A major facet of journalism in today’s world is the use of digital media. The rise of the internet and the continual improvements of mass communication mean that any event can be broadcast and witnessed by people across the world within mere minutes of it happening, via TV and radio or online. As such, it is important for prospective journalists to have a firm grasp on the concept of digital media, how it is implemented and how it affects the modern world.
Week One: Video Capture
In the first week of Digital Media we covered the use of handheld video cameras as a digital medium. Video footage is one of the most important commodities available to a journalist, and so having a video capture device close at hand is essential. Fortunately, with the development of modern technology quick capture of video footage on a digital camera or a mobile phone camera is available at a moment’s notice.
Thanks to modern technology, video capture is always readily available (Sources: http://www.mobilementalism.com, http://www.eastcoastphoto.com)
However, while handheld video camera devices have the advantage of being easy to carry and store, they also have disadvantages – primarily in video quality. Mobile phone cameras tend to have a fairly low resolution and framerate in video capture (most mobile phone cameras are less than two or three megapixels), and while digital cameras are generally of better quality than this they are known to produce blocky, juddering video footage depending on the ambient light, focus, etc. This is also true in the handheld camera’s ability to capture audio – while most mobile phones are digital cameras are able to capture audio alongside video, it can often be distorted by interference from other electronic devices and background noise (especially wind, if video is being captured outdoors), and so it may often to more advantageous to use a dedicated microphone. (see: Week Three)
Week Two: Video Editing
As a progression of video capture, video editing plays an important role in digital media. In most cases not all of the raw video footage captured is needed, and so the irrelevent content will need to be “trimmed” or “cropped”. The video may also need to be sped up or slowed down, or have a piece of separate audio playing alongside it, to suit the needs of the journalist’s broadcast, video feature, etc.
There are a number of video editing programs available, but one that is often used is Final Cut Pro. This piece of software, developed by Apple Inc., allows the user to crop video, adjust playback speeds, increase or decrease audio volume, add transitional effects, and many more besides. It also supports a large range of video and audio formats, making it an ideal digital media commodity.
Final Cut Pro is a good choice for video editing software. The top-left window shows the files in the selected folder available for use; the top-right windows are the playback windows for the selected piece of edited footage and the overall footage, respectively; the lower window shows the timeline, where audio and video can be arranged. (Source: http://www.newenglandfilm.com)
In Final Cut Pro, video is assembled by placing various pieces of audio and video into the timeline, shown in the bottom half of the screen. This timeline has separate “channels” for audio and video; video files can only be placed in the video channels, and audio files in the audio channels. However, there are a number of different video and audio channels on the timeline; this allows overlays and transitions to be used between audio and/or video files.
From the timeline, files can also be “cropped” to a shorter length. This is done by selecting the file on the timeline and placing “IN” and “OUT” markers on the timeline that appears on the left playback window in the top half of the screen. If the file being cropped is a video file this will be played back accordingly; if it is an audio file, a visual representation of the audio will display on the playback window and the audio will play. Furthermore, files can be sped up and slowed down using the various options from the toolbar located to the right of the timeline.
Once the appropriate editing has been done, the user can playback the overall edited footage by clicking the play button on the right playback window in the top half of the screen. This plays back the combined video and audio as positioned on the timeline, as well as any transitional effects used; the playback from this window is a representation of the finished product. From there, the edited footage can be saved as one of several different video formats. Alternatively, the user can save the Final Cut Pro project file for further editing at a later date – provided that all of the raw audio and video files used in the project are located in the same directories on the computer in use that they were in at the time of saving.
Week Three: Audio Capture
Aside from video, audio is also a useful facet of journalism – audio files can be used to provide an overlaying soundtrack or a voiceover to a piece of video. In most cases it is better to use a dedicated audio capture device such as a microphone to record audio, both for audio-only purposes and in accompaniment to video. This is because these devices generally provide a much clearer and higher-quality audio playback than the microphones found in video cameras. Most modern microphones also have USB ports and capture audio onto a small flash drive in .mp3 or .wav format, which are the most common digital audio format, hence they can easily be uploaded onto a computer and used accordingly through a video editing program (see: Week Two).
Microphones are often used in accompaniment to video cameras during interviews to provide higher-quality audio playback (Source: http://blogs.courant.com)
The most common type of microphone used during interviews is a unidirectional microphone. This is a microphone whose range of recording is mostly limited to the area in “front” of the microphone, i.e. the part pointed at the source of the audio. This means that alot of background noise and interference can be omitted from the recording, and hence is useful for recording audio from a single point of origin, e.g. a person speaking. A series of unidirectional microphones can also be set up to record audio from several specific points of origin, e.g. several people talking. These can then be overlayed and adjusted accordingly on a video editing program to provide a more even playback if desired, for example if a panel of people are being interviewed.
Another type of microphone used is an omnidirectional microphone. This microphone has a wide range of recording, limited only at the area “behind” the microphone. These microphones are often used to capture a more panoramic audio range, or are more preferably used in interviews with several people instead of setting up several unidirectional microphones. Because of the large range of recording that these microphones have, they are often positioned vertically to capture sound from all sides, or angled to one side to capture sound from one side and omit sound from another – this is a good means of reducing background noise and interference.
Examples of unidirectional and omnidirectional microphones, respectively (Sources: http://www.aues21.dsl.pipex.com, http://www.trewaudio.com)
Week Four: Text
One of the most useful commodities in used in digital media is that of text. Text is one of the most versatile tools available to a journalist, and if implemented correctly it can be used to highlight, explain, elaborate, summarise, assert, relay, coerce, and so on.
Text is found in variable quantities, depending on the media being used; obviously in radio journalism text is not readily available to the audience, whereas in online news articles and blogs text is the most heavily-used commodity of all. TV news broadcasts fall within these two extremes, often using text as captions and means of offering short, summarised points without removing the audience’s attention from the main broadcast entirely.
An example of text being used on a BBC News broadcast to summarise a news story – possibly unrelated to the one currently being presented – by means of a scrolling caption (Source: http://idents.org/)
Week Five: Blogging
With the advent of the Internet, an important rising media source is that of blogs. The term “blog” is derived from the term “web log” where individual users (known as “bloggers”) are able to publish their own news and opinions on any number of topics.
Perhaps one of the most integral differences between blogs and other sources of media is that blogs are not necessarily maintained by journalists, but by ordinary people who simply wish to share their views with the world. This has become a new means of employing a cyclical model of communication – blogs are a means of feedback through which the receiver of news (the audience, and hence the blogger) can convey their thoughts on a topic at hand. In either case, the power of blogs on digital journalism has clearly been identified and reacted upon – many news sources and freelance journalists have established their own blog channels to publish news stories on various topics.
The BBC Business Blog, written by the economics editor Stephanie Flanders (Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs – screen capture)
While most non-journalistic blogs are generally less professionally-upkept than those of journalists in major news corporations, they are regardless an important empowerment to the ordinary people whose opinions would otherwise go unheard. Many sites such as WordPress and Blogger now offer the ability to create and maintain a free blog for anyone with a valid e-mail address, and websites such as Twitter have allowed people to use short, direct updates to maintain a quick and constant feed of news that users can output for any to see. Many individuals have even taken to blogging on popular video hosting sites such as Youtube, in a growing sub-culture known as “vlogging” – a derivative of blogging and a contraction of “video logging”.
Twitter, a popular “mini-blog” site, combines the user interaction of social networking sites with the ability to provide short 140-character personal updates. (Source: http://www.twitter.com – screen capture)
SevenSimpleMinds, a collaborative YouTube vlog (Source: http://www.youtube.com – screen capture)
Week Six: Pitch Presentation
One of the assignments given to us during the course of the Digital Media module was to prepare a 90-second video clip using digital technology – cameras, microphones, etc. as covered earlier in this portfolio. Before this could be set about, however, a degree of preproduction tasks needed to be fulfilled. As well as a basic concept, a treatment for the recording process and a storyboard for the proposed progression of the video clip needed to be presented to our tutor before production could go ahead. Working in a group with three other students, we decided to base our video project on the Leeds Met Film Society. A treatment was drawn up for the proposed budget and requirements of the movie – incorporating transport costs, any foreseeable difficulties in recording and other necessities – and a storyboard was drafted to record at the Electric Press theater in Leeds.
An early draft of the Leeds Met Film Society storyboard. Sketches are not included and the progression has not yet been finalised. However this gives a working concept of the video’s setting, pace, etc.
We presented this pitch to our tutor and were given permission to proceed with the production process. However, due to communication difficulties with the Film Society we then decided to change our video to present new security measures being taken on Leeds Met’s Headingley campus. This was again discarded due to time constraints with relation to the security staff and our deadline, so we then decided to make a news report based on the recent heavy snowfall in Leeds and the effect it has had on staff and students at Leeds Met. This was to become the basis for our final recorded piece.
Week Seven – Sporting Words
During the first semester we were required to attend the Leeds Sporting Words event at Headingley Stadium in order to get a broader idea of how media works in effect – particularly in relation to sports journalism. A series of interviews and presentations throughout the day covered how the advent of digital media has affected all aspects of the field – from the perspective of the journalist, the PR officer, and even of the management staff.
The Sporting Words event took place in a sizeable suite overlooking Headingley Stadium’s pitches, which accomodated around 100 people. Both the presentations and the interviews were given in front of a projection screen between two of the suite’s windows, which allowed for backlighting of the person presenting and of the interviewer and interviewee, without having to deal with problems with lighting glare on the projection screen when Powerpoint presentations or backdrops were being displayed.
In both the presentations and the interviews a single handheld micrphone was used, so that the person in question could be heard in such a sizeable venue. In the presentations this was accompanied by a Powerpoint presentation, in which the person presenting could highlight and refer their points to the audience. In the case of interviews this was often replaced with a simple projection backdrop with the interviewee’s name and subject which they were addressing. The interviewer, Zoe Ward, was given a preset list of questions to ask during each interview, and once these were fulfilled the interview was then opened up so that people in the audience could ask any questions they had in relation to the subject.
Overall the Sporting Words event was a valuable insight into the world of sport journalism and the effect that digital media has had on it in recent years. The presentation by Ben Dirs and John Fordyce, two BBC sports bloggers, was particularly interesting, and provided an important insight into how digital media is affecting the entirety of journalism in the modern world.
