ted land

Introducing The Solo Video Journalist, 2nd Edition, an updated how-to guide for aspiring MMJs

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I used to be an anomaly.

When I arrived in the 10th-largest market in the country, I was one of the few who worked as a solo video journalist – or a reporter who shoots and edits my own stories. There were maybe a handful of us, and the newsroom wasn’t geared towards our interests.

More than a decade later, the state of my newsroom – and most others – has been upended.

According to the latest RTDNA survey, more than 90% of local TV newsrooms use solo video journalists – or multimedia journalists, or MMJs. More than half of newsrooms in market 51 or lower use “mostly” MMJs, and four out of five newsrooms in Top 25 markets use them in some way. Soloists are no longer a position of the future; we are present across the board in local news, and we’re finding opportunities beyond broadcast as well.

But for a long time, no book existed that offered a comprehensive overview of the position and gave instructions and advice specifically designed for it.

That’s why I wrote one.

Four years ago, I announced the release of The Solo Video Journalist, which featured interviews with nearly a dozen MMJs and broke down every step of the solo storytelling process, from shooting to interviewing to writing to editing.

Today I’m thrilled to announce The Solo Video Journalist, 2nd Edition, with more interviews, significant updates, and advice tailored to the updated landscape of video journalism.

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5 lessons from the NPPA’s Best of Photojournalism 2018 video winners

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I haven’t blogged in a few months, taking some time for a particularly busy season at work, at school, and as a dad.

But this occasion called for me to restart the engine.

Every year I pay particular attention to the winners of the NPPA’s Best of Photojournalism Video Awards. It’s a one-stop collection of some of the finest photography from some of the most prolific and talented photographers in the country. This year I set new marks personally, placing with five different stories in six different categories. But I never stop learning.

Through their work, my colleagues across the country never stop teaching.

Here are five lessons I learned from five powerful pieces of journalism and storytelling:

THE STORY: Remembering the Stains on the Sidewalk, by Jed Gamber (WBFF-TV, Baltimore)
THE LESSON: Commit at every level, not just with the camera.

I remember seeing this story when it first showed up in my Facebook newsfeed. I was blown back then and was blown back watching it again this weekend.

Jed Gamber has won a cavalcade of awards for photography in his still-young career, and he has helped build a tremendous team at WBFF-TV in Baltimore. This story shows the standard he sets.

Gamber and reporter Paul Gessler follow a still photographer who’s documenting the city’s homicides every day for a year. The camerawork is immaculate, but Gamber doesn’t stop there. He uses a projector, he stacks photographs on top of each other with a series of smash edits, and uses subtle but effective camera clicks to provide audio cues.

The whole thing is a masterpiece, pushed by a moving, meaningful message.

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5 lessons from the NPPA’s Best of Photojournalism 2016 video winners

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Every year I watch the video winners of the NPPA’s Best of Photojournalism awards.

Every year I go back to the same thought:

The building blocks of storytelling are absolutely important to a great piece of journalism, but they require the foundation of a story worth telling.

If we cannot get in the door with meaningful material, we cannot expect viewers to appreciate the various techniques on which we pride ourselves. Last year I profiled several BOP winners on this site and drew lessons from them. In my introduction, I wrote: “The best stories I saw last year demanded my attention, and I watched zero of them on television. I watched all of them online, via links and recommendations from colleagues and friends. I arrived upon them organically and, when I clicked on the videos, found myself instantly engrossed.”

Ditto for 2016. In general, the stories that won BOP awards — and stood out in public as well — were triumphs of content over technique.

Here are five first-place winners and the lessons I took from them:

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3 GREAT STORIES: Starring seafarers, Greenland, & Super Mario

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Every week, I shine the spotlight on some of the best storytelling in the business and offer my comments. “3 Great Stories of the Week” will post every Monday at 8 AM.

Seattle mission serves foreign ship crews who cannot come ashore (12/28/16, KING-TV): As we turn the calendar to 2017, here is a touching, deceptively straightforward piece worth watching from 2016.

Ted Land with Seattle’s KING-TV is an especially talented solo video journalist, as well as a one-time podcast guest of mine and one of the interview subjects of my new how-to book for MMJs, The Solo Video Journalist. He is also a former National Edward R. Murrow winner for writing, and in this story he displays why.

Land tackles a seemingly simple subject — a Christian group that puts together care packages for foreign seafarers who dock in Seattle — but puts immense care into every word and shot. One needn’t work too hard to spot picturesque shots along the Pacific Ocean, but Land goes further and finds some of the most beautifully framed clips of video I’ve seen all year (2016, not this year).

That work ethic shows up throughout the piece, and it culminates in a winner of a story from a tremendous storyteller.

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Introducing “The Solo Video Journalist”, my how-to book for aspiring MMJs

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I am a television news reporter for the NBC affiliate in Atlanta, Ga., the 10th largest TV market in the country. But I am also my own photographer, shooting and editing the video that becomes my pre-produced reports. From the start of my day to the finish, I am almost always on my own.

And I represent a growing reality in TV news.

The term “multimedia journalist” gets thrown around in the news business, but in television it has a clear meaning. It refers to a journalist who produces a report from start to finish, combining the jobs of a traditional reporter (researching, interviewing, writing) with those of a traditional photographer (shooting, editing). We now occupy a substantial part of TV newsrooms; per the latest survey, roughly nine of every ten local network affiliates use them in some capacity. When aspiring television journalists go to college, they are warned they will almost certainly start their careers – and likely spend a good chunk of them – as one-woman and one-man bands.

Yet no book exists that offers a comprehensive overview of what the job entails, with the insights and authorship of journalists working in the business.

So I wrote one.

I am proud and excited to announce the release of The Solo Video Journalist, available now on Amazon and Barnes & Noble. It is a how-to guide for a position in TV news that is long overdue for such analysis: the multimedia journalist, or MMJ.

(… or backpack journalist, or VJ, or any number of titles bestowed upon this position through the years. I went with “solo video journalist” because I think that term most accurately describes the job: producing video stories and journalism on one’s own.)

I have held this title since I entered the business more than a decade ago, and I have remained astounded at the lack of explicit instruction exists for those who do it. So many, both inside and outside the business, continue to envision newsrooms full of traditional reporters and photographers, neglecting the vital role MMJs have come to play.

The reality is far different.

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PODCAST EPISODE #19: Ted Land, reporter, KING-TV

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When I started in broadcast journalism, I encountered a very vocal school of thought from more experienced colleagues regarding backpack journalists — or, more simply, reporters who shoot and edit their own stories.

I was told repeatedly that the rise of backpack journalism would (A) be a passing fad in larger markets and (B) bring down the quality level of TV news as a whole because (C) backpack journalists could never do as good a job as two- or three-person crews.

More than a decade later, all three of those predictions have proven spectacularly wrong.

For starters, more and more large-market stations are making room for reporters who do it all. Cost is one reason, obviously; one employee is cheaper than two. But stations can get away with that now because the overall quality of backpack journalism has increased dramatically over the last few years. Check out this winter’s award-winning stories in the NPPA’s quarterly solo video competition. They are strong pieces done by more than a dozen backpack journalists.

And at the top of the ladder, the best backpack journalists can produce work every bit as good as that of larger crews.

The latest example? Ted Land.

This month he begins his new job at the prestigious KING-TV in Seattle. But last month, he received a National Edward R. Murrow Award for writing in small-market TV, all thanks to stories he produced at WSBT-TV in South Bend — by himself.

Let me elaborate. The “small-market TV” category covers reporters, both solo and traditional, who work in any television market outside the top 50. In the category of writing, a backpack journalist bested an entire nation of competition.

Land is my latest guest on the Telling The Story podcast. (more…)