Two Versions Of The Same Story

Posted October 06, 2020

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We all know how a TV newsroom works.

You come in in the morning and the assignment desk gives you a story to do.

Go down to X and get this story. It has to be on the air by 5 tonight.

So the clock starts running.

You arrive at the story, whatever it is, either by yourself or with a camera person.

You are under a lot of pressure. You have to report it shoot it, write the script, edit it and have it done by your deadline that day.

This is what we call a day of air turn.

You do the best you can, but often that is not so good. Not as good as it could be.

Is it possibel to do TV news stories in a different way - stories that are not 'breaking news?'

Last week, in our Spectrum News 1 Bootcamp, I did a little experiment. 

One of our MMJs, Maria Florencia Smith, a participant in the 5-day bootcamp did a lovely story about a Mexican immigrant to NY who was working to support his wife and children in Mexico.

Firstr, we did it as a standard day of air assignment.

Here's the story she did.

Then, we went back and gave her two days to do the story again. 

This time, she could spend more time with the subject of the story.

But because we shoot 3:1 ratios, we are not talking about a whole lot of time

Here's the same story, done with a bit of time:

Do you see the difference?

Now, you can't do this with Breaking News. But let's be honest. How much of the news is really Breaking News? Maybe 25%? Maybe less?

And when you look at Maria's story, I think it has a lot more journalistic value than another car crash.

Don't you?