Avoiding three common mistakes newspapers make in sports videosPosted by Cody Kitaura on June 8th, 2010
Video makes everything better. Just throw a camera at a reporter, crack the whip and you’ll be golden. Right?
As newspapers everywhere are faced with the challenge of being everything at once and covering everything in completely new ways, reporters with little (or perhaps no) training are being handed a video camera and are sent on their way with little more than an encouraging pat on the back. I’m by no means a sports reporter (or a full-time videographer), but I’ve filmed football, basketball, baseball, softball and boxing for our newspaper. Along the way, I’ve made plenty of mistakes. Here are three common pitfalls to avoid when shooting video for a news organization.
1. Showing viewers the most boring part of the game
Unless they’re game-winning shots, nobody cares about free throws. Or extra points. The general consensus with web videos is that the shorter the video, the more people will actually watch it. Usually that means keeping your videos between three and five minutes long. If you film an entire game, you’ll have footage that you want to use, but don’t have time for.
That’s a good thing. That’s how it’s supposed to be. The professors I had for writing classes encouraged me to always be willing to cut from my stories, and the same should be true for video. Don’t show the boring, mundane parts of the game. Edit those out or your viewers won’t stay for the whole video.
2. Only showing the final score
If your goal is to produce a recap of an entire game, it’s important to keep viewers updated on what’s happening at each point in the game. That doesn’t mean Photoshopping up some kind of fancy ESPN-style scoreboard or showing the score for each shot in basketball, but it gets confusing to watch teams trade points back and forth and not know who’s in the lead or how close the game is.
Points to anyone who can tell me what the score is halfway through this game without keeping track on a pad of paper:
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dkojVl6i46U
The final score only tells one part of the story. Videos that are intended to be full-game recaps should either have on-screen scores or a voiceover.
Here’s an example of how the score can be shown during a basketball game. This video is from staffers at the State Hornet, where I once worked (disclosure: this video was produced after I graduated, but I’ve worked with the person who shot and edited this).
Here’s an example of a great voiceover video (with on-screen scores, too) from the Long Beach Post, although I’m not too sure about the “what up” at the beginning or the generic hip-hop in the background.
3. Missing an important play while filming … and then letting it get to you
We’ve all been guilty of this. Unless you have multiple cameras at the game, this is bound to happen sooner or later. The important thing is to not beat yourself up over it. I’ve missed touchdowns and just barely captured a game-winning run at a baseball game – and I still had a job the next week.
Since many people who shoot video for newspapers have little experience doing so, it can seem a daunting task. Don’t let mistakes bother you. You will make mistakes. Don’t let a simple one discourage you from trying more video in the future.
As an example, here’s a baseball video I shot where I completely missed most of the game-winning play (at 1 minute, 46 seconds in).
The video could have been a lot better if I’d been steady and filming the other runner, but I know it’s not a huge deal.
What do you think? What are your pet peeves when watching online sports videos? What are some techniques that have helped you? Comment below.