"Snow Fall" a media art from the future

One of the great accomplishments of the 21st century according to journalism and news-reporters in specific “Snow Fall” is how it made its multimedia elements grabs all readers' attention In the six days following its launch, “Snow Fall” received more than 3.5 million page views and 2.9 million visitors but rather part of a natural, contiguous reading experience.

The New York Times stunned the followers and industry peers alike with the publication of an outrageous journalistic masterpiece “Snow Fall,” which tragically stated the sad avalanche in Washington’s Cascade Mountains this past February. On Dec. 20 It was not your ordinary multimedia feature. It merged the interactions of eye reading and watching together in a whole new way that had many has been left all over with chin opened out of thrill.

are we taking about future journalism now ? Why everybody just hailed the article back ?and whats hidden right the curtain of readers wants ?

The feature marked a big step forward in the evolution of online storytelling. From the earliest stages of developing “Snow Fall,” writers, researchers, designers, developers and multimedia experts all worked together to craft a compelling narrative wreathed in a natural user experience.

So, another day, another online journalism innovation. What does it mean for us and our higher ed newsrooms? Our resources pale in comparison to the Times’—after all, “Snow Fall” took six months and nearly a dozen staffers to bring to life. What does this latest notch in the Gray Lady’s belt mean for higher ed?

As it turns out, it means a lot.

Perhaps the NY Times this time wanted to deal with media like other website but now by its own phase and style, not just by going with the flow but also dealing with the settings by its own. The Times published that story on the front page. But Sports Editor Joe Sexton recognized that there could be something more to be done, and he enlisted me to examine that particular avalanche more closely.

A New Way of Working Together

Beyond the shiny appearance of “Snow Fall,” the heart of the effort was storytelling. As reporter John Branch put it, “when I returned with their stories, and we saw how their various perspectives of the same avalanche wove together, we invited the smart people in our interactive and graphics departments to help with the telling.”

It was this collaboration—which was baked into the project from the very get-go, even as Branch was in the midst of reporting, drafting and sourcing the story—which brought “Snow Fall” to life. (As we know, collaboration is key to content strategy success in higher ed.) And it wasn’t about throwing tons of media at a story—rather, just the right media, in the proper amounts and balance.

[“Snow Fall”] was an editing project that required us to weave things together so that text, video, photography and graphics could all be consumed in a way that was similar to reading—a different kind of reading. – Steve Duenes, The New York Times

“The larger project wasn’t a typical design effort,” Duenes told Source. “It was an editing project that required us to weave things together so that text, video, photography and graphics could all be consumed in a way that was similar to reading—a different kind of reading.”

Tunnel Creek avalanche As is probably evident, “Snow Fall” was built outside of the Times’ content management system. “Breaking out of that we are able to do a lot more of what you see in terms of the art direction, typograpy and the lay-out this couldn't be enough at all incase of dry typology stating the details of the story where it should have had this fututre piece of art that discssed smoothly the right actions timing and events in a way that washed the mind right away and evaluated the sensations of empathy toward the tragedy.

John Branch didnt want to give all credits to him other than wrinting the related article but it was obviously a huge and enormous teamwork behind the scenes as every body provided the right material video graphics infografichs POV s interviews in order to state the tragedy that happened up the large mountains declaring many sensations toward the losses inside the white dressed hills. An article template on a CMS typically has a slot, or multiple slots, in which you can plop a photo, a video, or another multimedia element.

The challenge that “Snow Fall” presents to us is to find a way to more smartly integrate and highlight multimedia content—not as an element shunted into a slot in a template, but an element that can succeed and enlighten in narrative context. This goes beyond technology in thinking through how different elements comprising a news story—text, video, imagery, graphics—complement one another and support the narrative.