NPPA ARTICLE ON B-ROLL.NET

[12/20/01]

Behind the b-roll
Meet the maestro of the Web site that serves as a sounding board for television photojournalists
By TOM HUBBARD [reprinted from News Photographer, November 2001]

I JOINED cameraman Kevin Johnson at the end of August on what might be described as a "typical day." The assignment for Kevin and reporter Doug Aronson, a photographer-reporter team from Norfolk's WVEC, was to find a teacher accused of molesting young children.

They had no luck at the man's home so they set up at his school, hoping for comments from anyone involved. They found some articulate parents and their work became part of the five and six o'clock reports.

Doug talks about Kevin's great eye: "When he gets his mind set and has full understanding of the story, he can shoot some great pictures. We work together and get the best piece under time constraints."

Kevin becomes concerned with stories such as this accused child molester. "I'm always scared on stories like this. If this accusation is false, we could be ruining this guy's life. On the other hand, if he did this, he deserves everything he gets." Kevin tries to not have opinions while he's working on a story, trying to observe a journalistic purism. He hopes the greater truth will come out in time.

Kevin and Doug handled this sensitive story humanely. They parked their car and the satellite truck off school property. Doug approached parents sympathetically. He got excellent sound bytes with patience, not cajoling. One parent talked extensively but came back in a few minutes, asking her part not be used. Doug said he would use as little as possible. He used one sentence with video of her back.

Kevin who turns 30 next month, is sensitive to the truth in his reports. One parent made a sweeping statement about perversion - "Going around everywhere." He was relieved to be able to get that generalization out of his report.

A few years earlier, Kevin caught the opening news-segment video of a distant station. It's dramatic: A tall building silhouetted against the evening sky. Suddenly, a helicopter appears from behind the building, a TV cameraman strapped to the rail. The shot opened the WXIA news in Atlanta and, somehow, the WXIA news appeared on Kevin Johnson's cable channel in Salisbury, Md. Kevin, then a student at Salisbury University made a decision. "I wanted to be on that chopper," he recalled. "It was about five years before I did it, but I eventually did ride the rail of a chopper, doing the same thing. It's that kind of excitement. And always finding new experiences has kept me hooked on the business."

Continuing, he said, "Occasionally, we get a chance to do a long-form story. We did a story on a Navy change of command. These are usually boring ceremonies but this was different, because, in this case, the officer was being replaced by his wife in the command position. This had never happened before in the US. Navy."

Given advance information, Johnson recalled, "We went to their home, where they were having a picnic. We were able to sit and talk with them and learn who they are, get some family into it. These are the rewarding assignments."

ANOTHER rewarding story was of a poor neighborhood putting up a community Christmas tree in their neighborhood square. Someone came along that night and cut the tree down and made off with it. "We did a story about the upset neighborhood and they wound up with 14 Christmas trees to be planted in that square. This story made me realize how powerful what we do can be. Almost a million people see it and it can affect them. That's powerful."

Kevin has mastered the psychic balance of doing his best when he can and settling for minimum video at other times. Journalism is a reporter-driven medium. Kevin can live with that. He thinks part of the fun is being with a different reporter every day. "They have different styles and even different interests to talk about along the ride. With some reporters, I'm going to do nat sound and shoot my heart out and they are gong to use every frame and write to the video and they are going to make it sing." With other reporters he may get basic shots, knowing their conservative taste.

He respects reporters and sees the hand of the reporter in award-winning tapes. When the nat sound, images and depth of the story click, it's a reporter and videographer working instinctively together. "I've done overseas projects with reporter Mike Gooding. We know how each other works and almost don't even have to speak," he said

"I want everything in my pictures to move, not just a steady shot, not a lockdown. I want elements to flow from one to the other." This is evident in his file tapes. The flow is poetic, even in mundane subjects.

Kevin notices the passing of seasons as many TV photojournalists do. In August live shots for the five and six o'clock news are available light. As the day shortens, the lights have to come out for these early news live shots.

KEVIN IS FAMILIAR with the debate about staging. The purist is against any kind of staging-not asking people to do anything. Kevin takes a more realistic stance. "I'm a six-foot-six guy with a big camera on my shoulder, standing in your living room with a bright light in your face. You will act differently. I've already affected my surroundings."

The more subtle debate is in how far you change the situation. Having someone sit for an interview is okay with Kevin, but for action he's guided by what people say they were doing. He asks, "What were you doing before I got here?" He tries to get them to go about that business in a natural way.

"My first day on the job was in the small market back in Salisbury. They gave me a basket full of toys- cameras, sticks, this was cool. When I moved to Norfolk there was this huge satellite truck. We had a helicopter. I could hang out. It's toy time all over again."

He remembers the goals of everyone in a small market - to get to a larger market. Every story is THE one to get out of there. Kevin said he notices that everyone seems to be more comfortable at WVEC.

Kevin reaches almost a million people in the Norfolk area through WVEC-TV news. He reaches the world with the b-roll.net Web site.

Net surfer Brent Job is familiar with Kevin's Web efforts. Job says, "I'm one of a small crop of Maori people here in New Zealand." Brent is a soundman with aspirations of being a director. He is looking forward to a new TV channel dedicated to Maori life expected to begin next year. He said he has learned some excellent tips from B-roll.net, which will be useful in developing this new Maori channel.

A month later, in September 2001, Kevin worked out of the station's satellite truck parked outside the terrorist-damaged Pentagon. What he photographed through the video camera on his shoulder went back to WVEC-TV for Norfolk-area viewers and those of other owned stations. His b-roll regularly gets comments from all continents of the world.

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