Module 63

Updated: 12/09/2008

Part  I I

News and

Documentary Production

 ENG Personnel

The number and type of positions involved in producing a daily newscast will vary from two or three people in a very small station to more than 100 in Toronto, New York, Los Angeles, or Tokyo.

Although responsibilities and titles can vary among stations, generally the news producer is the person who is directly in charge of the newscast.

He or she makes the major minute-by-minute decisions on both the technical and content aspects of the newscast.

Larger stations have segment producers in charge of specific stories or newscast segments. Some stations will have an executive producer who is over the producer(s).

Two types of directors are involved in putting the newscast on the air. The news director is the top person in the News Department. This person controls the budget, hires and fires personnel, and has ultimate responsibility for the station's news.

Much further down the chain of responsibility is the on-air director for the newscast. This person's responsibility is to take the plans of the producer and "call the shots" in the on-air phase of the broadcast.

As the title suggests, the ENG coordinator starts with the story assignments made by the assignment editor and works with reporters, ENG crews, editors, technicians, and the producer to see that the stories make it to "air."

ENG coordinators must not only thoroughly know their studio and location equipment, but also understand news, which brings us to...

Uncovering Truth

Ultimately, the job of the journalist  — especially the investigative journalist  — is to uncover the truth about situations and explain that truth to an audience in a clear and succinct manner.

Even when there seems to be a major injustice involved, it's not the responsibility of the reporter to be an advocate of a particular viewpoint, only to bring all of the related facts to the public's attention.

In the case of complex stories and situations, this does not exclude the necessary interpretation of the facts.

In mid-2002 two major stories were reported in the U.S. press: the molestation of hundreds of children by clergy and the largest corporate bankruptcy in U.S. history. In both cases the incriminating facts had been successfully hidden from the public as the situations continued to get progressively worse.

Had the truth been uncovered and publicized earlier, something could have been done to head off the pain and suffering that a great many people had to subsequently endure.

This includes the many additional children who were molested and the scores of people who lost all of their retirement funds while some corporate executives pocketed millions of dollars.

In both cases it was the journalist's job to uncover the facts that people were rather successfully hiding and bring these facts to the public's attention; in other words, to fulfill their role as "the watchdogs of a democratic society." Generally, public exposure is all that is needed to initiate corrective action. 

Video Journalists (VJs)

Today, we commonly see "one-man bands" in the covering of television  news; i.e., one person doing everything: camera operator, reporter, sound person, and editor.

In case you are wondering what the term "one-man band" refers to, it originally referred to a man who played multiple musical instruments at the same time. In the case of the person on the left, however, we have a one-woman band.

A slightly more modern interpretation is when an on-camera reporter shoots the basic story, then sets up a camera on a tripod, focuses on a mark on the ground, tilts the camera up to his or her height and locks it, puts on a mic and checks the audio, rolls the recorder, and then standing on the mark delivers the opening and closing to the piece.

Once back at the studio, the same person edits the piece and does the voice-over narration.

This has led to the term, video journalist (VJ), a single field reporter who writes, reports, shoots and edits stories.

It's not easy, but it saves hiring extra people. Thus, it's more important than ever to understand the entire production and news process.

Covering News vs. Making News

Scientists say that when you observe an event you in some way change it. Leaving the esoteric concepts of theoretical physics aside, we know that the presence of news reporters and cameras not only changes events, but it can even create news. An example of how this can take place happened one quiet morning in this writer's professional career.

Reporter's Checklist

Broadcast news is a highly competitive business and in the rush to get a story on the air it's sometimes tempting to guess at facts or use information from a questionable source.

However, errors in stories not only damage a station's credibility but they can derail a reporter's professional future. Here are five points to keep in mind when writing news stories.

1. Question those who claim to be a witness to an event and confirm that they really were in a position to see what happened. See the blog, "When Everybody Gets It Wrong."

2. Use a second source to double-check information that seems surprising or may be in doubt.

3. Double-check all names, titles, and places, and, when necessary, write out the pronunciation of names phonetically.

4. When writing the story, carefully check the grammar; do the math on numbers. If a telephone number or address is involved, make very sure they are accurate.

5. Make sure that sound bites selected during editing accurately reflect what the person being interviewed meant.

News Producer's Checklist

Once reporters turn in their stories and a news producer or director takes over, many decisions must still be made before the stories are ready for broadcast.

Among other things, the stories must be reviewed for balance, lead-ins (story introductions) must be written, and appropriate graphics must be prepared to support the stories.

You may recall that in Module 55 we discussed some important considerations in editing news pieces.

News Bias

Conservatives think that TV news has a liberal bias and liberals feel that news has a conservative bias. Being a human endeavor, total objectively in news is impossible, of course.  When you analyze bias complaints you are apt to conclude that bias is defined as "any view that differs from mine."

Although the media is often seen as having a liberal bias, it has been shown that most of the large broadcast operations are owned or managed by individuals who, almost without exception, hold views that are politically and socially to the right of center.

Bias can stem just as much from what TV news reports as what it doesn't report.

When it comes to politics, some individuals go to great effort goes into trying to keep certain things from being known. For example, it has been documented that many embarrassing government documents that have nothing to do with national security are marked "classified" simply to keep the information from the public.

To help address this issue The Freedom of Information Act (FOA) was passed that allows citizens and reporters access to some government documents.

However, not only is the process of obtaining documents fraught with red tape and delays, but key information is often blacked out, and in 2008 two-thirds of the requests were refused.

The question is, are the words of Patrick Henry, the prominent figure in the American Revolution (remembered for his "Give me Liberty, or give me Death!" speech) still valid:

Various independent agencies monitor the media for bias.  An excellent weekly program that examines all of the news outlets from the standpoint of possible bias and problematic reporting is Reliable Sources, broadcast Sunday mornings on CNN.

At Times, A Dangerous Profession

In the United States, as elsewhere, reporters have been killed before their stories could be aired. Numerous books and articles document this.

According to the Committee to Protect Journalists, between 1992 and 2001, 399 journalists were killed "because of their work." By 2007, more than 100 journalists had been killed in the Iraq and Afghanistan wars. In the last decade years more than 1,000 journalists have been killed around the world.

The 2007 film, A Mighty Heart, starring Angelina Jolie, dramatically tells the story of one such journalist: Daniel Pearl. The film, which is based on a book by Pear's wife, who is an award-winning documentary director, has been called, "one of the most captivating and terrifying stories of our times."

Suffice it to say, investigating and breaking important stories often carries a degree of professional and personal risk. At the same time, this is the way awards are won and professional careers are advanced — and, far more importantly, wrongs are rectified and needed social change is instituted.

And, finally, those who feel that covering wars from the battlefield is a man's job need to consider the story of Lara Logan, one of today's most successful foreign correspondents.

• Journalism.org - A comprehensive site of tools and information for journalists.
• State of the Media - A comprehensive analysis of media today.
• RTNDA, The Radio Television News Directors Association, the leading organization for broadcast news.
• The United Nations News Center - critical updates on developments around the world.
• The RTNDA Code of Ethics.
• RTNDA Guidelines for covering news events