Rise of the Solo Video Journalist

Old School Journalists Need to Change Their Brains

Christina Pino-Marina is a digital trailblazer. Armed with just a video camera and a laptop, she has helped redefine what it means to be a journalist in the 21st Century. The award-winner has transitioned from a newspaper writer into a powerful visual storyteller catering to the World Wide Web.

She's the perfect example of how all the old school journalists out there need to turn their brains around. Pino-Marina is divulging some insider's advice on how to be a sucessful multimedia storyteller. She spoke today at American University in Washington, D.C.

The Big Switch: Print to Video

After less than two years as a newspaper reporter at the El Paso Times in Texas, Pino-Marina decided to take a chance. In 2000, she joined the staff of washingtonpost.com. One of her first big assignments: the Presidential election re-count in Florida. No-one knew who our next President would be.

The story launched Pino-Marina into a digital arena all new to her: filing audio reports for the web. It was the fastest way to keep up with the news that was changing by the second.

“We were re-defining what it meant to file a story," Pino-Marina recalls. "Print still dominates, but it was difficult to wrap my mind around that instead of a print report, an audio report would stand as the story”

A few years later, in 2003, Pino-Marina switched to the Post multimedia division. That's where she began to master the art of the all-in-one reporter, producer, and videographer.

"I’ll call it solo video journalism... the individual is doing the work of a tv crew," Pino-Marina explains. It wasn't easy at first. “There was a big learning curve with the technology."

Soon, though, she would be winning awards. While covering the funeral of President Ronald Reagan in 2004, she was in downtown Washington during an evacuation. A small plane had entered restricted airspace.

She shot and put together a report using video with police shouting evacuation orders and worried downtown visitors asking questions. It won her a breaking news award from the White House News Photographer's Association.

Profiling a former Nazi

As time went by, Pino-Marina completely embraced the role of solo video journalist. She traveled to Mexico to file video reports on the country's presidential elections back in 2006. The year before that, she spent much of her off time putting together a profile of an Arlington, VA, man named Lennie Cuje. The local jazz musician is a former Hitler Youth member who still plays the jazz tunes he loved to hear American soldiers play during World War II.

The piece (which you can see here) has interviews with Cuje and lots of his music along with old film clips from the war-era It was orginally meant to be a magazine-style article, but Pino-Marina couldn't resist the temptation of putting all those visual elements together. What does she love about being a solo video journalist? "You have a lot of creative control."

Secrets to Success

Pino-Marina spoke to about twenty graduate students in the American University class called "Writing for Converged Media". She's now an adjunct professor at the University of Maryland.

Her advice to up and coming journalists? Learn these digital skills that so many converged newsroom are looking for. And when you're looking for a story, she says,"find something different than what you'll see on CNN."

When you find that story that means a lot to you, don't let pressure force you to turn-in something you're not completely happy with, she insists. There's a disadvantage because of the web's insatitable appeitite for new content. Journalists, she says, are often used to "feed the beast".

Clemetson Part 3 - Controversy

The content on The Root can be viewed as controversial. Before the election, managers actually debated on whether or not to turn off the comment function. But they decided against it, knowing that most people will understand that the comment area is simply a function of the web. Also, she tells us,"If you come into a place like the web and you start to write white supremicist stuff, and there's no one else reading it... it's not fun anymore".

The feedback sent to the site can be inflamatory. The site got one email from a man saying they shouldn't call Obama the first African-American president-elect because his mother is white. Clemetson says they emailed the person back, but never addressed that in an article.

Clemetson says The Root is not a news site. It's all about commentary and analysis. "The same rules doen't apply like they would at a newspaper or a traditional news site."

"The Root" Managing Editor at American University Part 2

Clemetson has started to speak.

First off, we're getting an explaination of The Root. It's a source of cultural/political/social views in the African American community. The website was launched in January of this year to serve a niche audience. The site started, coincidently, at the same time of the presdential campaign of Barack Obama. The site does not cater to entertainment or sports because Clemetson says those areas are already served in the black community.

In the past, people were afraid the "serious" websites might not be able to survive no matter which community is focused. That attitude in the business world actually benefited The Root. Audience research has shown that people weren't getting that serious news they needed.

That doesn't mean the site doesn't have fun. One of the stories, "5 Obama Hair Don'ts" was a big hit. News agencies in Britain were actually fighting for the rights to re-publish.

Who is The Root? "We're small... there's only about 5 of us," Clemetson admits. "It's a start-up." Clemetson says they use the same writers who are on a freelance basis.

"The Root" Managing Editor at American University

I'm in my Comm 535 class at American University right now, called "Writing for Converged Media." We're about to welcome a guest speaker: Lynette Clemetson, Managing Editor, The Root.

I'll be live blogging through most of her appearance. She'll talk about the historic impact of voters electing our very first African-American president. Some of the stories she'll talk about are linked below. They're articles from "The Root" online.

In Our Lifetime, by Henry Louis Gates Jr.
An Open Letter to Barack Obama by Alice Walker
The First Internet President by Omar Wasow
Michelle Obama: First Lady of the United States by Kim McLarin
5 Obama Hair Don'ts by The Root Staff