The Honolulu Advertiser, which covers the news in an environment so picturesque that much of the world considers it a paradise, has a natural urge to cover as much in video as in words and static images.
“We don’t do hula dancers,” says Sandee Oshiro, managing editor for digital and multimedia for the Gannett Co. newspaper, but videos of surfing and peeks at the on-location filming of movies such as The Last Princess are not unheard of. “And things that would work in Detroit -- fires and car crashes -- work here as well.”
Before Gannett sent corporate video trainers to the Hawaiian newspaper in January 2007, staffers had been recording video occasionally, “but nothing very concerted,” Oshiro says. Since the training, the newspaper’s staff has posted two or three pieces daily, most running between 60 and 90 seconds.
Or, at least, they were until June. That month, the union representing more than 600 Honolulu Advertiser employees authorized a “work-to-rule” campaign. This allowed workers to refuse to do anything not explicitly defined in their job descriptions -- which included shooting and editing video – as part of an overall employee action begun in February over a hike in health insurance costs. Also that month, newspaper employees authorized the Hawaii Newspaper and Printing Trades Council – a group of six unions – to call a strike if necessary. Since that time, the Advertiser has been in negotiations with the council, says spokesman Wayne Cahill.
The labor action has highlighted an interesting risk associated with newspaper video initiatives that rely on the voluntary efforts of reporters and photographers whose primary duties are not video-related.
Oshiro says that some of the best video packages have been made by the site’s reporters. “It’s because they’re natural storytellers. Photographers are visually very acute. They know what works visually, but putting together a story is a skill they’re not used to.” With reporters, it’s the other way around.
Since the video strike, the site has relied on video shot by Honolulu’s KGMB9 News Hawaii station. Though not a Gannett property, the two have enjoyed an informal partnership as they’ve worked together in the past on several community projects.
Still, the labor action has significantly impacted video operations. In April, the month preceding the video strike, the site racked up 244,260 video streams. In June, that number dropped to about 65,000, Oshiro says.
Shooting, Editing and Publishing
The newspaper purchased 12 Sony HVR-A1U high-definition cameras, which record video on mini-DV tapes and typically cost around $2,200. A pool of seven cameras are kept in the office and signed out as needed, and five mobile journalists carry one each. Gannett headquarters picked up the tab for equipment, Oshiro says.
In addition to the cameras, the newspaper has several lavaliere and handheld microphones.
Video is edited with Avid Xpress Pro, admittedly not the most user-friendly software available. “It’s a steep learning curve for Avid so it really takes a lot of effort and practice to get quick at it,” Oshiro says. “I’m kind of amazed that some of our videographers can turn out two or more videos a day.”
The finished product is converted to QuickTime and then Flash before it’s dropped into Gannett’s proprietary Maven Internet TV Platform player.
Part of Maven’s appeal is the ease with which video with a national appeal from other Gannett sites can be posted. Earlier this summer, recordings of the Iowa floods taken by The Des Moines Register were presented to Honolulu readers this way. It also allows producers to easily drop video into a related story, Oshiro says.
“When you have that ability, you do have to think about how the video supplements a story. In some cases we’ll talk out just what angle we want in the video so we won’t duplicate what’s in the story. It will be a sidebar, in effect.”
Video is an intriguing tool, but doesn’t do a newspaper any good unless readers know the newspaper has it and where to find it. In the Advertiser’s print edition, stories that have a corresponding video component are packaged with large screen grabs of the video itself accompanied by a short description underneath. Video refers also appear in print section rails alongside or beneath a newspaper section. “This especially works well when we have stand-alone video without a print story,” Oshiro says.
Training
For a week in January 2007, and another the following January, Gannett sent people to The Honolulu Advertiser to train staff members in the use of the Sony HVR-A1Us . Most of the 43 newspaper, online and marketing personnel trainees – including five reporters who were trained to be mobile journalists – were complete beginners, Oshiro says. “We wanted to train as many people as possible without having a dedicated video team.”
Complete immersion was the rule. During each class, participants were immediately placed in the rotation for video assignments.
Gannett’s course outline is available here http://www.naa.org/docs/Presstime/GannettTrainingProgram.pdf.
Before that training, mobile journalist Mary Vorsino had never shot video for the newspaper before, she says, “so it was definitely an intense introduction. And I especially enjoyed it because it talked about not only how to shoot and edit video, but how to do it well - like our colleagues in television. I can't say I was a great videographer when I finished the course, but I had a good grasp of how to tell a story with video and I got more and more comfortable with the camera equipment and editing software with each video I produced.”
Advertising
Ads are sold as bundles comprised of pre-roll video ads, usually about 7 seconds long, and 728 x 90-pixel static ads that appear horizontally above the video player, or vertically to the left or right. Fast-forward and other video player controls do not appear until after the pre-roll ad has played.
Advertisements are sold on a CPM rate, says Director of Digital Media Stella Bernardo. The company expects to test a longer-form infomercial-type advertising sometime this quarter or in Q4, she says. This will likely take the form of a showcase for featured products such as autos or real estate. Company profiles are also a possibility.
“We just want to make sure our readers know the difference between paid content and news pieces,” she says.
Landmark Projects
Any footage that is particularly emotional or dramatic, from fatal fires and traffic accidents to disasters and bad weather, do particularly well, Oshiro says. Other big draws include surfing, celebrities, high school championship games and University of Hawaii “football in any form: practices, press conferences, you name it,” she adds.
By far the most popular packages to date have been those involving the January murder of a toddler who was thrown into oncoming traffic on the H-1 Freeway from a pedestrian overpass. A 23-year-old Honolulu man was charged in the incident.
Video of one of the first interviews with the child’s mother has been viewed more than 17,000 times since it was posted in January; that of a witness describing the event has racked up more than 15,000 views. “Anything that involves a very emotional event” does very well, she says.