Writing Help – Page 9 – Survive Your Job In Television News

Could you turn a story without any track?

No this article is not for photojournalists. They don’t need it. They can turn a story without any reporter or anchor track. This question I pose is for two other groups in the newsroom: Producers and, to some extent, reporters. I am guessing most of you reading this are saying, “Probably, but why would I?” Because in truth, most TV journalists cannot do it and end up with a piece that makes any sense at all.

Why does this matter? Why should you have the skills to be able to produce a story without any track? There are several reasons:

Sometimes you must “see it” to get the context
Great content often needs no words
Video is the essence of TV news

When I was producing in a large market, my ND issued a really intense mandate to all producers: No writing vo’s, vo/sots, anchor packages or teases without first looking at and time coding the video. Now this was really a lot to ask, because we didn’t have desktop editing yet. You had to pull feed video or raw video, find an open edit bay and sit and log a videotape! It took a lot of time, AT FIRST. But soon, I started to see why this was required. Stories I had planned to air in my newscast were not always as they seemed. Written descriptions of the video, sent from other affiliates, were often off the mark. The video told a different story than the words. My field crew, or a reporter on the feed, missed an awesome opportunity with a sound bite or section of video. Soon I noticed a big change. When I sat down to write, I was fast and very efficient. The number of errors both I and my AP wrote went way down. My copy editors loved me. I didn’t assume as much about stories and actually saw the realities.

I also learned another amazing lesson. Great content often needs few words. I could play out sections of great nats and watch people in the newsroom suddenly stop and stare. I learned to use silence as natural sound occasionally. (For more on that technique see “Storytelling on a dime”, and “Can you picture it.”) Sometimes I ran a long bite instead of writing a vo/sot. Let the people involved give the context. I just set up the situation, and explained what would come next in the tag. No, this technique won’t work on every story. But if you don’t learn how to tell a story without track, you will never truly tell a great story for television.

The reason why is simple: Video is the essence of TV news. You cannot showcase the power of video without first seeing that video. Having a photographer or a reporter describe it is not good enough. With desk top editing there is no excuse. Call up the video, sit back and watch. Let the images move you. Let the video sequences form in your head. Let the images bring questions to your mind. The answers are your powerful elements. The answers are often in sound bites and single images. Remember “a picture tells a thousand words.”

So how as a producer do you write stories without using any track? Next time you are asked to write an anchor package, try and outline it without a single sentence of copy. Just write down the images and sound bites. Chances are you will end up with little to no track. The example above, where you let the sound bite breathe and tell the story instead of having an anchor talk over generic video, can be effective as well. Let’s take a story from a protest for an example. The anchor can introduce the piece saying where the event was held and how many people showed up. “What was their message? We’re letting them tell you.” Then let some sound play. Let a few people talk. If there’s another viewpoint, or a counter protest tag with: “And now, the other side.” and then let that sound play out. Never forget we need to be informed witnesses for our viewers. There is no agenda in this type of coverage. The viewer makes his/her own judgment. You can always tag out with some factoids to help the viewer see the whole picture.

As for reporters, too often nowadays the emphasis becomes the reporter track, not the video. How often do you pre-write your package before you even get on scene to shoot the video? How often do you hear the 1 sound bite you think you need then signal the photojournalist to turn off the camera and walk away? Yes, you have intense timing constraints. Many of you are backpack journalist or get to have a photographer only because you churn two or three packages a day. I get it. Instead of pre-writing sections of your pieces, jot down notes like you would for a live shot. Then go and really listen to the person you interview. Be discerning. Are you really getting the point of what is going on or just assuming the situation is a certain way? You don’t know if you don’t listen. Then write a log of the video and sound you have, in the order you want it, before turning those bullet points in your notebook into copy. At the very least you will write more effectively to your video. I bet you will surprise yourself and see that you need less track and find more chances to let your sound breathe. Finally, once in a while, take a story you did and try to redo with just the video and sound. Do not write any reporter track. Attempt a photo essay in your spare time as a way to hone your skills (see “Humble pie” for more ways to help yourself grow). You will become a better storyteller and a more informed witness for the viewer because of it.

“To be or not to be” The ultimate writing challenge.

When I ask journalists what they want to improve on most, I am usually told writing. Yet the more newscasts I watch, the more I am struck by the sheer number of basic mistakes that make it on air. (Don’t feel badly, this even happens on the network level) One cannot help but wonder if people are either that clueless about grammar and basic rules for writing to the ear, or if journalists are so overwhelmed they simply write anything and put it on air just to make deadline.

I understand no one is perfect (I’m not). That’s why so many of us have goals to write better. But how do you actually improve your writing, especially when it’s obvious from watching newscasts, that there is next to no feedback on your work? We will continue to provide ways to help improve writing. (Here’s a link to other writing tips in case you missed them.) Now let’s focus on “to be” and all of its forms.

Next time you have a few minutes print out several recent scripts you wrote and grab a highlighter. Take that highlighter and mark off every time you use a version of “to be.” Chances are your scripts will have a bunch of highlights. Here are some examples: “He was hit by a car.” “Protestors are being heard inside council chambers.” “He is facing murder charges.” “She was being given a plea deal.” When writing conversationally, using “was,” “being” and “are” becomes a real crutch.

Now take a look at those sentences with a form of “to be” in them. When you read those sentences out loud to yourself, do many of them seem exaggerated or just silly? How do you face a murder charge? Be active. He is charged. A car hit the man. Protestors spoke during the council meeting. Prosecutors offered her a plea deal. Hear the difference? Here’s another common example to explain what I mean. Usually you will hear this phrase in news copy, “The investigation is continuing.” Either it is, or it is not. You should say, “the investigation continues.” The “is –ing” combination is among the worst you can do. It is sloppy, wishy washy, and passive. Anchors and reporters do not need to come across that way. Period.

An assistant news director I worked with years ago, would put together amazing writing seminars. He would get you pumped to go write, then lay down this law: “From now on, you cannot use any form of “to be” in your copy. No exceptions.” Think about that for a minute. Look at your news copy. Could you pull that demand off every day under intense deadline pressure? That’s what my co-workers and I had to do. Yes, it was extreme and very challenging! But it made us all much stronger writers. Eventually he did ease the mandate. But by that time you were used to avoiding “to be.”

By doing this he forced us to use active voice. He forced us to take a stand in our news copy. No room for winging it. You had to know the facts. Think about it, you cannot really “couch it” much without using “to be.” Our scripts were clear, concise and consistent.

So if you want to challenge yourself as a writer try to avoid or even drop all forms of “to be” even if it’s for one or two news blocks a day. Reporters, try it once or twice a week when you are less slammed to ease into it if you must. If going “cold turkey” scares you, at least dump the “is –ing” combination. See what an impact it really makes.

What’s with the question? Make sure there’s an answer.

We recently got a Tweet from a frustrated journalist who had just watched a live shot from another station in another market. In that live shot the anchor asked a question to the reporter, and the question was not answered until the tag. The story came across as oversold and uncomfortable.

Sound familiar? The flow from anchor intro, to reporter live shot, to pkg, to live tag, to anchor tag is delicate to begin with. Then a whole bunch of writers step in, each with their own voice and tweak. The finished product often becomes forced and everyone looks uncomfortable or worse yet, detached from the information described. Then comes the big kicker: The consultant comes to town and tells the ND that the field crews and anchor desk must interact and seem engaged with each other. So what is management’s solution? Require anchors to ask reporters a question going into live shots. Then comes situations like the one at the start of this article. But it doesn’t have to be that way. There are solutions.

First, the one question you never want to ask: “Joe are you live at the scene now?” Before you chuckle and roll your eyes, I lost count of how many times I had to copy edit that type of pitch question out of intros. It was constant, in every market size. Also, make sure the reporter knows the question is coming and what it is. That way the reporter doesn’t seem clueless. Remember, IFB can and does go in and out, you want the live shot to start out smoothly. The reason managers ask you to use a question in the pitch line is to make the interaction between the anchor and reporter seem like a conversation. When you think about it, most conversations do begin with a question and an answer. The person answering expands on the answer then, asks another question to move the conversation along.

With that in mind, here are some techniques to keep anchor questions required in the intro from seeming forced:

Reference live surroundings in the question
Provide perspective through the question
Write what a viewer ask

Now let’s delve deeper, so these are clear. Remember this exercise is supposed to help the anchor and reporter talk with each other, instead of at each other. It is one of the many ways you create flow within a newscast. So when writing the question in the pitch line, a natural way to transition is to ask about why the reporter is live at a particular place. Things like, “Joe can you walk us through the situation where you are?” makes the anchor seem authoritative and the reporter seem like an expert eyewitness. Another way to reference live surroundings is to give anchors the freedom to know they can ask about what they see in the live picture with the reporter. This is effective during fires, standoffs, fairs, holiday parties, political events… you get the idea. You can also have the reporter tell the producer if something interesting is going on, right before taking the shot. Then the anchor can ad lib with that information. Something like, “Joe, we’re hearing another fire truck just arrived, where is it and why was it called in?” If the live surroundings are stagnant (which is often the case) you can have the anchor ask something informative about the area like, “Joe, that’s usually a quiet neighborhood how are families there reacting to this situation?” All of these scenarios give the reporter a reason to reference why he/she is live. That is part of the natural flow of a conversation. Think of it like this, if you bump into a friend at the store, you often say “Hey, what are you shopping for today?” The person answers usually by pointing to the aisle he/she either just went down or will head down next. The key for this type of pitch question is to transition to what is immediately next in the live report.

Now, let’s talk about using questions for perspective. This is where pitch questions can often go wrong, like the scenario at the beginning of this article. You must ask a question that provides an immediate answer. No waiting until the package or tag. If your reporter is at a boring scene and is doing a story that’s been done over and over, use the pitch question to help show what’s new. Use something like, “Joe, before we were told the tax cut would be small, why is it possibly going up now?” Or “Last night we were told this was an accident, why are investigators calling it intentional now?” You are showing that the anchor remembers what he/she tells people and that there is something new. Again, before you snicker, sit down and watch a newscast. It is excruciating how often anchor intros are written in ways that make the anchor seems clueless about the subject, especially when it’s an ongoing story. The cheap copout way to write an intro is to fake that the subject is new by providing no perspective. If you are struggling with ways to justify why this information is being given to the viewer again, let the anchor be the antagonist of sorts and ask that very thing of the reporter. “Joe, we’ve been talking about this political issue for a week, why do families need to hear about it tonight?” That’s a natural question someone probably asked in the editorial meeting when you decided to cover the story. So let the anchor ask it of the reporter in the intro.

Which leads to the kinds of questions viewers would ask: Put the viewer benefit, front and center. (If you don’t know what viewer benefit means read “What’s in it for me.”) Now consider this: Anchors are considered the voice of the audience. They are the people who can ask what viewers want to know, but don’t have the means to ask. Use that connection between anchor and audience to craft questions to the reporter. Let your anchor be gutsy with questions like, “Joe, a lot of people think this tax cut is a joke, is it?” Or “Joe, does this really mean (star player) is walking away from the team?” Or “Joe, there have been a lot of break-ins in this area lately, what makes this one different?” Again, think about bumping into a friend and briefly catching up. Most of us have similar things to say each time, so our friend prods with questions to see if there are any changes. People expect to hear some of the same information, but appreciate anchors asking what is different.

Finally, understand that questions can be a crutch. It is such a common technique, that it can be over used. But if done correctly, it will not seem forced. Remember, asking questions is human nature. So don’t fear questions, just make sure the reporter gets to the answer right away.

Taking ownership, from the first line of the anchor intro

Reporters, I know this is a big pet peeve. The producer writes the anchor intro or rewrites it and steals all of your thunder, just gives away the big surprise or the really good stuff in your package. That’s why I am writing this article my friends. Good storytelling begins with the first line of the anchor intro and ends with the last line in the anchor tag. Notice, I did not say package. I did not say reporter track. I did not even say live shot. It all begins with the anchor intro.

This is an important concept for both reporters and producers to understand and take seriously. Crafting a story begins with the anchor’s ability to make the viewer want to hear it. Then the reporter’s video, information and hopefully a surprise element or two (or three, four and five!) will keep the viewer engaged. The tag line should satisfy the viewer that you (as in the team) truly spelled out the entire story to the best of your ability at the time. Executing this way enhances the credibility of everyone involved and makes viewers trust the whole news team more.

So let’s talk anchor intros and storytelling. First I have to point out what NOT to do. Say the reporter is at a hit and run. The typical way to pitch to the reporter is to have the anchor give a rundown of what happened, then go the reporter with what happened. Something like: “Tonight investigators are trying to find a driver involved in a hit and run. Two women were struck (please don’t say and are fighting for their lives FYI) and traffic is still at a standstill while police piece it all together. Here’s reporter at the scene.” Then the reporter stands there looking frustrated and repeats the same information, because it just happened and there’s nothing else to explain yet. In this scenario you just spit out a bunch of facts. The anchors stole the thunder from the reporter on the scene by stating everything relevant before the reporter that’s standing there got a chance. The viewer notices you are being redundant and wonders why the anchors and the reporter didn’t talk to each other before the newscast came on the air. Yes, viewers really do catch this sort of thing. They may not be able to spell it out as clearly as I just did, but they are great at getting the point across another way, clicking onto another channel. You become too repetitive. The remote is too easy to click. Never forget that.

So what do you do instead? Give the anchors a chance to interact with the reporter (we will call him Bob) from the start. In this breaking news situation the anchor would say something like: “We want to check in with Bob right away for you. That’s because he’s on First Street in Typical City where some women were hit by a car. (take double boxes here) Bob, you just told me police are there looking for the driver. So what do witnesses say happened?”

This gives Bob a chance to tell a story even with just basic facts. He can walk around the scene and point out anything interesting, and stay engaged with the anchors. In breaking situations like this, I often had my director keep double boxes handy in case my anchors came up with a question during the live shot. This way I had the option to take the boxes and have the anchor ask the reporter for clarification etc., and stay engaged.

Now let’s move from story telling, breaking news anchor intro’s to planned out live shots with a package. The kind you have time to finesse. First, understand, as an EP I usually required reporters to turn in anchor intros before getting script approval for their live shots and/or pkgs. Tags were due right then and there as well, unless the reporter was waiting on a specific fact. In that case I asked for an outline of the tag. Why require an anchor intro with the script? It forced the reporter to segment out the information. It helped the entire segment, from anchor pitch, to live intro to pkg to live tag, to anchor wrap up, all flow better. It helped avoid the situation above. Again, so we are clear, that scenario was: Anchor intro gives away all the facts, then the reporter repeats, then the tag repeats again. So reporters, how do you write the anchor intro? You pick out the headline, the what’s in it for me or “WIFM” (if you don’t know what that means read “What is viewer benefit really” first.) Before you fuss that this is giving the story away, hear me out. That is NOT your surprise. The “WIFM” is the hook that will make your viewer want to watch your piece. It is the connector. That means your package needs a human element and ah-ha moment and/or a surprise to live up to the viewer’s expectation. If you need help with those elements read “Storytelling on a dime.”

Producers, do not write anchor intros unless it’s the lead story of the newscast or breaking news. (By that I mean it happened so late your crew will be getting on the scene during your show, or shortly before.) Yes, you can copy edit the anchor intros for time and to make sure the sell is in the intro. If a reporter hands you a 30 second intro with sloppy writing and no WIFM make the reporter rewrite. Remember, this anchor intro exercise helps the reporter break down the facts into sections so they are not: (a) just repeated over and over until the viewer is screaming “Enough I get it move on!” to the television screen. Or (b) so wishy washy the anchors seem clueless and uninformed. Remember, hardworking reporter, you do not get dibs on all the facts. You must share.

This sharing is especially true if you’re discussing the lead story. I used to let the reporter I had tagged as the lead know as soon as I could. This meant we would write the anchor intro together. Yes, we would actually sit on the phone and hash it out. Why? I needed the copy to be compelling and accurate. I needed to make sure that the anchors were able to set the tone for the newscast authoritatively and effectively. I also wanted the reporter to really shine. We had to do that as a team, from the anchor intro on. Yes, that meant my lead package elements were often hashed out earlier than the other stories in the newscast, unless the facts were late breaking. But even with late turning stories, the reporter knew what the sell was going to be in the anchor intro, so he/she could flow easily to the next fact in the story before air.

Now let’s talk anchor intro rewrites. Producers, you cannot just copy edit the anchor intro, change the essence of it, switch the pitch line and not inform the reporter. Simply put, that’s unacceptable. If you do this, the reporter will (a) stop giving you anchor intros at all (b) call the EP or AND and pitch a fit about you or (c) be caught off guard when you go to him/her and seem uncomfortable. Treat the anchor intro with a lot of care. If you cannot wait for a rewrite from the reporter, copy edit then call and read the reporter what you wrote. Make sure you are not stealing any thunder. Try not to change the essence of the copy. Your job is to make the anchors and reporters look like a cohesive unit, not two independent entities that happen to come back to back and talk about the same subject.

Which leads to my final point about why reporters should always begin their stories by writing anchor intros: It forces you to talk with your copy editor during the day. You have a responsibility to make sure your idea of the sell for your package jibes with the ideas of the producers, managers and the promotions writers. Good story telling involves solid sells. You cannot story tell if you have no point. The point of the piece is what the anchors need to allude to in the anchor intro. The promotion is just as crucial and the point of the piece is what is promoted. You do not want promotions to air a tease that is way off base. It makes all of you look bad. Calling in to the producer or a manager with an outline of your piece, including the anchor intro, will prevent miscommunication. It will make your life easier 90 percent of the time. It is a true mark of taking ownership and telling good stories.