DEADLINE: 12 NOON, WEDNESDAY, MARCH 11

ASSIGNMENT: You will divide up in groups of up tp three people to complete one audio-visual Soundslides project, telling a story through pictures and sound. The subject should be some issue or event related to Hong Kong’s heritage. (Examples of professional and student soundslides projects below.) For audio can use narration or interviews, or a combination – it’s up to your team to decide what works best for the subject.

The Soundslide project will be no more than THREE MINUTES long

The project will be evaluated based on the following criteria:

  • journalistic merit
  • coherence of storytelling
  • quality of photos (understanding limits on equipment)
  • quality of audio recording (with existing equipment)
  • quality of audio editing
  • how well the pictures and audio fit together
  • meaningful, appropriate, and accurate use of captions
  • attention to detail (avoidance of spelling mistakes and choppy editing)

EXAMPLES OF SOUNDSLIDES STORYTELLING:

Some good professional examples (courtesy of Mindy McAdams):

  • Guitar Lessons at the Central Area Senior Center: An 81-year-old Seattle woman loves taking guitar lessons. No narration, nice story, several interviews skillfully edited together.
  • Cockfighting in Puerto Rico: Awesome photos, wonderful audio that puts you at the scene.
  • Nutcracker: A fresh photojournalism grad tells us the story of a production of the Nutcracker ballet. She produced this while on an internship at The Gainesville (Fla.) Sun. Notice the variety in shots, scenes, lenses, etc. Notice too the excellent editing of the pictures to match the content of the audio. (Update, Jan. 29, 2008: Sorry, but the newspaper has apparently moved or removed this Soundslides. You can see the original photo story on the photographer’s bog here.)
  • After the Riots: A Soundslides about the housing projects in Paris, by the British newspaper The Guardian. Exceptional storytelling and great use of sound.

JMSC student examples from Spring 2008: