INTRODUCTION TO MULTIMEDIA REPORTING
Prerequisite: Multimedia skills class

INSTRUCTOR - Jane Ellen Stevens, multimedia journalist

OVERVIEW

We're still in the nascent stages of the evolution of a new communications medium, the World Wide Web. For journalists, the Web opens another powerful way to tell stories by combining text, video, still photos, graphics and interactivity. The purpose of this class is to teach the basics of becoming a reporter in this new medium called multimedia.

Students learn how to use storyboarding techniques to put together stories. This includes identifying the parts of a story that work best in video, in text, in audio, in still photos, and in graphics. Students learn how to use a digital video camera, grab still photos, do video and audio editing, and post the story to a Web site of their own design. The course will address the growing variety of methods used to make storytelling interactive with the community of people who experience the story.

Since the medium is still in its infancy, no paradigms exist in multimedia reporting. However, some characteristics can be defined. The course will examine stories on the Web to identify what works and what doesn't. Participants learn how to identify the types of stories that are told best in multimedia, and those that are best told in other media.

The evolution of multimedia is compared with the last emergence of a major communications medium, television, and the parallels that occurred in its transition from radio. The course also examines another important characteristic of multimedia reporting Ð how it demands the incorporation of context in a way that print and television do not.

Guest lecturers appear throughout the course to explore other issues that relate to this medium, including technical developments and questions of the integration of advertising and information.

Students produce two projects. The first, a short profile of a classmate, familiarizes them with the thinking, equipment, software and processes required to put together a multimedia story. The second project is a feature story that lends itself to using all the characteristics of multimedia. Students do a storyboard, do research and interviews, shoot video, grab photos, select and edit video clips, write text, do some basic graphics, design a Web site and put the whole thing on the schoolÕs server.

CLASS SCHEDULE

WEEK ONE
INTRODUCTION TO MULTIMEDIA REPORTING
Course goals and schedule, personal introductions. Review of examples of what is multimedia and what is not. Students find multimedia stories on the Web, show the sites to the class and explain why they chose them.

WEEK TWO
STORYBOARDING
Students determine how to divide a text story into video, stills, graphics, text, make it interactive, and give it context. They study video on TV news and on multimedia stories, and develop observations on how video is used differently in the two media.

WEEK THREE
MULTIMEDIA REPORTING - VIDEO
Students learn the basics of using a digital video camera. They shoot a short video for practice.

WEEK FOUR
MULTIMEDIA REPORTING - VIDEO
The class reviews the practice video. Students begin shooting video for first project.

WEEK FIVE
MULTIMEDIA REPORTING - VIDEO
The class reviews the video the students shoot for the first project, and defines the video clips to be used for the story. Time is spent focusing on defining the types of stories that work in multimedia, and those that donÕt.

WEEK SIX
WEB PAGE REVIEW
The school's Webmaster reviews the basics of putting together Web pages and loading them on the schoolÕs server. Students finish their first story projects.

WEEK SEVEN
MULTIMEDIA STORY PROJECT #1 REVIEW
Critique of first projects, with a review of the strengths and weaknesses of some multimedia stories. Review of requirements for the second project. Students select a story to start from scratch, and begin doing research.

WEEK EIGHT
MULTIMEDIA STORY PROJECT #2
Review of project proposals and storyboard critique for the second project.

WEEK NINE
MULTIMEDIA STORY PROJECT #2
Guest lecturer on one of these topics: the future of multimedia Ð broadband, enhanced TV, etc; storytelling ethics in the information age; multimedia reporting Ð stories from the field; trends and careers in multimedia reporting. Students do field work for second project.

WEEK TEN
MULTIMEDIA STORY PROJECT #2
Students report on their project progress and present revised storyboard. Guest lecturer on one of these topics: the future of multimedia Ð broadband, enhanced TV, etc; storytelling ethics in the information age; multimedia reporting Ð stories from the field; trends and careers in multimedia reporting.

WEEK ELEVEN
INTRODUCTION TO INTERACTIVITY
The course focuses on storytelling trends emerging outside the journalism community. Guest lecturer: Joe Lambert, co-director of the Center for Digital Storytelling. Text due for the second project.

WEEK TWELVE
CONTEXT AND CONTINUITY: THE WEB SHELL, Part One
Review of the current transition to context-based reporting. The class will select a traditional newspaper "beat", and design a Web shell. Video due for the second project. Review of video.

WEEK THIRTEEN
CONTEXT AND CONTINUITY: THE WEB SHELL, Part Two
Review of the current transition to context-based reporting. The class will select a traditional newspaper "beat", and design a Web shell.

WEEK FOURTEEN
MULTIMEDIA STORY PROJECT #2
Students finish putting their second project onto the school's Web site.

WEEK FIFTEEN
MULTIMEDIA STORY REVIEW
Students present their stories to a jury of professional journalists. The best stories are selected to appear on the course's main Web page. Course review.