John Salazar, Spectrum News 1 Austin, Texas

Using Editing To Convey An Emotion

John Salazar is an MMJ with Spectrum News 1 in Austin Texas.

He's also a graduate of our 5-Day Storytelling bootcam - done by Zoom these days.

Last week, he shot (on an iPhone, of course) a lovely story of a profile of a healthcare worker in Austin - Medical Assistant Debbie Maxwell.

She collects plasma donations from Covid 19 survivors.

Plasma infusion is one of the few treatments that works, and without Maxwell, the plasma would be hard to come by.

What makes this piece intersting to me is the opening segement.

Note how quickly the cuts come - medical shots, intercut with quick bites of Maxwell at work

Note how Salazar's narration is as short and quick paced as the edits.

It all weaves together to convey a sense of immediacy and emergency

The pacing and the edits carry an emotional value to the viewer.

The way it is paced and cut communicates to the viewer that we have to move fast - that thiis is serious business - that lives are at stake here.

This is a great example of the subtle power of editing.

The edit can speak to the viewer as clearly and as directly as the shooting and the scripting

Nice job John.