New contender for worst newspaper video
April 23, 2007 at 6:53 am paulbradshaw 10 comments
And I thought the Bolton News was bad. The bar has just been lowered by Reading Evening Post’s Sports Editor David Wright’s video bulletin, a painful lesson in how not to do online video:
Rule #1: if you’re aiming to imitate broadcast television, make sure you’ve watched it since the ’80s.
Rule #2: if you use a cloth for a background, make sure you iron it.
Rule #3: tempted to use those fancy transition effects on your video editing software? Sleep on it. Please.
Rule #4: if you’re going to do ‘green screen’ make sure the green covers the whole background.
Rule #5: don’t start talking to your mate while the camera is still filming.
Rule #6: speak clearly, slow down.
Rule #7: film at a time or place when people are not coming in and out of a door and mumbling to each other out-of-shot
Rule #8: do more than one take.
It’s not David Wright’s fault that he has to learn his trade in public. I doubt Surrey and Berkshire Newspapers have invested in any training for him, and it’s clear they’ve not invested in facilities. Perhaps material like this may persuade them otherwise.
UPDATE: I hope David’s hits have shot up – they’re watching him in Australia and Hungary.
Entry filed under: online journalism, online video, video blogging. Tags: .
1. Wordblog » Blog Archive » Video help needed at Reading | April 23, 2007 at 11:00 am
[...] editor, David Wright, is a “new contender for the worst newspaper video” according to Paul Bradshaw, who teaches online journalism at the University of Central [...]
2. Martin Stabe » links for 2007-04-23 | April 23, 2007 at 12:21 pm
[...] Online Journalism Blog: New contender for worst newspaper video Paul Bradshaw isn’t impressed with the Reading Evening Post’s new sports video bulletin. Paul offers some helpful hints for shooting video, like “if you use a cloth for a background, make sure you iron it.”. (tags: video newspapers readingeveningpost) [...]
3.
Hil Hunt | April 23, 2007 at 2:34 pm
You could add a couple more:
9. Try being interesting or at least (unintentionally) funny.
10. If you can’t, at least tell us something new – not a list of the bleeding obvious.
It’s not confined to Bolton & Reading – this stuff is all over the place. Why do news sites persist with multimedia without hiring the right skills? You’d no more ask a video technician to design a front page than pay a graphic designer to doorstep the mighty. Surely it’s worse for a newspaper’s reputation to offer up risible stuff like this than to leave video to the experts? (Or at least to the gifted amateurs?)
4.
newsvideographer | April 25, 2007 at 3:24 pm
That’s pretty funny.
5. This critique is right up my alley | News Videographer | April 25, 2007 at 3:29 pm
[...] Online Journalism Blog, and I’m thinking I like this blogger’s style. Go check out his funny critique of a “sports vlog” from Australia. Mindy McAdams emailed me the [...]
6. Newspaper Video: do’s and don’ts : Andy Dickinson.net | April 30, 2007 at 4:03 pm
[...] A post from Paul Bradshaw caught my eye. He seems to have acquired the formidable skill of sniffing out ‘bad’ online video. His previous benchmark ,The Bolton News, has been usurped: The bar has just been lowered by Reading Evening Post’s Sports Editor David Wright’s video bulletin, a painful lesson in how not to do online video: [...]
7. Hack Attack » Blog Archive » The Internet: jack of all trades, master of none? | May 2, 2007 at 8:17 pm
[...] have to look far to find bad newspaper video. Andy Dickinson over on his blog, in a response to a post by Paul Bradshaw reiterates Paul’s belief that the most important part of making good online video is to watch [...]
8. It's not the BBC the newspapers need to worry about, it's ITV Local « MediaBizTech | May 3, 2007 at 7:22 pm
[...] (and I don’t) the trial has had a good effect in mobilising newspapers into producing video, some with better results than others. However approval for the service is travelling down the BBC Trust’s approval process which [...]
9.
anoymous | November 14, 2007 at 12:29 am
You know, none of you are funny at all.
10. A new nomination for Worst Newspaper Video - Reading Evening Post does it again « Online Journalism Blog | February 18, 2008 at 1:14 pm
[...] the previous contender for Worst Newspaper Video have done it again. But this time, instead of Sports Editor David Wright, it’s young gun News [...]