BFC announces workshop in Germany

For our German readers, we will be doing a workshop in Hamburg, Germany at the Akademie für Publizistik on March 30th to April 1st 2010. During three labour intensive days we will teach how to stitch together a professional multimedia narrative.

More information right here

Canon and Vimeo contest

Vincent La Foret is the man behind a nationwide (US) contest that kicks off on January 7th.


The Story Beyond the Still - Behind The Scenes from Vincent Laforet on Vimeo.


BFC whishes everyone out there a very happy New Year and a prosperous and exciting 2010 !

CODE OF ETHICS - PART THREE
A take on a set of rules for online storytellers

When the first camera phones came out onto the streets, the monopoly of (photo)journalists on providing news truly ended. From that moment on, news came from whoever published it. From blogs, personal websites, foras - everywhere!
But nobody ever expected fairness from a citizen journalist, did they? Nope, because a different set of rules applied to those guys. For us (professional photojournalists), it's an entirely different matter. Credibility is everything. No more, no less.

So here it is: Our first take on where to draw the line, a probable Code of Multimedia Ethics (feel free to chip in - we'd like this to become a collective effort and an industry standard - or at least a topic of discussion):

As a general rule, web documentaries are divided into a "News" category or a "Feature" category. For both categories bullets 1) - 3) apply. The differences appear once we talk sound.

1) Subjects depicted in a web documentary, should be represented in fairness whether they’re presented in stills, video or audio;

2) Photography used in a web documentary should be a fair and accurate representation of what went on in front of the camera at the time of exposure (stills- or video).

3) Audio should reflect the given situation at the time of recording accurately and with fairness.

4) Audio used for a "News" documentary, should ideally be as close to the depicted reality as possible. The use of music is allowed.

5) Audio used for a "Feature" documentary can incorporate third party products such as foley sounds, re-enactments and music to enhance the overall goal of telling a story.

CODE OF ETHICS - PART TWO

"-if they aren't doing it, don't make them".

Jeanie Adams-Schmidt, ass. professor/Western Kentucky University

Multimedia is slowly finding it's legs in the post-recession economy and slowly a set of undefined ethics seems to surface. Nevertheless we still need to come to terms with what we're actually dealing with.

As mentioned in an old post on this roll, multimedia is not video, it's not radio, it's not print - it's all that and a lot more. It's open to what the story needs, not a given timeframe within a TV slot for instance.

But here's the catch: is it journalism?

This is where the quagmire is and this is where the waters divide. Talk to Stan Alost at Ohio U's School of Visual Communication and we here at BFC are all out of buisness: "If a journalist holds true to accurate and inclusive reporting, then such issues as (...) music used to create emotion (...) become moot. Conversely (..) the resulting content is entertainment and not journalism".

Well, there goes The Afghan Diaries, Wasteland and almost everything we've done so far. And most longer format documentaries on any platform for that matter. So I have to say Stan: I don't agree!

What I do agree with is the need for accurate, fair and non-biased reporting no matter the platform. Last years POY in Denmark spawned a remarkable debate worldwide when three photographers raw files was called in for 'inspection' by the jury and later on excluded from the competition for not being true to reality.

For our part here at BFC, the codec adapted towards multimedia have so far been more or less based on the same principle than that of the danish POY: "Pictures submitted to POY should be a fair and reliable representation of what happend in front of the camera at the time of exposure".

If you extrapolate that to multimedia this means that the subjects given voice should be given a fair and reliable representation within the context of the web doc, you're producing.

I'd call that journalism any day.

Quotes from Jeanie Adams-Schmidt and Stan Alots: Newsphotographer, september 2009

Observatorium online!

It's been some hectic weeks for Bombay Flying Club, flash developer Michael Vestergaard and De Volkskrant photo editors Frank Schallmaier&Geerit-Jan van Ek. But now we are finally ready and happy to present De Volkskrant's first ever online Observatorium multimedia site. Maybe that is why they chose the overall theme to be - The First Time!

In short: Bombay Flying Club was commissioned to do this project in two weeks only. Our mission was to produce and create 7 smaller multimedia stories out of photographic material gathered and provided by De Volkskrant photographers/editors. 

We hooked up with flash developer Michael Vestergaard and he has been completely in charge of the graphic design, programming and website functionality.

The website is financed by the Dutch Fonds BKVB and is in Dutch only. It's sponsored and supported by Canon.

The multimedia site contains a feature showcasing some 5600 images(!) 

The idea here is to show the daily image flow that passes through the picture desk. Each image can of course be clicked on and then seen with a caption.

This website shows what a professional and ambitious newspaper can do if they are open for ideas and open to embrace and experiment with new media technology. 

Why don't you go look and check it out yourself. The site is in Dutch but it is fairly easy to navigate and the "Prison story" featured is in English (subtitled in Dutch).

IT'S THAT TIME OF THE YEAR - CODE OF MM ETHICS, PART ONE

Award season is approaching - did you behave yourselves?

It's the seasons finale and it's time to polish off your images and web doc's and submit them for the (inter)national contests that sprout every year in December/january.

A code of ethics in photojournalism in the age of Digital has evolved and crack downs happens as documented in this list, courtesy of 10,000 words.

But what about ethics in multimedia?

If we assume that the photos adhere to NPPA's code of ethics for instance, then what about the sound? What can we expect of sound provided for a web doc?

Is canned sound OK? Is it OK to recreate, re-enact sound bites? Foley sounds?

NPPA's key word in this, is 'Misrepresenting'. So in other words, if you make use of canned sound because you don't want those camera clicks in your sound files, it's all fine that the sound of the rain on the roof is recorded perhaps in Bangladesh even though your story is from a normal rainy day in Copenhagen?

I can think of several guys in NPR who'd have a say or two in the matter...!

Working with sound in web documentaries is essential on par with the photography it self. And so is the ethics involved. It is therefore a new battleground for online documentarists and it is not to be taken lightly.

To stay with the NPR, they write the following:

"- or by manipulating audio in a way that distorts its meaning, how it was obtained or when it was obtained".

In the end it's still all about your credibility and your limits. So how did you behave?

De Volkskrant Observatorium 2009

Our big multimedia project for the Dutch paper De Volkskrant will be online very, very soon. It is in Dutch only but hopefully it can give any viewer out there an idea of how Flash can be used to present online photojournalism in a cool and compelling way. Stay tuned!