for the lake story, i think the most effective way to show readers the extent of the drought would be to pair a full lake photo with a drought lake photo taken from the same vantage point. this shows readers the extent of the problem and saves the paper time, money and bandwith.

as for the second video, almost half of it is footage of a water bottle being filled. i’m no genius, but i have to imagine that there is a lot more important shit going on in town than that water bottle being filled. maybe damon can answer this, what is either, informative, graphic or emotional about that video. once again i think one picture, maybe a well-composed, decisive-moment, hot-weather feature, which a ultra-talented photographer like chris seward can do in his sleep, would do a better job of telling the story, serving the reader and using the resources of the paper.

p.s. chris’ work on the n&o’s photo column “the view” is outstanding – here are a few links

http://www.newsobserver.com/lifestyles/family_community/view/image_media/651511.html

http://www.newsobserver.com/lifestyles/family_community/view/image_media/596639.html

chris

Three types of photography:
1) Informative
2) Graphic
3) Emotional

Emotional, of course, is the highest level, denoting an image that includes elements of the first two categories, but goes a step further.

Is there a reason newspaper video should not follow that basic guideline? Does every video we do need to be a 1:30 masterpiece? Isn’t there room for videos (like the two linked above) that, within a larger context, simply show the scene?

One of the most popular videos we had this year was 90 seconds of water rushing under a bridge during a destructive flood. It was shot on a p/s and required no editing. It barely qualified as journalism – except it gave readers a view that few of them could see in person but which affected all of their lives directly.

There are plenty of great stories out there – and we need to focus on telling them well. That being said it is patently unrealistic and unfair to argue that we as photojournalists are too good to spend our time shooting anything other than ‘the best’ video.

Video is no different than anything else in this biz: we should do great work and take our time on the stories that matter. And, in other cases we should grab a p/s and get 30 second clip of the big fire downtown so we can add some value to the 2 inch breaking news update on the site.

We as journalisits have an obligation to both our employers and mankind. Almost always, it is possible to serve both.

But it takes a lot of willpower, politics, and hard work to still serve mankind when an editor tells you to shoot videos like these. We have an obligation to do stories that matter.

Everyone has a story. Find it. Don’t roll over and play dead.

I just wanted you to think about the remark. “Please defend yourselves.”

And you did.
This is good news, not for just these photogs but for all of us out there who sometimes are not given the choice of what we shoot. I have to eat and pay my bills.

Last week I shot and edited 6 videos of high school football previews. This on top of the daily still images for the paper. These videos, although not crap, are not ones I would like to see in this context and with those words. Not after the long shifts I worked last week.

I say before you do, “Come and walk in my shoes partner.”

Richard, I don’t know you but I have seen your work and it has inspired me. Thank you for this forum. I’m very grateful.

I’m sorry if my remarks “ridcule” and “blame” were hurtful.

Randall Hill

“outside vindication soothes a troubled soul. cheers!”

It’s just as valuable to your reader and your advertiser.

I can’t disagree with you enough.

We are not in the business of creating content. We are in the business of telling stories about our communities, to our communities.

We should never forget that.

If you just think of your job as creating content your will wind up with content for content’s sake. The result is too much content. Yes, TOO MUCH CONTENT.

That is not counter-intuitive at all. Its an argument for good work

If you have a few good stories and a ton of crap who is gonna see the good stuff? and why would they want to come back?

you answered the question about “why is someone gonna come look at your crap” argument. By saying “Because if you’re the only place writing about the little league game in Devils Lake, N.D., there’s no place else to get it. So people will find it at your site.”

I don’t buy that argument. you are saying its ok to do crap if as long as you don’t have competition.

Also, there is an nice video by photog Jason Arthurs about quadriplegic rugby here. — http://www.newsobserver.com/1241/story/497771.html

Here is a link to their multimedia section. I only see three videos but there are a lot of good audio-slideshows. . — http://www.newsobserver.com/gallery/index.html

A lot of us probably take pride in being able to make nice photos out situations where the odds were against us. Video isn’t like that. If it’s not there, it’s really not there. Editors are going to have to start understanding what makes a good video and what doesn’t. It’s up to us to pass around good work to our word counterparts and show them where the bar is being set.

The public is watching photogs learn on the job and they are watching newspapers experiment with new ways of using multimedia to see what works. It looks to me like the videos in the first post were an attempt at video wild art. Judging by their web site which has a bunch of slideshows, audio-slide shows, and Flash pieces they are using a bunch of multimedia formats. They are trying to flush out what works for them, as we all are. I do understand Richards concerns. When all the experimenting and trials are done, I hope good story telling wins out. The good news for all of us is that great online journalism requires great visuals and online is making photographers even more relevant because we supply much of what people are looking at when they visit our newspaper’s sites. For me, video and multimedia has really given me a lot of freedom to do stories on my own.

Pat

I propose an equilibrium,
instead of having a little bit of good-shit
or a lotta bit if crap,
why not just have a lot of good shit?

For this to work,
it may mean having

a) Enough people working who are qualified,
are paid what they’re worth
and given enough time to pursue quality

and

b) An economic model is in place which isn’t 100% advertising.

Let’s change economics of news..

Money is made on advertising. Not on storytelling.
The sales from subscriptions usually only count towards
the printing and delivery costs of the paper/magazine.

Thus,
money is seldom made on the content.

Imagine for a moment,
making more money on content than on advertising..

Sell extended cuts of video-stories through services like iTunes Music Store.

Say you go out and do a story;
you make a 2-3 minute cut of it available for free online
and you also make a 5-6 minute extended cut
that is exclusively available through your paper’s online store
for $0.99-$1.99 per downloadable copy.

Imagine selling 10,000 copies of a high-quality extended story
for $1.99 each, grossing $19,900.
Assuming that iTunes (or whomever) and taxes take 30-50%,
you’ve effectively made a net profit on one video for almost $10,000-14,000.

Assume your paper gives you at least 50% of all net profits from the stories you sell,
you’ve made $5,000-7,000 dollars in your pocket on one video.

Us journalists are perhaps accustomed to making a set salary
which is mandated by ‘the market.’
A corporate outlet might only pay a low set salary-rate
regardless of how good the given hired journalist is.
Because we are not rewarded financially based on merit,
where is our incentive to put in that extra ten percent?
To make that story the best it can be? Not in the paycheck.

Now,
imagine a merit-based payment model
where your income is supplemented by sales of your videos downloaded.
Better produced stories will receive more downloads,
so you are perhaps more directly motivated to produce better videos.

Imagine paying people based on the merit and quality of their work
and giving them more incentive to learn and perfect their job skills.

The stories that sell, in theory, won’t be the mediocre dailies or the quickly produced pieces.
They will have to be stories of high production-value
that have historical or literary significance.

Long-term, as opposed to short-term, value.

Instead of making the newspaper product a glorified bulletin board for advertisers
(that masquerades around as a news outlet)
why not make your product the actual news?

Stories that matter,
stories that change or impact the way people think. Stories that help people.
Stories that educate people, help them to understand, or enrich their perspective.

Imagine having a week to do a story with your employer knowing full-well
that it is economically and commercially feasible to do so.
Because, afterall, if you strike gold with your story,
you may have produced in one week,
what will continue to make you and your paper money
(from perpetual sales of internet downloads)
for upwards of, say, 30+ years.

There is often too much filler in newspapers.
Much of the content is often unnecessary.
But if you have, a 50/50 news content-to-advertising ratio,
and you have 100 pages of ads,
then you are required to produce 100 pages of news content
probably without enough journalists on staff who even have enough time to do so.
The more assignments you have to do a day, with the less time per assignment,
the more mediocre your work is going to be.

How can anybody be expected
to produce something of significance when they are living
in a constant state of work-related stress and financial insecurity?

No wonder morale is low,
no wonder the soul of journalism has been sucked dry and lifeless
by the economics of the news industry.

Here’s another crazy idea.
Why limit ourselves to just journalism?
Why can’t our news sites deliver different kinds of media than just news?

Imagine,
having a one-stop shop for news, documentary, art, music, and entertainment?
Imagine being able to experiment, produce, and sell all kinds of narratives
through your paper’s site?

There’s more to life and communication than just journalism..
what about editorial or creative non-fiction?
Isn’t there value in that too?

Journalism doesn’t always do the trick,
sometimes you need a little bit of poetry or artistic expression in the mix
to really communicate what it is that needs to be communicated.

As long as you present your journalism as journalism,
your fiction as fiction, and your biased-propaganda as ‘editorial’
then you are probably being ethical.

The problem arises when you present your editorial as journalism,
or your fiction as non-fiction, et cetera.

There is a financial incentive for news publications to allow for this.
Your creative non-fiction or editorial video-compositions
might end up selling more downloads online than your journalism.

You can’t fit a talented journalist into a box of mediocrity
and many of the good ones are forced to go into Public Relations
just to get paid more close to what they’re worth.

If the current market trends continue in journalism at their current pace,
there will no longer be such a thing as journalism as we know it in ten more years.
It will all become public relations, and quite frankly, it almost already is.

To rescue journalism we must change the economics of journalism.

Albert Einstein said that the way of the world
is the product of how we think,
and to change the world,
we must change the way we think.

The economics of journalism are a product
of how business and marketing-people think;
to change the economics of journalism,
we must change the way business and marketing-people think about journalism.

-p.money

There’s two things here that you’re talking about, though. First let’s get “white noise” out of the way.

We’re in the business of creating content. There’s myriad ways to find content online, and you’re probably familiar with all of them or else you and I wouldn’t be at this site.

You’d never be able to comprehend the Internet today if it weren’t for search technology.

The long tail works because filters work. If your Web site isn’t doing a good job at giving users tools to filter the news or break it down into specific pieces of content (most newspaper sites and almost all TV sites are horrible at this), then that’s why it’s “white noise.”

You can never have too much content. And arguing against it seems counter-intuitive to those who wish to keep their jobs in the newsroom.

This is the perfect argument for creating more jobs.

Now for the “why is someone gonna come look at your crap” argument. Because if you’re the only place writing about the little league game in Devils Lake, N.D., there’s no place else to get it. So people will find it at your site.

The real question is why do newspapers continue to put national news (usually AP) on their sites when THAT can be found anywhere on the Web.

If we just start posting everything then the good stuff gets lost. It all becomes white noise.

I don’t think that long tail economics means that you’re going to lose your “voice.” Trust me, I’d rather see what I think is good video than what I think is bad video. And I’m sure there’s a very large audience out there for good video.

I guess what I’m saying is that these short clips, taken out of context don’t make for good storytelling. But in the context of the written text, other photos, etc., they make sense and compliment the story in a way that doesn’t take too much of a photographer’s time away from producing content for other stories.

I am coming at it from an eyeballs and ads standpoint, because that’s my job in this business. But the fact remains that we’re not just creating for one medium, we’re creating for multiple media.

We have to maximize our efforts. And sometimes that means producing crap video when it’s pulled out of the context of the package. Talk to your Web developers and tell them to make sure that clips like this aren’t found on the site out of their original context.