In television news you quickly learn what makes a good video story and what should be information put in a script for the news anchors to read.

Video stories have become a vital part of online and newspaper multimedia reports, but not every story should be turned into a video report.  I thought I’d ask three television news videographers to help us in our quest to figure out what makes a good video story and when should it only remain a story in print.

Chuck Denton is a multiple Emmy Award-winning news videographer based near Los Angeles.   He has 23 years of experience and has been a long time freelancer for CBS, FOX, NBC, and ESPN. He’s also won awards for his video editing.

Bonnie Gonzalez works as a one-man-band for an Austin television station.  She’s been a reporter/videographer for more than five years, and admits doing it all has taught her to be creative and resourceful.

Jim Kent is another news videographer with a long resume.  Jim has 10 Emmys and has been awarded Region 10 Photographer of the Year by the National Press Photographers Association.  Jim has more than 20 years experience and has freelanced for Fox and ABC.  He owns his own company in Phoenix called ArtGecko Productions.   

What do you look for in a good video story?

Chuck:  Are there “visual” elements to help tell the story? Covering a city council or school board meeting can be a snoozer to watch unless you can use video to help illustrate the issue. Sometimes local news covers a crime and has no crime scene video from the night before. It can be a challenge. Are the interviews dynamic?  Are they compelling enough to keep folks interested in tuning in?

Bonnie:  Is there action and lots of nat sound or natural sound?  That’s the sound you hear within a story that really pulls you in and makes you feel like you’re there. For example, say I was doing a story on fishing. I’d want to pick up the sounds of splashes, the reel, a fisherman’s laughs or groans, and place a lot of emphasis on those sounds in the story. Watch a story with a lot of nat sound versus one without, and you can really tell a difference.

When do you know it’s just a good print story and not really a good video story?

Chuck:  It’s a good print story when there’s no real video to use or shoot to tell the story. Meetings come to mind!

Jim: TV is a visual medium, that’s a given.  I believe  a great still shot and a well written print story can’t be beat when the story is complicated and complex, and can’t be told in a minute and half in video.

How important is it to have good characters?

Chuck: Having good characters is always a plus, but boring interviews can be offset by compelling video and by keeping the sound bites short.

Bonnie: If you have an interesting character, viewers are going to pay attention. Journalists tend to look towards people who are energetic, emotional, etc.

Jim:  What do we all remember about our favorite stories? Is it the well written copy or is it that great opening or closing shot? Most likely it was that fantastic character that led us through the story. People relate to people, not reporters, besides we all know reporters aren’t people, right? Just kidding.

How important is it to have good sound bites and action?

Chuck: Great sound bites can portray emotion and incredible context of the situation/story you are trying to tell; a grieving family member, a witness to a crime, a victim of a scam, someone well-known who may say something outrageous or out of character. How many times have stories been made for television, because we have terrific home or surveillance video?

Bonnie: If there’s no action how interesting of a story is it going to be? I once did a story on the housing market. My video was only different shots of houses and my interviews.  Not too exciting is it? Maybe I could’ve connected with a realtor and got video of a person showing a house otherwise it was a better print story.

Jim: I never stop shooting until I know I have great sound to tell the story. It’s that important.

Here are some examples of their work:

Chuck’s stories on CBS Evening News “Going with the Grain” and “Fallen Hero’s Story Inspires.”  You can contact Chuck at chuckdenton@yahoo.com

Bonnie’s story on News8 Austin “Prehistoric Mammoths Debut in Waco” and “Junior Chefs Shine in Temple Culinary Class.”  Bonnie can be contacted at bgonzalez@news8texas.com

Jim was one of the videographers on ABC’s 20/20 report “Revenge Against A Religious Sect.”  Jim can be contacted at  artgeckojim@cox.net

Rebecca Aguilar is an Emmy Award winning freelance multimedia reporter in Dallas. She produces videos, digital slide-shows along with her reports. She can be reached at aguilar.thereporter@yahoo.com

O.K. -  so you just shot some footage with your digital video camera.

Now what?

Well, if you’re one of those kids who can’t afford a slick Mac, and you’re stuck with an ol’ PC (like me), you can still edit and produce decent videos with Windows Movie Maker. It’s a standard video editing program that comes with most Microsoft media software packages. Nothing fancy, just basic tools and enough features to allow you to create some nice-looking clips.  It’s a good program to practice on – once you know how to use one video editing program, you pretty much know ‘em all – IMHO, they all pretty much work the same way.

Now then, the only way to learn to edit video….(and sorry for sounding like a sneaker ad here)…. is to just do it.  Here’s how you can get started, in seven easy steps.

1.) First things first: Connect your camera to your PC and transfer your video footage to the computer.  Import the video files into Windows Movie Maker.

2. ) Once you have some video footage to work with, click and drag the  clips to the storyboard at the bottom of the screen. (If you have a lot of footage, it’s a good idea to write an outline ahead of time, so you know where the scenes should fall on the timeline. Oh yeah…and once you start editing, don’t forget to save your Windows Movie Maker project!)

3.) Trim and arrange your clips as necessary. To shorten a video clip, use the “split” button on the bottom right hand side of the screen. Delete the bits and pieces you don’t need.

4.) Add some audio. Mosey on over to the Movie Tasks Pane, look under Capture video, and click on Import audio or music. Drag your song of choice to the video clip where you want the soundtrack to kick in. (If you need to raise or lower the volume, right-click the music on your timeline, and then click on….can you guess?….Volume. Then adjust accordingly.)

5.) Or maybe you want to add a voice-over. To do that, you can record a sound track separately, or connect a microphone to your PC, click on the  Tools menu, and then click Narrate Timeline, and do it right there. You can record your voice to go with individual clips or do the whole movie all at once – it’s your call. But whatever you do – make sure you write a script beforehand. Seriously. Believe me, it’s worth it. If you wing it, and try to narrate your vid on the fly, it’s not going to sound good. (Believe me, I’ve tried. Don’t repeat my mistake. You will not save any time.)

6.) Add titles and credits.  To add written words to your video, just click on the clip where you want to add some text. In the Movie Tasks pane, under Edit Movie, click Make titles or credits. From there, you can choose how many lines the title will have and how it will move. You can also change the size and color of the text.

7.) Preview your movie. If you like what you see, then it’s time to produce your video. Use the Save Movie Wizard to save your project as a .wmv or .avi video file. Once your video file is ready, you can upload it to the web  for all to see. If you don’t have a place to show it off, you can always post it on a free video hosting service such as YouTube or Vimeo.

So that’s my 7-Step tutorial on Windows Movie Maker.

The main sources of information for this article came from the Windows Movie Maker product guide and tutorials on the Microsoft website, and from my own personal experience. FYI, I’ve been editing video for over five years now, and during that time I’ve used many different programs – Final Cut, Cyberlink PowerDirector, Avid, and (of course!) good ol’ Windows Movie Maker. But I must confess, Windows Movie Maker is not my first choice, and I don’t use it that often. So if I missed anything here, please let me know.  I’m especially interested in hearing from any regular users out there – if you have any tips/tricks/hacks to share, please comment below.

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Emily Sweeney is a staff reporter at The Boston Globe. You can follow her on Twitter (@emilysweeney) and find her on LinkedIn among other places.

Sree Sreenivasan is dean of student affairs at Columbia Graduate School of Journalism, a social networking whiz, and an all-around cool guy. He recently stopped by The Boston Globe to talk to reporters and editors about the joys of Twitter and how to tweet efficiently and effectively. He showed us some handy Twitter-related tools that journos can use to locate sources, find story ideas, and get more people to check out your work. Here’s a quick sampling:

1.) HootSuite – web-based service allows you to track tweets, manage several Twitter accounts at the same time, and schedule when your tweets will be posted (so you can tweet into the future)

2.) Twiangulate – Find out who the people you follow are following. Great way to discover new sources.

3.) FriendorFollow – Find out who’s following you back (and who isn’t)

4.) Twitcam – Live video streaming. Looking forward to trying this – sounds really cool.

5.) Twitpic – I use this service. Easy way to share photos and images.

6.) Search.twitter.com – Find trending topics.

7.) Monitter.com – Search tweets by location. Another site worth checking out is Trendsmap, which lets you view trending topics in any location, in real-time.

For more tools and tips, check out Sree’s Social Media Tipsheet and his Twitter Guide for Newbies & Skeptics.

…and YO – a word to the wise!  As you probably know, there are zillions of Twitter apps, tools and services floating around out there, and new ones are being created every day. Many of them require that you type in your Twitter username and password to use them. So be careful! Don’t hand over your Twitter housekeys without doing some due diligence first.  Before you type in your Twitter account information and password into any website, make sure it has a solid rep and has been reviewed by some reliable media experts (like Sree, or the good folks here on SPJ’s Digital Media Committee

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Emily “Spikey Em” Sweeney is a staff reporter at The Boston Globe. You can follow her on Twitter (@emilysweeney) and find her on LinkedIn, among other places.

R U you ready for the collision of social media and public records? Is your state ready?

University of Texas journalism professor Wanda Garner Cash had an excellent column the other day in the Texas Tribune about how Texas’ open records laws haven’t kept up with the changing technology, such as the advent of Facebook and Twitter. She noted several things legislators should do to update the laws to ensure transparency in an increasingly tangled-up social media world.

But Texas can’t be the only state facing this issue.

So here’s my challenge to you for the week: Read Prof. Cash’s column — then sit down and think about how well your state’s public records laws deal with text messages, PIN messages, DM’s on Twitter and Facebook messages and write your own piece — whether it’s a column on your news organization’s site or your personal blog or wherever you can. Make this an issue in your newsroom, in your community, in your upcoming elections.

Let’s work to help the public stay one step ahead of government officials and their use of technology, not two steps behind.

Quill isn’t just SPJ’s print magazine – it’s a multimedia resource for all journalists. To accompany his Digital Media Toolbox column in the January/February issue, videographer Jeff Achen made this brief training video on getting better video from a digital SLR camera. Enjoy.

Follow Jeff on Twitter, @jeffachen, or e-mail him at jeffachen@mac.com. And please feel free to share.

Argentine journalist, Sandra Crucianelli knew something was missing when she attended the IRE conference in Miami in 2008. She couldn’t find a book on digital media tools for journalists in Spanish.

Crucianelli has now written the book in Spanish called “Herramientas Digitales Para Periodistas.”  It’s been published by the Knight Center for Journalism in the Americas, and is available for free in a PDF that can be downloaded. Here’s the link: http://knightcenter.utexas.edu/hdpp.php

I looked over this online book and strongly feel it’s a great resource for reporters who work in Spanish language newspapers or online news sites.  It’s also handy for reporters who are learning Spanish in hopes of someday working in Mexico, Spain, and South or Central America.

The book includes chapters on accessing databases and official documents, using social networks, video conferencing, photo galleries and blogs.

Rebecca Aguilar is an Emmy Award winning freelance multimedia reporter in Dallas. She produces videos, digital slideshows along with her reports. She is currently working on an Associate’s Degree in Multimedia Development.  She can be reached at aguilar.thereporter@yahoo.com

Steve Jobs may have unveiled the highly anticipated Apple tablet yesterday, dubiously named the iPad (how many jokes did you see on Twitter and Facebook after the morning release?), but true tech/geek/news nerds know the idea is not exactly 21st century.

Let’s take a stroll down memory lane. To 1994. When Knight Ridder’s Information Design Lab — notice they avoided calling it the News Design Lab — was experimenting with digital ways to present the news. Something tells me the R&D people over at Apple examined a few of these as they brainstormed an iPrototype.

File under #dontsaynewspapersdidnttry

Tablet Newspaper (1994)

SPJ Digital Media Committee member Jessica Durkin is the founder and editor of InOtherNews.us, a directory of online, independent news start-ups. Jessica is a former daily newspaper reporter based in Scranton, PA.

Mimicking the Federal Trade Commission’s recent efforts, the Federal Communications Commission has begun soliciting input on its media rules and the news industry’s future. The FCC project, “The Future of Media and the Information Needs of Communities in a Digital Age,” will investigate the changing media landscape and news delivery technology to potentially make policy recommendations.

The FCC deserves kudos for its multipronged multimedia outreach effort, which involves a Web site, a Blog and a Twitter account. But the catch for those sharing their opinions with agency is that it doesn’t have a ton of daily authority over the media. Its primary media regulatory responsibilities involve licensing radio and TV stations and the agency’s famous rule limiting the cross-ownership of newspaper and broadcast properties in a given market.

It’s possible the FCC could use the Future of the Media report as part of its quadrennial review of America’s media ownership rules, which Congress mandated the agency perform as part of the Telecommunications Act of 1996. Input from the new FCC report also could be used as the agency decides how to handle the thorny situation surrounding its decades-old cross-ownership rule.

Two years ago, the FCC altered the outright ban on the cross-ownership of a newspaper and a TV station in the top 20 U.S. markets, and the agency put out a new waiver process for smaller markets. But the FCC never managed to implement the rule change. That’s because opponents of the rule — some want it relaxed while others want to keep it tight — have waged challenges and court battle since the Bush administration began trying to loosen it 17 years ago.

The rule change case is currently before a federal appeals court. And, now that the FCC is in Democratic hands, some accuse the majority commissioners of stalling the court from tackling the issue until media ownership rules can be rewritten to keep them tighter.

Those in favor of less restrictive media ownership rules use a similar argument to the successful case for consolidation made by Sirius and XM in 2008. (You’ll recall that merger combined two massively indebted companies to create one unfathomably leveraged satellite radio giant.)

Rule change proponents say ownership limits are unnecessary today because a multitude of media and platforms disseminate information and opinions and vie for the public’s money and attention. In the meantime, big corporations say they’re missing out on potential broadcast, online and print synergies that could save their businesses.

Those who argue against changing the rules say they don’t want Rupert Murdoch, Gannett or any other corporation controlling the bulk of the major media voices in their markets. Be sure to visit the FCC’s “Future of the Media” Web site to tell the agency what you think.

Daniel Axelrod spent five years as a full-time newspaper reporter, most recently in Scranton, Pa., before moving into public relations in April 2009. Reach him at deaxelrod@msn.com

Computer scientist Alan Kay once said, “The best way to predict the future is to invent it.” As Apple gears up to launch its much-hyped tablet as soon as next week, the best way for legacy media to succeed with it is to create rich content.

Apple’s tablet could end up setting the same standard of excellence the iPhone achieved in a crowded, confusing (but booming) cell phone marketplace. Or Apple’s tablet could fail in a fledgling tablet/e-reader market that hasn’t given consumers enough compelling reasons to buy products that are more powerful than cell phones but less advanced than computers.

Meanwhile, newspapers, radio and television stations are considering how they can profit from tablets, the next generation of which will have ever bigger, better screens, quicker processors and stronger Internet connectivity.  Yet, newspapers need to figure out how to derive revenue from tablets more than tablets need to learn how to benefit from the print media. Any news on a tablet will compete against all the devices’ nonnews content including phone services, music, games, TV shows, movies and Web sites across the Internet.

In order to profit from tablets, newspapers must provide an increasing amount of unique, high-quality content including top-notch videos, photos, graphics and troves of valuable information in databases. More than anything, newspapers must reaffirm their commitment to good hyper-local journalism, in-depth investigations/analysis and breaking news updates.

Of course, the media will need talented staff to produce all this great content, but layoffs, firings and buyouts continue daily. Arts and entertainment writing, business coverage, regional reporting and, perhaps most critically, investigative, state-house and Washington D.C. reporters generally suffer the heaviest causalities. Across all departments, newspapers announced roughly 30,000 layoffs and buyouts in 2008-09, according to the industry-tracking blog Paper Cuts.

Predictions are never harder than when it comes to technology. So, here’s a safe prediction. If newspapers don’t stop firing people and begin bolstering their content, all the whiz bam tablet technology of the future won’t save them. Once these tablets come down in price and advance (perhaps only a bit more) technologically they could become hugely popular.

But newspapers risk suffering so many self-inflicted wounds they won’t be fast or agile enough to keep up with tablet technology let alone all the other multimedia/multiplatform competition for the public’s attention. Many people already have stopped relying on legacy media to get their news fix.

“One of the problems is newspapers fired so many journalists and turned them loose to start so many blogs,” industry analyst and blogger Alan Mutter recently told the NY Times. “They should have executed them. They wouldn’t have had competition. But they foolishly let them out alive.”

Daniel Axelrod spent five years as a full-time newspaper reporter, most recently in Scranton, Pa., before moving into public relations in April 2009. Reach him at deaxelrod@msn.com

As we enter a new decade, it’s time to reflect on some of the best Web sites run by print media outlets, and what makes them good. No matter what their size, attractive, well-formatted, user-friendly and informative media Web sites share common traits. And they don’t need a bunch of videos, photo galleries, fancy animations or graphics to be good.

The best news Web sites aggregate local happenings and interesting area news from other sources. They use calendars and databases and offer effective search tools for their archives and the Web sites themselves. They provide solid “About” sections with listings of staff members and their full contact information (not just lame fill-in-the-blank contact forms).

Good Web sites let readers share stories and rank the most popular news and commonly emailed pieces. They empower users to participate in the news and information gathering processes. Most importantly, they create the proverbial “town square” where readers can provide their opinions, commentary and analysis and talk about the news of the day.

Here is a very small sample of some well-done print media Web sites. (I’ve omitted several famous media Web sites known for excellence including the BBC.com, TheWallStreetJournal.com, NYTimes.com and USAToday.com.)

The Guardian: www.guardian.co.uk
The Times of London: www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news
The NY Observer: www.observer.com
Newsday: www.newsday.com
St. Petersburg Times: www.tampabay.com
Website Magazine: www.websitemagazine.com
Charlotte Observer: www.charlotteobserver.com
Entertainment Weekly: www.ew.com
The Economist: www.economist.com
The Seattle Post Intelligencer: www.seattlepi.com

Of course this is a tiny list, and most of the Web sites on it have won big awards, so I’m the hardly the first person to spotlight them. But I was recently inspired to highlight them again after visiting nearly 200 Web sites for daily and weekly newspapers in Pennsylvania. My online PA newspaper travels were spurred by a mission to promote a journalism contest, but I was flabbergasted by what I found.

It’s 2010 yet many of the weekly papers had no Web sites. If they had Web sites, several posted little more than scanned PDFs of their printed pages (and even those were often inaccessible unless the reader paid to view them).

Sure America’s weekly papers, which some estimates peg at over 8,000, often don’t have the resources of big magazines or the more than 1,400 U.S. dailies (70 percent of which also are small with a circulation below 50,000).

But even tiny newspapers — with news monopolies, readers that primarily consume their print editions and goals of getting revenue for their limited Web offerings — shouldn’t let dog walking services outdo their online presentations. Meanwhile, there’s plenty of great work they can use as a model for their Web sites.

On an interesting side note, here is a list of the most visited Web sites produced by print media, according to Experian’s Hitwise Web tracking service. These figures are as Oct. 2009, and the number in parentheses is the Web site’s market share, or the percentage of U.S. households visiting it. Examiner.com provides localized content for 20 cities.

1. The News York Times (4.64)
2. USA Today (4.03)
3. People Magazine (2.4)
4. The Washington Post (1.78)
5. TV Guide (1.6)
6. The Wall Street Journal (1.6)
7. Sports Illustrated (1.19)
8. The Boston Globe (1.02)
9. NY Daily News (.96)
10. Examiner (.92)

Daniel Axelrod spent five years as a full-time newspaper reporter, most recently in Scranton, Pa., before moving into public relations in April 2009. Reach him at deaxelrod@msn.com