It gives me great pleasure to announce the winners in our first-ever CICM Online Journalism Contest. Read below for judges’ comments and the winners in each category.

Best Overall Design

1. Mustang Daily - http://www.mustangdaily.net/
They take number one because of their overall organization and abundance of visual elements on the homepage. It has simple navigation below the masthead; well-designed secondary buttons for multimedia, blogs, etc.; dominant, clickable, rotating art; a concise “online features” section highlighted by a subtle background color; well organized section previews complete with the main story of each section containing thumbnails; a unique “yousubmit” button; not to mention a well-placed AP viewer and poll. All of this is found on a homepage that is one of the smallest in length in the competition. The masthead type is a little lacking in proportion, but other than that it’s pretty flawless. Beautiful. Useable. Winner.

2. GW Hatchet - http://www.gwhatchet.com/
Its “New York Times Online” aesthetic is unique to the college field and is even more evident in this competition. The homepage looks a lot like a paper. It uses a serif font, columns and dominant art complete with studio photography and a colored background. It also has an obvious and well-organized section for multimedia. It’s masthead is well designed and the navigation is well-placed with the colored text drawing attention to the web-only content. Below the digital fold is a nice blog preview which links to a well-designed, well-organized blogs section. Also toward the bottom is the area designated for the traditional sections. I would like to see a little more movement with some of the art and maybe a little less of the GW statue (appears 4 times on the homepage).

3. The Shorthorn - http://www.theshorthorn.com/
Third was very tough but I landed on The Shorthorn because of its large rotating art, defined sections and front page video player. However, I would like to see thumbnails with the headlines in the different sections, more attention paid to the placement of the video player and the navigation move below the masthead. Good color scheme and good mix of serif headlines and sans-serif copy.

Best Breaking News Video

1. Shorthorn - gymnasium opening
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PWOstABKZDw - This is the only video in the bunch that told a comprehensive visual story. We see a sequence of events that happened (beginning, middle, end). We keep seeing new scenes like the treadmills, basketball court, weight lifting. We get to hear from some students about their thoughts on the new gym. The video could have been improved with even more student voices. The producer should also study the basic shooting rules such as using a tripod and shooting wide, medium and tight sequences.

2. GW Hatchet - Anti-muslim poster
http://media.gwhatchet.com/index.php?id=1019. This video told the most comprehensive story in regards to narration. Using a voiceover was a wise choice to quickly and effectively provide the history of the story that people needed to know to understand what was happening now. The soundbytes from sources at the end provided valuable information and they were intelligent and emotional. I think the video could have been improved if the producer would have focused more on shooting more video during the meeting, and less on recording the speakers during the meeting. I wanted to see the emotion on the faces of the students in attendance.

3. Nevada Sagebrush - Democratic caucus
http://nevadasagebrush.com/blog/2008/01/19/video-the-joe-hosts-democratic-caucus/
- This video did the best at providing a great variety of voices and opinions. I think it could have been improved if the videographer would have focused more on shooting video of the caucus in action. One source said the process was confusing … Instead of just telling me that, also show me video of the confusing process.

VIDEO PACKAGE

No placements

Honorable mention: Daily Mississippian - Street preacher
http://media.www.thedmonline.com/media/storage/paper876/news/2007/03/21/Multimedia/Evangelist.Continues.To.Warn.Students-2783051.shtml.
This is the only video that made an attempt at telling a visual story. The video producer should revisit the basic rules of shooting video, including using a tripod, no pans and zooms, and shooting image sequences of wide, medium and tight shots. I had problems with the video player because there were no controls and it seemed that the audio and video were out of sync.

Advice for others: Video is a medium for showing things, not telling. If you just wanted to report what your sources had said, you can use text very effectively to deliver that information. If you want to use video, you need to show your viewer things. For example, instead of showing the frat presidents talking the whole time, you should have showed the rush events. Instead of showing the professor talking the whole time, you could have showed him teaching a class and showed him logging on to his facebook account.

Best Podcast

1. GW Hatchet
http://media.gwhatchet.com/index.php?id=1014
http://media.gwhatchet.com/index.php?id=1006
http://media.gwhatchet.com/index.php?id=1030

2. Nevada Sagebrush
http://nevadasagebrush.com/blog/2007/10/09/oct-9-2007-an-interview-with-lt-dangle/
http://nevadasagebrush.com/blog/2007/12/03/dec-3-2007-perspectives-editor-jordan-butler-loves-his-quadrangle/
http://nevadasagebrush.com/blog/2007/12/10/dec-11-2007-garrett-hylton-scott-oxarart-and-david-calvert-discuss-luke-babbitt/

They were closely match in quality and variety. While both were very well done, the GW casts had more original reporting, more depth on topic and their effort was more consistently, professional sounding and rewarding. Note their ease-of use for playing the poddies on the Web site.

Best Weblog

1. Mustang Daily - http://blogs.mustangdaily.net/
The writing is lively, personal and contains some perspective. The blogger is at his best when he’s writing about issues related to campus life or the local community, but there is always a sense of personality in the posts.

Best Breaking News Package

1. Nevada Sagebrush
http://nevadasagebrush.com/blog/category/news/2008-caucus-coverage/

A clear first place winner. The staff used every tool available to them to bring the online reader the best coverage possible. Audio, video, slide shows, all presented in a clean and easy to find/navigate page. Great use of large photos and audio podcasts that could be played on the page versus needing to ‘click through’. I would have loved to see the same approach with the video, post it on the main page, like the slides shows and th audio. They created a one stop online experience that I didn’t want to leave. Congrats!

2. GW Hatchet
http://media.www.gwhatchet.com/media/storage/paper332/news/2007/10/11/News/Seven.Students.Take.Responsibility.In.Controversial.Poster.Campaign-3026870.shtml

Clean design, nice Soundslides integration and the two elements; QUICKTAKES: THE TIMELINE and the The Poster Controversy box in the upper right are the two elements that help this package stand out above the rest. They provide the reader a great way to see other elements of the story. This is very important for a breaking news package. Readers will always want more. Well done.

3. Kentnewsnet.com
http://media.www.kentnewsnet.com/media/storage/paper867/news/2007/03/20/News/Fire-Guts.Kent.Home-2781666.shtml

This was a nice response to a local breaking news event. The page had video and photos, always a plus. What would have really helped this package would have been a map of the location of the fire. Overall nice page.

Best Audio Slideshow

1. Daily Eastern News

http://media.www.dennews.com/media/storage/paper309/news/2007/11/16/OnlineExclusives/Slideshow.Eastern.At.Jacksonville.State-3094260.shtml

This slide show has strong integration between the images and the audio. Good use of subtitles for introducing speakers. The audio edit could be much tighter on the coach. Also, some basic game info in the intro, such as score and team rankings, would made this more of a complete report.

2. The Shorthorn
http://shorthorn.uta.edu/new/archives/2007/spring/050207/kuban/index.html

There are some real moments in the photography. The photographer showed a sensitivity in some of the selections, though the overall pairing of the audio and the images is lacking. The subject’s music was a prime opportunity a strong visual pairing, however we don’t hear the music until after those corresponding images have passed by. Overall audio quality is poor, but the content is strong.

Best Overall Web Presence

1. SageBrush - http://nevadasagebrush.com

2. Shorthorn - http://theshorthorn.com

3. Mustang Daily - http://www.mustangdaily.net

Congrats to all the winners!

This entry was posted on Monday, March 17th, 2008 at 8:14 am and is filed under contests. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.