Storytelling The Stillmotion Way: Part 1

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npr:

This map shows just-released satellite imagery of the damage from the tornado that struck Moore, Okla., and vicinity on May 20 — one of the most destructive storms ever recorded. Zoom in to see the extent of the damage.

futurejournalismproject:

Why It’s Time to Rethink Web Video Entirely

Producer Adam Westbrook recently built an essay called The Web Video Problem about how cinematic video content is wrong for the web, and that we can and ought to recreate the visual storytelling experience on the web entirely. Toward that end, he’s working on web publishing house (Hot Pursuit).

He writes:

In visual storytelling on the web we are still talking about images in deliberate sequence. We are juxtaposing these images, either over time (in a linear audio/visual way) or in space (like a web comic might).

If we accept this definition of visual storytelling (in the purest sense) then it doesn’t matter if it’s video, a web comic or even an animated GIF - or a combination of all these and more.

Combine this with the growing capabilities of the web browser, and the connectedness of the internet, and potentially we have the ability to tell dynamic, visual stories in a way that hasn’t been done before.

This excites me very much.

The essay is nicely built and designed with bold, scrolling visuals (using the curtain jquery plug-in, which yes, is very popular these days and can be downloaded here for your own building pleasure) so that you can choose to read the whole thing or just get the highlights. It’s worth checking out. 

Bonus: He provides some great resources on visual storytelling:

A good briefing on the principles of visual storytelling are featured in the second issue of Inside the Story Magazine, available here. If you don’t want to pay for the whole thing, this free articlecovers a lot of the same ground. Scott McCloud’s comic book on comic books is an essential read for visual storytellers. Craig Mod’s essay on Subcompact Publishing informed some of the ideas about thinking web-natively, as did this article by John Pavlus and this piece by Bryan Goldberg. Finally, Steven Benedict’sanalysis of Spielberg’s cinematic storytelling skills demonstrate what visual narrative can acheive, and let Steven Soderbergh tell you why this new thing shouldn’t become like the movie business.

Image: Screenshot from The Web Video Problem

shortcutsradio:

“I wonder, though, if their reactions would be the same if it was pre-internet, pre-social media, pre-ubiquitous surveillance cameras? Are we so used to broadcasting our lives on the internet and being spied on that what I did seems normal? I don’t know.

But what I do know from my experience is that when I was recording - I did it routinely for three years, and another two years on and off - I wasn’t myself. I was so conscious of how I sounded that I became someone else. I was hyper-aware of my own voice. I spoke less. When I did speak, I had this idea in my head that I was a documentarian. I tried to sound important. Sometimes I would “get personal”, when no-one else was around, and narrate my life like it was a diary entry. You can imagine how fun that is to listen to.”

shortcutsradio:

“I died when I was two…”

Beautiful audio-driven film by Alan Spearman (via Third Coast International Audio Festival)

Chris Dean’s heart stopped when he was two. He died but he came back. When Chris was five, his father was murdered, riddled by more than 20 bullets in a gang shootout. At age 18, Chris gained national attention when he introduced President Barack Obama at his high school graduation. Chris is an observer and philosopher who has always had a few things to say about life from his vantage point in South Memphis. He and Emmy-Award winning filmmaker Alan Spearman walked the neighborhood for eight weeks observing and recording what became the script of As I Am. This film floats through this remarkable young man’s landscape, revealing the lives that have shaped his world. Poetic and powerful imagery, captured by Spearman and cinematographer Mark Adams, combines with the young philosopher’s trenchant observations about life.

blutspur:

Radio Stations by Cassia Beck

alirussell:

JAILED IN THE UAE
Australian woman Alicia Gali was on a working holiday at a five star resort in the UAE when her drink was spiked and she was gang-raped by three of her co-workers. When she reported the incident to police, she was charged with sex outside marriage and jailed for 8 months. In this three month investigation spanning five countries, Alicia speaks for the first time on television about her terrifying ordeal and the laws all Australian travellers need to know about.

Produced for Channel 7’s Sunday Night. Watch it here.

For more information about human rights in the UAE, visit Human Rights Watch.

fer1972:

Know where you stand: Modern Day Locations blended with Major Historical Events by Seth Taras 

1. The Hindenberg Disaster of May 6, 1937 

2. Allied soldiers rushing the beach at Normandy in June 1944

3. The Fall of the Berlin wall in 1989

4. Adolf Hitler touring Paris and standing in front of the Eiffel Tower in 1940

instagram:

Photojournalists Sharing the World through Instagram

Photojournalists from around the globe have begun using Instagram as an important part of their storytelling, using the intimacy and immediacy of mobile photography to open up new avenues of engagement with their audiences.

From Hurricane Sandy’s destruction to baseball’s opening season, photojournalists are capturing and sharing the world’s stories with people in real time through Instagram.

To tune into the news as it unfolds, be sure to follow these photojournalists:

• Michael Christopher Brown, documents life in Congolese refugee camps — @michaelchristopherbrown
• Ben Lowy, a conflict and feature photographer based in New York City — @benlowy
• Phil Moore, a British photojournalist based in East Africa — @philmoorephoto
• Kevin Frayer, the chief photographer for the Associated Press in South Asia — @kevinfrayer
• Ivan Kashinsky, a freelance photographer based in Quito, Ecuador — @ivankphoto
• Michael Yamashita, a documentary photographer for National Geographic specializing in Asia — @yamashitaphoto

Reuters app #thewiderimage is fantastic!

politics-war:

A portrait by Andrea Gjestvang, named Photographer of the Year in the 2013 Sony World Photography Awards. The photograph comes from a project called “One day in history” Portraits of children and youths who survived the massacre on the island of Utoeya outside Oslo (NO) on 22nd of July 2011. “I bear my scars with dignity, because I got them standing for something I believe in,” says Ylva Schwenke (15). Ylva from Tromso, hid by a path called “The love path”. She was shot in the shoulder, her stomach and in both of her thighs.

Andrea Gjestvang/2013 Sony World Photography Awards)

futurejournalismproject:

Sony 2013 World Photography Winners

Top: Jens Juul, winner, Professional Portraiture, for Six Degress of Copenhagen.

Left: Andrea Gjestvang, Grand Prize winner, for One Day in History, portraits of survivors of the 2011 massacre in Utoeya, Norway.

Right: Valerio Bispuri, winner, Contemporary Issues, for Prisons of South America.

Select any to embiggen.

Winners across all categories along with photo galleries of their can be viewed at the World Photography Organization’s web site.

instagram:

Chernobyl, 27 Years Later

For more photos from Chernobyl, check out the Chernobyl and Pripyat (Припять) location pages, or search for photos tagged with #Pripyat, #Припять, #Chernobyl and #Чернобыль.

On this day 27 years ago, an explosion at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant near the city of Pripyat, Ukraine, killed dozens of people and released a plume of radioactive fallout that would eventually require the relocation of more than 350,000 people.

The event ranks as the worst nuclear disaster in history. The area immediately surrounding Chernobyl is still too radioactive for habitation and will remain so for another 20,000 years. Until recently, an exclusion zone of 19 miles (30 km) extended in all directions from the power plant, which is now entombed in concrete. In 2011, however, Ukraine opened up this area to tourists, giving the world a peek into a town abandoned and untouched for nearly three decades.

likeafieldmouse:

Alejandro Cartagena - The Car Poolers (2012)

“A bridge is situated on a highway that goes from the Mexican city of Nuevo Laredo — across the United States border in Laredo, Texas — due south to Monterrey. In the winter early-morning hours, Cartagena stood there, pointing his lens down at the passing cars, like a distracted spy.

He was peeking into the backs of the pickup trucks, where construction workers pile together on their way to earn an honest living. Car Poolers is an effort to peer inside these tiny worlds that straddle public and private.”

drewvigal:

I Love Your Work : Teaser (by Jonathan Harris)

‘I Love Your Work’ is an interactive documentary about the private lives of nine women who make lesbian porn. The project is less about porn, and more about nine different women navigating the complexities of life, youth, fame, privacy, gender, and sexuality in America today.

More interactive work from Jonathan Harris (@jjhnumber27) with an interesting distribution and funding twist. More at I Love Your Work.

awkwardsituationist:

besprizorniki (“the neglected ones”): yana’s story, by david gillanders

i want to thank fotojournalismus, who was kind and smart enough to track this down for me.

instagram:

@Ravivora’s “An Instagram Generation”

Want to host your own InstaMeet or photowalk? Be sure to check out our blog post with tips on how to organize and throw a great event.

On April 13, @projectlife365, @christianflorin, @alexanderpavone and @mattbg held an InstaMeet at the Santa Monica pier in Los Angeles, California. 115 people turned out for the event, and one of them, @ravivora, decided to put together a film about the day and what happens when the Instagram community comes together. Check out his short film, “An Instagram Generation,” above and browse more photos from the InstaMeet under the #santamonica0413 hashtag.

Read more about this short documentary on Ravi’s website.

Instagram love!