Before I joined the BBC the one news programme that I would always try and catch was the World at One on BBC Radio 4. It had in Nick Clarke the best news presenter and in Kevin Marsh the best Editor. Kevin went on to take charge of the Today Programe, arguably Britain’s most important current affairs programme and sadly Nick Clarke died of cancer in November 2006. The BBC lost one its great broadcasters.
Kevin is now Editor of the BBC’s College of journalism. He writes one of the best blogs about journalism both on the BBC website and off it.
You can imagine then how chuffed duckrabbit was that he used our recent talk at DIGITAL STORYTELLING ’10 to examine just how kick ass audio slideshows can be. I don’t think anyone has quite so successfully nailed why they offer something different to video, and why the still photograph can never be replaced by the moving image as a tool for making people think. They both work in such different ways. Kevin has kindly allowed duckrabbit to republish the post.
Of all the sessions at Digital Storytelling ’10 – an event in London on 19 March (co-organised by the College) – that is/was about … well, digital storytelling, the one presented by Benjamin Chesterton of duckrabbit in praise of the audio slideshow was a stand-out.
Duckrabbit is a production team that focuses on journalism and advocacy touching, mostly, development and human rights issues … it also does stuff that is just, well, beautiful. And one of their most effective tools is the audio documentary illustrated by – usually very high quality – still images. The audio slideshow.
As Benjamin Chesterton said, it’s both a new language and a very old one – and it’s one that’s much better developed in the US and amongst non-broadcasters than it is here in the UK and in (former) broadcasting organisations. Take a look at Interactive Narratives for some recent good, and bad, examples.
The audio slideshow suffers from a default perception that it’s neither one thing nor the other; something less than video while tainting the purity of audio. One questioner at the conference put it succinctly: “Why would you choose a slideshow when you could use video?”
Benjamin Chesterton’s response: with moving video, the viewers eye is centred – broadly, locked to the framing of the video camera. With still images, the eye roams. It stops and moves and stops and moves. Frozen gestures and expressions kick off a cognitive process – thinking – that moving images simply never do.
Something similar is true of good audio. The best audio blends reportage (‘being me, being here’) with the kind of aural cues that make audiences think and wander off down their own pathways while still engaging with the sound.
Put the two together – great audio documentary and great still images – and you have something that is potentially MORE than great storytelling.
“Most storytellers want to get people to think” was a striking line from this session. Would that it were true … true about journalism, at least. You’d need to add the phrase ‘… like them’ to apply it to much modern journalism.
The point about audio slideshows is that they’re not storytelling – at least, not in the conventional journalistic sense. You can, of course, build a traditional story in audio and images … but why waste what you have?
Take one of duckrabbit’s pieces of work with Medecins sans Frontieres, Condition Critical – a suite of shows beginning with Francoise’s Story. This, and the other stories in the suite, don’t so much include excluded voices (actually, traditional journalism is much better at that than its critics allege) as lift those voices out of the constraints of formal storytelling, the straitjacket of a single beginning, middle and end; an external, journalist-imposed conclusion.
You, the viewer/listener bring your own narrative arc – or none at all – to the audio in the same way as, and at the same time as, your eyes roam the images. It is engaging and involving – and very, very personal. We will all see and hear something in the shows that no-one else will.
The antithesis of the story – and all the better for that.
I’ve just finished a really inspiring two day training at the Open College of Arts. They want to use audio slideshows to illustrate good work to their students. What’s incredible is that two days after the training finished they’ve got their first audio slideshow online!
This is what Gareth Dent, Chief Executive of the College had to say about the training:
“It may seem fanciful to suggest that one can learn multimedia story telling in just a couple of days, but Duckrabbit gave us everything we needed from skills in interviewing and audio editing to image selection techniques in that short time. And did in such a way that left us with a passion to develop further. A transformative experience.”
Textiles tutor Pat Hodson talks about The Herbal Notebook, its genesis and the methods used and why. Or rather, how the why sometimes escapes articulation.
Condition Critical is a groundbreaking digital campaign by Medecins Sans Frontieres to raise awareness about the conflict in Eastern Congo.
‘The last chapter of Condition: Critical featured stories directly from Congo – just their voices and photos to accompany them. It proved to be the strongest part of the whole campaign and the engagement that people felt having watched them was amazing (as you can see from the message map). Unsurprisingly, people within the organisation are suddenly keen to learn more from duckrabbit about how to produce this kind of multimedia, to better make our patients voices heard.’ Pete Masters, Web Editor, MSF
Duckrabbit has played a dual role in the campaign. Firstly we trained members of the MSF communications team to gather audio and photography and secondly we then used the materials to produce the four films featured in the final surge of the campaign.
The results have been remarkable:
The website had 350000 visits between November 2009 and March 2010.
60% per cent of people who start to watch a video on the website, watch it all the way through to the end.
Over 10000 people have visited the website as a result of links to it from Facebook, blogs like The Travel Photographer and other influential websites.
Over 2500 people have left messages of support on the website.
The videos were screened for two days in a shopping centre in Belgium, reaching thousands more people
We’re particularly proud of this project because it demonstrates both that duckrabbit’s training is effective and that well produced audio slideshows can be more powerful than video. It’s especially important that the videos tell the stories of the people featured in their own voices.
‘I’ve appreciated your strong commitment to the project; your perseverance, hard work, and integrity; and above all your grasp of the reality of DRC and how to tell these stories in way that is compelling, dignified and at the same time raw and honest. Thank you.‘Jake Wadland, Condition Critical Coordinator
Since we completed the project MSF have contracted us to train all of their UK communications team.
‘Before doing this training I felt I could have a decent stab at recording audio in the Congo. I now know that it would have taken some sort of miracle for me to get really useful audio. I now have the tools to come back with something a bit special. Thank you.’Robin Meldrum, Publications Officer MSF
MSF UK now not only have the ability to produce multimedia for their own websites but also to offer the work for publication on some of the world’s biggest websites. Remarkably audio slideshows they have produced have been published on the BBC, The Guardian and The New York Times’ website.
‘Many people at MSF believe this is a breakthrough in getting the stories out there, for a bigger audience.’ Bruno Du Cock, MSF Picture Editor
We recommend that you take time to experience the videos and the messages left by viewers on the Condition Critical website here. Alternatively you can watch them embedded below:
We hope you enjoy this portrait of the world famous Carters Steam Fair. If you would like to purchase a very collectible print of any of the photographs please email david@duckrabbit.info
The World famous Carters Steam Fair is a thing of wonder.
Click on the image to open the video and then click again to watch OUT OF THE BOX:
In 2008 duckrabbit was commissioned to make a piece about Riverford, the Uk’s biggest veg box grower.
Benjamin first met Guy Watson, owner of Riverford, back when he was producing documentaries for Radio 4. Guy is the dream person to interview because he’s passionate, eloquent and quite frequently controversial.
All the photos and audio for this piece were recorded in one day, which shows duckrabbit’s ability to work fast without compromising quality.
