One of Those Hard Days at Work

They say that you can never go wrong with doing a story on dogs or kids. People love both of them because they are drawn in by the cuteness factor. The problem is when the kid becomes an innocent victim.

Last night I covered a story about Imani Jennings. Imani was 20 months old and Friday late afternoon police found her dead in her apartment. As we learned more about the story, police told us that the mother's boyfriend (who by the way is 15) beat the child with a metal rod, cable wire and a metal spring then left to go to school.

When the couple got home from school, the child was lifeless in their apartment. Apparently police say the couple routinely left the child home alone with nothing but chicken nuggets and milk.

While the due process of law presumes everyone is innocent until proven guilty, if you have a heart, you can't help but be bothered by the fact that a 20 month old child was left to fend for herself.

As if the story can't get more twisted, I spoked to the biological father and grandmother and they were in the process of filing for custody after they say the mom denied the dad visitation at least five times.

Here's the story:

Pedaling to Albany

When it comes to reporting, you have to go into a story anticipating what will be at the location for your shoot. For example, knowing who's going to be there, what can I get video of and who will I be able to interview. This a classic example of NOTHING going as anticipated (as with anything in news).

Here's the Background:
I was going to cover an event where a 'group' of people were supposed to be pedaling into town on bicycles from Buffalo as they were making their way down to Albany. They wanted to send a message of green energy in light of the elections.

But, I emphasize the word 'group' because a 'group' was NOT what I was greeted with I arrived at the location for my shoot.

When I drove up to an empty parking lot in Dewitt, I noticed a van with a bike parked up against it and a guy wearing a shirt promoting the event.

First thought, 'hey I made in time to get all the bikers pedaling in. Great.'

So, I rolled down my window and asked the guy wearing the bright yellow shirt when the bikers would be rolling in and he said, "We just got here."

Second thought, "you have got to be kidding me, where is everyone?"

Turns out the 'group' biking from Buffalo to Albany was ONE GUY. That's right. One Guy. And if there was one guy I would have pegged as the guy biking hundreds of miles from Buffalo to Albany it would not be this guy in the front giving a thumbs up.

Reporting Approach:

Adjust to what you're given. So what, a group of bikers turned into one guy. I focused my whole story around this one guy. I let him tell the story and tried to relay the message that if this guy can do it, ANYONE CAN.

I tried to get video, natural sound and capture everything that was atypical about this guy biking to Albany. For example, his 'bike's dashboard' and his pseudo sound system.

I Met 'Joe the Mason'

Now here's a guy that you call "a gold mine" when you go out to cover a story by yourself.


Here's the background:
For class, I was told I needed to go out and cover something about Election Day on Election Day. It could have been anything (of course with the approval of my professor). So , I decided to do something on early voters for the election. Were people jumping hurdles, or in this case jumping out of bed early, to make sure their vote was counted.

Turns out the polls opened at 6:00AM election day, which made for a very early morning and a VERY LONG DAY.

When I got to one of the polling locations (in the pitch black of the early morning), I noticed a lonely red van sitting in the parking lot with a man sitting in it. The light from inside the cabin of his van drew me to him like a mosquito who can't resist the florescent glow from the bug light zapper.

When I approached him and started talking to him, I knew I had hit a gold mine. Turned out he jokingly referred to himself as "Joe the Mason."

Reporting Approach:
I tried something different with this piece. I only had five minutes of video to work with (three minutes of which was the interview). I timed my voice tracks out just right so that I could slip them into a 0:30 second continuous clip of uncut video.

I did this so that I could get the natural sound of the van door closing and him taking a drag of his cigarette. Made for easy video editing, but really hard writing.