Hard work and commitment do pay off

Ten months ago, on Jan 1, 2008 I took the rather drastic decision of quitting my secure job at a local newspaper and striking it off as a freelancer, dabbling in multimedia and new media tools.

During this time, I used the internet to learn and develop skills needed in this fascinating arena. I have been following several blogs, spent entire nights viewing hundreds of multimedia work, participated in the Panos South Asia multimedia workshop and most important of all, together with my friend and mentor Alito Siqueria of the Goa University, got a group of enthusiastic young minds together under the name of GoCreat, to conduct Digital Storytelling (DST) workshops in the community - thus sharing our own knowledge in visual literacy.

It appears all of the work is now bearing fruit. I have just got news that GoCreat will receive a small grant for equipment, from the Toyota Foundation. This will enable our group to buy a few laptops, cameras and recorders to do some more work in DST in the community.

At a time when newspapers in the West are going through bad times, I feel fortunate that I have the chance to develop something exciting in New Media.

I started dabbling in multimedia back in Jan 2008. I intend to continue dabbling in 2009 and beyond, perhaps more seriously. After all, with "dabbling" and experimentation alone come fresh breakthroughs.

Pans, Zooms and Giddy Feelings

One of the cardinal rules I learnt from my regular internet resources, (Cyndy Green's VideoJournalism, Angela Grant's News Videographer etc) is this: Do not pan or zoom unless absolutely necessary.

And even if absolutely necessary, keep it to a minimum.

Now I had those instructions in the back of my mind when shooting Simrik, during my trip to Nepal. And the video I came back with, was sequences of wide, medium and close-ups, not a single zoom or pan. There was no requirement for that. After all, I was shooting an artist in his studio - no action to follow.

Then I got back to the editing desk, fired up Premier and inserted some still images to mix with the video footage. That's when the Zoom Devil possessed me and, using Premier's motion keyframe features, I introduced "movement" into the still images of the paintings I shot at Lok's studio.

The end result, while the video sequences were without any camera movement, the stills were moving all over the place! And I didn't even notice anything amiss until I received a critique from Cyndy Green.

Here's what she had to say:

A fascinating subject - one that I enjoyed learning more about. However, as my former mentor, Willie Kee, told me - zoom again and I’ll break all of your fingers. I realize you may have wanted to draw the audience into your subject with the zoom, but it was distracting. Either use a series of shots held longer so we can see the paintings and artists using cuts or slow dissolves - or if you must zoom, make it a barely noticeable zoom.
The story itself was very well produced and very educational.

Looking once again at the video I realised motion on the stills was really distracting and quickly made changes taking Cindy's critique into account.

First, here is the old version:


Simrik: Colours of Poubha from Gasper DSouza on Vimeo.

and now, here is the re-edited version:


Simrik - colours of poubha from Gasper DSouza on Vimeo.

What do you think?

A Mother's Plight

This is the most heart-wrenching pieces "in these times of war and economic crisis" I have seen from the ANP website. I do hope Jocelyn will find justice.



This is what journalism is all about - voice for the voiceless.

UPDATE: Through a grassroots initiative, ANP reports Jocelyn has kept her home - for now. See: http://newsproject.org/videos/159

Glamour of Journalism

Who's really watching anyway?

"We need you to file more glamorous reports. That's what our readers want"

That was the message a journalist friend of mine, Rupa, was given by her bosses at the Times of India. It could be justified, assuming Rupa was reporting from high society Mumbai. But fact is, she specialises in health issues and was reporting on the North East of India - comprising some of the most under-developed states of India, torn by conflicts and a vastly under-reported region in mainstream media.

Rupa has worked in the North East over years and knows the land and its people all too well. But she soon realised she had no space in glamour-driven mainstream media. She quit the ToI, considered one of the biggest newspapers in India and is currently working on a book on the NE region.

I met up with Rupa and a mutual friend and urban researcher, Rahul Srivastava over dinner the other night. Our conversation wound around the shrinking spaces for good journalism in Indian print media.

Newspapers and magazines will seldom accept researched stories on important developmental issues. Even when they they do pay lip service, the pay is a pittance. So, if you are a freelance journalist, in India, looking at dealing with social issues through your writing, you need to look elsewhere for your sustenance.

That is a very dangerous scenario when good journalists are forced to opt out of the system.

Rupa recounts her experience with a group of journalists on a recent field trip in Haiti. The young journos with her couldn't be bothered about the history and background of the land they were reporting from. Nor were they keen on actually meeting the people at the grassroots, she recalls. All they were concerned about was to get "quotes" and "sound bites" from the iNGO reps working in the region to file stories back to their newspapers. That is the level of depth newspapers really expect these days.

For the best and most satisfying writing, Rahul believes in the power of the blog to get your points across. Commercial work is just that - survival money. The real power and pleasure comes from posting to your blog - unedited, unadulterated.

Yes. There's no money there. But given the commercial interests over social concerns in newspapers these days, that is the only way to go. At least for now.

Glamorous?

Panos South Asia: Final Multimedia Presentations

Poubha in Progress

Whew! The past 5 days were really hectic, exciting and went by in a snap.

We began with some overnight research and planning for our multimedia production. I met my subject, Lok Chitrakar to get an idea of the basic flow of the presentation - issues, concerns, future etc. Lok is a traditional Poubha artist, a religious Nepali art form that is losing out to the commercial variety of Thanga. Tourists love the later, without knowing its roots in Poubha.

I shot Lok in his studio and worked with group member Rajesh to record an interview in the local Nepali language. Rajesh edited the interview. The piece needed to be no more than 3 minutes so I editied my video footage to create a coherent piece from the original 20 minute interview and additional studio footage.

Step 3 was to design a web presentation which we worked on overnight. I also thought of adding images of Poubha paintings in a slideshow, set to traditional devotional music for a multimedia production.

Here is the final product uploaded to the Panos website:

Click to view production

And here are presentations from the other groups from the workshop:

Main group page: panosmultimedia.org/

Individual groups:
Group 1: panosmultimedia.org/grp_a_2008/
Group 2: panosmultimedia.org/grp_b_2008/
Group 3: panosmultimedia.org/grp_c_2008/
Group 4: panosmultimedia.org/grp_d_2008/
Note: Although I personally prefer Firefox or non-ie browsers, these pages may need to be viewed through Internet Explorer since the videos are in windows media format. Sorry about that.

After Panos 2008: Challenges for the future

Groups fevourishly to complete the multimedia productions

Even before we knew it, the 9 days of the Panos South Asia multimedia training workshop came to a close and participants are back home in their own countries, each doing their own bit for society. We had media persons, non-governmental organisations from areas of work ranging from environment to human rights coming in from countries as diverse as Afghanistan to Bhutan.

The past 9 days have been exciting, not the least because of the fantastic location with views of the distant snow-capped peaks of the Himalayas. But more importantly, for the people I met and the networks we built across South Asian nations.

On the last day, Kishor Pradha, Deputy Director, Panos South Asia asked participants to now go out and carry out multimedia productions in our own situations, for the development of society. This is something very close to my own heart - using the multiple tools of communication to give voice to those not within mainstream media scanners.

This is also excellent for community media which can add new dimensions to mainstream media resulting in multiple voices and not just those with the power to control. Using the power of the Internet, it has become relatively easy to have multiple voices without having to rely on traditional publishing methods - print, tv or radio.

In this respect, the role of Panos in facilitating such media pluralism in South Asia is crucial for the region. Now that the workshop has come to an end, it is important to use the technology in our areas for the purpose of local development and empowering those with little to no say in the process of society building.

That is the challenge the future holds.