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Written by Administrator Wednesday, 23 September 2009 21:30

News - Student News and Awards

Students in Southern Illinois University Carbondale’s School of Journalism will experience their own version of a “multimedia boot camp” when they spend three days in October documenting one weekend in Murphysboro.

From sunrise, Friday, Oct. 2, until sunset, Sunday, Oct. 4, approximately 50 students will chronicle the Jackson County community and its residents, while receiving on-site expertise and assistance with their photography, audio, video and multimedia production from some of the nation’s leading practitioners and editors.  Other departments within the College of Mass Communication and Media Arts also are participating.

Mark J. Dolan, in his second year as an assistant professor in the School of Journalism, conducted eight similar workshops while teaching at Syracuse University. The projects were successful on several levels, Dolan said.

“When we create a body of work like this not only do the students learn but we are creating a wonderful archive of stories and images for and about that community,” he said.

Students will use digital still photography, sound and video to document the city.  Computer stations to edit and download audio and video, and build multimedia projects and packages, will be in a building in town.

Students will shoot their assignments, have the work edited, and receive immediate feedback for improving their work from SIUC faculty and volunteer professionals.  They can then go back and reshoot the assignment, if needed, Dolan said.

A fall semester Web design class is in the process of designing and building the Web site, which Dolan and Roger A. Hart, a lecturer in new media in the journalism school, hope to unveil to the community in early December.

The exercise will resemble a “multimedia boot camp experience,” Hart said.  “It’s very seldom where students will get the chance to have that kind of intense, individualized coaching and critique of their work and be able to work with established professionals,” Hart said.

The three-day effort will ultimately result in a gallery-quality exhibit of the students’ work, an interactive Web site, an online documentary detailing the project, and possibly a coffee table book, Dolan said.  An Oct. 3 evening slide show for the community will feature some of the best images collected to that point.
The workshop has three important components, Kolb said.  Students work on a project that provides a historical product, with the opportunity to work with SIUC faculty and some of the best photojournalists and editors in the country.

Dolan praised Murphysboro Mayor Ron Williams for his enthusiastic support, and said the community response is “incredible.”  The focus is documenting an average weekend in a community, not a particular event, Dolan said.

Murphysboro was chosen for the initial project because it is convenient, and it is a large enough community “to offer a significant amount of diversity and yet is a small enough community to still be intimate,” Dolan said.

Dolan sees the workshop as a way for students to strengthen their storytelling abilities through several mediums.  He wants students to understand that good stories are not only in places like New York City, Chicago and St. Louis.

“They are everywhere.  They are in smaller communities, like Murphysboro,” Dolan said.  “It’s just a matter of finding them and committing to them and doing the best job you can.”

Source: http://www.murphysboroamerican.com/news/x1073708495/SIU-students-to-chronicle-life-in-MBoro