Covering Fires

Smoke escapes and flames ignite as scared faces watch a burning building. It's always interesting to see how stations cover fires. I looked at WMBF News in Myrtle Beach at a recent fire it covered. I think its reporters did a fine job covering this fire.

There were also two photos on the web of the fire. One photo showed the smoke building up from the apartments on fire. The other was just a shot of the fire truck. I didn't think it was very stimulating.

Photo Courtesy: wmbfnews.com

The reporter should have put a photo of the fire more close-up. It's a 'duh' moment showing a fire truck. We all know they're going to have a fire truck at the scene of fire.                                    


It's extremely important to show viewers where a fire is located.
WMBF News' story is a great example of how to do this.

Photo Courtesy: wmbfnews.com    
              
They go from the anchor to boxes with a map and zoom in to show the exact location of the fire. Then, the story uses photos sent in by viewers of the fire scene. This is a phenomenal way to use social media and citizen journalism to your advantage.                                                    

You can use what you don't have when your crew wasn't on the scene. I love how journalism has grown to use things kinds of opportunities.

They had a live reporter on the phone. I'm assuming that they simply couldn't get their live truck on the scene for some reason. This is another good way to get a reporter's perspective live when you don't have all of your tools. They used a picture of the reporter so you see who was talking on the phone. This is a tool many stations use that I think is a smart move. People want to see what they hear. Since they can't see the reporter, a photo is the next best thing. The producers rolled the fire photos while the reporter was talking about the fire. This is another way to put pictures to what you're hearing.

The reporter talks about the status of the fire, what neighbors are saying, how many apartments were affected by the fire and what fire investigators are looking into. These are the fine details you want to talk about to inform your viewers.

Here's Kyle Grainger's story: Fire

Green is Alive with the Sound of Music!

Go Green! That's the big fad these days. Many people advocate to save the environment.  But I'm not blogging about that. I'm talking about the one day everyone wears green...for the Irish! St. Patrick's Day. One Columbia woman doesn't just wear green on this day. She's a musician who brings her talents to senior citizens on St. Patty's Day. Another reporter, Kylie, and I went out to cover the holiday festivities and ended up with a great, little story. The executive producer at KOMU told us she passed by a house fully decorated in green. She thought it'd be worth stopping by and possibly talking to the owner.

 
When we got there, no one was home. We decided to get some video and head downtown and talk to people celebrating there. Just before we packed up our gear, Cookie Hagan pulled in her driveway. She was wearing this great black hat rimmed with green and green beads around her neck. "This is going to be great!" I thought to myself. We told her that we were doing a little story about St. Pat's Day. We said we loved her house and we'd love to talk to her if she didn't mind. She was more than willing. We began to set-up while she went inside. I shot most of the video while Kylie gave her thoughts. Since we were set-up in front of the house, Cookie came out her front door, so we had the perfect video of her to use. Turns out Cookie plays the harmonica and ukulele in several bands.
Photo Courtesy: thegift.com

We asked her questions like, "Why decorate on St. Pat's?" "Is there any special meaning?" "Are you Irish?" We got some great quotes from those questions. She said she's 'Cookie O'Hagan' every March 17th. What a crack up. I was having one of the best St. Pat's Days and I was working! Imagine that!

We asked if she'd be stopping by a senior center to play her harmonica and she said, "Sure! Why not?" We asked if she could play play her for us in her house in case we couldn't get in the senior center. This worked out perfectly because it provided us with more video. She played O' Danny Boy; an appropriate melody for the day. One thing I wish I did: get video of the boom box playing so the viewers could see music came from her playing and the CD player.

Luckily, we got in the senior center and got video of Cookie playing for her friend Sue. Sue was a bundle of joy. The expression on her face was priceless. I wish I had a different angle on the two of them. I eventually moved my camera angle, but didn't have very much time to get enough video from that view point.

Here's the story we put together at KOMU: An Irish Song.
                                                   
                                                                                                          Photo Courtesy: musicwithease.com

Up In The Air

Heights have never made me nervous like some people. I could stand at the edge of a cliff, feel my heart beating and love every bit of it. Every vacation my family and I took, I wanted to partake in any adventurous, dangerous activity offered. When I was ten, my brother, sister and me hopped on a small plane and took a ride around the area of the North Woods of Wisconsin. It was one of the greatest memories I have.

When an airplane story crossed my journalism path, I jumped to cover it. There's this little aircraft repair shop in Fulton, MO. It's been open for 10 years, but any average passerby probably never noticed the shop.

I'll admit that I could have covered this story a heck of a lot better. I needed more of a business side. I only spoke to the guys at the shop. As my professor stated, too much like a commercial; I agreed.

Nevertheless, I had fun and learned a great deal.

Skytek's shop is a four-car sized garage at the Elton Memorial Airport in Fulton. During the wintertime, the owner, Bob Moseley, says they're pretty slow. But lately, they've had the business this winter since opening.

I wish I had gone to Skytek when it was a little warmer and not so much snow on the ground. That day kind of limited me to what I could shoot. I wish I had video and sound of the plane engine and the mechanics moving the planes.

I shot my stand-up in front of the plane. It looked pretty cool but I thought of a better idea after I had already shot it. I could've sat in the actual plane and talked. That would've been much more captivating. Worried about returning the camera, I left Skytek without re-shooting. Looking back, I wish I had just stayed a bit longer and re-did my stand-up.

I had some nice sequence shots but the natural sound wasn't as strong as I had hoped. Again, having the plane engine noise would've made the story much better.

Also, my framing on my interview with Moseley was too wide. After I shot my third story, Running For Robert, I think I learned my framing lesson.

Even though my story wasn't up to par, or to my liking, I learned what it takes to repair small airplanes. It takes a lot more knowledge to repair small airplanes because mechanics need to know how to fix every part. On commercial planes, each part of the plane is designated to certain mechanics. Moseley said he and his guys could easily walk into a big plane shop and fix those air crafts but it wouldn't be quite as simple for the big plane mechanics.

I had a good laugh with all the Skytek employees. I'd love to see the skies one day again...maybe Skytek can help.

Ah! Unda' Da Sea!

Oceans are a mystical land...or should I say land of seas? Bodies of water where there are more species and plants than the mind can imagine. Beneath the big blue waves lives a world unknown to the average boat rider. An article describes how half of the Earth's life may very well may be under the sea. After I skimmed through Huffington Post's 'Green' stories, I found a link to a story on McClatchydc.com. "Buried alive: Half of Earth's life may lie below land, sea" captures readers from the get-go. The writer, Robert S. Boyd, describes astronauts' duties seamlessly into biologists' jobs. He uses strong, catchy verbs like scour. Those kind of verbs are what make good writing.

The story goes on to say that scientists believe half the living organisms on the planet are buried in the ocean or places alike. A few examples: rocks, soil, tree roots and aquifers. Along with the writing accompanies a graphic depicting the 'subsurface biosphere'.

The area that half of our living things are in the dark, Earth's basement, as Boyd says. I've always wondered what lies underneath all that sand we see, lurking down under the sand.

There was a fascinating quote in the article about what may be beneath the surface. Boyd quotes a microbiologist saying,"The organisms that live in this environment may collectively have a mass equivalent to that of all of Earth's surface dwellers." Isn't that profound? Could you imagine having twice as many living animals and plants as we do now? We simply don't have room. The microbiologist goes on to say that these creatures may help essential environmental, agricultural and industrial problems.

I didn't like the way the writer set-up these quotes. They were combined into one paragraph; it's hard to distinguish. I think he should have separated them more clearly. He described the microbiologist in the same paragraph all bunched together; that was distracting.

In 2011, several scientists will venture to North Pond in the Atlantic to drill four holes in the seafloor to observe what lies beneath. Boyd ends his story with this last bit about the future plans. This is the perfect way for readers to look for more.

Here's a link to another story I found similar to this one. Check it out! World's Largest Live Underwater