VIDEO JOURNALISM TAKES ROOT IN LOCAL TV NEWS

At the opening session of the Radio-Television News Directors Association’s conference last April, New York-based consultant and video journalism evangelist Michael Rosenblum told an assembly of TV journalists that many of them, for business purposes, “are dead” and that this is “the end of the old world.”

Rosenblum referred to the conventional ENG gear, sometimes costing tens of thousands of dollars, as “paperweights.”

“So, the barbarians are at the gate?” asked moderator Miles O’Brien, of CNN.

“No, no, no,” said Rosenblum. “The people are at the gate; the barbarians are going to be unemployed.”

Despite Rosenblum’s passionate, sometimes inflammatory and frequently off-putting proselytizing, he has converted a few broadcasters to video journalism—the idea of replacing heavily equipped news crews with more lightly equipped individuals who can both report the story and capture the video.

Perhaps more important, Rosenblum has caused other broadcasters to do some soul searching about the way they collect news and prompted academics to rethink the way they are training TV journalists.

They are beginning to see the potential of low-cost, lightweight cameras and laptop editors and the increasing availability of wireless Internet access.

Combining those factors with constant corporate budget pressure and a ravenous demand for content, some suggest, could make wider adoption of video journalism inevitable.

But, right now, even Rosenblum admits that video journalism is still no more than a fringe religion in the U.S. “We’ve moved forward a little bit,” he says. “But it’s no great drama. I’m getting rejected by a better class of clients. But at least they’re talking to me.”

It may take a generational shift within the industry, Rosenblum says.

“The Israelites wandered in the desert for 40 years, not because they were lost, but because everybody with a memory of slavery had to die.”

Rosenblum distinguishes between the video journalist and the one-man band.

“The VJ concept is to 'empower' a journalist to translate their voice into video,” says Rosenblum. “It strives to bring a sense of creativity and authorship to television journalism.”

A one-man band can be an inexpensive way of imitating what a crew does, he says. Video journalism requires more time working a story than traditional crews that produce a couple of packages a day can often afford.

The VJ movement has perhaps made its biggest inroads with Young Broadcasting at its stations in San Francisco (KRON) and Nashville (WKRN). Rosenblum was hired to train reporters at both stations.

Two McGraw-Hill stations, in San Diego (KGTV) and Indianapolis (WRTV), have begun moving in that direction, also with Rosenblum’s counsel.

Gannett is providing its own training in an effort to add VJs to its stations' news staffs, and other stations and station groups are considering ways to incorporate the concept, driven perhaps by technology, budgets or even Rosenblum’s rhetoric.

Recently, the ubiquitous and influential Associated Press advertised for applicants, using both the terms “video journalists” and “one-man band.'

KRON’s ratings haven’t changed since it went with the VJs in 2005. The MNT affiliate is still fifth out of five stations doing news in San Francisco.

Early local criticisms complained of poor video and sloppy editing. Others said the stories looked good, sounded good or were well written, but seldom all at once. Some suggest an MTV-hand held look.

Some KRON veterans stayed on board; others left the station, often to competitors.

KRON General Manager Mark Antonitis disputes the negative local and industry perceptions, insisting that going VJ at KRON was never “about cutting costs as much as about productivity, using resources.

“We’re producing more news with fewer people, but it’s journalism that better speaks to the needs of the audience,” he says. “The audience doesn’t care how many people did the story.”

“If anybody expected instant ratings impact, they have no idea what this is about,” Antonitis adds. “We’re still in transition; we produce more stories than anyone else in the market. We’re building an organization that’s efficient and effective. We have greater flexibility now. This is about local television.”

At the other Young station that moved to VJs, new WKRN Nashville General Manager Gwen Kinsey, says that the station news staff is mostly, but not all, VJs.

Kinsey’s predecessor, Mike Sechrist, left the station in the spring and now works with Rosenblum training stations.

Sechrist says that WKRN became far more competitive and efficient through video journalism. And it opened a new advertising revenue stream by creating compelling content for the Web.

“When I left, we had 12,000 videos searchable on the Web,” he says. “Our Internet sales people sold 10 second pre-rolls.” It’s not TV news-size margins, he acknowledges, “but it’s money we ignored for a long time for content we already had.”

Wally Dean, broadcast/online director for the Committee of Concerned Journalists, says that while he sees little interest among stations in completely converting to VJs, he sees some value in the industry’s limited experience so far, holding Young’s Nashville station as an example.