3340 Digital Story Telling Media Types Story Boarding February 28 08

Slide 1: Digital Storytelling & Tools University of North Texas Department of Journalism Online Journalism 3340 February 26, 2008

Slide 3: The Five ‘I’s  Interactivity  Involvement  Immediacy  Integration  In-depth

Slide 4: Interaction/Involvement Continuum The greater the interaction and involvement, the higher the learning Low High Text Online Discussion Online Lurker Interactive: Interactive Discussions -Timeline Game Static Link Quiz Reporter Graphic: - fact box Email Photo - Slideshow Interactive Text Box - map Flash Content

Slide 5: Integration  “Among-media”  Shovelware  Reproducing newspaper story as-is into newspaper  Posting video from newscast onto the web  “I think that the great fear was that we were all going to turn into three-headed monsters and do three times as much work in eight hours, and you just can’t. And, furthermore, you probably won’t do it that well; particularly in a market this size you can’t afford to have a mediocre person on TV or a mediocre news writer.”  Jim Riley, Director of Operations, of TBO.com  http://www.ojr.org/ojr/workplace/1017858030.php

Slide 6: Integration  “Within-media”  Great reporting + multimedia using digital media tools: your pen, paper, digital recorder, digital video camera  Long form narrative meets digital story telling  Fully integrated into the story assignment process  Ability for more in-depth coverage  Better interviews  Greater consciousness of photos  Selected use of video  Fairness & accuracy still reign

Slide 7: Digital Storytelling Tools  Shovelware out, Within Media In  It’s no place for lazy journalists  Dig deeper, report more, drive to find more sources, quicker  Need to be more accurate and more thorough  Search, research and verify

Slide 8: Digital Storytelling Tools  Rules of the road:  Links  Tighter, shorter copy  Fact Boxes  Section heads  Graphics  Boldface type, bulleted  Visuals presentations  Audio  Pull out quotes  Timelines

Slide 9: Digital Storytelling Tools  Drilling Down – What Really Works  Timelines  Old School: Static graphic in chronological order  New School: Dates, images, description, audio  http://www.reuters.com/news/globalcoverage/timelines  Quality Audio & Video  Slide shows  Story Boards

Slide 10: Story Boarding  It’s all about nonlinear!!! 2) Divide the story into its logical, nonlinear parts, such as: a) A lead or nut paragraph, essentially addressing why this story is important b) Profiles of the main person or people in the story c) The event or situation d) Any process or how something works e) The history of the event or situation f) Other related issues raised by the story

Slide 11: Story boarding  Change the way you think:  Avoid “First Part”, “Second Part”, etc.  Divide the contents of story into media elements  Video  Still photos  Audio  Graphics  Text

Slide 12: Story boarding  Determine which pieces of story work best with video  What a great way to see, hear, watch  Decide which still photos you want  Creates moods, punctuates your text, adds context, richness  Which audio? And will still photos work with it?  Bad audio detracts from the story, the audio and the entire package  What about graphics  Animated graphics help show how things work  Go where no cameras can go: e.g. showing how things work, like cells or space

Slide 13: Story boarding  Using maps  Google, government, satellite imaging  Showing neighborhoods, patterns of crime  Text  “Chunking stories”. Q&A. First-person. Investigative.  Complementary media, not redundant  Match each element.  Interactivity means reader involvement