"Embracing Reality" : A Photog's Theory of News

(This is from Drew Cook, a photographer at WAVE-TV in Louisville. There are some very interesting ideas here...)



My philosophy is ridiculously simple. We provide a service. We do not sell a product. Newsrooms have forgotten this. If we sold a product our goal would be the same as anyone's who sells something... make it as good as possible for as little as possible. You make a quality product, people will buy it, you make that same quality product inexpensively, you will make money.

Unfortunately we have only information to offer people and we do not charge them for it. Therefore there is very little perceived value related to news. We do not have the benefit of lowering our prices to increase sales. The only other option is to have the best service.

Think of it like gift giving: Your appreciation for any gift depends on two things; who's doing the giving (obviously a crayon drawing from your child means more than a tie from a coworker) and the need you have for the gift. So, a gift with little to no value might be a tie given by a complete stranger.

The only way to not be strangers handing out ties is consistently provide the highest quality, most useful service and do so in a familiar way.

Word of mouth is the best form of advertising. We know this because we try to do "water cooler"' stories. Every element of our shows should be talkable.

We must get away from categorizing stories as "hard," "feature," etc... to get those water cooler moments we must simply fill our shows with the best stories possible. Folks at home neither care nor know the difference between feature and hard news stories. They only know if something is interesting, informative or entertaining. If it is, they will talk about it.

I have yet to be in line at the grocery and overhear someone say, "I can't believe they lead with the armless badminton player... that was more of a kicker, I thought."

If we start and end strong we're more likely to get people talking. The "primacy and recency effect" teaches us we remember what we're exposed to first and last most easily. We want to be remembered.

I have a step by step guide I've created to help decide what gets covered, how and where to place it in a show if you're interested.

There’s a shortcut to this, it’s what I call "embracing reality."

Embracing reality does several things. First, it distills journalism: a rally is being held to protest, oh I dunno, those ridiculous form fitting plastic wrappers no one can ever open. The crew gets to the location and three people are there. In most newsrooms one of two things will happen - the crew calls back and says, "no one's here, this isn't a story." The producers either change it to a vosot or demand a pkg. anyway because that's what the crew was assigned.

Both are wrong. It is wrong to make this story a vosot because that will lead to the crew being assigned an alternative story of lesser value simply because it "CAN" be turned. But remember we initially sent them to pkg the rally because everyone previously agreed that was a more important story than option two. Either it's worth 90 seconds or it's not.

In the second scenario, most reporter/photographer teams would now get ticked off. "Why is this a story?!? There's only three people here!" There is ALWAYS a story. In this imaginary case I suspect it would be about passion and commitment. EVERYONE'S passionate about something. THAT becomes the story. The plastic wrappers are incidental. Maybe the people are a little off their collective rocker. THAT becomes the story. Find the "universal truth." Journalism is about documenting lives and events. Nothing more.

“B-roll" is dirty word (like "feature" and "hard news") I'd like to see it removed from our industry. Packages are called such for a reason. They are all inclusive. They are linear. There should be no distinction between video, sots and track. It is one unit.

This simplifies writing, focuses the story and eliminates the confusion caused by "wallpaper" video. Remember what Al T. says.. and he's right..."When the eye and the ear compete, the eye wins."

Knowing what to shoot and how to write become clear and honest.

Embracing reality also gives talent an outlet to become more accessible to viewers. Remember, we don't want to be strangers handing out unwanted ties. We want the same familiarity that comes with the gift given by the child. Talent must find their own voice, be themselves. Every news operation looks and feels basically the same, because the talent are "expected" to act and look a certain way.

Being the same provides no incentive for a viewer watch one station over another.

For example; when a prompter goes down, anchors attempt to muddle through scripts attempting to pretend it didn't. They look foolish and awkward, skipping and combining words as a result of trying to constantly look at the camera and their copy. Who wants to watch someone be that uncomfortable? 'Don't seem so trustworthy now that they appear to not have a clue what they're saying. Not to mention if a person were to stick around they'd be so distracted by the antics they'd never hear word one.

Embrace reality says, "Oh, hey folks, our prompter just went out. We're gonna have to read from this paper now."

Embracing reality reestablishes trust. Viewers do not trust the media. They need to.

Imagine that an anchor or reporter is late getting to the set... no last minute camera or script changes.... just roll with it. "Jane, 'you get your hair fixed the way you like it? 'took you long enough to get out here." "No, no. This whole day's been a bear... I hope you guys like this story 'cause we worked our tails off trying to get it together... I've been behind all day." People can relate to that. Full disclosure is important.

Think about this.... anchors toss to missing reporter. Director takes shot of missing reporter. Anchors joke and wonder the same things as the folks at home... "Where's Frank?" Why isn't he there? Will he ever show up?" Now the viewer at home has a built in reason to watch. John Larson calls it "quest." Take viewers on a journey of discovery. Obviously this applies to storytelling as well, not just AWOL talent.

Embracing reality applies to all aspects of producing shows. Obviously, these are just a few examples, but I've taught it and those that do it produce far better, more interesting, pure, entertaining and informative work.

Thanks.