Friday, January 18, 2008

Storm of the Century (Or at least until the next one comes)

There is a fine line between overselling the forecast for a storm and actually providing you with “accurate, balanced and to the point” information.

It is our responsibility to prepare you for inclement weather. We run crawls and extended weather coverage designed to keep you ahead of the storm. It is a process that involves a great deal of planning, coordination, teamwork, and some very long days out in the element for our reporters and photographers.

Much like the mail carrier (no, i won’t wear those blue pants) we bring you coverage through rain, sleet, snow and shine. We put our crews throughout the viewing area to report on the latest conditions in your neighborhood. Often times this means calling in extra reporters, photographers, producers, content coordinators and production staff rotating through a 12hr “on” and 12 “off” schedule.

Meanwhile, when we are not on air….we are providing constant updates to our website, http://www.nbc17.com. There you’ll find the latest school closings and delays along with winter weather tips, live weather warnings and advisories as well as the latest video and pictures submitted by YOU, our viewers.

If you have pictures of weather conditions in your neighborhood or better yet pictures of your kids enjoying the winter wonderland, we’d love it if you would share those with us so that we may, in turn, share them with other viewers. You can send your pictures to: .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)

Be Safe
-Jason

Stop, Drop and Roll

Today, all I wanted to do is stand in the middle of the newsroom…stop what I was doing…drop…and roll on the floor.

You see, the fire department was back for day #2 of testing our building fire alarm system.

Since we are nearing completion on the construction of our newsroom, it’s time to get final inspections. One of the most important inspections is the fire/safety inspection. In the event of a fire, the safety of every single newsroom employee is top priority. Rest assured the system works. In fact, my ears are still ringing at home…some eight hours later.

I totally understand that fire alarms are supposed to be loud but the tests were not 10-20 second bursts of the ole’ sirens. Instead, they were more like 4-5 minutes of non-stop (urrrnnnk…..urrrnnnnkkk…..urrrrnnnnkkk). If that wasn’t bad enough 50 strobe lights began flashing. All this while trying to listen to scanners, get updates from reporters who were calling in from the field and responding to viewers tips and emails. We quickly realized that…urrrnnnk…(sorry I couldn’t resist) conversations of any sort, no matter how important, were simply not going to happen while the tests were going on.

Our resident blogger, Ginny, actually became annoyed enough with the situation that she blogged about it, and even posted a short video clip to further explain our pain. Meanwhile, I’m now deaf (what did you just say?), my eyes still feel like I spent too long inside a techno disco club and the headache is still pounding. Ahhhhh…the sound of safety (urrrnnnk…..urrrnnnnkkk…..urrrrnnnnkkk).

Thursday, January 03, 2008

Sporting A New Look

If you happened to have watched our newscasts yesturday evening you may have noticed something looked different, and you would have been correct. We debuted a new graphics package on air yesturday, and I must say it is very cool.

A graphics package is often referred to as our “look”. Those graphics you see over anchors as they talk to you at home are part of the complete graphics package. The graphics that pop on and off the bottom of the screen with locations and reporter names etc are also a part of the complete graphics package. In short, our old look was ancient dated and needed to be redesigned.

The new graphics package is both crisp and bold. There is a heavy dominance of yellow/gold and blues to the new graphics but by far the biggest difference you will see is that all the new graphics are animated (meaning they move). The old look was static and had no animation.

A new graphics package is not unique. In fact, many news stations freshen up their graphics every 2 years by making slight alterations to the exisiting look. These are not usually drastic changes but rather offer a freshened up look to the existing package. However, in our case, we did a complete redesign. This is when you throw out everything related to your old graphic look and start from scratch.  Usually, TV stations do complete overhauls on their graphics packages every 3-4 years with refreshed looks in between.

So do you like the new look? Hate it? Let me know. Post your thoughts in the comments section.

-Jason
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Wednesday, January 02, 2008

A Naked Feeling. A Lost Sense Of Faith.

A recent overseas vacation has left me with a naked feeling.

The airline carrier lost my luggage and everything I had packed, and now 10 days later I am still separated from my clothes. This is the first time this has ever happened to me but the whole ordeal has shattered my faith in the airline industry and got me thinking….

A reputation is something that takes a long time to earn…sometimes years and yet it can be wiped away in a matter of mere seconds. As a frequent traveler, I became so accustomed to always walking off the plane and getting my bags that when ever I heard my bags were M-I-A, I just couldn’t believe it. As I was stewing over my lost bags, I started wondering if this theory is the same for TV news viewers. Does one bad experience with a TV news organization shatter your trust in all main stream media? What is it that would make that happen?

Heck…Today there was a Greyhound Bus that overturned on a local highway. I wonder if this one bad situation will shatter people’s faith about the safety of motor coach transportation despite whatever past positive experiences they may have had on motor coaches.

Let me know your thoughts….Meanwhile, I’m going looking for my bags

Tuesday, January 01, 2008

Stranger in a Strange Land

As the newest kid on the block (I guess on the blog, too) here at NBC-17, I’ve got a lot to learn. Not only am I learning to adapt to new coworkers, a new newsroom, and new responsibilities I’ve got a new area to learn as well.

I was born in New Jersey, but raised in Allentown, Pennsylvania.
(I can almost hear the Billy Joel fans singing “Allentown”. Did you know that song was actually written about Bethlehem? It’s apparently easier to rhyme words with Allentown than Bethlehem.)
Any visitor’s guide can tell you to visit the Allentown Art Museum, Dorney Park, The Crayola Factory, and the historic district of downtown Bethlehem.  Only a local – like myself- can tell you where to get a good cheese steak, the diner with the best late night service, and how to avoid traffic around mall during the holidays.
There are some great suggestions in the Greater Raleigh Visitor’s Bureau , but it’s too impersonal for me. The people who live, work, and play in this area know what makes it unique. Send me an email .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) and tell me what places and/or people really capture the flavor of your neighborhood.

Donna Wentzel
Multimedia Content Coordinator
WNCN - NBC17
1205 Front Street
Raleigh, NC 27609
(W) 919.835.6318
(F) 919.836.1687
(E) .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)
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Check out my blog: Inside the Core