Bringing Depth To Your Characters

Posted February 07, 2020
Share To
 
 

We have, of course, been running our video bootcamps for more than 30 years now.

As part of the bootcamp, the participants go out and find a local story, then shoot and cut a 1-minute video.

By now, Lisa and I have seen tens of thousands of these small stories, but a few still stick with us.

Those are generally the ones where the particpant found a second angle to the story. More often than not, this second angle had almost nothing to do with the original story. 

One that still sticks with us was a story about a florist.  These are pretty predictable. They do what florists do.

But this florist, as it turns out, was also an opera singer in his spare time. So, of course, the VJ asked him to perform, which he did. 

The combination of the singing and his story of being as aspiring opera star while also doing flower arranging made for a great story. 

It had more than one dimension.

We push this idea all the time.

Every person has at least one great story to tell.

All you have to do is ask them.

Spectrum1 MMJ Itay Hod did a diet story.

Intermittent Fasting is very big in LA.

Well, of course it is. It's LA.

And there are lots of local news stories about this new dieting trend.

But in this case, Itay Hod finds a second angle to the story.

One that makes it far more intersting than just another diet fad story.

 

 


Recent Posts

There is a great deal of concern, well placed, that few people under the age of 30 watch TV news. Viewership of TV news in general has fallen off, so naturally, TV executives across the boards are searching for a solution. How to appeal to a demographic that spends most of their time on social media?


Sometimes when you are searching for something, the answer is right before your eyes. For years, I have been looking for a new and powerful way to cover breaking news stories - and now, I think, I've got it.


When we run our video storytelling bootcamps for TV news organizations, our primary focus is on what we call ‘the viewer experience’. It is a given that the journalism is well researched and accurate, but if no one is watching; if there is no ‘audience engagement’ with the story, then you are in fact showing it to no one, which is tragic, and avoidable.


Share Page on: