Best of Photojournalism 2009: Video News Photography: Winners

Clips from the Video News Photography and Editing winners in the Best of Photojournalism 2009 are now viewable at Poynter Online.

Chat with Al Tompkins and the BOP TV judges — live each day at 12:00 EST. Ask the judges questions and hear what they love and have learned from the entries they have seen each day.

News Feature Finalists

(In Alphabetical Order)

“Bury That Old Man With His Roller Skates”
George Taylor, KWCH/Wichita
“Faces of the Southside”
Doug Burgess, WFAA/Dallas
“From Barney to Barry”
Corky Scholl, KUSA/Denver
“Hard Act to Follow”
Steve Rhodes, WTHR/Indianapolis
“Reflect on America”
Darren Durlach, WBFF/Baltimore
“Steven Seagull”
Andy Shilts, KMSP/Minneapolis
“Tea Time”
Steve Rhodes, WTHR/Indianapolis
“What the Duck?!?”
Jonathan Malat, KARE/Minneapolis

News Feature Winners

1st
“Tea Time”
Steve Rhodes, WTHR/Indianapolis
2nd
“From Barney to Barry”
Corky Scholl, KUSA/Denver
3rd
“What the Duck?!?”
Jonathan Malat, KARE/Minneapolis
HM
“Reflect on America”
Darren Durlach, WBFF/Baltimore
HM
“Steven Seagull”
Andy Shilts, KMSP/Minneapolis

Judges’ Comments

Terry Bulger

“Tea Time” was impeccable from all technical components of a story....well done and beautiful, and it also connected with the judges because it told a story revealing something none of us expected.

“Barney and Barry”- rarely does a tv news story make you laugh out loud, this one did. The set up was terrific and the noise shots letting people make the sounds was nice, I just loved the way the story unfolded, and the little clips of sound from the judge even kept the courtroom from being boring.Great reaction...all very real and telling...photography didn’t need to be overly done or stunning, but it was solid well-lit and didn’t attempt to overpower the story being told.

“What the Duck?!”- You’ve got a good slug to start with on this one, and the storytellers here did not mess it up. Well shot, well structured, well written.

“Reflect on America”--- If it was about skill and beauty this is your winner, but it was more theme than story, and more deserving of Honorable Mention.

Scott Jensen

It always comes down to the old question: should we value substance over style? In this case style won out because the production value of Tea Time is so far above the others it has to be recognized with a first. And at the same time the story is strong. It’s arguably not as strong as some of the others, but strong enough. Good moments. Great pacing. Fantastic imagery. “From Barney to Barry” narrowly beat out “What the Duck?!” because judges felt the Barney story was more difficult to flush out. I feel Duck is a better story. I wanted it second. “Reflect on America” is an incredible piece of video production. We dropped it to honorable mention because it’s largely manufactured. I feel we should first consider journalism captured naturally in the moment; not journalism recorded in controlled setting. News Feature is the best category we’ve seen so far.

Jon Knorr

This was the hardest category to judge. We argued constantly over whether one style had merit over another style. Whether great writing was more important than great editing. “Tea Time: was the obvious winner to me. It had great moments and a great surprise. The setting of the story definitely was an asset to the story. “Reflect on America” was a fantastic way to turn a story that was basically a bunch of MOS’s.

Production values on those two stories were tremendous. “From Barry to Barney” took what could have been a boring sentencing and turn it into a visually appealing story. What the duck had a great subject with great moments. All the stories were capable of winning this category. It’s good to see that there are still great feature stories being told.

Shane McEachern

All I can say for this category is “wow!” It was nice to see so many features coming and coming and they were all very good. In a day and age when “feature” is a dirty word in some newsrooms, it is nice to know they are still being put together somewhere out there.

It was a toss up between 1st and second. 1st place was nice for production values and storytelling, 2nd place was good on storytelling and excellent shooting. I preferred “Barney to Barry” because of its subject matter and it was a good read from beginning to end... ”Tea Time” was also quite impressive with some clever shooting, editing, and attention to detail in both quality of story and photography...

The rest were a toss up, with “What the Duck?”, “Steven Seagull”, and “Reflect on America” neck and neck in the running for 3, 4, and HM. ”Reflect” was impeccably shot, edited, and visualized, with each shot something to be framed on your wall. It just didn’t have the story the others did so it lost favor in the running.

Duck was a great feature, Seagull as well. Both were fantastic representations of what NPPA is all about, quality storytelling, shooting, editing and so forth.

Tom Sharkey

This was a tough one. Tea time was the total package: well shot, well edited with a surprise twist and a good story. There were two well shot and well executed pieces in this category, the other being Reflections on America. Reflections was a theme story which was carried throughout the piece. great Photography and great editing, but when you get down to the heart of it there was no story. It was basically a souped-up MOS. But boy, was it done well. Unfortunately that’s why it landed an HM. “Barry to Barney” was an imperfect piece which should have been faster paced, especially when the music started in the second half. But this one was a page turner, with surprise after surprise. This could have been just a regular pedestrian piece, but they took this ordinary story and elevated to something special.

The last two were coincidentally bird stories, both were done well but the duck story kept moving and was an example great sequential shooting, it was funny and was written very tong-in-cheek, while “Steven Seagull” dragged in the middle and took a long time to get to the payoff at the end.

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