Audio can make the audio slideshow
Posted on January 24, 2007
The Chicago Tribune’s “The art of listening” is a perfect example of why audio slideshows work.
Creative. Beautiful. Well done.
Design makes a difference
Posted on January 23, 2007
I found this project, Feeding Africa, by the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. I’m not sure when it was published (we really need to put publish dates on these things!)
What a clean, visually stimulating design. It really makes this project work for me.
And it probably helps make the section “stickier” for readers. Interesting to look at, they’ll keep digging to see more content.
This kind of project may take longer to produce, but I think the pay off in better journalism — and page views — is worth it.
One disappointment I found here is that the graphics are still quite basic. But I won’t be too critical of that because I know why this happens — it’s so darn hard to coordinate with print.
I don’t know the dynamics and relationships at this paper, but if it’s the same as in many, the Web had to wait for the print designers to generate the graphics first for print. And THEN they were altered for multimedia. What you get is a print graphic that’s “jazzed up” to look interactive.
Given those kind of restraints, I think what they did to the graphics is a nice solution.
And it’s this very type of design that inspires me to keep pushing myself in my own work.
Do readers want to talk about multimedia?
Posted on January 23, 2007
Washingtonpost.com started a blog about multimedia and invited readers to engage in a dialogue with the editors/reporters/producers at WP about their story decisions, experiences and philosophies about journalism.
Great idea — if, of course the reader cares about “developing the medium of Web-based visual journalism.”
As a multimedia editor, I really wish they did. But I honestly, I don’t think so. Readers will be wowed by well-designed presentations and solid reporting and multimedia editing. But I seriously doubt that they ponder the future of visual journalism.
Come on, we’re interested in this because it’s our passion. It’s what we do for a living. Readers outside the profession of journalism look at our sites to consume information. Facts, figures and stories. And they’ll react to a topic. They’ll talk about issues (readers LOVE forums). But I just don’t think they’ll stop and engage in such an esoteric discussion.
Maybe I’ll be proven wrong. But just browsing the comments on this blog so far, I think I might be on the mark.
Flip-book style
Posted on January 22, 2007
This has been out for awhile, but I guess I just crawled out from under the holiday rock I’ve been hiding and found it. Wow. What an innovative way to display a story.
MediaStorm, a multimedia company headed by Brian Storm — formerly of Corbis and MSNBC.com — auctioned off this piece to the highest bidder (which turned out to be MSNBC.com). They’ve created videos for National Geographic, LATimes.com, Slate and more.
Here’s a more detailed explainer about the project.
Interesting quote: “(Ed) Kashi, along with his friend and collaborator Brian Storm, realize that the flip book technique is part of the project’s appeal, but they hope people see it for more than just a novel way of showing images.”
It’s hard to get past the effect. But perhaps because of the effect, viewers will watch it more than once, and then Kashi and Storm’s intentions may be realized.
More on audio slideshows
Posted on January 22, 2007
So I was thinking more today about the pros and cons of using audio slideshows. Going back and looking at the projects I’ve done this year, yeah, I admit that some could have been better displayed as video rather than still photos.
This project about a cheerleader suffering from a malformed back did quite well as an audio slideshow, but it could have been a compelling video piece, too.
However, this project, an account by H-T Director of Photography Mike Lang’s trip to swim with the manatees couldn’t nearly be as effective as moving pictures.
These sets of slideshows from the Rocky Mountain News piece “Final Salute” are so moving that they really are best displayed with the still photo. And it’s a perfect example of why audio slideshows work.
I’m going to keep this in mind moving forward. It’s time to experiment more with video. I’m not sure what the next break-through step is going to be in interactive journalism, but video is definitely going to be a key player.
After all, we can’t go anywhere without seeing video of some sort any more, can we? From the car to the dentist’s office, it is such an integral part of our lives.
But do away with Soundslides awards
Posted on January 21, 2007
I helped judge the ONA awards this year and was surprised to see so many Soundslides submissions (and I’m using Joe Weiss’ “brand name” product on purpose here).
Now here is where I may seem to contradict myself: Audio slideshows done well are a great asset to a newspaper’s site, but a Soundslides audio slideshow which is preformatted isn’t award-worthy content.*
It’s too easy to produce. It’s simply not innovative enough. To me, it’s the equivalent to giving a Pulitzer to a brief. It might be well written, informative, maybe even heart-tugging depending on what that brief is about. But award winning? Hardly.
* (Note: Taking several slideshows and adding them to a bigger project is something else entirely.)
Long live the audio slideshow
Posted on January 21, 2007
I’m a little late to the conversation, but Michael Bazeley posted on his blog that he’s bored with Soundslides (aka, audio slideshows).
I see where he’s coming from, especially when it’s so easy to produce audio slideshows — and a bunch of them — which can lead to sloppy work and, well, boring projects.
It’s a pattern that’s I’ve seen happen a lot over the years: For example, quizzes are fun so you do one for a project. Next thing you know, all of the reporters are requesting a quiz, even if it wouldn’t do anything to compliment or advance the print story.
But I don’t agree that audio slideshows are the poor man’s video and should, therefore, be scrapped entirely.
Video, indeed, has a growing role in online storytelling. But audio slideshows have the potential to make a powerful statement when used correctly.
Trying to set a scene and sit on a single image for a while? Why not take advantage of this fabulous asset you have at your paper — the photography department — and use an audio slideshow.
Here’s an example: A review of fashion at the Golden Globes. The stars move by on the carpet so quickly that one photograph paused for a bit so the reader can get a full look as a voice-over comments on the dress works so much better than video could. There are plenty of stories like this that could warrant the use of a slideshow rather than video.
Plus, look close, and you’ll see TV use still photos quite often when they’re looking to make a dramatic effect (most recently, I recall seeing this during President Ford’s funeral). They’ve made that choice because the photographs tell a different story.
In the end, it comes down to determining which medium will tell the story best, and which way is easiest for your audience to consume the news.
Oh, and the whole Ken Burns-style effect added to slideshows is downright cheesy if overdone. Sparingly, it’s OK, but I always cringe when someone suggests we move the photo for better effect. If you need to move the photos around, then just use video.
‘The Last Word’
Posted on January 21, 2007
Many are touting “The Last Word” as innovative and break-through journalism.
But Art Buchwald’s video obituary posted on nytimes.com this week has haunted me since seeing him introduce himself by saying, “Hi, I’m Art Buchwald, and I just died.”
That creeps me out.
And I don’t see how this project is so ground-breaking.
Don’t get me wrong, I admire the sentiment of a video tribute, and it’s helpful to be able to see and hear the person who just died rather than reading about it. Filming video for solely that purpose hasn’t been done before as far as I know.
But in addition to the ick factor, I’m not too impressed with the actual video: It’s too long and even though it’s broken up into pieces, the style isn’t condusive to Web surfing. That same video could easily be a news segment on a news show like CBS Morning News. And TV is where I would go to watch something like that, not on my laptop or a new iphone-like device.
Plus, the concept behind it is old: Newspapers already have obits ready to roll on prominent figures because you certainly can’t predict death. And it makes getting copy in by deadline — or filed to the Web — a whole lot easier if the background work has already been done.
“The Last Word” is just taking that concept and turning the print into video. Where’s the innovation here?
NYT says they’ve got 10 of these videos already done for when the next celebrity they’ve interviewed has died. I just hope they don’t follow the same format.
How do we get to the x degree?
Posted on January 20, 2007
For several years now, Web editors have identified the need for and the power of multimedia — packaging that incorporates interactive graphics, sound, photos and video and has the potential to create a powerful form of storytelling.
“Non-linear” is what we call it. But is that really what we’re doing?
Audio slideshows, for example, are quite popular on newspaper Web sites — thanks to Joe Weiss, who brought us Soundslides, and Mindy McAdams, who literally wrote the book on multimedia journalism. With Joe’s easy-to-use software we don’t need to even load Flash on our computers to produce a nice looking slideshow.
But is this non-linear?
Nope.
We’re still telling a story in a traditional style, it just happens to be displayed in photos and audio rather than text.
Same goes for video. And interactive graphics.
We need to reach the “x degree” where we tear apart the linear format we’re so used to following. Newspapers are in their infancy in exploring the true potential of the Web and how multimedia can change the way we publish and consume news. A truly non-linear format is just that — not linear. A choose-your-own adventure path of news consumption, let’s say.
A non-linear story uses the most appropriate tools at the most appropriate time. So perhaps instead of reading a story and seeing attachments, the reader starts with a video, reads some fact boxes, takes a closer look at photos, and downloads and audio piece to take with him or her to listen to on the go. And maybe none of these pieces are complete stories in of themselves. They’re pieces that make up a whole. News consumption becomes a multi-tasking process, as in The Washington Post’s Being a Black Man.
These thoughts are nothing new, I know. They’re dreams cited often by many Web journalists predicting the “paper of the future.” Of course, these ideas are impractical to implement on a site-wide level at this point — most paper don’t get nearly enough Web resources nor support from the print side for that valuable content.
But we CAN start experimenting with this new format in small projects. And then we might actually see some non-linear storytelling and get to that “x degree” that I think will push us into a whole new dimension of journalism.
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