Dr. Paul Martin Lester, Professor
[textbooks] | [grading] | [supplies] | [assignments] | [outline]
Photojournalism Changes Into Visual Reporting
We live in a visually intensive society. Bombarded daily with a steady, unrelenting stream of visual stimulation from all manner of media, we seek understanding from pictures when we are only taught to understand words. We see mediated images more than we read words. Some have warned that if the trend continues, civilization will regress to illiteracy and lawlessness. Other, more optimistic researchers predict that technological advances will merge words and pictures in new ways that will create innovative educational possibilities.
It has been estimated that the average person sees approximately 5,000 mediated messages every day. Computers are cited as the reason for the image explosion. Computers, the software programs that run them, and the publishing networks that present them offer quick and inexpensive remedies for visual artists.
Writers, photographers, and graphic designers have been kept apart by separate production facilities, job descriptions, educational backgrounds, and working class biases. Traditional technology has given editors the excuse to exclude photojournalists from their decisions about story selection, completion, and display. Newspaper photojournalists have unwillingly contributed to their own isolation from newsroom decisions by working in separate spaces-studios and darkrooms-that isolate them from the rest of the newsroom. Although this photographer's club has been comforting as a special place where equally talented personnel can gather, such isolation causes a deepening rift among word and image producers.
Computers are changing everything. The reason is simple-only a photographer can use a photographic enlarger. A computer can be used by everyone for word, picture, and design production. Darkrooms are becoming lightrooms as computers are employed in the newsrooms. Innovative technology is causing a merger between words and images.
As words and pictures become further merged, the role of a writer, photographer, infographics creator, researcher, and graphic designer will become merged into a single title-the visual reporter. This merger of reporters, photographers, and graphic artists in the workplace calls for a new definition and approach. Visual reporting is the marriage of words, images, and designs to convey information.
Journalists must be part of a team. Even before the reporting begins, photographers and graphic designers must be involved in discussions on how a story might be covered. In most cases, they should be involved in the reporting and be encouraged to ask questions. Reporters, on the other hand, must become visually astute. They must be encouraged to collect graphic information at an assignment.
Journalists must not only know how to gather information and write stories and cutlines, but they must also have the confidence to work with pictures and layouts. Consequently, every journalism graduate must know the fundamentals of visual communication-how to sense, select, and perceive a visual message-and how to work a camera, a computer, and the software, how to use database research methods, how to create informational graphics, how to combine words with your stories, and how to make layouts and designs for print and interactive multimedia.
Consequently, there is no required darkroom work. You will shoot all of your photojournalism assignments with color film, digitize your selects with a scanner, and complete your assignments using the computer.
Specifically, you will learn how to use computer software programs to perform traditional darkroom procedures, create print-based picture story layouts, and develop online portfolios and interactive presentations. You will work the entire semester on a single picture story with other students to merge words and pictures in traditional and networked interactive multimedia presentations.
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[]Textbooks:
Recommended: [Photojournalism The Professional Approach] by Ken Kobre
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[]Grading
Twenty-five assignments @ 3% each: 75%
Ten points off each day an assignment is late.
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[]Supplies
A 35mm SLR adjustable aperture, shutter and focus camera with removable lenses, access to a video camcorder, any color negative film of your choice-you will get the film processed, and a 100mg "Zip" drive formatted for the Macintosh & perhaps 5 floppy disks.
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[]Assignments
The schedule below is divided in half with the topic before the slash (/) discussed from 12:00 - 12:50 in the lecture classroom (H-223) and the topic after the slash covered from 1:00 - 1:50 in the lab (H-312). Assignments are in parentheses.
Week 1
Week 2
Week 3
Week 4
Week 5
Week 6
Week 7
Week 8
Week 9
Week 10
Week 11
Week 12
Week 13
Week 14
Week 15
California State University, Fullerton
714/278-5302; [Email] |
[Homepage]
Office: H-324F
Recommended: [Desktop Computing Workbook]by Paul Martin Lester
Recommended: [Visual Communication Images with Messages] by Paul Martin Lester
Mid-Term Exams: 15%
Attendance/Enthusiasm: 10%
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[]Course Outline
assignment 1: [first shoot and scanning]
assignment 2: [photojournalism analyses]
assignment 3: [photojournalism ethics]
assignment 4: [picture story research]
assignment 5: [story lead and outline]
assignment 6: [photoshop 1]
assignment 7: [picture story pictures 1]
assignment 8: [photoshop 2]
assignment 9: [writing cutlines 1]
assignment 10: [picture story pictures 2]
assignment 11: [writing cutlines 2]
assignment 12: [quarkxpress 1]
assignment 13: [quarkxpress 2]
assignment 14: [picture story]
assignment 15: [picture story pictures 3]
assignment 16: [print rough layout]
assignment 17: [print layout 1]
assignment 18: [print layout 2]
assignment 19: [quarkxpress 3]
assignment 20: [world wide web 1]
assignment 21: [world wide web 2]
assignment 22: [online rough layout]
assignment 23: [online format check]
assignment 24: [online video]
assignment 25: [final presentation]
[extra credit opportunity]
Introduction to the course ([1])/Introduction to the lab
Photojournalism history ([2])/Ethics program ([3])
Critique. Assignment 1 Due/Open lab. Assignment 2 Due
Semester assignment ([4]) ([5])/Photoshop 1 ([6])
Picture stories ([7])/Photoshop 2 ([8])
Critique. Assignment 4 Due/Assignment 6 Due
Writing cutlines ([9])/Assignment 8 Due
Critique ([10]). Assignments 7 & 9 Due/Assignment 3 Due
Lighting concerns ([11])/QuarkXPress 1 ([12])
Victims of violence. Assignment 5 Due/QuarkXPress 2 ([13])
Rights of privacy ([14])/Assignment 12 Due
Picture manipulations/Assignment 13 Due
Critique. Assignment 10 Due ([15])/Assignment 11 Due
Stereotypes and persuasion/Assignment 14 Due
[Mid-term exam/Mid-term exam] | [extra credit opportunity]
Design for print ([16]) ([17]) ([18])/QuarkXPress 3 ([19])
Critique. Assignment 15 Due/World wide web 1 ([20])
Critique. Assignment 16 Due/Assignment 19 Due
Feature assignments/ Assignment 20 Due
Critique. Assignment 17 Due/ World wide web 2 ([21])
Sports assignments/Design for online ([22]) ([23]) ([25])
Critique. Assignment 18 Due/Open lab
Using video ([24])/Assignment 22 Due
News assignments/Assignment 23 Due
Extra Credit Discussion/Open lab
Illustration Assignments/Assignment 21 Due
Portfolio Show/Assignment 24 Due
Photojournalism conclusion/Open lab
Assignment 25 Due. Extra Credit Due