Design a multimedia journalism workshop
I’m going to ask you to think about a workshop — but not one for beginners.
Think about the workshop you would like to attend if you are an online journalist, or an online producer, or a photojournalist who shoots video, or a data reporter. In other words, you are someone who already does online or multimedia work.
Now, two requirements:
- You have to bring one other person from your newsroom, and the two of you must work together in the workshop.
- You have to pitch an online project as the price of admission.
This would be a workshop where you come with a partner and work on a real project that both of you want to do. The workshop leaders and instructors would be people who can help you make significant progress on the project.
So what kinds of things would you want to learn, if you could attend a workshop like this?
Two things pop into my mind right away:
- In-field/during-reporting communication. How do you blend two visions together to make a cohesive whole?
- Pacing. How do you decide on a pace for the final piece and how do you keep it consistent.
Oh, okay, one more:
- Time. How do you help your editors manage the departments schedule so you can work on more projects.
-mark
November 11, 2008 at 8:58 amI’d want a heavy dose of data visualization, both theoretical (what are the best ways to present different data) and practical (building dynamic XML-driven Flash presentations).
November 11, 2008 at 9:12 amNice ones, guys! Keep ‘em coming!
November 11, 2008 at 9:34 amAlright, lets see if I can get the hopelessly impossible/obscure award on this thread:
1. How to best structure and build a custom data driven web application so it can scale across all digital media (i.e. you’ve got your web app, your mobile app, your social media integration, your syndication and your API). We aren’t just building web sites anymore.
2. How to design the UI for this cross medium application to provide the best user experience for each piece of the puzzle. The UI for the web app won’t be the same as the UI for the mobile app, etc. etc.
3. Now the hard part: How to take 1 and 2 and construct something so what we learn there scales to new applications — i.e. is there a way to build generically so that new ideas can get the best of what we’ve learned in 1 and 2 and launch faster. Obviously, the “custom” part of this makes cookie cutter solutions impossible — one template for all “custom” applications = fail. The vagaries of news makes this impossible too. But there are components that can be made generic to cut down on the amount of custom development that must be done. What are they? What do they look like? How do we build them?
November 11, 2008 at 10:45 amMaybe these suggestions should be PART of the workshop. What I mean is… quite often the biggest mistake I see is not whether a journalist can post a blog/make a video etc, but rather the journalist not knowing WHEN to make these decisions.
I think an online workshop where you have no plans as to what you’ll end up doing but, instead, will just have stories ready would work amazingly well.
Why not treat the workshop like a newsroom. Get people in, cover a local story and you, as tutor, will mentor as they go. A bit like that program Supernanny where she watches a ‘normal’ day, but gives instructions from the background.
Too often with journalism training is that we learn all the skills, but perhaps not enough about how and when to apply them.
November 11, 2008 at 10:56 amI really like Dave’s comment about the “workshop like a newsroom.”
If we take a real story and allow everyone involved the time and space to learn and the benefit of the full attention of a leader, then we provide the best hands-on education. The result is a product that is tangible, publishable, and it can be shared with the next group to be trained.
November 11, 2008 at 11:18 amI’d want to work on data, video and writing. How to make different media work together? How to package? Advanced data analysis and video production. Also, I agree with Matt, because I always agree with Matt.
November 11, 2008 at 12:04 pmNot something that I personally am looking to learn,
but may be helpful for others..
The showcase of project timeline examples.
By this I mean instructors should open up their best examples of Final Cut Pro (or other) project editing timelines.
Many could benefit from visually seeing the structure of multilayer timelines and the transitioning effects applied to them, etc.
November 11, 2008 at 1:07 pm@Matt Waite - Who the heck could we bring in to teach those things? Wow!
November 11, 2008 at 1:20 pm@Dave Lee - Actually, that’s what I’m struggling with right now. In a lot of short workshops, you or your team build a fake thing. It’s not a real story, and it’s not a story you can take home and post.
This would arguably be a lot easier to do than what I am thinking about doing.
I am trying to structure a workshop where four to six teams — with two or three people on each team, and each team being from a single newsroom — will work on and learn more about how to do a real project that they will likely complete when they go back home.
November 11, 2008 at 1:23 pmSo many good ideas! I like the idea of workshop that is like a real newsroom situation with the teams working on a real story that needs a database, a video and user interface design. And Matt is right, find a way to make it work across all digital media. Mobile is huge, newspapers really need to know how to create stories for both Web and mobile. Learning some SEO [search engine optimization] would be good too.
November 11, 2008 at 2:32 pmI totally agree with the suggestions for database and user interface design.
Most online journalists and courses have elements of finding a story, writing it, and maybe some basic SEO etc.
But it’s a lot harder to find people even willing to play around with basic HTML, or mess around within the constraints of whatever CMS system they are using to construct something of far more value than basic text and an image.
November 11, 2008 at 4:28 pmRe: “a real newsroom situation with the teams working on a real story that needs a database, a video and user interface design” — Great, great idea, but let’s look at this from a realistic angle.
If I bring 12 people from 4 to 6 newsrooms together for three days — that AIN’T gonna happen!
Plus, people want to work on something for their OWN shop, yes? Not a manufactured project for a workshop lesson plan. Yes? Or no?
November 12, 2008 at 9:49 amI didn’t mean a “manufactured project.” I mean a real project with a spreadsheet, a video and in need of a design. Not a project for a beginner and it might need to be longer than a 3 day workshop. But I’m asked to do this all the time. I’d like to know how to do more with databases without having to run to over and bother Matt. I’m lucky, I can do that, but everyone does not work with a Matt.
November 12, 2008 at 10:27 am@Desiree Perry - Ha ha! yes, don’t we ALL wish we had a Matt? I wish he came in a portable version, like an iPhone. (With better battery life, of course.) Especially for all those hard-to-answer data queries!
November 12, 2008 at 5:20 pmMindy, I am in a place where journalism is very basic, we need certainly to work harder in doing a better job.
November 19, 2008 at 2:48 pmI am thinking on a project that can be interesting. It is about a story on the fisherman that suffer the lost of their ship and men in a storm in Topolobampo, close to Mar de Cortés in Mexico.
Can we do that?
Saludos desde Los Mochis.