My only criticism is a piddly one. The home page has a sentence at the bottom of the intro text that reads, “Read the entire story by clicking on the link above.” But there are many links above and no “one” link that does the job. So an improved approach might be to use text something like, “Use the links above to begin exploring this story.”

Also, what do you think about making the home page itself clickable and have it take you into the Video section as a default (or whatever section you think is most popular or the best place to begin).

I read the story in the Merc when it came out and I liked it there very much. Then I forgot to go and look for it online. Doh!!!

This is my first time on MultimediaShooter too. What a resource! So much fantastic content. How’s a guy supposed to get any work done?

Thanks.

Craig

Here’s my critique:

Interface/Design: Don’t forget to set the title in your html:) I would make the title “Red Hot Rails” clickable to take you back to the main splash. Transitions from one section to the next always go from section 1 to the section you clicked on.

Audio:Watch PoPPing your Ps. Hold the mic below the mouth of your subject not in front.

Great job, love your artistic nature.

I envy the size your video runs and how well it survives being compressed. Video needs to be geared only toward broadband users. Not the 2 guys that still have dial up. Great quality as have others been on your papers web site.

Again it looks super and gets me to rethink the more literal approaches I take.

Where’s the web statistics?
Do y’all just go by y’alls server stats?

I believe Analytics is free:
http://www.google.com/analytics

Used to cost about $200 dollars a month as
urchin before Google bought it and made it free.

It’s real cool stuff.
You can track flash buttons as separate webpages so you know how long people looked at each part of your flash site.

And it helps your Google ranking.

What note was included in your paper for this project?

Highly inspirational!

The presentation is simple, clean, and effective. In my estimation, I don’t think the average viewer would have any difficulty with the treatment of text integrated with the video. Seems to serve as an appropriate underscore, if you will. One consideration, and this might be nitpicking, but if the rails truly are “red hot”, give the viewer one little added extra aesthetical reason to engage the show by changing the font color from white, to a red.

On a personal note, my first photographic excursions were made on my bicycle with a Pentax K1000, and a Pentax p30t from Atlas Ave. — just six blocks from the switching yards, and old turntable. So, your piece brings back some fond memories!

Nice work!

- Andrew

I do have one comment about the video, particularly the one about riding the Alameda rails. The narrators voice comes in too far into the piece, almost half way in, and is a bit jarring. When using narration in documentary, even if it is to be used very sparingly, it is very important to introduce the narrative voice early, even with only a few words. Just my two cents ;-)

I am very impressed with all you guys are doing, keep up the great work.
-Roger

I’m gonna play it around my office for a bunch of well-confined tv reporters as a reminder of what you can do when you’re thinking and feeling.

I like the ‘Hillman Curtis’ treatment mixing text with the voices; I wonder if some of it may be too much simultaneous info for the viewer, however, and detract from the overall story-telling.

First, congrats on getting the project “out the door,” I haven’t even looked it over in detail; however, I read the little “intro” on the main stage, clicked on the story link, and then clicked on the big gothic “M” in hopes of reading the full story…

But when I do this, all I get is the front page of the Merc; I can’t see anything about this rail story… is this a treasure hunt?

What am I missing?