Participants work with their coaches during the editing stage of the 2018 Multimedia Immersion workshop at the at the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications at Syracuse University. Photo by Tom Burton

NEWS PHOTOGRAPHER | MAY-JUNE 2018

Getting Comfortable Outside the Comfort Zone

By Tom Burton

Sitting in the second row of the screening room at Syracuse University, with her husband in his wheelchair in front of her, Leesa Paul saw their life in a two-minute-and-45-second video. To her right was Bill Foley, the photojournalist who made the video. Paul was smiling.

“It was cool to see myself through someone else’s eyes,” she said.

Paul’s husband, Doug, suffered a stroke, and the couple spend a lot of time together during his rehabilitation. In the interview in the video, she said, “I appreciate him now more than I ever did.”

Bill Foley photographs Leesa Paul as she watches a video about her and her husband. Photo by Tom Burton

The video was one of nearly 40 shown at the end of the 2018 NPPA Multimedia Immersion workshop held at the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications. Each short story was shot and edited that week by one of the participants in the workshop that introduces video and multimedia storytelling to photographers, students and communication professionals.

During the screening of the final videos, the subjects of the videos from around Syracuse were invited to come and watch. In the first couple of rows were a gospel singer, a metalworking artist, a man who collects cans to raise money for cancer research, a 9-year-old skateboarder and his family, and a man who raises racing pigeons and brought along two of his birds in a carrier cage, all of them there to see their stories told.

Storytelling is the central message of the workshop, and it has become more so over the years, said workshop co-founder Seth Gitner, an associate professor at the Newhouse School.

The first workshop in 2007 came from an idea from an NPPA board of directors that knew multimedia training was becoming more important for visual journalists. Gitner, along with co-founder Will Sullivan, brought together coaches and vendors to get the program started. It has been held in several locations but for the last seven years has been at the Newhouse School. Gitner is still a co-director of the workshop along with Jamie DePould and Carli Cichocki.

At the first workshops, the technology of running the cameras was very unfamiliar to nearly all of the participants. The cameras were Canon XL1s recording on MiniDV tape, and some participants, coming from a still photography background, would use photos paired with audio recorded separately to create video slideshows.

That learning could take most of someone’s attention. Now more people are familiar with video gear, and the equipment is easier to use. In this year’s workshop, every participant worked with either DSLR or mirrorless cameras. Sony and Canon were there to lend cameras, and B&H Photo lent out audio gear.

The participants and coaches at the 2018 Multimedia Immersion Workshop

This year’s workshop participants ranged from students and early career professionals to veterans such as Foley, who has been in business long enough to have won a Pulitzer Prize in 1983. All of them, and many of the coaches too, were stepping outside their comfort zones to try something new. The younger participants were looking to expand their skill sets. Foley said that because he’s still alive, there are still things to learn.
The message from several of the speakers was to not only accept the uncertainty of the workshop, but to embrace it as not just an aspect of the workshop, but as part of a career.

Keith Jenkins, director of visual journalism at NPR, has worked for digital startup projects at NPR, National Geographic and The Washington Post. The path has been exciting, starting in the early days of digital platforms. Other times it was challenging, as projects were shut down, leaving him looking for the next opportunity.

“I’ve enjoyed the journey of not knowing what’s next, even when the pace of not knowing has accelerated,” Jenkins said during his opening-night keynote speech.
The current state of digital is moving even faster. Jenkins said we have to know that what is new today could be the old platform in as little as two or three years. He said if you focus instead on making your projects mobile first, people first and storytelling, you can have success, and those stories can make a difference.

“Be thankful. As much as sometimes it is painful, be thankful that you are in the place that you are today and that you get to do the type of work you do,” Jenkins said. “What you do is super important to the world.”

Bruce Strong, chair of the multimedia photography and design department at the Newhouse School, followed with a similar theme when he presented about storytelling. Quoting author Neale Donald Walsch, “Life begins at the end of your comfort zone,” Strong emphasized that deep, rich storytelling happens when the storyteller embraces a level of vulnerability. Being vulnerable means getting close to the subject, having empathy and then making a memorable story.

“We remember what we feel,” Strong said.

During the week, the coaches and participants worked as teams to learn the processes. The volunteer coaches are a large group, and the workshop can provide a 1-2 ratio of coaches to participants. In addition to lectures from the coaches on video, audio and storytelling techniques, each participant made an replace short video during the week.

Potential subjects are screened prior to the workshop, and slips of paper with their contact information are put into a hat for a random draw by the participants. In some cases, the leads fell through, and the participants went to backup possibilities or finding their own stories.

One of the challenges for coaches across all teams was helping their participants narrow their focus to what they needed for video and interviews. For those new to video, it was sometimes difficult at first to visualize what their videos would need to tell a story.

This discipline of finding the multiple elements of a story can be new to someone who has worked primarily in still photos, capturing moments.

“They learn about story, and then they bring it back to their still photography, and their still photography gets better,” Gitner said. “You can actually strive to dive deeper.”

After long days of shooting, followed by long days of editing, each participant had a finished video. The workshop does not give awards for best video or best edit because everyone at the workshop, coaches and participants alike, is on a learning path. Each team did name a participant who stood out, often for overcoming adversity. One person won a “remember to push the record button” award, while at least two participants had encounters that resulted in law enforcement being called.

Two people did win camera gear through a random drawing. Canon donated an EOS M50 mirrorless camera kit, and Sony donated an a7s II mirrorless camera with a lens.

Still, one of the unique moments was the final afternoon, when all of the videos were screened. It is unusual for visual journalists to see their work shown in a theater environment and even more unusual to view them alongside their subjects who are seeing the video for the first time.

Alyce Henson, a photographer for Rotary International, attended the workshop having only previously shot short video clips and never a full story. Her video featured Deka Dancil, a woman who works with teenagers at the Syracuse Boys and Girls Club, along with Dancil’s co-worker and boyfriend, Jeff Eysaman.

At the screening, Henson sat next to Dancil. When the video played, they both looked a bit nervous, and Henson later admitted that she could only glance briefly at Dancil, not wanting to make her feel self-conscious. In the video, Dancil talks about her impoverished childhood, and they visit the abandoned home she once lived in that Dancil describes as “horrific.” The video also shows how Dancil works to help similarly troubled kids and the tenderness of her relationship with Eysaman, who describes her as someone who cares about everything.

After the screening Dancil told Hanson that she was impressed. “Someone sees beautiful things in my life,” she said.

Workshop co-director Seth Gitner holds the hat as participants draw their story ideas. Photo by Tom Burton