Newspaper industry remote practical assessment week

Important

You are submitting three pieces of work:

1. 'The role of bias' research task

1. Biased newspaper front page with at least three original images

1. A short evaluation of your newspaper front page

All three pieces of work should be published to your media blog. 

Make sure you screencap your newspaper front page and upload it to your blogpost as an image!

This week's task involves a practical element. Since we are in the middle of a pandemic, it is absolutely essential you familiarize yourself with the health and safety regulations detailed below. If there's anything you're unsure of, just play it safe. If in doubt, don't go out!

This post is subject to be tweaked and updated as the week goes on. If you need any clarification on anything, just let me know!

Brief

Create a biased and potentially misleading newspaper front page story that represents your house/street/town as a perfect utopia or an unlivable hellhole

-or-

Create a biased and potentially misleading newspaper front page story that uses your house/street/town as the setting for either a positive or negative news story

1 - Planning and preparing a biased news report

In this session, you will research how newspapers use bias, and you will prepare and plan your own biased news report

i - Introduction: spinning a story

In media products, particularly in news media, spin refers to presenting a deliberately and often overtly biased representation of an issue or event for the purpose of manipulating the ideological perspective of the target audience. An even can be spun in a variety of different ways, and in politics, politicians will often hire spin doctors, whose sole job it is to spin unflattering events and problems to make them seem agreeable to the public.

Even the most damning and problematic events...

...can be spun in to something less damaging...

...spot the difference!

ii - Discussion: 'the camera never lies'

In what ways can inventive photography be used to distort the truth? What techniques can you use for your own front page? What techniques do you use when taking pictures to create a more flattering and exciting image?

iii - The role of bias

• Bias through selection and omission 
• Bias through placement 
• Bias by headline 
• Bias by photos, captions and camera angles 
• Bias through use of names and titles 
• Bias through statistics and crowd counts 
• Bias by source control 
• Word choice and tone 

Visit the website of a tabloid newspaper (eg The Sun, The Mirror, The Mail Online) and select a news story that interests you, and make screen captures of the story. How does this story use spin to present the ideological perspective of the producer? Run through the bias list above and see how many you can identify, and write notes in your blog post about how the article you have selected is biased

iv - Selecting a headline

A headline needs to address the target audience, and it needs to do it effectively. If the story isn't effective enough, then no one's going to buy the newspaper, and your revenue will fall. Which is why your potentially boring story needs to sound as exciting as possible. Puns, plays on words, and emotive language are the order of the day here. Here are a couple of examples that

Clean and Tidy!: Town jubilant as Impington wins cleanest village award for fourth year in a row

Secret shame: Milton village drags down local profile

Life of Luxury: inside the luxurious mansion of shamed TV host turned tax cheat

Crime town: the inside scoop on 'Britain's worst street'

Write down as many potential headlines as you can, both positive and negative. At least five will really help you here

v - Team talk

You're doing this individually (because there's a pandemic on), but now is a great opportunity to chat to those in your breakout group about what you're going to be doing. Share ideas, steal ideas. But absolutely do not meet up in person!

2 - Shooting and producing a biased news report

In this session, you will shoot the highest quality photos possible with the equipment you have available. For most of you, this will probably involve shooting on your phone. This is absolutely fine, and even encouraged. There's lots of awesome stuff you can do with even the simplest of smartphones!

i - Health and safety guidelines

• If you are planning to eave your house, you must do so alone, or with members of your household only
• You are only permitted to leave your house for a few essential activities, including exercise. Therefore, you will take photographs as you go for a walk
• Do not leave the town/village/area where you live
• Make sure your journey starts and ends in the same place
• Do not meet with anyone outside of your home
• Make sure to stay away from other people

As long as you are sensible, there is absolutely no risk from undertaking this work, and it does not breach any government guidelines. If you are in any doubt about any of these rules, then shoot indoors instead

ii - Preparing to shoot

There are absolutely tonnes of videos on YouTube about how to effectively use your phone to take pictures. Some are more... annoying than others. So take your pick. I like this one with an Indian dad showing you five straightforward techniques. You may wish to spend some time on Youtube looking for other videos. If you find a good one, send me a link!

iii - Taking pictures

Take as many pictures as you can which will construct a biased, opinionated and potentially misleading story. When taking you images, consider what you're going to be doing with them afterwards. Are you planning to edit them on your phone? Then you might as well just shoot with the default settings. However, if you want to try out using a program like Lightroom or Photoshop (see next box), you may want to change the settings to RAW by using a mode like 'Pro' mode. everyone's phone is different, so make sure you take the time to learn what your phone can do. 

iv - Writing your report

Check out the newspaper template in the SUBMISSIONS folder. Make sure that you don't edit this file! Instead just click 'file', and then 'make copy'. Now feel free to edit the template to your heart's content!

You probably won't finish this in today's session, which is fine. You'll have time to finish in the final lesson. 

v - Extension: using Adobe Lightroom to edit your images

As a student at our college, you are able to access Adobe Creative Cloud software for free! This includes Photoshop, Premiere, and a nifty little product called Lightroom Classic, which allows you to quickly and creatively tweak the look and feel of your photographs. You can download all this by going to the Adobe website and logging in with your college user name and password. Any technical issues, please email IT. Remember, all this is contingent on if your system can run these programs. 

I made a video on how to use Adobe Lightroom Classic, which you can check out by clicking here.

3 - Evaluating your biased news report

In this session, you will finish off writing your news story, and you will write a brief evaluation of how you used a biased point of view to reconstruct reality

i - Finish your news story

depending on where you are up to, use the time in today's session to either finish or start your news report/newspaper front page

ii - Evaluation

Explore how newspaper producers use representations to construct reality 

Questions???

Do we have to take the pictures during the lesson? For example, can we take pictures at night?

Yes, definitely! I'll be interested in seeing how they come out!

Does the story have to be serious in tone?

It can be less serious if you want, but it must still be appropriate for a newspaper. S you can be tongue in cheek, and you can use puns!

Can we, like, make stuff up? Can we make up quotes and characters?

Yes! Absolutely! Go wild!

Do do they all have to be our own photos or can we use a few from online?

Please use your own pictures!