Roll with voice over to tell the audience details of what the story is about.

Since the Art Walk is a visual story the video will include pictures of not only the event itself but some of the pieces featured in the galleries themselves. This will give the online news consumers a better picture of what the event is about, literally.

Making or Breaking it with Online Video

It's easy to get caught up with all the outlets that online journalism has to offer, which unfortunately, leaves more room for error and disorganization. To make it with online video, it's important to remember the following:

1. Keep it short and sweet: Online news consumers are scanners, they won't read the full story, they're not going to watch the entire video.
2. Make the video relevant: nothing is more irritating than clicking on a video that you have to search for the connection to the news story.
3. Keep it simple: Online video should be direct, you only keep your browser's attention span for so long, make the most of the time with simple, easy to follow video

Although following these simple rules may seem like common sense, some news sites, still manage to lose track of these warnings. If the video is so good it's a must use, try taking the USA Today approach, and have it stand alone. Who has time to read copy and watch video anyway?

Metrolink engineer may have been texting

The engineer of the Metrolink passenger train that collided Friday with a Union Pacific freight train in Chatsworth may have been text messaging prior to the crash, authorities said.

The National Transportation and Safety Board said it has subpoenaed cell phone records to examine if the engineer, who was killed in the crash, was texting. Officials said he might have been texting teenage rail enthusiasts.


The engineer

Robert M. Sanchez, 46, had a passion for trains and Italian greyhounds.

In the years before his death, Sanchez led a nomadic life, with public records showing addresses in Oregon, Colorado, Nevada, Arizona, Nebraska and California.

One of the worst train crashes in history

The collision Friday killed at least 17 people and leaving more than 135 injured. It was one of the worst train crashes in Southern California history and Metrolink officials said they could not explain why warning systems failed to prevent such a catastrophic collision.

"I saw it coming," said Eric Forbes, 56, an administrator at Cal State Northridge who was riding in the second or third car of the Metrolink train when he glanced out the window to see the freight train bearing down. He spoke later at a nearby triage center, his raspy voice swelling with emotion as he was wheeled on a stretcher to an ambulance.

"There was no time to stop," he said. "The next thing I knew I was in a seat in front of me. It was horrible."

Officials and Eyewitnesses

Metrolink spokeswoman Denise Tyrell said officials did not yet know how the accident occurred. "Obviously two trains are not supposed to be at the same place at the same time."

Joelle Ouellet, 38, said she was a few hundred feet away, turning around her horse on a nearby ranch, when the trains collided. "I heard a huge crash," she said. "Then I saw a fireball. I ran over there and there were people lying all over the hill."

"Victims are on top of victims," Los Angeles Fire Chief Douglas Barry said after surveying the scene. "Metal and debris is all tangled together. It's a difficult situation."

Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa said he was heartbroken by what he called "the devastation, the carnage," adding, "I haven't seen anything like it."

Previous Crashes

Metrolink trains have been involved in several serious wrecks in recent years, the worst of them a crash with an SUV near Glendale that killed 11 people in 2005.

Friday's crash more closely resembled one in Placentia in 2002, in which three people died and more than 260 were injured when a Burlington Northern & Santa Fe freight train plowed into a double-decker Metrolink passenger train.

Federal investigators blamed that crash on an inattentive Burlington Northern crew that missed a warning signal as well as on the lack of an automatic braking system on the freight train.

The worst train wreck in Los Angeles history occurred on Jan. 22, 1956, when a Santa Fe train en route from Los Angeles to San Diego lurched off a curve near the Los Angeles River, killing 30 people and injuring 130.


Further links:
Fatality List
News footage of crash

Keep 'em Coming

It seems to me that no matter in what medium photographs are portrayed they have the power to move us. That said, however, the internet allows for the rummaging-through of thousands of photographs while sitting in one place and without the piles and piles of tree detritus upon which printed photographs make their mark. I took a look at two very different photography websites: World Press Photo and MSNBC's "The Week in Pictures" feature.

World Press Photo
Here's the skinny on the WPP website: the photographs are beautifully displayed and each comes with a little caption giving background info such as the photographer, the location of the photographs, and the circumstances under which that photograph was taken. However - those little captions? They intrude upon the actual photograph and in a couple of instances actually hide a very important part of the photo!

Another complaint I had with the WPP photo-site was that there is a too-long-for-my-internet-age-instant-gratification-please wordy introduction before you even get to the whole shindig. No thanks... just give me the pictures, please.


Also, the intro-page has every picture hidden behind the year in which it was the Photograph of the Year, and so one has to guestimate the time period in which the photograph one is looking for was taken and scroll over every year until their photo materializes. Again, my patience wears thin.



However, one cannot deny the compelling and powerful photographs presented on this particular website and one must admit that the presentation thereof is really wonderful, albeit a bit time consuming. The photos really evoke a photo gallery.





MSNBC Photos of the Week

First off, I agree with so many of you who have said that the lack of thumbnails in the slideshow menu at the bottom is disappointing. It goes back to the problem with the WPP hide-and-go-seek approach to finding the photo you want to go back to - you have to do some guestimating. And no one likes that.

However, there is something to be said for the element of surprise right? Nah, didn't think so.

The photographs they chose were nice and they had a good selection of photographs pertaining to current events. But, come on? A photograph of a horse fight? When the world as we know it is collapsing around us in nearly every sector? And where was the picture showing Wall Street on its knees? Sorry, folks - the horse fight was just so much more interesting.

Sweet Stuff

It always, always, always comes down to the details. Even for the case of a great cupcake, ingredients, appearance, and other small factors determine if it is a worthy piece of scrumptious delight. In the case of photojournalism on online news sites, the details and layout matter too.

Both Yahoo! News and MSNBC News have a "This Week in Photos" segment. Both have a pop-up screen displaying images of significant events that have occurred in the past week. Both have captions/blurbs on the side of the screen. Both screens, at first glance, even appear the same. But what differentiates them from one another? What makes one more appealing for viewers?

"The Menu"

Perusing the menu is the process of deciding whether or not one would want to try a particular store's cupcakes. A menu that simply lists its cupcakes through words will struggle in luring hungry crowds than a menu that gives glimpses of its diversely delicious dishes.

The very BEST part of Yahoo's photo slide show is the small scroll of minimized photos at the bottom of the page (see fig 1). It allows viewers to pick and choose what they want to click on and see instead of blindly clicking image after image.

Example: If someone wanted to show a friend a picture they saw earlier in the day, that person would need to click through each picture to eventually find the desired photo if using MSNBC's (see fig 2). But if they used Yahoo! News' slideshow, the small icons would allow the search to be much faster.

No time would be wasted on looking at more photos of the Iraq War when all you wanted was the cute fluffy white polar bear.

FIGURE 1 - Yahoo!


FIGURE 2 -msnbc

"All About Presentation"

True or False. A chocolate-colored cupcake looks tastier than a blue-colored cupcake.

Cynthia says true.

Yahoo! News has a dark grey and black background that accentuates the colors in the photo. Everything (the sky, faces, mother nature, etc) is highlighted when the background is darker. Take a look for yourself (see fig 3).If the background was a dark grey or black for this msnbc picture, the ranging shades of purple and orange would be enhanced a lot more. An aspect as simple as the backdrop could change the experience for a viewer.


FIGURE 3 - msnbc

"The Cherry on Top"

There are a lot of additional applications that I felt were pretty neat. MSNBC gives the option of an automated slide show for the click lazy (see fig 4). Missed last week's photos? MSNBC also has a direct link that takes viewers to archived photos. (Yahoo! provides old photos too, but not directly.)


Figure 4 - msnbc

Overall, both websites have pros and cons, but I think Yahoo! takes the cake (no pun intended, really).

The Week/Month in Photos

REUTERS/David Mdzinarishvili

Echoes of the Great Depression AP/Seth Wenig

In the past few years, popular news sites like Yahoo news gained much popularity with their photo slideshows "The Week in Pictures". In a similar vain to this, Reuters.com has a similar application on their website, only it is a “Pictures of the Month” option. Both sites have several images that highlight the week and month’s most important headlines, and both have the advantage of allowing the viewer to cycle through the photos. Yahoo posted 12 photos this week, while Reuters.com posted 52 photos this past month. Reuters is loaded with photos of the Olympic Games in Beijing, and has several photos of isolations of people and their faces, making them very powerful. Yahoo’s website tends to focus less on people and more so on settings, so I give the edge to Reuters there.

YAHOO

First off, it’s impressive to note that the home page of yahoo has their weeks in photos dating back to May of 2006. One of my favorite photos is one of stockbrokers on Wall Street stressing out about dropping stocks. In this particular photo, it is centered around a particularly distraught man in the middle.

As I mentioned before, the biggest flaw in many of these pictures is a lack of human contact. While their photo was a long shot of the train wreck, MSNBC had a much more powerful photo of a woman getting pulled form the wreckage.

REUTERS

The photos for the month of August were predominately ones from the Beijing Olympics, but there are a handful of powerful photos that show just how brilliant some of their photographers are. The most powerful one that I found is below of an injured woman in Georgia from the Russian attacks. The following is a list of pros that make it better then the yahoo website.

• The slideshow is operational by simply clicking on the photo itself, where the yahoo website is only operational through the timeline down below.
• These photos are focusing primarily on close ups of human bodies and faces
• They have a stop motion picture that is very creative and interesting.

Picture of Perfection: Photos on the Web

Photographs. Everyone wants to be in them. Everyone wants to look at them. Everyone wants to see a story come to life through the use of a still photo. No one wants to squint at them. No one wants weird color contrasts.




And that's where the Internet comes in. While the Internet has many advantages over print, the one area where it truly excels is in photos. Online news sites don't need a picture to tell a thousand words, because they actually do have the space to write one thousand words. Regardless of that, the Internet has taught print and broadcast news a lesson, showing just how powerful a still image can be.



A Snapshot of Success


The Internet utilizes photos in ways drastically better and more dramatic than print or broadcast could ever hope. Here's a snapshot of how they do it:

• Space-photos can be small, medium, large, or gigantic. They can take up the whole screen if necessary
  
• More options-because the Internet provides an unlimited news hole, publications can put as many pictures up as they want, allowing for a more visual and compelling story
  
• Slide shows-sometimes stories are better told without words. Slide shows allow all angles of a story to be told in an organized and often dramatic format

Not All Pictures are Created Equal

Ok, so pictures are cool to look at. Anyone can slap a photo online and call it online photojournalism. The true marker of a news site, however, is their ability to use photos to complete and complement a story or to even tell a story itself. Lets take a look at two sites who show us how it should be done...

MSNBC-A Week in Pictures

This site does an amazing job with its pictures. It utilizes a slide show to show a weeks worth of events in pictures. The pictures are clear and crisp; they can be dramatic or inspiring; some even offer audio to tell more of the story.

Smiley N. Pool / Houston Chronicle

This is the first photo in the "Week in Photos" slide show. It is both stunning and heartbreaking, and also in excellent quality. Though the image seems to tell the story of Hurricane Ike pretty well on its own, MSNBC also offers audio to discuss the hurricane and the story. A great addition and very helpful for viewers.

AP/Ryan Ling

Another great thing about MSNBC is that it does not shy away from images that may be difficult to view. This photo of the Metrolink crash in Chatsworth is not a comforting or pretty image. Instead, it shows exactly what the scene of the accident must have been like. Confusion, pain, and immense tragedy.

AP/Janet Jensen

While MSNBC does not shy away from painful photos, it also does an excellent job of showing that not everything in the world is painful and sad. Some people get shot out of cannons! MSNBC could have shown another image of devastation or tragedy, but instead they chose this great image.

Yahoo! News-The Week in Photos

Like MSNBC, Yahoo!News also uses a slide show of images to show what happened in the world during the past week. One feature that Yahoo!News uses is thumbnails of the images coming up, so if a viewer is in a hurry they can skip ahead to ones that seem particularly interesting.

AP/Jack Dempsey

This image is great because it tells a story without even showing the person the photo and the story is about. The use of the lipstick as almost a symbol of Sarah Palin is quite interesting. The image is both compelling and entertaining, with an excellent background and framing.

AP/Eric Gay

I thought using this photo as an entryway to talking about Hurricane Ike was a great idea. Everyone has already seen pictures of the devastation the Hurricane left in its wake, but I doubt many have seen it like this. An excellent choice on the part of Yahoo!News

In Conclusion

Photos are a great a way to tell a story. They provide information and drama and incite emotions that print simply can't. Pictures should be bright, big, and carry a big impact. The use of photos online is one of the best ways that the Internet proves itself to be a better news source than print or broadcast, and the proof is in the pictures!