Old friends help teach new media
*Updates: more videos by Joel Graff
Joel Graff, formerly a videographer at the Sun-Sentinel, is the new chief videographer for Florida Today.
Graff is a veteran of video. He taught me a lot of things about journalism–specifically about being a videographer.
Graff owned his own video media company before working at the Sun-Sentinel. While at the Sun-Sentinel he was the co-director of video, though that was not his official title.
While with Graff he told me what he thought was both a step forward and a step backward in bringing video to readers through the Internet. He explained that the more reporters and print journalists that they gave cameras to, the less video he himself got to shoot. Graff’s skills that ranged from reporting, to videography, to digital editing, were stifled. As one of the only video editors, he was forced to edit the video taken by print journalists in their reporting endeavors instead of taking his own video.
Graff was presumably against the idea of the “backpack” journalist. He felt videos needed to be taken by videographers and pictures by photographers.
He was often heard saying, “I’m stuck trying to make chicken soup out of chicken crap,” when referring to having to edit video that he considered to be sub-par due to lack of proper training.
We’ll soon see how different the move from a TribInc. paper to a Gannet paper is. As for Graff, his skills will surely complement the young staff in Melbourne, Fla.
Here are some of the latest videos I could find that Graff had a hand in:
