The Digital News Test Kitchen

Innovative, experimental news storytelling: A semester wrap-up

Steve Outing — Wed, 22 May 2013 23:08:39 +0000

If you think that there are greater possibilities for presenting a news story than with the traditional forms, then now is a great time to be a journalist with a taste for experimentation and doing things differently. A group of CU-Boulder students spent a semester experimenting with new storytelling tools and techniques. >>>

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Digital ethics: The evolution of cameras in disguise

Daniel Greenwood — Fri, 10 May 2013 20:40:58 +0000

They are small enough to fasten around your ear or wear like glasses and record your surroundings non-stop. Looxcie and Google Glass are two of the more recent innovations that are stripping down cameras to the size of an index finger and smaller. This technological trend has major legal and ethical implications not just for journalists. >>>

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What makes a photograph popular? A rhetorical data-research effort

Steve Outing — Tue, 07 May 2013 22:32:06 +0000

What words or phrases would you use if asked to describe what makes a specific photograph outshine others and is popular with many viewers? A research study by CU-Boulder student Robert Denton, in cooperation with the large and popular online photography community at Pixoto.com, attempted to find some clarity in photographic rhetoric. Check out Denton's research study. >>>

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Social-media data deluge: How to make sense of it (video)

CU JMC — Mon, 22 Apr 2013 19:52:28 +0000

Hundreds of millions of pieces of information and data flow through social-media sites every day. If you know how to analyze it and have the right technology to do so, never-before-available insights become available into what large populations of people do, care about, think, and experience. Data scientist Scott Hendrickson will get you up to speed on social-media data in this workshop video. >>>

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IFTTT: A ‘miracle’ application for journalists

Stephen Kasica — Fri, 05 Apr 2013 04:46:54 +0000

There's an application that I don’t hesitate to call the Holy Grail of the Internet. Behold If This Then That, commonly known as “IFTTT.” It is a web service that creates what programmers call conditional expressions, or recipes; I call them miracles. >>>

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Two powerful interactive infographics

Steve Outing — Tue, 26 Mar 2013 23:05:05 +0000

These two recent stellar interactive infographics, on Pakistan drone deaths and guns deaths following the Sandy Hook Elementary killings, demonstrate that visualizations of data can have a lot power -- no lengthy narrative needed. >>>

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Drones offer new angles on video shoots

Steve Outing — Thu, 21 Mar 2013 21:23:20 +0000

Many journalists are interested in the idea of experimenting with drones (a.k.a., unmanned aerial vehicles or UAVs). Here's an example of how a bit of UAV videography can add to the quality of a video project. >>>

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An intriguing new video technique (with 15 GoPro cameras)

Steve Outing — Thu, 21 Mar 2013 00:40:58 +0000

Formerly expensive video effects now can be coaxed out of low-cost cameras like those from GoPro. Marc Donahue of Permagrin Films has been experimenting with using an array of GoPro Hero2 cameras ($200 each) to create new effects, such as "Matrix"-like bullet-time action sequences. >>>

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Good reading: What makes journalism ‘innovative’

Steve Outing — Tue, 19 Mar 2013 00:49:28 +0000

What makes "innovative" journalism? Mark Briggs, writing for Poynter.org, reflects on the experience of being a judge for a contest that for the first time has a category called "Digital Innovation." Plus, more good reads. >>>

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Map storytelling, visualization tools

Steve Outing — Mon, 18 Mar 2013 23:11:00 +0000

BatchGeo: Create a map Make maps from a list of multiple locations, use addresses, postcodes, or coordinates. Free hosting for your own interactive map locator. via: batchgeo.com GeoCommons Create compelling map visualizations. Easily find answers to complex questions and share them with the world. With increased speed, greater usability, bigger data visualization, and cross browser [...]

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