Production Notes

Graphic Content: Part 2 Journalism and Voyeurism

2012-01-19T11:17:00.002-05:00

In April 2007 Michael Vick’s dogfighting ring dominated the news. Outside the Lines and SportsCenter showed video of dogs in violent combat, and were stung by viewer backlash.

      One viewer wrote: “I'll be honest: I turned that story off when they started showing the tapes of the dog fights...that was one of the few times where I completely and totally disagreed with an ESPN decision. Dogfighting is awful, we know it's awful, you don't need to show the tapes.”
      Those were the words of ESPN columnist Bill Simmons, in an online chat. Simmons laid bare the risk of graphic content. If he turned the channel, anybody might.
      But that’s only half of the risk - viewers also turn away from indifference. Graphic content can hold or build an audience, in its appeal to the intellect, through effective journalism, and to the gut, through voyeurism.
      In its decisions, ESPN must consider its own brand, as well as that of its parent company, Disney, says producer Ben Houser.
      Yet, if ESPN uses graphic content for journalism, and another network uses it to exploit voyeurism, a cynical public might not make a distinction, or care.
      This two-edged sword that is graphic content asks two subjective questions of producers: 1) is it too graphic? 2) is it necessary?
      When Outside the Lines pushed to use the moment of contact - baseball against skull - in the Gunnar Sandberg story, Sandberg’s parents refused. The two diametrically opposed views reflect the nuance of the issue.
       “Well, their motive was to protect the privacy of their child and their family,” said coordinating producer Tim Hays. “Our judgment is based on two completely different criteria; what's appropriate and what represents the best interest of our viewers. We have to make a call that balances those two factors. We wouldn't use a piece of video that is particularly gruesome or gratuitous, even if the viewer would like to see it. However, if we feel like it's an important part of the story, we have to consider it.”
       Said Dwayne Bray, head of the Enterprise Reporting Unit: “We never want to be gratuitous. We use what we need to tell the story, and nothing more. If the storytelling is strong enough, we believe, then you don't need to exploit graphic or violent video images to enhance viewer engagement.”
       How graphic is too graphic? Where is the line between necessary and gratuitous? The Radio Television Digital News Association counsels “particular compassion to victims of crime or tragedy” and offers up even more questions to help news organizations decide.
       Lots of questions, no easy answers.
       Producers say they weigh criteria on a story-by-story basis, but it also appears to be the case that it is weighed on a show-by-show basis.
       The story about alleged pedophile Bobby Dodd, former head of the A.A.U, and his accuser, Ralph West, ran in December on Outside the Lines, while an abbreviated version ran on SportsCenter.
      “SportsCenter decided - after some discussion - to bleep out the word ‘masturbate’,” said producer Carolyn Hong. “Outside the Lines did not bleep it out of our long piece...I understand that some of the staff were complaining that their kids would see the broadcast.”
       Viewers were given a warning about the language in the lead-in to the story, Hong said. One broad area of agreement is that viewers should be warned if there is any doubt about the material.
       Producer Martin Khodabakhshian recalled an HBO story about black market horse slaughter that did not warn viewers.
       “They showed horsed being sliced through - it felt like the Silence of the Lambs,” said Khodabakhshian. “I felt offended that they didn’t warn us this was coming.”
       Beyond that, producers apply their own rules of thumb.
       Jose Morales, in his piece on motocross riders, used crashes in which the injuries were not permanent, though he would not use the fatal crash of Jeremy Lusk, nor would he have used the moment of impact - if he had obtained it - that paralyzed Stephen Murray.
       “I think it’s fair to say that the degree of injury has an influence on my decision,” said Morales.
       On the other hand, producer Yaron Deskalo said that, in his 2010 piece on the playing fields of Bhopal, India, he did not hesitate to use rows of dead bodies from the 1984 pesticide factory disaster “because there was not a lot of blood, which is the danger.”
       E:60 executive producer Andy Tennant advises special caution “on stories involving dogs, horses and children.”
      The time slot of a show is a factor, producers said. A weekend show in the morning or afternoon could have a larger viewership of children. Parental caution should be advised early and often for questionable material.
      E:60 coordinating producer Michael Baltierra suggests more restraint with domestic stories than with international, because the emotional impact is greater if the image is closer to home.
     “You probably wouldn’t show a severed head in Cleveland,” he said.
      To that point, graphic content is defined by community and cultural standards, which vary from region to region, country to country, and are in constant flux. But as technology evolves, and citizen journalists feed You Tube and social media, community and cultural standards change. Today’s graphic content may be tomorrow’s elevator music.
     Which explains why, in the future, Yaron Deskalo’s decision not to air a flapping skull in Bahrain will be even more difficult.
     “The definition of what a journalist is has changed,” Deskalo said. “Those of us trying to tell a balanced story have to be more aware of what is being shown across the full spectrum.”

Posted by Steve Marantz on January 19, 2012

Graphic Content: Part 1, Deskalo’s Dilemma

2012-01-17T11:50:00.000-05:00

Arab Spring brought revolution to the Middle East and, inevitably, graphic content to media. In producing a story for E:60 about political repression in Bahrain, Yaron Deskalo found ample video of carnage, much of it shot by non-media with personal devices.

Deskalo’s task was to tell the story with proper context, texture, and tone - to use graphic content and not be used by it. Into his Sorcerer’s Brew went video of a bloodied man on a gurney, a bloodied protestor on a street, shootings of two protestors on the streets, and a man with a bloodied head on an operating table. Then a snippet gave him pause.

“Someone’s head was literally blown up,” recalled Deskalo. “A grenade had opened up his skull and it was in fragments - the guy was being carried and his head was flapping.”

The shot had come from a private flip-cam inside a Bahraini hospital. On the one hand it conveyed the brutality of the conflict. On the other it was repulsive enough that viewers might click away.

The tightrope was familiar to Deskalo. In May 2010 he produced an E:60 piece about Liberians who lost a limb in that country’s civil war more than 20 years ago and who found comfort in playing soccer. That piece, “Survival 1”, featured a severed head on a table and a decapitated body on a street, as well as a maggot-infested skeleton, and tape of a man being clubbed. Those images were appropriate, Deskalo had decided, because the story was about amputees - the graphic content spoke to the theme of the story.

But this call wasn’t as clear. The Bahrain story was about political repression; the injuries were peripheral.

Deskalo’s dilemma, as defined by the Radio Television Digital News Association, is that, “the visual images always overpower the spoken word. Powerful pictures can help explain stories better or they can distort the truth by blurring the important context of the report.”

Explain or distort, either or both, take your pick. ESPN producers routinely wrestle with graphic content.

In June 2010 Outside the Lines produced a show about the dangers of metal bats. Gunnar Sandberg was a high school pitcher in California who nearly died after being hit in the head by a line drive off a metal bat. His parents had the only video of the incident, and they gave it to OTL with the stipulation that the moment of contact - when the ball hit Sandberg’s head - not be shown. But that was what OTL wanted to show.

“We tried to convince them otherwise, because seeing it would make for a more complete telling of the story,” said coordinating producer Tim Hays.

Sandberg’s parents held firm and the moment of contact was not aired.

OTL pushed last summer in its reporting on Shannon Stone, the fan who fell over a center field railing, to his death, at Arlington Stadium trying to catch a ball tossed by outfielder Josh Hamilton. In an interview with a man who sat next to Stone, and tried to grab him, OTL ran tape of the fall not once, but twice.

“The video clearly showed the man trying to grab Mr. Stone, and since it was such an important part of the story we used the video a second time so that the viewer could see what the man was describing,” said Hays.

OTL producers knew the second showing could draw criticism.

“Others might have seen it as gratuitous, but in our judgment it wasn’t,” Hays said.

As often as producers push for graphic content, they pull back.

In a 2009 story on the dangers of freestyle motocross, producer Jose Morales declined to use the crash that killed rider Jeremy Lusk.

“After securing video of the crash and watching it, it was clear to me that I wouldn’t use it,” Morales said. “It was just too violent. Jeremy’s body literally snapped in half. It was gruesome.”

The story, which ran on OTL and SportsCenter, covered Lusk’s death with a SportsCenter announcement, and a sound bite from Lusk after he won a gold medal at the X Games.

Earlier in the piece, Morales showed rider Stephen Murray at the start of a stunt that would end with him paralyzed from the neck down. Morales did not have tape of the moment at which Murray snapped his neck. Even if he had, he says he would not have used it.

Instead, Morales dipped to black, carried the announcer’s call, and showed the reaction of other riders.

More restraint? OTL reported the story of Bobby Dodd, the former head of the A.A.U. alleged to be a pedophile, and interviewed Ralph West, who claims to have been molested by Dodd. The interview was well along when West, visibly shaken, arose and walked toward the back of the room. Producer Carolyn Hong’s cameras stayed on West as he puked. He still was mic'd, and she picked up the sound.

The question was not whether to air the moment - because it conveyed West’s distress and made his story more believable - but when.

“We had a number of discussions amongst us, with some people believing that the moment should play up high in our piece,” Hong said.

There also was a thought to amplify the sound of West puking. But in the final cut, the moment was aired when it occurred, near the end of the interview, and the sound was not amplified.

Sometimes a compromise is struck.

Producer Ben Houser had graphic photos of the mangled left leg of Nate Winters, a Florida boy who was in a 2008 boating accident and came back to become a high school pitcher. The photos came from Winters’ parents, both doctors, with permission to use them.

“The photos were not easy to look at and I don’t have a weak stomach,” said Houser. “But in the context of the story we determined that you had to see what he went through relative to his coming back and pitching.”

Houser’s final cut for E:60 found a middle ground.

“We blurred the photos - they’re not 100 percent crisp high def in focus,” he said. “You can make out that the leg was severed, but we took the edge off.”

In the case of the flapping skull, Deskalo put it into a rough cut and showed it to E:60 colleagues.

Producer Martin Khodabakhshian took one look and said, “It’s too gross. You’re going to lose people.”

Nobody disagreed and Deskalo removed it from the final cut.

“At the end of the day we just decided we had so many great images that we didn’t want to distract the viewers,” Deskalo said.

Part 2 will explore guidelines and best practices for graphic content.

Posted by Steve Marantz on January 17, 2012

Ashley Owens Quinter 1987-2011

2012-01-03T11:10:00.000-05:00

As the new year begins we remember Ashley Owens Quinter, who received the lungs of Paco Rodriguez, and breathed through them - with gratitude and exuberance - before she passed away on December 8, at age 24.

Rodriguez was the boxer who died in November 2009, from injuries in the ring, so that others might live, through his organ donations. Ashley lived a bit more than two years with Rodriguez’ lungs.

Vin Cannamela, who co-produced the piece on Rodriguez last spring, attended the memorial service for Ashley, in Birdsboro, Pa., on Dec. 18.

The chaplain who presided over her wedding last summer, to high school beau Jesse Quinter, recalled that joyous event:

“At one point she turned to Jesse and said, ‘If I died today I would be happy’.”

Three other recipients of Paco’s organs attended - Alexis Sloan (heart), Meghan Kingsley (liver) and Victoria Davis (kidney, pancreas). The four women had formed a “sisterhood” after they traveled to Chicago last spring, at E:60’s behest, to meet Paco’s family.

Victoria’s husband, Stuart, spoke on behalf of the recipients, and talked about Ashley’s kindness.

“It is said that every time a bell rings an angel gets her wings, well, Ashley was an angel on earth,” he said.

Attendees received a Mass card, with a photo of Ashley and four hearts, which said, “I think you should never waste a second of your life.”

After the service Cannamela reflected on Ashley and the story he co-produced.

“I was struck by everything she did in two years - finish her degree, graduate with honors, start a teaching career, get married, travel,” he said.

Asked about his own emotions at the service, Cannamela paused - for several seconds.

Finally, he said, “I guess I was just honored to be there - to be able to pay tribute to her and who she was and how she lived her life and touched people.”

He attended, he said, because, “As journalists we sometimes ask a lot of people in doing these types of stories. I don’t know if ‘obligate’ is the right word, but I felt it was the right thing to do. I wanted to see the other recipients and be there for them. In a real way we were the reason they got to know each other. For us to see the bond they created amongst themselves - that’s rewarding.”

Posted by Steve Marantz Jan 3, 2012

Shooting Bahrain

2011-11-22T12:35:00.001-05:00

Before the Arab Spring, Yaron Deskalo had produced E:60 stories from India, Liberia, Serbia, England, Spain, Venezuela, Brazil, Mexico and the Dominican Republic. Not bad for a guy from Milwaukee.

And then Bahrain erupted in six weeks of protests, which left 24 dead and 400 missing. Its Sunni royal family imprisoned and tortured elite soccer players, as well as workers at the Formula One racetrack, many of them Shias, who dared to protest. Bahrain is a mere speck of a country on the western shore of the Persian Gulf, but not too small to escape Deskalo’s passport.

Shooting in a foreign country, particularly one in upheaval, requires a detailed plan.

“I might have 12 things on a list, but I have a sense of four things we really want, and I prioritize,” said Deskalo.

Nothing gets done without a “fixer” - someone who lives there and can act as a guide, intermediary, translator and reporter. Deskalo hired Lubna Takruri, a U-Cal Berkeley Masters of Journalism graduate (2006), who had reported from the Middle East for CNBC and Irish Radio. While Deskalo, reporter Jeremy Schaap and shooters Bill Roach, Joel Edwards and Jessie Edwards applied for media visas, Takruri reached out to potential interview subjects.

“In a foreign country if you don’t speak the language you’re only as good as your fixer,” said Deskalo. “At the end of the day if you can’t communicate your vision to the fixer she can’t communicate to the government and you will have a hard time getting what you need.”

A tight budget limited the shoot to 5 ½ days. First came Oman, another Persian Gulf country slightly larger than Bahrain. Two of Bahrain’s top soccer players, the brothers Alaa and Mohammad Hubail, had been banished to Oman. Late in September, after 20 hours of travel, Deskalo’s crew arrived in Oman. At Customs he was told he did not have the proper papers for ESPN’s gear.

“We were screwed,” Deskalo recalled. “It was Wednesday night and Thursday and Friday is the weekend in Oman. My fear was that our gear would be in the airport for two days.”

In the morning Deskalo appealed to a press officer at Oman’s ministry of information, and his gear was cleared, but half a day was wasted. Still, he got what he needed, in a day and a half.

Next came 3 ½ days in Bahrain, which could be difficult, he worried, if government officials suspected a critical story. Officials were told the story would show “how the uprising affected sports in Bahrain, and how the country was moving forward”, Deskalo said. They were told athletes who were in the protests - and subsequently tortured - would be interviewed.

But at the time Bahrain was alone among Arab Spring countries to retain the backing of the Obama administration. This likely worked in Deskalo’s favor.

“I didn’t’ get the sense that they were concerned about a sports network,” said Deskalo. “There was no video of torture, and no wounds remained on the athletes. There was a level of arrogance from the royal family in terms of acknowledging the situation.”

On the first day he interviewed a soccer official whose comments were too guarded, so Takruri lined up alternative interviews. On the second day, driving to the U.S. Naval base, Deskalo thought a helicopter was shadowing his vehicle, but nothing came of it. Coincidentally, the government handed down prison sentences to several doctors who had protested. Takruri knew the attorney of one of the doctors, and secured an interview.

“You have to adjust on the fly - you only get one opportunity because you’re not flying back to Bahrain soon,” Deskalo said.

Overall the E:60 crew shot 13 interviews and ample scenery and color. On the last morning, before his flight out, Deskalo still needed an interview with a Formula One official but his request had been ignored. Finally, he took his crew to the lobby of the Formula One office. A flak told him the official was unavailable.

“We can’t go back without him,” Deskalo insisted.

The flak went into a back room and then returned.

“You can have 10 minutes in his office,” he said.

Schaap interviewed the official, also a member of the royal family, who pleaded ignorance to the plight of 27 of his former employees who claimed to have been tortured while in jail. The man in flowing white garb did his best Sgt. Schultz “I know nothing” impersonation, but his furtive eyes spoke otherwise.

“A good moment,” said Deskalo.

Posted by Steve Marantz on November 22, 2011

Risk in Snowtober

2011-11-10T19:43:00.000-05:00

On Saturday afternoon, October 29, three E:60 producers worked on three stories at three edit houses - all near, but not on, the ESPN “campus” in Bristol.

Martin Khodabakhshian was at Bluefoot Entertainment in West Hartford, Mike Loftus was at Northern Lights in Bristol, and Matt Rissmiller was at Anderson Productions in Bristol. Each was in a dash to complete a story for the special “Risk” show - about extreme athletes and their deathly feats - scheduled for Tuesday, November 2.

Snow began to fall. It fell and fell, gobs of wet stuff, a record amount for Connecticut in October. Trees bent and power lines sagged. Lights flickered out and furnaces went dead. Though generators powered the campus, many neighborhoods and homes went dark and cold.

Soon enough, “Risk” was something that crawled off the screen and into the lives of the three producers, and indeed, all ESPN employees and families in central Connecticut.

At Anderson Productions, Rissmiller toiled on a piece about Tyler Bradt, a kayaker who plunges down steep waterfalls. A generator kept Anderson lighted and warm.

Then Rissmiller heard the crack of a tree.

“A large pine tree fell within inches of the post-production facility,” said Rissmiller. “The limbs broke a window in a nearby edit suite and caused some water damage.”

The tree missed the generator, though. The building had power. The “Legends of the Fall” edit continued.

Executive producer Andy Tennant stopped in, viewed the damage, satisfied his concerns about safety, and headed to New Haven, where he found his home with power.

Over at Northern Lights, Loftus worked on “Kings of the Mountain” - about the ‘Red Bull Rampage’ mountain bike contest in Utah. At 8:30 p.m. Loftus and editor Nate Hogan called it a day. Loftus returned to his West Hartford home - minus heat and lights.

“It was cold,” Loftus recalled. “I had to bundle up and use a lot of blankets.”

Khodabakhshian, who conceived the “Risk” show, was in his third day of edit on “Land Sea Air” - about a high liner, free (ocean) diver, and sky diver - with editor Matt McCormick. Preoccupied, neither thought about the storm. But both received calls from their wives - stressed and anxious - so they broke off at 6 p.m. and headed home. Khodabakshian planned to return later to edit the ‘tease’.

West Hartford’s streets were shrouded, an apocalypse - Khodabakhshian counted a dozen trees downed. In his car Khodabakhshian took another call from his wife, Shalom, at their West Hartford home with their three children.

“The electrical wires snapped and are sparking like mad,” she said. “I think our house is on fire. I called the Fire Department.”

Moments later McCormick, at his home without power, texted Khodabakhshian: “WOW. Do not go back to Bluefoot!”

The Khodabakhshian family, without power, bundled up and hunkered down for the night. Khodabakhshian tried to get his Honda Civic off the street, but its battery died, and it was plowed in by two feet of snow. His four-year-old son became ill and vomited. Khodabakhshian made a run for supplies with his 4-Runner, but only after the vehicle spun and almost hit the house and garage.

Rissmiller left Anderson Productions late Saturday evening and drove to his Bristol home. He lost power at midnight as he shoveled his driveway.

“I was shoveling in the dark - awesome,” recalled Rissmiller.

By Sunday morning the storm passed, but the temperature plummeted. Tennant returned to the campus and beheld a post-apocalyptic scene. Employees, spouses and children crowded into the cafeteria, seeking food and warmth.

“People were showering in the locker rooms across from where we have E:60 production meetings on Friday,” Tennant recalled.

But Loftus and Hogan returned to Northern Lights to find it now without power. Hogan called Bluefoot owner Tim Horgan - by a stroke of luck Bluefoot was spared. Horgan offered Hogan space at Bluefoot, at which point Loftus and Hogan transported an entire edit bay 20 miles to West Hartford and set up in an empty conference room.

By now Loftus was worried.

“All of this is cutting into precious edit time,” Loftus recalled.

Khodabakhshian was at Bluefoot on Sunday, too. But as he worked he worried about his wife and kids in their cold house. Shalom tried to find a hotel with power - all were full. Later in the day Horgan invited Khodabakshian’s family to bunk at Bluefoot, in an empty edit room.

“So we packed up,” Khodabakhshian recalled. “We got pizzas and moved to Bluefoot and my family was huddled in one room while I edited in the other two rooms at Bluefoot.

“It was wild. Checking on kids. Encouraging the wife. Making L-cuts with Matt. Adding more insane-Asian-model shots with Tim. Surreal experience.”

Also sleeping at Bluefoot were Horgan, his wife Hillary, an E:60 producer, and McCormick, whose wife and kids had gone to New Jersey. Hillary Horgan, who grew up in Florida, had spent the day editing ‘bumps’ on campus - but only after her husband had chauffeured her from their Avon home, and then to West Hartford.

“I was too afraid to drive in the snow,” Hillary Horgan recalled.

Tennant came by, and was amazed at the scene.

“There were blankets, pillows, kids and bodies everywhere, on couches and floors, whatever space was available,” he recalled.

Loftus chose to sleep at home.

“Night was the worst, sleeping in a cold drafty house trying to stay warm and hoping that each day you would get the power back,” he recalled.

Power remained out Monday for much of central Connecticut while edits continued at Bluefoot. Shalom Khodabakshian and her kids found a hotel room in Boston, at Logan Airport.

About 80 to 90 percent of the E:60 staff, Tennant learned, had lost power, and had their families displaced.

Loftus and Hogan logged 14 hours to complete “Kings of the Mountain”. At one point Loftus ventured out for food.

“Lines were nuts,” he said. “One pizza place had to turn us away because they ran out.”

Khodabakhshian finished his edits late Monday, slept for three hours at his 43-degree home, and flew out at 5:45 a.m. Tuesday to Birmingham for the premier of his ESPN Films documentary “Roll Tide/War Eagle”.

E:60’s “Risk” show aired Tuesday evening, without a hitch.

The next day, Wednesday, Tennant recalled, “we had a smile on our face. People told us they enjoyed the show, but no one had any idea what went into putting that on the air.”

That same day ESPN President George Bodenheimer issued a statement to employees:

“It has always been true that the people of ESPN band together to meet any challenge placed before them. Its what has made this a special and exhilarating place to work.

“The last few days of ‘Snowtober,’ which continue to leave so many in the Northeast without power and heat - and their families in distress as a result - are the latest examples of this. Schools and businesses are closed. Fallen trees and power lines dot roads and streets. Municipalities have declared states of emergency. Amidst this turmoil, our people are meeting their professional obligations to each other and to sports fans nationwide in exceptional fashion. Anyone consuming any of our content would have no idea of what our people have dealt with to present it.

“From added meals for families in our cafes, to making showers available in a variety of Bristol campus locations, to the Kids Center going beyond to help families, to watching everyone pick each other up - the events on our campus these last few days have been truly inspiring.

“My sincere thanks and appreciation go to all who have demonstrated the best of ESPN during a difficult time.”

Nearly two weeks after the storm, with Connecticut power crews still making repairs, Tennant looked back at ‘Risk’.

““To put on a show so unique and well-produced under those circumstances was truly remarkable,” he said. “I couldn’t be more proud.”

posted by Steve Marantz on November 10, 2011

Ray Rice’s Barbershop

2011-11-04T14:08:00.000-04:00

E:60 pushes for access to celebrity athletes off the field and away from the spotlight. Sometimes the personal door is jammed tight. Other times it creaks slightly ajar. And then, on occasion, it swings open to unfiltered light and sound.

Such was the case with Baltimore Ravens running back Ray Rice in “Like Mother Like Son”. Producer Frank Saraceno asked Rice if he could shoot him at his barbershop, in his hometown of New Rochelle, N.Y., because Rice had worked at a barbershop as a kid. Rice agreed, and invited Saraceno and reporter Rachel Nichols to join him, on his bye week.

They met at “Flavaz” just before noon and Saraceno sized up the layout. The shop was large enough, he determined.

“The only real concern were the mirrors which of course are everywhere in a barber shop,” said Saraceno. “I told my two-man crew to shoot like they weren’t there so they wouldn’t be concerned about being seen in the shots.

Regulars - tipped to Rice’s visit - crowded the shop. This put to rest another concern - that the scene would lack energy and atmosphere.

To encourage relaxed banter, Saraceno urged Rice and the others to forget that a camera crew was in their midst.

“It took a few tries but once they finally got going, the conversation started to become very natural and free flowing,” Saraceno said. “By the time Rachel stepped in to ask Ray questions the room was primed.”

The scene yielded one particular gem - Rice’s anecdote about his first encounter in pads with Ravens linebacker Ray Lewis.

Nonetheless, in the first cut, Saraceno downplayed the barbershop. The first cut began at the public housing project where Rice grew up.

But after a staff screening, coordinating producer Michael Baltierra urged that the barber shop lead the piece, to highlight Rice’s outgoing personality and his close relationship with Lewis - who spoke of it in a separate interview.

“In retrospect it was a brilliant decision which helped give the piece a great kick-start and pacing,” Saraceno said.

Posted by Steve Marantz on November 4, 2011

Subtitling Ernest Willis

2011-10-24T15:05:00.000-04:00

“The Good Life” is the story of Patrick Willis, All-Pro linebacker for the 49ers, and his ascent from rural poverty and an abusive father.

The story takes Willis back to his childhood in a rusted trailer outside of Bruceton, Tennessee. His mother abandoned his family when he was four. His father, Ernest, a part-time logger who drank and used drugs, raised him and his three siblings.

Willis and his siblings describe the physical beatings and threats they endured from their father before state officials placed them in a foster home.

Ernest Willis was interviewed by E:60 producer Beein Gim, and denied the allegations of his children.

But Ernest’s diction - colloquial and rapid - raised a question in edit: should he be subtitled?

Executive producer Andy Tennant asked E:60 staffers their opinion after they screened the story. Ernest was subtitled in the version they watched. The result was a 50-50 split.

Feature producer Lisa Binns, who did not work on the piece, opposed subtitles.

“The first time I watched I relied on the subtitles and the second time I avoided watching them to see if I could understand and I did,” said Binns.

Typically, subtitles are used to translate language foreign to the intended audience. They may be used for the same language as the intended audience - if the speaker has impaired speech. Subtitles can be used for song lyrics, rapid dialogue, and for accents unfamiliar to the intended audience. They are used to keep the viewer in the moment if speech poses a potential distraction.

Said Coordinating Producer Michael Baltierra: “When you subtitle somebody in our own language there’s always a concern of why are you doing this.”

In this case, Tennant and senior producers sought out multiple opinions, including that of senior vice-president/director of news Vince Doria. They reviewed the raw footage of the interview. And they asked the E:60 staff for its vote.

In the end, the decision was to subtitle Ernest Willis.

Tennant explained it thusly:

“If half the room can’t understand him clearly - if 50 percent of our audience is not going to understand his side of the story with clarity - maybe the way to go is to subtitle.

“Several factors came into play. One, he was not the main character...he was a secondary character. But more important, he was responding to accusations against him by his children - serious accusations. To be fair to him and to give him a platform to respond we thought it was an absolute necessity that people were 100 percent clear on what he was saying.”

E:60 logged no complaints about the Willis subtitles, Tennant pointed out. And if the decision had been reversed, perhaps nobody would have complained, either.

“When you produce this type of TV clarity is the most important thing,” he said. “You want to make sure it’s easy to follow and that the characters are easy to follow. We did what we thought was the fair and right thing to do.”

Going forward, Binns suggests that when a judgment call arises, the staff first should view a version without subtitles.

“I’m suggesting as a best practice to show these things without subtitles to see how the room reacts,” she said.

posted by Steve Marantz on October 24, 2011

Jamie Convey, Radio Dreams and Judgment Calls

2011-10-13T12:16:00.001-04:00

“Radio Dreams” is the story of Jamie Convey, a 10-year-old boy with cerebral palsy, his own Internet sports talk show, and indomitable spirit. The making of “Radio Dreams” raised a couple of sensitive issues around Jamie’s disability.

One was subtitling. Jamie’s speech can pose a challenge because cerebral palsy affects a part of the brain that controls motor skills such as speech. Producer Heather Lombardo and E:60 brass considered subtitling Jamie’s comments.

Typically, subtitles may be used - for the same language as the intended audience - if the speaker has impaired speech. They also are used to translate language foreign to the intended audience. Subtitles can be used for song lyrics, rapid dialogue, and for accents unfamiliar to the intended audience.

“If he says something and the viewer has to stop and think, ‘What?’ and then misses the next ten seconds, it takes the viewer out of the moment,” said Lombardo. “With subtitles there would be no questions about what he said.”

But Lombardo was wary. She once produced a story that involved an aging heavyweight boxer, James ‘Quick’ Tillis, whose speech was slurred from his life in the ring. She subtitled Tillis, and incurred the wrath of his girlfriend.

“You made him look stupid!” the woman complained.

Lombardo stands by her decision, but says it can be a tough call.

“It’s sensitive because you are dealing with pride and ego and emotion,” she said.

In Jamie’s case, because speech is central to his role as a broadcaster, subtitles were deemed “insensitive”.

With careful screening of Jamie’s shows - archived as well as the two shot by her crew - Lombardo found ample bites that were clear and understandable.

“It’s about a kid doing a radio show,” Lombardo said. “We want people to understand Jamie, but we don’t want to embarrass him.”

“Radio Dreams” posed another sensitive decision. Just past the five-minute mark it includes a scene with Jamie and his father, at an outdoor track, where Jamie goes for exercise. From a distance, the camera catches Jamie, on his walker, exhausted and discouraged. At one point, he collapses onto his walker, with tears in his eyes. Then, with his father’s help, he collects himself, and completes the circuit.

Lombardo’s first inclination was to leave out the moment of discouragement, and show him at the moment of completion. But the more she thought about it, the more she liked the scene.

“In order to show what Jamie has accomplished - for the story to resonate - we had to show the challenges that he endures on a day-to-day basis,” Lombardo said.

Yet, Lombardo knew that “Jamie might not be happy with that scene because it captured a vulnerable moment.”

Another judgment call, but this was different. The track scene, she decided, is more about Jamie’s courage and spirit than weakness. She used it.

After the piece aired Lombardo talked with the father, Jim Convey, and sure enough, Jamie is not happy with the track scene. On the other hand, as a veteran talk show host, he knows to respect her professional prerogative.

“He understood,” Lombardo said.

Posted by Steve Marantz on October 13, 2011

In the Moment

2011-09-22T12:30:00.001-04:00

Producer Dave Salerno was under pressure for his August piece on Tulsa quarterback G.J. Kinne. Another story was cancelled at the 11^th hour, and Salerno was asked to pull off a tight turnaround.

Kinne’s story involved his father Gary Kinne, his former coach at Canton High School in Texas. In 2005 a disgruntled father of another player confronted Gary at the high school and shot him in the stomach. He was rushed into emergency surgery, and a police officer told G.J. that his father had died. But he hadn’t.

Salerno moved into production mode without a script in mind.

He interviewed G.J, his mother, another coach, and Gary, and elicited detailed and emotional accounts of the shooting and aftermath.

In edit he had two choices.

One was to use Gary’s voice in the re-telling of the incident.

Another was to create a “reveal” - an editing technique in which crucial information is withheld until the middle or end for a surprise. In this version, the reveal would be Gary’s survival. Reveals are desirable for their dramatic tension.

E:60 has used reveals in stories about retired NFL-er Marvin Harrison, MMA fighter and bank robber Lee Murray, double-amputee sprinter Oscar Pistorius, and brain-damaged college football player Preston Plevretes.

An effective reveal requires interviews that stay in the moment, meaning they describe action without giving away the outcome of that action. The subject knows the outcome, but is transported back in time to when he or she did not.

“I knew there were things we had to hit,” Salerno recalled. “I wanted to go into detail and build up the events of that day.”

Salerno and reporter Lisa Salters managed to elicit G.J.’s description - six years after the fact - in the moment. In edit, Salerno went with the reveal because “we had the sound to support it.”

At the top, when reporter Salters ask G.J. for his thoughts at the time of the shooting, he says “I’ll never see my Dad again. He’ll never get to coach me again. He’ll never get to do the things that Dads do because someone had taken that from him.”

The first hint of Gary’s survival comes at about eight-and-a-half minutes into the piece. Gary doesn’t speak until 9:10 - a powerful and uplifting moment for those unfamiliar with Kinne’s story.

The reveal proved persuasive at the E:60 screening and became a segment titled, “Back From the Dead”.

In retrospect, Salerno credited the interviews.

“With material like that it’s much easier to hold the reveal,” he said. “Sometimes you can do it, and sometimes you can’t. In theory it’s great but in practice it’s more difficult to pull off.”

posted by Steve Marantz on September 22, 2011

Finding Emotion

2011-08-17T10:58:00.001-04:00

By the time producer Hillary Horgan caught up with the 18-year-old Coppola triplets in December 2010 their unusual story was well along. Brandon Coppola had fractured a cervical vertebra in a 2008 scrimmage that ended his football career. Jared Coppola had suffered the same injury in a 2009 practice, and was in a wheelchair.

The third brother, Tyler, was the star running back of St. John’s Prep of Danvers, Ma. He was “Running for Three”, as St. John’s went into the state championship Super Bowl at Gillette Stadium.

Horgan had two challenges. Her story had three main characters, and two (Tyler and Brandon) are identical. She had to minimize confusion to viewers.

“Typically in a feature we only put name fonts to identify a person one time - the first time they show up on the screen,” Horgan said. “But in this case, to alleviate any confusion, we put name fonts up each time a triplet was on the screen.”

Problem solved.

The second challenge was more difficult. In their interviews with E:60, the triplets and their parents had a flat affect. This may have been because they had ample time - and local media coverage - to move beyond the initial trauma. Or it may simply have reflected their personalities and priorities.

“The parents, Dawn and Skip, never really got emotional in order to stay strong for the family,” Horgan said. “They never felt sorry for themselves or their situation. They always stayed positive. The children saw this and did the same.

“I give them a lot of credit, because I think the positive attitude helped Jared to continue to work as hard as he has in order to one day walk again.”

A flat affect is okay for people, but not for stories. Horgan had to find a way to tell what in essence was a dramatic story - of three brothers tied to a cruel fate - without emotion from the main characters.

She took two approaches. First, to put viewers ‘in the moment’ as the triplets and parents experienced the injuries and aftermath. Second, to emphasize the close bond of the triplets, with photos and video from their infancy and youth.

Especially powerful were images of Tyler and Brandon helping Jared with his rehab. The defining image came as Tyler carried Jared up a flight of stairs, to the second-floor trophy room at St. John’s Prep, where Horgan shot their interviews.

“The shot happened by chance,” Horgan said. “There was no elevator and no way to get Jared up the stairs without someone carrying him up. Without even giving it a thought, the boys said ‘no problem, we can carry him up, we do it all the time’. So when we were ready for Jared, I asked one of my camera men to get in position and shoot them going up the stairs.”

The special brotherhood of triplets takes over the story. There is Jared, on a walker, making his way to the center of a football field, with Brandon and Tyler at his side.

At Tyler’s final high school game, Horgan has her cameras on Brandon and Jared, riding the team bus, watching from the sidelines.

Horgan wraps it with a specialty shot, with Jared between his two brothers, arms entwined, standing tall, about to head off to three different colleges.

By that time it’s hard not to cheer - and feel a lump in the throat - for the Coppola triplets.

Posted by Steve Marantz on August 17, 2011

Comfort Zone

2011-08-15T10:54:00.000-04:00

Production assistant Toby Hershkowitz writhed on the floor while a frail 7-year-old boy twisted his arm and stomped on his chest.
E: 60 meets WWE? Not exactly.
The vignette occurred July 7 at the E:60 roundtable shoot in midtown Manhattan, as producers, talent and film crew relaxed between segments.
By way of explanation, later, Hershkowitz, 26, said, “I still consider myself a kid.”
But that’s only part of it.
Rewind to last fall when E:60 ran a story about the little boy fastened onto Hershkowitz.
Josiah Viera suffers from Hutchinson-Gilford Progeria syndrome, which causes accelerated aging in children, and has a life expectancy of eight to 13 years.
Baseball, a sport without a clock, is Josiah’s passion. The story, “Josiah’s Time”, with footage of his first Little League game in Hegins, Pa., touched viewers near and far, and garnered an Emmy nomination.
For E:60’s summer lineup 2011, executive producer Andy Tennant proposed a show of Emmy-nominated features. Feature Producer Ben Houser, who produced “Josiah’s Time”, suggested that the boy and his mother sit in on the roundtable - a simulation of a news meeting in which producers and reporters discuss the news value, characters and themes of stories. The idea was to use the roundtable to update Josiah’s story.
That’s where Hershkowitz, who produces the roundtable, came in.
When Houser arrived with Josiah, and his mother, Jennifer, Hershkowitz called for a break.
Houser introduced Josiah to Hershkowitz. They shook hands - and Hershkowitz took note.
“An incredibly firm handshake for a 25-pound kid,” Hershkowitz recalled. “A lot of kids are shy whether they have issues of not. He was not shy.”

Josiah took a shine to Hershkowitz. He told the producer that he planned to go to a park to play baseball after the roundtable.
“You can come and be on my team.”
Soon enough, Josiah and Hershkowitz were on the floor in their best WWE imitation. Hershkowitz was not entirely surprised - though not a father he has young cousins and he babysat in his younger days.
“I love being around kids and I usually have a pretty good rapport with kids,” Hershkowitz said, later. “I still consider myself a kid. Anytime I refer to myself in conversation I probably use the word ‘kid’ more than I use the word ‘man’ because that’s just how I feel. I don’t mind rolling around on the floor and pretending to play dead when he punches me in the chest. It’s as much fun for me as for him.”
But behind Hershkowitz’s playfulness was a professional calculation. In a few minutes Josiah would be on camera.
“We’ve had guests at the roundtable before - it’s always important to let them know what we’re trying to accomplish and to make them feel comfortable,” Hershkowitz said.
“He was in a room full of adults and I could tell he wanted to play - little kids just want to run around and play all the time. And I’m probably among the goofiest most childish people on this show so I was a good candidate to play and make him feel comfortable.”
Indeed, Josiah and his mother appeared relaxed when the cameras rolled. At the table - actually a rectangle - were Tennant, Houser, coordinating producer Michael Baltierra, and reporters Rachel Nichols, Chris Connolly, and Jeremy Schaap.
Jennifer told about wondrous events, about gifts from Terrell Owens, a trip to Cameron Indoor Stadium at Duke, the 15-games Josiah played in little league, the Harlem Globetrotters’ show at his elementary school, and about countless requests for autographs. Josiah, in his squeak of a voice, talked of the batting glove and bat he received from Ryan Howard.
Neither mentioned the several strokes he has suffered in the past year, or the increased fragility of his health. Those demons will return soon enough. But not now - not with Josiah feeling chipper and surrounded by a roomful of adults and cameras who adored him.
The group arose from the table. Tennant tossed a plastic ball and Josiah swung a thin wooden bat. The ball soared over Tennant’s head and caromed off a wall. Another pitch came back on a line at Tennant’s face. Then Josiah ran around the table. The cameras got all of it.
Later, after Josiah, his mother, and Houser departed, to eventually visit Diane Sawyer at the set of ‘World News Tonight’, Hershkowitz pondered the edit.

“This is a situation where they will let the roundtable go a little longer - maybe two to 2 ½ minutes,” he said. “Because it’s easy to feel for this kid - but maybe tough to connect to him on a personal level because of the unique situation facing him. That’s what the roundtable does. It lets us connect with him just as a person and forget for a minute that he’s a little kid with this terrible disease. It lets us see him just as a little kid who loves to have fun and play baseball and interact with adults the same way other kids do. I hope we can get that across.”

Posted by Steve Marantz on August 15, 2011

E:60 Jib and Boom

2011-08-01T10:38:00.001-04:00

For two days last August E:60 producer Ben Houser followed Mike Reeder around two of the lesser-known of the five courses at St. Andrews in Scotland. On the third day Houser arose well before dawn.
Reeder, 63, of Franklin, Tennessee, was about to become the first wheelchair golfer to play the Old Course, the ancestral home of golf, one of the most iconic locations in all of sport.
Reeder had lost both of his legs below in the knee in 1970, in a mortar explosion, while serving as a medic in Vietnam. He took up golf in 1988, shot par at his home course in 2001, and dreamed of playing St. Andrews with his golf buddy, Mike Bilbrey.
But Bilbrey never made it - cancer took him in 2009. Before he died he asked Reeder to spread his ashes on the Old Course. Reeder made the journey in August 2010, funded by the Challenged Athletes Foundation.
Which is why Houser found himself, with a local Scotsman, assembling a jib camera near the Swilcan Bridge - the most iconic landmark at St. Andrews - before sunrise.

The jib, which reaches 36 feet at full extension, was essential to Houser’s game plan.
“The jib gives you a different perspective,” Houser said. “It allows you to see the majestic nature of that course, and also gives you very smooth movement.”
At sunrise, when Reeder rolled across the fairway in his wheelchair, the jib was ready, as were Houser’s two other cameras.
“We waited for the sun to come up on the horizon, so that it framed our shot,” Houser said. “It was between the bridge and Reeder as he wheeled toward the bridge. When he was on the bridge we had this big jib overhead.”
The sunrise shot in “Dead Solid Perfect” speaks for itself, for sheer beauty.
But the emotional climax came later in the day, after Reeder teed off on the 14th hole. He climbed out of his golf cart, accompanied by his wife, and carried Bilbrey’s ashes to the sand trap known as Hell Bunker. Houser’s main shooter positioned at the edge of the bunker, while Houser held a second camera from another angle.
As Reeder spread the ashes over the sand, and bid farewell to his friend, he was seized with grief. When he walked away from the bunker, he sobbed. Houser got it all.
“A guy with a boom mike was standing there right over top of him - but out of the frame so you can’t see him,” Houser said.
From the Old Course to your screen, another E:60 trail of tears.
“What you saw was real,” said Houser. “Witnessing it, obviously not knowing Mike Bilbrey, and only knowing Reeder for a short time, to have him open up his world and allow ESPN to document what happened, to be a fly on the wall as he’s doing that, takes a lot of trust. I was thinking from a producer’s standpoint, what an amazing moment to capture. Most of the time you don’t have people open up the most intimate things in their life.
“Lots of times a story will just cover that moment with a track, ‘oh, and he spread the ashes’. Or we’ll do a recreation or cover it with a photo. But we literally had it. The way it happened is the way you saw it.”
Reeder emoted for E:60, Houser suspected, because he had come to know Houser and his crew in the two days before he played the Old Course.
On the second day, Houser recalled, one of the cameras had moved too close to Reeder as he hit a tee shot.
“Hey, you got a little close that time,” Reeder said.
That moment, Houser later realized, was crucial in establishing rapport and trust.
“By Day 3 he had played 36 holes with us,” Houser said. “He knew we weren’t going to talk or interrupt his golf game. He had a comfort level with us.”

Posted by Steve Marantz, August 1, 2011

E:60 Paco Rodriguez (subtitled)

2011-05-26T14:57:00.001-04:00

On Sunday, November 22, 2009, boxer Francisco “Paco” Rodriguez was declared brain dead two days after collapsing in the ring following a fight in Philadelphia. Hours later, his family made the decision to donate Paco’s organs and in turn revitalized the lives of five others. One of the recipients, 25 year old Meghan Kingsley had been diagnosed nine years earlier with a condition known as Neurofibromatosis Type 2 . In 2009, Kingsley participated in a clinical trial to attempt to reduce the growth of the benign tumors in her brain and spine, but the medication shut down her liver, leaving her in dire need of a transplant. Meghan, like many NF2 patients has suffered a loss of hearing. In order to serve the Neurofibromatosis community, we have produced a version of E:60 Hero – The Paco Rodriguez story” with subtitles.

Chameleon: Going Undercover

2011-05-23T15:48:00.001-04:00

This is the story of two E:60 producers – one who conceived and plotted “Cockfighting Undercover” and one who shot it. Their names are changed here to safeguard their identities.
The lead producer, Claude, had read about illegal underground cockfighting in Texas. The ‘sport’ features duels to the death, with rooster claws outfitted in three-inch blades that produce a bloody and gruesome result within a few minutes. Up to 20 matches take place, before crowds of 200 to 300, who wager on the outcomes.
Claude reached out to the Humane Society, which investigates and exposes cockfighting. The Humane Society agreed to take an E:60 producer undercover to shoot an underground cockfight. But the Humane Society did not want the typical producer type - urbane and sophisticated.
“Since cockfighting in Texas is largely Hispanic and rural they needed someone who kind of fits the bill,” said Claude.
That’s where Earl came in – he had The Look. Claude asked Earl if he were game, so to speak.
“I’d like to be part of it,” Earl said.
Earl’s photo was sent to the Humane Society and he was approved.
Claude and Earl met with Humane Society officials in Texas and agreed on a plan. Earl would accompany an undercover informant for the Humane Society, as well as the informant’s undercover informant. They would attend an illegal cockfight just outside Gunter, Texas, (population 1,100), about an hour north of Dallas, on the morning of April 16. Both Earl and the informant for the Humane Society would be fitted with hidden cameras.
Dangers were discussed. Cockfights attract a rough crowd.
If the hidden cameras were exposed anything might happen.
Earl had a moment of reckoning.
“If you get caught doing something like this at the very least you are going to get the crap kicked out of you,” he told himself. “Who knows what else could happen.”
Details were ironed out. Earl would be outfitted with a buttonhole camera connected to a wire that ran down his leg to a receiver strapped inside one of his boots. Prior to the cockfight he practiced with the buttonhole camera – to learn its range. He practiced natural movement.
Claude told him, “Be comfortable with the equipment.”
Earl also watched footage of previous undercover forays, in order to dress to blend with the crowd.
Early on April 16 Earl met with Claude.
“If you don’t feel safe you don’t have to go through with this,” Claude said. “Are you sure you want to do this?”
Earl nodded – this was his Rambo moment.
Soon he joined the two informants at a parking lot in Gunter and met with a surprise. Earl had expected to be driven to the cockfight in a vehicle owned by one of the informants. Instead, a fourth man pulled up, with roosters in his car.
“Right then you realize that going undercover things can change in a heartbeat and you have to react,” Earl recalled.
Without his own vehicle, Earl knew, there would be no getaway if something went wrong. He considered aborting the mission, and then climbed into the vehicle.
“Now we were all in,” Earl recalled.
The car with Earl and the informants made its way over flat country roads. Claude and his crew followed at a distance, guided by text messages from Earl. When Earl’s car turned onto a dirt road he sensed it was near to the ‘arena’. He texted Claude: “Don’t come down this dirt road – I think we’re close.”
Indeed, Earl’s car was the first to arrive, and each passenger paid $20 for admission. Soon other customers filed in and circled the ring, a 15x35 rectangle covered in plywood.
As a new face, Earl felt eyes upon him, and his stomach knotted in tension. Worse, the receiver tucked inside his boot dug into his foot, but he dared not stoop down to adjust it, and he dared not limp.
The promoter came through the crowd and introduced himself. Again, Earl tensed, because if the promoter had patted down his boot he would have discovered the receiver.
The promoter spoke in Spanish to Earl, who does not speak Spanish.
“I just shook his hand, gave him a nod and smile, and didn’t say anything,” Earl said.
The others passed a few words with the promoter, and he moved on to the next group.
“Did I just pass the test?” Earl asked himself. “I hope I did.”
Just before the cockfights began Earl found a quiet spot and turned on his camera.
“I let it go from that point until it was full,” he said. “I was already not part of this so I didn’t want to stick out anymore by constantly going behind trees or trucks to check the device so I just let it go.”
Earl went to work.
“You find a spot and stand there and make sure nothing is obstructing you and you stand there for the entire fight,” he said.
“I just tried to fit in by seeming enthusiastic. The whole thing is to fit in like a chameleon.”
During the fights, with attention on the birds, Earl found that his tension subsided. Between fights Earl moved through the crowd. He was approached by beer and food vendors, and by rooster owners who showed off their vanquished combatants, with blood dripping from slit necks.
“Sorry, sorry – too bad,” Earl said, and hoped that he had positioned his camera to capture the scene. He also hoped that his face did not reveal his revulsion.
“One thing that struck me was when a bird got sliced and was dying fairly quickly, the owner took almost as much pride as when they won,” Earl recalled. “They were showing that off. That was disturbing. Be disappointed. Be upset. But don’t be showing it off.”
His hidden receiver had about two hours capacity. But the fights went on for six hours, during which 15 roosters died. At one point four toughs dressed like “Latino gang bangers” arrived.
“I made sure never to make eye contact with them,” Earl said.
After the last bout Earl and his group filed out with the crowd and drove off the property.
“That’s when I took a deep breath,” Earl recalled. “My next deep breath didn’t come until I was out of that vehicle and back with my crew and lead producer.”

posted by Steve Marantz, May 23, 2011

Empathy and Wow!

2011-04-27T12:48:00.000-04:00

Paco Rodriguez, a 24-year-old boxer, died on November 22, 2009, from injuries sustained in a Philadelphia ring. Shortly thereafter, his heart, lungs, kidneys, pancreas and liver were transplanted to five recipients. The New York Times reported Rodriguez’ organ donations in December.
In February 2010, E:60 requested permission from Gift of Life, a Philadelphia-based group that arranged the organ donations, to report on four of the recipients. (The fifth was an “uncle” of Rodriguez, who got a kidney) Permission was granted in July.
Producers Vin Cannamela and Frank Saraceno began the work. Cannamela went to Philadelphia to meet with the recipients, whose names were not yet public. It was a task to which Cannamela was sensitive. He was born with a congenital heart condition and underwent open-heart surgery when he was six.
“To some small degree I had empathy for what these people had been going through,” Cannamela said. “But I also felt sympathy for what they dealt with. I did not equate my situation with theirs.
“Mine was a condition that could be repaired – my life wasn’t in danger. Surgery certainly improved my life, but it wasn’t a thing where I would have died.”
Saraceno went to Chicago to meet with Rodriguez’ family: his widow Sonia; infant daughter Ginette, brother Alex, mother Maria and father Evaristo. By that time Sonia had exchanged letters with the four recipients – all wanted to meet with her.
The meeting, underwritten by E:60, was arranged for December 1 in Chicago, in front of E:60 cameras. One recipient balked, and then consented.
Cannamela and Saraceno set up the meeting at the offices of Gift of Hope, an organ-donation group in suburban Chicago. They wanted it to be tasteful, genuine and powerful.
“How could we shoot this and have it be authentic?” Saraceno asked himself.
“You only have one shot at this moment, and if something goes wrong... a number of things could go wrong...a mike cuts out...a wrong button...everything has to be letter perfect.”
A plan took shape. They decided to limit the initial meeting – too many faces could confuse viewers. The widow, daughter, brother, and mother were chosen to represent the family. The mother was chosen because of her desire to meet the heart recipient. Alex, the oldest brother, was chosen to help translate the mother, whose primary language is Spanish.
Another question: should the recipients meet the family one-by-one or as a unit?
The four recipients – Alexis Sloan (heart), Ashley Owens (lungs), Meghan Kingsley (liver), and Vicky Davis (kidney, pancreas), had dined together the night before, and had established a rapport, a “sisterhood”, as Saraceno called it. The producers decided they should meet the family as a unit.
Four cameras were deployed. The lead shooter, Mike Bollacke, was riveted on the widow, Sonia. A second camera was a “catch-all” for wide shots. A third camera shot at 60 frames per second, providing a slo-mo option. Saraceno had the fourth camera – a mini-cam - with the freedom to roam and fill in the gaps.
Eight microphones were wired to the four family members and four recipients.
As the meeting drew nigh anxiety mounted. The producers worried that the meeting could produce awkward moments. They worried that the one reluctant recipient would back out or not emote. They worried about the equipment.
“I hope nothing happens,” Saraceno thought.
Finally it was time.
The recipients filed in, led by Vicky Davis, at 57 the eldest of the four. Davis hugged Sonia and Maria, the mother. Soon everybody hugged everybody, carried up on waves of emotion, awash in tears of joy.
Maria buried her head in the chest of Alexis, over the beating heart of her son. It was the money shot, unscripted, and captured by Saraceno’s mini-cam.
“It happened so quickly,” Saraceno recalled. “The guys were on the other side. I was able to swing around and get the shot they couldn’t get to.”
Then Sonia placed the hand of her 11-month-old daughter on the chest of Alexis. At that instant Cannamela felt vindicated.
“This is going to be good,” he told himself.
In time Cannamela sent in three more family members – father Evaristo, brother Tito, and “uncle”, Ramon, who received a kidney. Then he sent in the four guests of the recipients, who had accompanied them on the trip. Among the guests was Sharon Kingsley, the mother of the liver recipient, Meghan. Sharon hugged Maria and whispered in her ear.
Later, family and recipients lingered over a display of memorabilia from the boxing career of Paco Rodriguez, and chatted, while the cameras stayed on.
When it was over, and they had a moment alone, Cannamela and Saraceno took a deep breath and looked at one another.
“Wow!”
The shoot had exceeded their hopes.
“As much as you think you might know what it’s like to be in that type of setting, I think we were just blown away,” recalled Cannamela.
“You can’t script that. You could try – we try to control as much as we can – but when these things happen that you couldn’t even dream of, and are so natural and organic and come from the heart – and that’s what our cameras are there to capture – that was amazing.
“And you are feeling for these people as you see this happen. You’ve got to stay as unemotional as you can but you can’t help but feel for these people.”
Said Saraceno: “It’s rare when you’re in the middle of a story when you have to check your emotions so you can think clearly. Watching it all come together was for me very powerful.”
Two months later, in edit, Cannamela and Saraceno experienced another – and unexpected - moment of wonder and triumph. When they queued up Sharon Kingsley’s hug of Maria, they heard what the mother of the recipient whispered to the mother of the donor:
“From one mother to another, nobody could understand it but yourself. But I thank you for the gift that you've given us, because without him, she wouldn't be alive, either.”
Again, the producers looked at one another.
“Wow!”

(posted by Steve Marantz, April 27, 2011)

Co-Stars

2011-04-22T15:56:00.000-04:00

At about 10 a.m on April 8 Carl Crawford climbed out of a dugout onto the field at Fenway Park, four hours before the home opener of the Red Sox. He was greeted by an E:60 crew on hand to capture the moment.
For Crawford it was the start of the Red Sox phase of his career, after 10 years in the Tampa Bay Rays organization.
As Crawford walked toward left field and gazed upon baseball’s most iconic location, producer Heather Lombardo’s cameras devoured the scene. John Updike once called the wall “a compromise between Man’s Euclidean determinations and Nature’s beguiling irregularities.” Whatever.
To Crawford the Green Monster is something he was hired to protect, but to Lombardo it’s a co-star in her profile of Crawford.
In Lombardo’s telling, Crawford inherits a realm of immortals – Ted Williams, Carl Yastrzemski, Jim Rice – Hall of Famers who played left field for the Red Sox. (And Manny Ramirez, an immortal flake and cheat). Crawford has something none of them had – speed – a gift that carried him out of his tough neighborhood in Houston and to four American League stolen base titles with Rays. And now it has carried him to a $142 million contract and a chance to become the next Hall of Fame left fielder from Boston.
“The Wall bookends the piece – we need it as a character,” Lombardo said. “We just wanted to capture the beauty and grandeur of the Wall.”
Lombardo approached the Monster shoot as she had other iconic locations – Churchill Downs, Belmont Park and Daytona.
“You want to capture them in their most pure form,” she said. “You want to capture a quiet moment – that’s where it resonates with people. You want it to be as pure as it ever was – if it’s iconic it’s traditional, and tradition is roped into it – you want to capture that.
“You want to make them feel big, because that’s how people build them up to be in their minds.
“And respect. You always want to be respectful of these locations. You don’t want to shoot the Wall with people milling about. You want it to be the central focus.”
The shoot began as Crawford and reporter Buster Olney walked toward left field, while shooters Mike Bollacke and Tim Horgan circled in front and behind. At one point, Crawford stopped and turned his back to the Monster, to allow for a different angle.
The shoot called for Crawford to walk through the door at the base of the Monster, enter the dim and cramped interior, and sign his name on a wall alongside thousands of signatures of players and fans. As Crawford signed, one camera zoomed in on the signature, while another got a low wide shot. But the interior shots, Lombardo knew, wouldn’t be as important as those of the exterior.
“From a distance the Wall looks small and then you stand next to it and look up and it’s huge,” Lombardo said. “It comes across as a larger-than-life structure, almost like a sculpture. That will come across, I hope. These guys are artists that way – they’ll make it come alive.”
The bright morning sun, which bathed the Wall in a flat light without texture, proved a challenge. Bollacke’s solution was a “boatload of filters”.
“You want something that draws your eye to the standard part of the frame but the edges will be kind of black or faded off,” Bollacke said. “The idea is to draw the viewer’s eye somewhere else to distract you from the flatness.”
The shoot took about 25 minutes. When it ended Crawford grabbed a glove and fielded caroms off the Monster. They had met before, but never as co-stars.

Posted by Steve Marantz, April 11, 2011

E:60's new season begins Tuesday, April 12th @ 7pm ET on ESPN.

2011-04-07T15:33:00.001-04:00

E:60 3D: Coming at You

2011-03-22T12:11:00.000-04:00

Making of the Great Throwdini in 3-D from E60 on Vimeo.

ESPN pioneered sports television 3D with a college football game in 2009, and continued in 2010 with World Cup Soccer, the Home Run Derby, and college and pro basketball. Viewers find live action enhanced by a depth of field enjoyed by the athletes.

In April E:60 will debut ESPN’s first 3D feature presentation: “The Great Throwdini” – about the daredevil act of a knife-thrower, David Adamovich. Viewers will see sharp gleaming knives fly through the air, in ultra-slow motion, in various directions. Some come straight at the screen, others go toward a woman attached to a giant spinning “wheel of death”.

What they won’t see is the 10-12 hours of trial-by-error that went into shooting the 4-5 minute piece. That was in February, at a Hofstra University theater, in a session that required a small army of 15 to 20 specialists. Nor will they see the hours of editing.

“It took James Cameron nine years to do ‘Avatar’ in 3D, and I’m like, ‘That’s all?’,” said producer Martin Khodabakhshian,

“Everything takes longer in 3D – field planning, pre-production, shooting and editing.”

Khodabakhshian was on his first 3D shoot, as were producers Robert Abbott and Brian Liburd. They were challenged to get a shot of a knife hurtling toward a $200,000 Phantom camera – without damaging the camera.

The camera was protected with one sheet of plexiglass, then three. A mirror was set up, and a reflection of the knife was shot as it hurtled through the air.

Wearing 3D glasses, the producers watched replays on monitors. But, for an unexplained reason, the slow-motion shots would not replay in slow motion.

Producers experimented with unfamiliar 3D technology and arrived at a few conclusions:

1) Conceive and layer shots differently than in 2D – the more layering the better. Create depth between the camera, the subject and the background.

2) Cameras and rigs should be static. Movement should come from the subjects.

3) Abundant lighting is required for Phantom cameras, which enhance 3D with ultra-slow motion.

4) In edit, avoid fast cuts. Viewers need more time to adjust to the depth and dimension of a 3D shot. Shots should be longer with movement toward and away from the camera.

At the end of the day, Khodabakhshian was intrigued by the creative potential of 3D.

“You don’t have to be throwing something at a camera – it doesn’t have to be Friday the 13^th,” he said. “If you have a story on rowing, and there’s layers of kayaks, it will look cool. If a girl is honoring her brother at his gravesite, and the tombstone is in your living room, and she’s coming to kiss that thing with emotion, why not?

“You could do almost anything with 3D. It just takes a lot of time and money.”

(Posted by Steve Marantz, March 22, 2011)

Re-enactment and Specialty: A Fine Line

2011-02-14T14:59:00.000-05:00

Part 2

A dummy from a costume shop was outfitted in a black hoodie and wing pants. Producer Martin Khodabakhshian used the dummy as a stand-in for Jordan Burnham, who had survived a suicide plunge from a ninth-floor window.

“This was more of an experiment – I didn’t know if it would be cheesy or offensive,” Khodabakhshian recalled.

He considered a drop of the dummy from the bedroom window, but decided the image would be “too much”. Instead, the dummy was thrown from the hood of a car, and filmed as it plummeted downward, silhouetted against a white sky.

Powerful images, for sure, but Khodabakhshian wondered if they might be too...something. Uncertain, he consulted E:60’s management team.

“It’s not just you deciding in the end this is right for what we’re doing,” Khodabakhshian said. “There’s nothing wrong with getting input from the subject, photo editors, bosses and peers. They help you decide if you’ve gone too far or not far enough.”

Producers walk a fine line on re-enactment and specialty B roll.

E:60 executive producer Andy Tennant produced a piece in 2002 on a former Buffalo Bills running back, Doug Goodwin, who had received a heart transplant in Manhattan on the morning of 9/11. The story included re-enactments of the donor heart harvested in Boston by two surgeons, flown to New Jersey, and shuttled across the George Washington Bridge minutes before the bridge was closed.

The re-enactment was so lifelike that some at ESPN thought Tennant had shot the story live. Tennant ultimately added a ‘re-enactment’ font at the start of the sequence.

“The way you shoot a re-enactment will determine how it’s accepted by viewers,” Tennant said. “If it’s shot to match the time of day, at live speed, off the shoulder, it will give the appearance that it’s live and the story is unfolding.

“We discuss re-enactments often – how to do them – where to draw the line – what’s over the top and what’s acceptable.”

The history of re-enactment is as old as the re-enactment of history. So said an Oxford professor of metaphysics, R. G. Collingwood, who died in 1943. “History is the re-enactment of the past in the mind,” he wrote.

Film re-enactment enjoyed a watershed moment in 1988 in documentary filmmaker Errol Morris’s award-winning “The Thin Blue Line”. Morris’ re-enactment of the murder of a Dallas police officer, based on interviews, trial testimony and evidence, was so persuasive that it resulted in the over-turning of the conviction of a man sentenced to death.

In the last decade, cable viewers grew accustomed to re-enactments in the programming of the History, Discovery and Sci-Fi channels.

But a 2005 documentary film, “Mighty Times: The Children’s March” – about a 1963 civil rights protest by thousands of children in Birmingham, Ala. – was controversial for its use of re-enactment. The filmmakers, Bobby Houston and Robert Hudson, recreated scenes with vintage cameras and distressed film stock to shoot more than 700 extras, trained dogs, period autos and fire engines at various locations in Southern California. Real archival footage and re-enacted footage were woven together. Shots from other cities were edited into the footage from Birmingham.

Of “Mighty Times”, Errol Morris wrote in an essay for the New York Times: “Surely this is not a question about re-enactments. It’s a question about fraud. If someone presents a scene as a real event, and it has been produced after the fact, it’s a re-enactment that’s a deceptive practice. It’s a false claim. It’s a lie.”

Morris made a broader point: “Critics argue that the use of re-enactments suggest a callous disregard on the part of a filmmaker for what is true. I don’t agree. Some re-enactments serve the truth, others subvert it. There is no mode of expression, no technique of production that will instantly produce truth or falsehood. There is no veritas lens – no lens that provides a “truthful” picture of events. There is cinéma vérité and kino pravda but no cinematic truth. The engine of uncovering truth is not some special lens or even the unadorned human eye; it is unadorned human reason.”

“The brain is not a Reality-Recorder. There is no perfect replica of reality inside our brains...Many people believe they have found a way around the eccentricities of the brain by substituting a camera, but this only defers the problem. It does not solve it. Even photographs have to be perceived. They have to be seen. There is no shortcut around the Cartesian riddle of separating reality from the appearance of reality. There is no shortcut to reality. The brain is all we have.”

E:60 producers have used re-enactment since the show’s inception in 2007. Producer T. Sean Herbert, whose resume includes CBS News’ ‘60 Minutes’, had never shot a re-enactment in 20 years in network news before he came to ESPN. The difference, Herbert noted, is because ESPN, as a sports network, does not have the same standards and practices as a news network.

“It’s always a delicate balance,” said Herbert. “If you’re asking your character to do what they normally do, that’s okay. At ‘60 Minutes’ we could have a generic walking shot, or a shot behind the desk or typing at a keyboard – something the character had done a gazillion times and might do that day.

“Conversely if you took someone to the middle of a desert, or to a concrete bunker – anything that didn’t happen or never happened and is unnatural – that might be pushing the boundaries.

“Re-creating is okay – you duplicate what they do, whereas, creating is asking them to do what they haven’t done before. Staging is not organic, and in my mind it’s not real or authentic.”

Herbert cited his piece last fall on Preston Plevretes, a college football player who nearly died from Second Impact Syndrome. It included specialty shots of Plevretes as he held a football and wore his letterman’s jacket, and of his mother as she peered at a pre-injury photo of him.

“Would they normally do those things – not necessarily,” Herbert said. “But I was in her foyer at her home so I was comfortable asking them – to have him wear the clothes he wore, and to have him hold a football he actually owns, and to have her at the bottom of a grand staircase holding the photo in her arms.”

Producer Lisa Binns, who also worked for ’60 Minutes’, recalled her piece on Andre Lampkin, a Texas football player whose legs were amputated as a result of bacterial meningitis. She re-enacted the night he became ill with POV shots of Lampkin in the shower, at the refrigerator, and falling down.

“It falls in line with what this show tries to do – you might see something like that in a movie,” Binns said. “As long as the viewer is aware that it’s not actual video and not altering or taking license with the facts.

“A purist would say any re-creation is too much. The rule of thumb at other networks was ‘oh yeah, that’s a great story, but how can you tell it visually?’ And if you couldn’t you might pass on the story. But considering how the medium has evolved, if a story should be told, you should be able to use visual tools that are out there.

“A producer might say to a character ‘show me what you were doing’ and somebody might perceive that as acting. But a print reporter would do the same thing. What’s wrong with asking them to emote and show what they did? What’s the difference?”

Producer David Salerno re-enacted a scene in his piece on running back Maurice Jones-Drew last fall. He shot Jones-Drew under a showerhead, with water cascading over his head.

“It wasn’t a special shower – he wasn’t pretending anything – he was in a contemplative mode,” Salerno said. “It wasn’t overt – it didn’t feel emotionally over the top to me. In the Burnham piece I wouldn’t have chosen to have the mother bang on the door. I like to be more subtle and not as overt.”

Neither re-enactment nor specialty shots are addressed in ESPN’s new Editorial Guidelines for Standards and Practices, although “the intention is to continually grow the documents - they may be something to consider at some point,” Senior Vice-President/Director of News Vince Doria wrote in an e-mail.

“I’ve never been comfortable with re-creations in pieces that are clearly investigative, or examples of enterprise journalism,” Doria continued. “The credibility of that sort of work relies heavily on accurate reporting and hard facts. The interjection of actors re-creating a scene clearly can increase the dramatic impact of a piece, but too often, I think, may over-dramatize the facts in ways that don’t reflect accurately what actually occurred.”

Re-enactments and specialty shots in the Burnham piece were scrutinized, Tennant said, because the principals acted them out, they looked real, and the subject – clinical depression – is sensitive.

“Every story gets treated differently,” Tennant said. “This subject matter was very sensitive, but the producer argued that the family was comfortable with it. At no point when we watched it did anybody question the integrity of the piece.”

In the end, four of Khodabakhshian’s dummy shots were approved. The first three are in a ‘falling’ sequence that includes a shot of Burnham looking upward and opening his mouth as if to scream. In the fourth and final, the dummy floats upward, to symbolize Burnham’s recovery.

“To me it’s more about doing it tastefully cinematic and dramatically than just doing it to have video,” Khodabakhshian said. “I don’t think there are any rules beyond not offending the family or doing something they wouldn’t be on board with.”

posted by Steve Marantz, February 14, 2011

Re-enactment and Specialty: Trust and Imagination

2011-02-09T14:19:00.001-05:00

Unbreakable from E60 on Vimeo.

Part 1

E:60 producer Martin Khodabakhshian set out last year to make “Unbreakable”, a feature on Jordan Burnham, a 21-year-old who survived a suicide attempt in the throes of depression.

But there were no photos, or video, of Burnham’s attempt, which had occurred in 2007. Nor were there photos or video of the events that had led up to it.

Khodabakhshian had a few photos of Burnham as a high school golfer and pitcher at Upper Merion High, near Philadelphia. He had video of his high school graduation, and of him, at 21, speaking to incoming freshman at the University of Miami. He had video shot by Burnham’s family during his rehab, and some film from local media.

But the heart of the story – Burnham’s protracted descent into alcohol and depression and his plunge from a ninth-floor bedroom window – was bereft of actual images.

“How do you illustrate a battle with depression?” Khodabakhshian asked himself.

“How do you represent the fall – and make people feel what it’s like to fall out of a ninth-story window? How do you tell about the moment when his father found him under the window? Or the moment his father confronted him with a duffel bag of alcohol – the straw that broke the camel’s back? How do you play that out beyond the family telling you about it on camera?”

Thus began an effort that pushed the creative and journalistic envelope, even for E:60, which prides itself on bold storytelling.

A producer relies on an array of storytelling tools – among them re-enactment and the B roll ‘specialty’ shot.

Re-enactment is a literal interpretation of something that happened in the past, but was not filmed. A specialty shot is a subjective or metaphorical interpretation. Khodabakhshian used both, in unusual fashion.

Typically, actors are in re-enactments, because the protagonists are deceased or unavailable. But Khodabakhshian made his with the actual characters – Burnham, his father and mother - with their full cooperation.

“The biggest thing to me was building trust with the family members,” Khodabakhshian said.

Re-enacted scenes included Burnham’s father laying a duffel bag of liquor at his feet, Burnham’s sullen reaction and subsequent locking and barricading of his bedroom door, and his mother’s anguished pounding on it.

Khodabakhshian asked Burnham to fall backward, as if he were dropping out of a window, into the arms of the production crew.

“Open your eyes and mouth like you just jumped,” he directed Burnham.

Burnham complied. Khodabakhshian understood that Burnham, now a motivational speaker, perceived the E:60 piece as a potential tool. Burnham knew the more powerful the image, the greater the impact on an audience.

In one specialty shot Burnham dropped a beer bottle in a stairwell and watched it shatter at his feet. Then he dropped two. Then nine.

“We wanted to create a theme of falling,” said Khodabakshian.

In another specialty shot, Burnham pushed athletic trophies – made for the scene – out the window. As they toppled, the trophies, labeled with “pain” and “hopeless” and “empty”, were shot in slow motion by a Phantom camera.

A $200 flip-cam was protected in bubble wrap, with the lens cap open, and tossed out of the window.

“We got two incredible shots spiraling downward, in real time,” Khodabakhshian said.

“I shot the ground where he landed at several angles. I put the lip of the lens at grass level – it felt ominous. I shot tilt-downs from the building to show how high it was. I shot POV shots from outside the window.”

Exploding golf balls were shot, at Burnham’s feet, to symbolize how depression had detached him from the sport.

One scene combined re-enactment and a specialty shot. It depicted Burnham’s father arriving at the site of the suicide plunge, moments after it occurred. In reality Burnham’s crumpled body was rushed to a hospital as he clung to life. In Khodabakhshian’s version, the father sat down next to his son and hugged him.

Khodabakhshian directed:

“Mr. Burnham, can you remember how you felt when you saw your son on the ground? Can you do that face?

“One more time?

“Can you go up to him and put your arms around him?

“Jordan, close your eyes. Earl, keep yours open.

“Jordan, open yours and Earl, close yours.

“Both open your eyes.

“Both close them.”

The scene, shot in muted colors to impute starkness and cold, connected to old footage shot when Burnham, barely able to walk, received his high school diploma, and hobbled toward his father.

“You can’t be afraid to take those educated risks after you build trust,” Khodabakhshian said. “Explain to them what you’re doing. Don’t rely on spontaneity. You need precise direction, and you need to control the situation where you can gauge how much is enough.”

A fine line – between enough and too much - is discussed in Part 2.

posted by Steve Marantz, February 9, 2011

Josiah T-Shirts

2010-11-16T12:33:00.000-05:00

Back of shirt

Front of shirt

Our little hero Josiah, who has progeria--and loves to play baseball, has created such a buzz around the country since the airing of his story on E:60!! There has been such interest in the t-shirts and so many requests from college to major league teams, and just those who want to be a part of his story!

Therefore, we are going to do another t-shirt and hat sale that will go nationwide and also be included within the ESPN websites!!

Proceeds will benefit Josiah and his family!! Sizes are listed below and hats will have Velcro backs.

If you are interested, please read all info below and get your order in immediately! Orders will only be taken until December 2. We cannot accept orders after that date.

T-shirts—

$12.00 S-XL

$13.50 XXL & XXXL

$14.50 XXXXL

Hats-$12.00

If you cannot pickup your order at the Hegins Ambulance building on December 16 from 6pm-8pm, you will need to include shipping chrages as follows:

1-9 items--$4.95
10-30 items--9.95
31-100 items--14.95

Checks or money orders should be made out to:
Jen Bordner
c/o Josiah Viera
63 Schwartz Road
Hegins, PA 17938

****PLEASE INCLUDE YOUR NAME, ADDRESS, AND SIZES OF TEES, OR QUANTITY OF HATS.****

Anatomy of Chemistry

2010-11-16T11:35:00.001-05:00

Josiah plays baseball with the crew.

Last spring reporter Tom Rinaldi was about to leave home to work on an E:60 feature. Before he left, Rinaldi explained to his 6-year-old son, Jack, about Josiah Viera, also 6, who has a rare disease and a love of baseball.

“Wait,” Jack said.

The little boy ran to his room and returned with a book about how Babe Ruth “saved” baseball.

“Give it to him.”

By the time Rinaldi arrived at Hegins, Pa., senior producer Ben Houser was already there, with a plan.

Josiah suffers from Hutchinson-Gilford Progeria syndrome, which causes accelerated aging in children, and has a life expectancy of eight to 13 years. He is 27 inches tall and weighs 15 ½ pounds, and has a squeak of a voice, infectious smile, and a spirit buoyant and courageous.

But like any 6-year-old, Josiah doesn’t necessarily talk to suit producers or reporters. After an initial meeting with Josiah and his mother, Jennifer, Houser knew a conventional interview would not work. He conferred with Rinaldi.

“He just loves baseball,” Houser said.

“Let’s talk to him while he’s hitting or throwing,” Rinaldi said.

When Rinaldi met Josiah he handed him his son’s book about Babe Ruth. Maybe chemistry can’t save Josiah, but it can tell his tale. The two clicked and the story took off.

Houser shot the interviews outdoors while Josiah swung a bat or threw a ball. In one shot, Rinaldi says, “Tom pitches, Josiah crushes it over his head! Oooh!” To which Josiah says, “That is gone!” Rinaldi echoes, “That is gone.”

One morning Houser asked Josiah to sit on a bench holding his bat.

“No.”

“Just a few shots.”

“No. I just want to play baseball.”

Houser and Rinaldi discovered Josiah Time, which meant a lot of throwing and hitting. Passion indulged, Josiah agreed to the specialty shots Houser wanted.

Ben Houser at Josiah's 6th birthday party

‘Josiah’s Time’ became a metaphor on which to hang the story – a boy whose time is limited playing a game without time. Houser had seen the BBC series, “Life”, which features visual representations of the passage of time, such as flowers blooming and growing. He decided to shoot Josiah’s birthday party, an obvious marker.

“Time was one thing you could definitely say he has less of than me or you,” Houser said. “He’s not going to graduate high school or get married or have the things we have. That’s what gives meaning to the moments he has – why baseball is so important to him.”

Rinaldi’s rapport with Josiah enabled him to ask Josiah what heaven is. Josiah trusted Rinaldi enough to answer.

“It’s God.” He pointed skyward. “Heaven.”

“And what do you think heaven looks like?”

“Jesus.”

Houser and Rinaldi collaborated on the writing, though Houser credits Rinaldi with the memorable final track, set over images of Josiah slapping hands with the enraptured who lined the field to watch him: “It would be easy to say the scene was timeless. But really, it wasn’t. It was Josiah’s time.”

Said Rinaldi: “It seemed time was a natural theme. Ben and the editor who shaped the piece, Matt McCormick, enabled me to write more ethereal tracks because they could visualize them.”

Josiah with DP Thom Stukas

Houser’s initial meeting with Josiah took place after he had played his first game for the Tri-Valley White Sox. He assigned two cameras to Josiah’s second game – one to cover the crowds and people, the other dedicated to Josiah.

“It went wherever he went – running to first, scoring, sitting in the dugout,” Houser recalled. “He would actually push the camera out of the way, like we were paparazzi. He got comfortable with us.”

One camera covered Josiah’s third game, but for his fourth and final game Houser again had two cameras, plus a mini-cam he operated. In addition, Houser’s wife, Christina, shot still photos. Tom Stukas, director of photography, and shooter Jim Grieco, were in position when Josiah reached base, and danced for joy.

Josiah meets Chargers TE Antonio Gates

The story aired on November 9. Three days later Josiah, with his entourage, came to the ESPN campus. Josiah sat on the shoulders of E:60 executive producer Andy Tennant, showed off his Ryan Howard swing for “Outside the Lines”, high-fived network execs and another visitor, Chargers tight end Antonio Gates, and ran around the tables in the café, as carefree as any six-year-old.

Those touched by Josiah’s story include six-year-old Jack Rinaldi and his three-year-old sister Tess.

“They have watched it every day since it aired – several times a day,” said Jack and Tess’ father. “They feel a connection to Josiah even though they never met him. It’s wonderful.”

(posted by Steve Marantz, November 16, 2010)

Travel Essentials for a TV Producer

2010-11-15T15:49:00.000-05:00

Since E:60 launched back in the fall of 2007, my assignments have taken me to many locales throughout the United States, including California, New York, New Jersey, Tennessee, Florida, Minnesota, South Dakota, Missouri, Pennsylvania, and Nevada. International destinations have included England, Iceland, Germany, Italy and

South Africa

No matter where E:60 assignments take me, there is always an essential “go bag” of things I like to have with me to make my travels more productive and more comfortable.

Some of the tools of the trade are obvious: passport, money, laptop computer, etc. But some items are less obvious and good to have whether you are producing a TV segment or just traveling leisurely on vacation. They include sunscreen and all-weather gear (I’m often shooting outdoors at all times of the year in many different climates) and it can be extremely hot and sunny in places like Florida and Nevada, and incredibly cold (Iceland) or wet (Britain). Having the proper protection from the elements are essential.

Also essential are comfortable and appropriate footwear. As a TV producer, a lot of time is spent standing on your feet, and traveling on all types of surfaces. A comfortable pair of sneakers are great if you are working on a basketball court, but I have a great pair of trekking shoes that provided the best traction in the Italian Alps.

When traveling to more remotes places like South Africa or even rural areas in the

U.S.

, having bottled water, toilet paper, and over-the-counter medications for to prevent or cure contaminated water, or bad food can keep you on schedule.

But believe it or not, I think the two most important items that I never travel without these days is an HD pocket video camera and a really good pair of noise cancelling headphones. At E:60, we pride ourselves on production value, and whether capturing another angle, or saving costs by using a small inexpensive HD video camera instead of hiring a full crew, today’s technology has allowed producers a great deal more flexibility and opportunity to get more high quality footage for less. They are great for grabbing photos for producer blogs, too.

Similarly, whether trying to be productive on an airplane, or trying to access the quality of the sound during an interview, and just need quiet while screening footage in a noisy room in Bristol, a quality pair of noise-canceling headphones can be a game changer. Noise-cancelling technology allows me to focus on the task at hand without being distracted by the person next to me, or the crowd at a noisy sporting event.

T. Sean Herbert

E:60 Feature Producer

2010-11-05T14:03:00.002-04:00

E:60 Josiah from E60 on Vimeo.

Airing on the season finale. Tuesday, November 9th at 7 pm ET on ESPN.

2010-11-04T12:04:00.002-04:00

E:60 Roberta Mancino teaser from E60 on Vimeo.

Airing on the season finale. Tuesday November 9th @ 7pm ET on ESPN.

2010-11-04T12:02:00.002-04:00

E:60 Bhopal Trailer from E60 on Vimeo.
Airing on the E:60 season Finale. Tuesday, Nov. 9th @ 7pm ET on ESPN.

Two Traditions

2010-11-03T14:49:00.001-04:00

Middlebury College of Vermont celebrates a precarious tradition.

Fifty years ago a Middlebury athlete escorted Butch Varno to a football game for the first time. Varno, then a young teen, was disabled by cerebral palsy and could not attend on his own. Now in his 60s, Varno continues to attend Middlebury football and basketball games, escorted by generation after generation of varsity athletes in a ritual of compassion and love.

Senior Producer Ben Houser wondered how to do visual justice to the tradition. How to convey its timeless values? How to convey its inherent fragility?

On a drive through Vermont, Houser and his wife stopped at an antique shop. They spotted an old film camera, a Keystone 8mm, made in the late 1930s by a now-defunct Boston company. An idea took shape.

“No real film existed from the 60s. I thought, if I can shoot something in old film, and something in HD, and place the two next to each other, it would give a sense of the passage of time, visually,” Houser recalled.

Houser bought the Keystone. Film for it no longer is made, but he found a hobbyist in California who owned an old supply of ASA 50 color film – tiny spools in a metal disk. The Keystone has settings from ASA 10 to ASA 40. He bought five rolls of the ASA 50 color.

“Those old cameras don’t have iris control (which regulates light), so you hit-and-run and you get whatever image you get,” Houser said. “I got the ASA 50 knowing I could fix a little of the brightness or darkness in post-edit.”

Wielding the Keystone, Houser and production assistant Megan Anderson shot the nursing home where Varno lives, a campus archway, and the football field.

“It was hard – I had never used anything like that before,” Anderson said. “Luckily I had a cameraman – Jim Greico – who knew how to work with it.

“Each roll of film was only about eight minutes, and you had to crank the camera, and it would only roll for seven or eight minutes. So you roll, and crank it, and then roll and crank it again. You were constantly getting one shot and stopping and trying to reset.”

At a climactic moment honoring Varno at Middlebury’s homecoming ceremony, film ran out.

“It’s not something you can easily replace,” Anderson said. “You have to go somewhere out of direct sunlight and reload and re-string it through – it took like 15 minutes.”

Developing the film was the next hurdle – and not a small one.

“Old 8mm has two sides to it – when you run it through the first time, you take it out of the spool on the bottom and put it back at the top and run it through again,” Houser said. “Because if you think of an old film strip, think of two images next to each other, and that’s what old 8mm is.

“We had to find a guy who could take that film, split it down the middle, so now there’s two separate rolls. The rolls are 25 feet long, so you get 50 feet out of it because it runs through twice.”

Houser found a small studio in Seattle that pulled off the feat. The developed film then was sent to a New York studio, where the images were transferred onto digital beta tape. With that, Houser completed the journey by converting the digital beta into the 4x3 HD format used by E:60.

“It took five states – Vermont, California, Washington, New York, and Connecticut – to get 10 shots,” Houser said.

He thinks it was worth the effort. The new ‘old’ film will augment two authentic shots from that era culled from a Middlebury College promotional reel.

“Artistically it made a lot of sense because this is a 50-year-old tradition,” Houser said. “It shows you what it would have looked like in 1960 if he (Varno) had walked on the field, versus today when you see the pretty HD and slo-mo cameras.

For Anderson, the Keystone connected her to her own tradition of film technology. She said it heightened her empathy for producers of that era.

“It made me realize how lucky we are that it’s so easy and how hard it must have been for them,” she said. “It made me feel sorry for them.”

posted by Steve Marantz, November 3, 2010

The Shower Scene

2010-10-26T11:08:00.000-04:00

Film fans of a certain age have ‘Dr. No’, when Ursula Andress emerges from tropical surf, bikini-clad as Honey Ryder, to the delight of Sean Connery’s James Bond.

Football fans now have E:60’s shower shot – 25 seconds of water pouring over the bare torso of the Jacksonville Jaguars’ running back Maurice Jones-Drew.

“Unique and different,” producer David Salerno said.

It was conceived at an initial interview, in Jacksonville, in which Jones-Drew talked about his late grandfather, Maurice Jones. He told Salerno and reporter Lisa Salters that his mental preparation for games involved relaxing under a shower and thinking about his grandfather.

“We’ve got to shoot that,” Salters said.

Jones-Drew consented. The shot took place in the locker room at De La Salle High School, Concord, Calif., where he starred early in the decade, known then as Maurice Drew.

Some viewers will be disappointed to learn that Jones-Drew stripped only to his shorts.

“We had the shower lit, and had one mini camera, and one Varicam to shoot the 60p slow-mo stuff,” Salerno said.

Salerno had Jones-Drew strike several poses – head down, hands in front of chest, hands pressed against the wall – as water sprayed and tumbled over him.

Over the sensual imagery Salerno laid Jones-Drew’s voice, “There is one thing I do the night before a game...turn on the shower and turn the lights off...put my head down and try to relax...and the only thing I think about is him, man, and everything he done for me...”

Salerno led with the shower shot. It was a triumph of access, but that was not Salerno’s first consideration.

“It was more of an artistic thing,” Salerno said. “The dim lighting and the moodiness – you don’t see it that often in stories about athletes.”

posted by Steve Marantz, October 26, 2010

From Finish to Start

2010-10-23T15:01:00.000-04:00

Newton Marshall’s journey took him from Jamaica to Alaska, from reggae to frostbite, from obscurity to E:60.

Producer Mike John’s journey was the opposite – minus the obscurity.

“Mush Mon” is the story of the first Jamaican to pilot a dogsled in the Iditarod, the 1000-mile Anchorage to Nome race. It is a light-hearted story, a variation on ‘Cool Runnings’, about the Jamaican bobsled team of 1988, and as inspirational.

To tell it, Johns and reporter Seth Wickersham, a native of Alaska, started near Fairbanks, where the 27-year-old Marshall trained last February.

“You think of him going from Jamaica to Alaska, but we did the main interview in Alaska and the follow-up in Jamaica,” Johns said.

Johns shot Marshall on a rural expanse owned by Lance Mackey, the four-time Iditarod champion who was hired by sponsor Jimmy Buffett to teach Marshall the ropes. The weather was milder than expected.

“Zero degrees,” said Johns.

To shoot Marshall on his dogsled, Johns put a camera in a sled towed by an all-terrain vehicle. But when the ATV braked, the sled kept on going. Wipeout.

Minus a smashed camera battery, Johns soldiered on. He shifted from an outdoor shoot to a heated indoor location. Oops. His cameras fogged up from condensation.

“They needed at least 45 minutes to warm up,” Johns recalled.

The crew flipped on the light switches in Marshall’s cabin, adjacent to Mackey’s house. No light. Broken generator.

They used natural light from a window.

“Given the humble nature of the cabin that kind of limited lighting worked,” Johns said.

Marshall, raised in poverty with little education, proved to be a strong character, after he overcame his initial shyness.

“Our first day around him I was a little concerned that he wasn’t going to be as expressive as you would like to tell his own story,” Johns said. “But this was a kid stuck in a cabin in Alaska for four months – after a couple of days with him – in some ways he was anxious to talk to people. Once we sat him down we couldn’t shut him up.”

When the race began early in March, Johns was gone. Footage from the race and interviews at four checkpoints came from Iditarod organizers.

Johns finished in Jamaica, where it had begun for Marshall. He shot the back-story about how Marshall came to be in the race, as well as Marshall’s reflections on his 12-day mush and 47^th place finish.

In the telling Johns and Wickersham managed a bit of story magic. Marshall had related that at his lowest point, in the second week, he had sung to himself – a popular Jamaican tune. Wickersham asked him to sing it for the E:60 camera.

Marshall offered up his front porch version of “All Will Be Fine”, by Buju Banton. Johns transitioned from Marshall’s song, at the Jamaican location, to the Buju Banton studio version, over a shot of Marshall guiding his team across a frozen trail.

Johns called it “a device for emotional resonance.” He could have said it was a device to tug at the heartstrings, or to make the spirit soar. In the end, “Mush Mon” did both.

posted by Steve Marantz, October 22, 2010

Roundtable: Not A Con

2010-10-12T14:14:00.002-04:00

Production assistant Max Brodsky senses something amiss. The E:60 roundtable segment on disgraced former basketball star Rumeal Robinson is into its 12th minute, and has yet to yield what Brodsky needs.
As the cameras roll, Brodsky signals Executive Producer Andy Tennant, at the table with six others, and mouths a question: “If he’s not a con man what is he – without giving away the details.”
Tennant nods, turns back to the table, and breaks in. He references a comment by reporter Lisa Salters, who earlier had called Robinson a “con man”.
“Go back to what Lisa said,” Tennant says. “If he’s not a con man, what is he?”
Reporter Jeffri Chadiha re-focuses. He ponders Robinson, convicted in September of eleven federal counts from a sham business deal, and of Robinson’s adoptive mother, who lost her Cambridge, Ma., home in her effort to help him.
“What he is...he is a guy who had a lot of success as a basketball player, and got in way over his head, and once he was over his head, didn’t know how to reach out for help. He wasn’t humble enough to go to the people he loved and ask them to help him out.”
Chadiha says more, in a tidy and poignant summary. Brodsky has enough.
“Cut”.
The 10-person production crew and the roundtable participants relax. Brodsky shakes his head. He is 25, with a thick shock of brown hair, three-day stubble, and wry sense of his work.
“Sometimes they forget that it’s about the big themes – not about the details,” he says.
The shoot is into its second hour, at a meeting room called the “garage”, at ESPN the Magazine, East 34th Street, Manhattan. Roundtables for three of the six fall shows – 15 stories total – are being shot on a weekday evening early in October.
The roundtable is a simulation of a news meeting in which producers and reporters discuss the news value, characters and themes of stories.
When E:60 was conceived by ESPN Content Development early in 2007, the roundtable was not unanimously embraced - some feared it would appear “phony”. But advocates believed if it was unscripted, and captured the spirit of a real news meeting, it could work.
Fast forward to October 2010. E:60 is the first show to migrate from Content Development to Production. Now in its fourth season, E:60 features the roundtable before and after most segments – as a preview and postscript.
It reaches for big themes, as Brodsky insists. It also evokes casual banter, and a thoughtful and irreverent take on sports.
At the table, which is not round, are Tennant, along with coordinating producers Robert Abbott and Michael Baltierra, and, by turns, reporters Chadiha, Salters, Jeremy Schaap, Rachel Nichols and Seth Wickersham, magazine editor Gary Belsky, and columnist/commentator Bill Simmons. All are made up and miked.
Only Tennant, Abbott and Baltierra are familiar with all of the stories. The others know about their own, but hear about the rest with fresh ears and opinions.
Brodsky directs the crew, which includes an overhead camera, two handheld cameras, and a dolly camera that moves on a semicircle of tracks. Production manager Sue Friedman hovers at the periphery.
Tennant acts as a moderator – initiating and guiding discussion. Typically, a reporter explains his or her segment, and others chime in with comments, questions and wisecracks. The conversation, at its spontaneous best, mirrors an actual newsroom.
Typical is the discussion about Jets quarterback Mark Sanchez.
Nichols pitches it as a story about a second-year quarterback facing high expectations because Jets coach Rex Ryan “loves to talk and draw attention” and because Sanchez is the “first Hispanic-American playing quarterback in a market like this” and because of Sanchez’ popularity with celebrity/gossip media which taps into the cultural legacy of Broadway Joe Namath. Whew.
Schaap disagrees – he thinks Sanchez is not burdened with particularly high expectations because the Jets aren’t built around him the way other teams are built around their quarterbacks.
“He’s in a position where he doesn’t have to be a great player,” Schaap says.
Nichols demurs – she points out that after the Jets lost their opener he was pilloried. She goes on to say that he draws more attention because of his USC pedigree, which draped him in the glamour of “Hollywood”.
Simmons points out, as a Los Angeles resident, that Sanchez was not as big a deal as two USC stars that preceded him – Matt Leinart and Reggie Bush.
“That’s like following the Beatles – nobody is going to win in that situation,” Simmons says.
“I think he did quite well,” Nichols says.
The discussion veers – with ribald humor - towards Sanchez’ sex appeal. Abbott mentions that the Jets’ off-field problems – the DWI charge against Braylon Edwards, and the harassment of reporter Ines Sainz, are making Sanchez’ job more difficult.
Sanchez is up against a phenomenon, Nichols explains, in which opposing defenses get ahead of second-year quarterbacks.

“We got behind the scenes to see how he will hold himself together for this season,” Nichols says.

At this point, 12 minutes into the Sanchez discussion, Brodsky has what he needs – and probably too much.

“Cut.”

The participants wander off to snack on pizza and Friedman’s brownies, save for Simmons, who taps furiously on his Blackberry, absorbed in a white-knuckles Twitter drama.

Soon the roundtable will enter its fourth and final hour. Shoulders will sag, eyes will glaze, and voices will drone. The dolly camera will de-rail. Brodsky will shrug and help put it back on track. The dolly – and the show – must go on.
On the seventh floor of a deserted mid-town building, a custodian leans in the doorway to watch the making of journalism and entertainment.
“Roll ‘em.”

(Posted by Steve Marantz, October 12, 2010)

2010-10-01T12:17:00.002-04:00

E:60: More B-Boy from E60 on Vimeo.

E:60 B-boy teaser

2010-09-26T12:27:00.000-04:00

E:60 B-Boy Teaser from E60 on Vimeo.

The Prime of E:60

2010-09-25T17:08:00.001-04:00

TRAILER: E:60 Bhopal India from evolve. J EDWARDS on Vimeo.

E:60 shooters Joel Edwards and Bill Roach went to Italy in August – for a story on model/skydiver Roberta Mancino – and India in September – for a story about children who play cricket on the toxic fields of Bhopal.

Before they left they acquired new equipment that – they hope - will deliver those stories with greater impact.

The just-out Zeiss CP.2 prime lens, Edwards said, “offer serious upgrades to image quality, aperture control and dynamic range.”

Filmmakers long have used older versions of prime lens. Now, television is using prime lens as it gravitates towards digital cinema.

In Italy the new lens were used for some specialty and scenic shots. In India they were used, when possible, on the A and B cameras, for interviews, scenes, and scenic b-roll.

Prime lens creates a “huge” depth of field, which leaves some of the image out of focus, and draws the viewer’s attention to what is in focus.

For a shooter, the prime lens poses a challenge.

“The big difference is that it slows everything down – it makes you think out your shots,” Roach said. “You can’t zoom – you have to walk closer or change lens. It’s a very methodical way of shooting.”

Said Edwards: “It's all about mood setting and image control when choosing a lens - so depending on the creative content of the scene - we'd use the best matching equipment setup accordingly.”

Shooter lexicon is rich with arcana such as iris ring, flare suppression, aperture, and t-stop. My personal favorite is “bokeh” – the out-of-focus areas in an image produced by a lens. But viewers need not know any of that to appreciate the next flight of E:60 stories, which starts October 5. You can just watch.

Posted by Steve Marantz, Sept. 23, 2010

Here’s the link to Zeiss:

http://www.zeiss.com/compactprime

Justin Timberlake

2010-09-07T10:47:00.002-04:00

On Labor Day weekend, an E:60 production crew headed to Memphis, TN, to complete it's feature with Justin Timberlake. His biggest fans probably know how much of a golf fan Timberlake is...BUT everyone else might be surprised to learn how much passion Timberlake has for the game of golf.

Long before he made a name for himself -- first as a member of the New Mickey Mouse Club, and then as one of the lead singers of the boy band 'N Sync -- Timberlake learned the game of golf from his step dad, Paul Harless. His first round of golf was played at a public course in Millington, TN, his hometown, at a place called Big Creek.

Then about 10 years ago, while on tour, Timberlake played a round with some of his roadies and ever since has had a love affair with the game. He told E:60's Rachel Nichols in an interview -- perhaps half jokingly -- that on his concert tours, he would adjust the travel schedule to accommodate golf.

Then a couple years back he got a call from his mom, Lynn Harless, and Paul, telling him that Big Creek was up for auction. For less then $1 million dollars, Timberlake became the owner of the course where he first learned to play the game.

Last fall, E:60 started this project with Timberlake at his PGA Tour event in Las Vegas, The Justin Timberlake Shriners Hospitals for Children Open. Since his involvement, the event has been gaining in popularity with pros on the tour. Timberlake has a celebrity Pro-Am that kicks off the event each October at the Summerlin TPC, and he also throws a concert on the night before the final round.

On Labor Day, after investing at least $16 million of his own money, Timberlake was back in his hometown and E:60 cameras were rolling as he cut the red ribbon at the grand re-opening of Big Creek, which he has renamed Mirimichi, a native American word which means, "Place of Happy Retreat."

After the ceremony, Timberlake sat down with Nichols for an in-depth interview about his love for golf, before showing off his tricked-out golf cart, and giving Nichols a driving tour of the course. Mirimichi is a luxurious and upscale par 72 golf course, which stretches more than 74-hundred acres. And after all of the improvements and upgrades Timberlake and his team have made, it is now recognized as among the most eco-friendly golf courses in all of the Americas.

Tune in to E:60 in October for this entertaining feature with one of America's Most Sexiest men, Justin Timberlake.

T. Sean Herbert
E:60 Feature Producer
9/7/2010

Bhopal, India - September 6, 2010

2010-09-06T16:38:00.000-04:00

You're probably wondering why I haven't written a blog in the last couple of days. I thought about it a bunch of times. After all, we've sat in traffic for far too long (jeez, and I'm not even in Mumbai yet.). What can I tell all of you about India? What would you like to know? I just never felt I had a theme for a blog entry. But maybe my theme is just what India's all about.

Is the food good? Yes. Fantastic, actually. I love Indian food, and here, the spices pop. I always describe Indian food (in America, of course) as spicy, but not in the hot way. In the flavorful way. Here, it is a mixture of the perfect heat with the perfect taste.

Is it crowded? Indeed. So many people. Everywhere. There isn't a street corner that isn't populated, a road not full of mini-taxis, and a slum devoid of naked children running barefoot through waste. India is dense. And claustrophobic.

Here's what you need to know about India: Imagine you want to direct a movie, and inside your cozy studio, you need to create a scene of poverty and despair. What would you put in there? Sewage in streets? Dead frogs in your drinking water? Barefoot children walking through shit? You can find that everywhere in Bhopal.

Ok. To India's defense, this is Bhopal. I've spent much of the last week within a couple of miles of the Union Carbide factory. As you know, the factory still stands. Corroding. Toxic. And dangerous. Why would you live by the site? Well you wouldn't. Unless you were so poor you couldn't go anywhere else.

What's worse is that it appears no one cares? Ok. People say they care. But they let them live. And no one intervenes. Why is that?

India is all about a sense of community, and these people like that. No matter if they live in filth or wealth. Especially the filth. I can't quite wrap my head around that. How do you live in a place so dirty? Well, they don't know anything else, and for most of them, they'll never be afforded any other opportunity. But they smile. And they live through it. After all, they have no other choice.

I promise. Next blog entry, I'll tell you more about the story out here. It's about a factory. Its destruction. Its presence. And its aftermath that lingers through the streets both visibly and invisibly.

Yaron Deskalo

Roberta Mancino Day 5

2010-09-02T11:22:00.001-04:00

E:60 wrapped up its production on its feature of Italian fashion model and extreme adventure athlete, Roberta Mancino, on Tuesday, by traveling from Rome to Bomarzo, Italy to shoot a formal interview and more specialty portraits in a 16th century park of carved stone gargoyles.

It was a unique but fitting backdrop to try and explain what makes Mancino do what she does so well. Check out this link to learn more about the Park of Monsters in Bomarzo.

In was an exhausting 5-day shoot, with over 1,000 miles travel by car and truck from the most northern parts of Italy (the Dolomites), down to its largest city (Rome), and further points further south (Cisterna and Anzio).

On September 1, the E:60 production team was back in Rome, but not for long. Some headed back to the United States, the others moving on to assignments in India.

Tune in to E:60 this fall to see the exciting feature on Roberta Mancino. And check out tomorrow’s daily blog to find out more about what they are working on in India.

T. Sean Herbert
E:60 Feature Producer
8/31/2010

India Blog Entry - September 1, 2010

2010-09-01T14:27:00.000-04:00

All India had been was rain and hotels for me the first two days here...

But today, the sun was finally shining in Bhopal, the site of our first story.

As some of you recall, in 1984, a major gas leak from the Union Carbide plant in the city of Bhopal killed thousands instantly. It was utter chaos for weeks in Bhopal. Many would be afflicted with permanent injuries like deformities, blindness and mental problems.

In the last 25+ years, not much has changed in the city of Bhopal. The UC plant still stands, now amongst twisted weeds. The inhabitants surrounding it are still dirt poor.

What does this have to do with sports, you ask? I've said that the best sports stories are not stories about sports, but human interest stories and the effect they have on the world of sports. It can be something small or something big. But likely, anything that has happened -- calamity or success -- has some tie to sports. Bhopal is no different.

Children in the neighboring slums, who cling to nothing but a shirt on their back, still dream of getting out one day. Without a viable school system, sports may be their only option. And it is a gigantic longshot. But still they dream. And they do it on the playing fields in Bhopal -- of which many in the slums are located on or around the Union Carbide plant.

While this image may appear romantic, it is hardly that. Because of the gas leak and the lack of cleanup throughout the last two and a half decades, these children are playing on grounds that are likely highly contaminated.

Today, accompanied by a reknowned testing agency, we went around to a couple smaller cricket fields to see how contaminated they were.

Imagine knowing that as a child you were playing your favorite sport on a ground so contaminated it's unsafe. What would you do about it? If you live in the slums, you have no choice. Either play there or don't play at all.

Who's to blame for this? Not an easy question to answer.. More to come on that in later entries.

Yaron Deskalo

Roberta Mancino Day 4

2010-09-01T07:58:00.002-04:00

E:60 continues production on its feature of Italian fashion model and extreme adventure athlete, Roberta Mancino on Monday filming more Rome sights before traveling 90 minutes south to spend time with fashion photographer, Stefano Manfredini. He has been one of Mancino’s favorite photographers and has shot many of the 29 year-old’s most memorable images.

After E:60 cameras documented Manfredini’s talents up close, they turned their cameras on him, for an interview with Jeremy Schapp about Mancino’s talents and appeal as a fashion model.

Then the E:60 production team headed to the coastal town of Anzio south of Rome on the Tyrrhenian Sea, where Mancino was raised. We visited some of her old stomping grounds and the Anzio train station where Mancino used to live in an upstairs apartment. The day ended with a sunset shoot in the town square, harbor, and at the beach.

Tune into E:60 this fall to see the interview with Manfredini, and more sights and sounds from our trip to Italy. And check out tomorrow’s daily blog to find out where E:60’s production team is headed next… a hint… it’s a very scary place.

T. Sean Herbert

E:60 Feature Producer
Aug 30, 2010

Roberta Mancino Day 3

2010-08-31T08:12:00.000-04:00

The E:60 crew drove nine hours from the Dolomites in northern Italy to Rome in order to continue producing its feature on fashion model-turned-dare-devil, Roberta Mancino. On August 29, 2010, at 11 a.m. on Day 3 of our shoot, we were in central Rome when Jeremy Schaap interviewed Mancino’s mother. A translator was used to convert the questions into Italian and the answers into English.

By 1 p.m., the E:60 production team was scouting for a location for Schaap’s next interview. Jeb Corliss is among the top wing suit flyers in the world and Schaap was going to be asking him questions about his girlfriend, Mancino. E:60 produced a feature back in 2008 on Corliss and his pursuit of trying to jump out of an airplane in a wing suit and land safely without a parachute. Some called him crazy, other call him a genius. We’ll give you another chance to decide.

After the Corliss interview, the remainder of the day was spent traveling the streets of Rome capturing the best moments of Mancino’s Italian roots. Even if you have never traveled to Rome, you will likely recognize some of the locales.

Watch E:60 this fall to see which moments from these interviews and what iconic Rome sights make the final cut. And check in tomorrow to here more behind-the-scenes tidbits from the Roberta Mancino shoot in Italy.

T. Sean Herbert, E:60 Feature Producer

8/29/2010

Roberta Mancino Day 2

2010-08-29T10:14:00.001-04:00

E:60 continues following Roberta Mancino in Italy this week on Day 2 of her attempt at her first helicopter proximity jump in the Dolomites. On August 28, 2010, her day begins early, at 7:30 a.m., when she awakes to check the local weather reports with the chopper pilot. She’s in luck…the weather is going to be very favorable. She and her boyfriend, Jeb Corliss, start to prepare mentally and physically. They travel with a few hundred pounds of gear, including their wing suits, helmets, some hi-tech HD camera equipment, and of course, their parachutes.

E:60 crews were dispatched to the heliport for Mancino’s 11 a.m. departure, while another camera crew headed to the area where she hoped to land, and another took a gondola to the top of Sass Pordoi, a 10,000-foot mountain top adjacent to Mancino’s jump site. That crew then had to take a perilous hike nearly a mile down to a perch on the edge of a cliff with the best vantage point for Mancino’s planned trajectory.

At 11:10 a.m. the E:60 crew joining Mancino in the chopper called the other crews to let them know that they were taking off from the heliport in a few moments for the 6 minutes flight to the chosen drop site. And on schedule, with all of E:60’s cameras rolling, the helicopter quickly appeared on the horizon, climbed to about 11,000 feet, and then Mancino and Corliss stepped out onto the choppers rails in their wing suit poised to take an extreme leap of faith…

Watch E:60 this fall to see what happened next. And check in tomorrow to find out what’s next on this incredible journey.

T. Sean Herbert, E:60 Feature Producer

8/28/2010

Roberta Mancino Day 1

2010-08-28T10:14:00.000-04:00

E:60 is traveling to Italy this week to shoot a feature on Roberta Mancino. For those of you who are not familiar with Mancino, go to Youtube and check out some of her highlight reels. Not only is she an accomplished fashion model, but she is also a world-class skydiver. Several years ago she began base jumping off of some of the world’s tallest skyscrapers, harrowing cliffs, and now has begun jumping out of planes wearing a wing suit. For the uninitiated, Mancino in flight looks more like a flying bat than anything else.

Our journey began Wednesday, August 26, with a trip to Milan, Italy before a four-hour trek north to The Dolomites in the Italian Alps to meet up with Mancino and her boyfriend, Jeb Corliss. Together they are donning their wing suits to attempt a helicopter proximity jump…trying to fly as close to one of the tallest mountains in all of Europe without killing themselves.

On Thursday, E:60’s cameras were rolling when Mancino and Corliss met with their helicopter pilot to check on the days conditions. Unfortunately, they did not look promising, with strong winds and rain in the forecast. They decided to take a site survey of the exact area where they intended to jump and their search for a suitable landing zone.

Corliss and Mancino located a small area off a road that took them to the base of the mountain no bigger than a football field and decided it would be big enough and easy enough to spot from a few thousand feet above. By 2 p.m. the wind and rain as predicted rolled in and scrubbed their first attempt. They try again tomorrow.

Submitted by T. Sean Herbert

8/28/2010

From Belarus with Love

2010-08-17T10:40:00.000-04:00

When Maria Sharapova returned to Gomel, Belarus in late June, E:60’s cameras wanted to be there. Belarus was the Eastern European homeland of her parents, who fled it in 1986 after the Chernobyl nuclear disaster. Sharapova’s mother and father moved to Siberia, where the tennis star was born in April 1987.

But a shoot in Belarus has special logistical challenges, as you might expect of a small country that at various times belonged to the Principality of Polotsk, the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, the Russian Empire, and the Soviet Union.

Since 1990 Belarus has been sovereign, with its very own ‘elected’ dictator, Alexander Lukashenko, who did not take kindly to former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice calling it an “outpost of tyranny.”

Amnesty International’s 2009 report on Belarus said “state control over the media increased, and restrictions on independent media continued. Some public events were banned; peaceful demonstrators were fined and detained for short periods; and civil society activists and journalists were harassed.”

Producer Matt Rissmiller’s job was to get in and out of Belarus without becoming another statistic. Napolean’s Grand Army marched through Belarus in 1812 on its way to infamy, and Rissmiller was determined to avoid the same fate. The way in to Belarus, he decided, was through Ukraine, to the south.

“Belarus is more challenging to get into than Ukraine,” Rissmiller said. “So we had contacts from Belarus meet us on the Ukraine side.”

He and his crew flew into Kiev. Customs was slow because of 10-11 cases of production equipment. Led by their Ukrainian and Belarusian guides, the crew drove two hours to the border. There, they were detained for 8 to 10 hours, even though they showed the proper paperwork and letters from government officials.

By the time they reached Gomel, a drive that should have taken 5-6 hours took 15 hours. They had flown out of New York on Saturday evening, and arrived in Gomel at 3 a.m. Monday.

The exhausted crew slept for a few hours and shot Gomel for the rest of Monday and Tuesday. Sharapova arrived on Wednesday, June 30. At

5:30 a.m. Rissmiller and his shooters – Bill Roach and Joel and Jesse Edwards – began to set up in a local “palace” for the Sharapova session scheduled at 9 a.m. But they ran into a problem.

“As we were setting up fire started shooting out of the electrical strip that the equipment was plugged into – it was jumping off the ground and cracking,” Rissmiller recalled. “Power in another country can be sketchy.”

The crew could not fix the problem, and Sharapova’s arrival drew nigh. Rissmiller scrambled.

“I called an audible,” he recalled.

The interview of Sharapova took place outside the palace, in natural lighting.

Sharapova left on Thursday, as Rissmiller’s crew made its way back to northern Ukraine to shoot desecrated Chernobyl. The crew was cautioned to walk on the pavement and avoid stirring up dust or dirt. It was warned about local food, water and air. Rissmiller had no urge to linger.

“We had our points mapped out pretty well,” he recalled. “We shot from 10 to 3 and got out of there.”

They returned July 4, touched ground on an international runway, jet propelled back home, from overseas to the USA. The fruits of their journey air tonight.

Posted by Steve Marantz, August 17, 2010

Bike Kids Tradition to be featured on E:60

2010-08-08T13:33:00.000-04:00

--Click here--

Phantom Debut

2010-07-20T12:52:00.001-04:00

Chelsea Baker is a 13-year-old girl whose knuckleball baffles the boys of Plant City, Fla.

Producer Ben Houser wanted to tell her story – of crossing baseball’s gender line with a signature pitch she learned from the late Joe Niekro – in a special way.

“How do you represent the knuckleball visually?” Houser asked himself. “I wanted to see it coming off her fingers.”

He decided to throw the high-tech version of a knuckleball – the Phantom HD Gold Model camera– at E:60 viewers, for the first time.

The Phantom shoots in extremely slow motion – 1000 frames per second as compared to the normal 30-40. It also shoots in a 1080p resolution, which is presently the highest HD TV video format available.

Because of its speed and resolution the Phantom requires “a ton of light”. It also requires more planning than usual.

“You can’t do it on the fly – it has to be directed like a movie,” Houser said.

Shooters Joel and Jesse Edwards and Bill Roach helped Houser conceive several Phantom shots that tell the story in gorgeous slow-motion metaphor.

One is of a fluttering butterfly – captured for the crew by Baker’s brother.

“I put it in front of the lens and let it go – we shot it for maybe 1 ½ seconds before it flew off,” said Jesse Edwards.

The Phantom turned it into six seconds of air time.

The crew purchased glass panes and had Chelsea throw baseballs through them. Shards of glass explode before the viewers’ eyes.

“We put Plexiglas in front of the Phantom so as not to damage it,” Houser said. “That’s a $300,000 camera we rented for a day.”

Posted by Steve Marantz, July 20, 2010

2010-07-19T13:51:00.002-04:00

A League of HER own

2010-07-12T20:43:00.005-04:00

Chelsea Baker

E:60 Blog Entry

Monday, July 12^th

A League of HER own

Chelsea Baker is a thirteen year old female little league pitcher. She’s as dominant as any little league pitcher in the country.

In the last four years Chelsea has NOT LOST an official sanctioned little league game.

Zero.

Undefeated.

Perfect.

Oh yeah, and she pitched TWO perfect games in the last two years, one of them was in an all-star game…all against BOYS.

Can you remember when you played little league and there was that one pitcher that threw harder than everyone? You grabbed a batting helmet, walked to the batter’s box and saw the hype in your area. I remember the first time I faced Corey Meyers. He was the best little league pitcher in my area along with former Villanova pitcher Casey Geib. I vividly recall not seeing the pitch, but hearing the sizzle of the ball go by. I trembled, stood there waiting for the next pitch. I shook, took strike two, strike three. I sat down and dreaded going back up to face Meyers. Call me a wimp, but I was more afraid of getting hit than swinging the bat and hitting the ball. Luckily, I was on Geib’s team, Harmony and Sons. I don’t really remember facing him, but if I did, I guarantee I struck out.

(If you are wondering the scouting report on my little league career it wasn’t stellar. I made one year of all-stars as a replacement player. You might as well call me a little league scab. I hit a few home runs that year, and probably broke the record for most errors at third base.)

The point of my story is that Chelsea Baker is that pitcher, except she is in a league far better than my little league in Palmyra, Pennsylvania. She is playing against boys that look like full grown men in Plant City, Florida, a state where baseball players seem to be born and bred.

Chelsea’s story is unique in that she is a girl completely superior to her boy counterparts in little league baseball. She isn’t just a good player; she dominates…and throws a knuckleball!

Our E:60 cameras filmed Chelsea for four days in June, and I personally witnessed her pitch against 16 batters. She walked one. Three players grounded out, (one into a double play), and she struck out twelve boys. As I sat in the stands an opponent’s mother explained the situation, “they were all intimidated before they ever got in the batter’s box.” It was seriously like watching a late 1980s Mike Tyson fight. One young spectator had built her up, saying to our E:60 cameras, “She throws a 65 mile per hour knuckle ball.” He was close…she throws her knuckle in the low fifties, but her knuckle ball is legit. We also filmed in Hinsdale, Massachusetts at former Red Sox general manager Dan Duquette’s Sports Academy. I witnessed the best knuckleball I have ever seen live in my life. She struck a boy out after throwing two fastballs right past him and completed the K with a knuckle curve that would buckle the knees on any hitter.

Duquette told me after watching her pitch, “Chelsea has a good delivery, and I saw that she throws down hill. I also say that she has good life on her fast ball and she’s a good competitor.”

The story has its parallels with a successful movie from 1992. A League of Their Own starring Tom Hanks, Madonna and Geena Davis among others. It was a movie about the all American girls professional baseball league in the 1940s. Geena Davis played the best player on the team, her fictional character’s name was Dottie Hinson. My initial thought for a narrator was Hanks…two-time Oscar winner. I thought about it, even made a call to Hanks agent, but after further review, it was obvious who the perfect fit was for voicing this E:60 story…Geena Davis. She is classy, successful and has the perfect female voice to narrate Chelsea’s tale.

Today, Geena recorded her voice in a production facility in California and narrated Chelsea’s story. The story should be a special one because of Geena’s involvement and we are all grateful to have her be a part of the E:60 summer premiere.

Geena arrived at the production facility in California around 4:30 eastern today. She was cordial and voiced our story as a true professional. We sent her the script in the morning for her to review prior to the tracking session. She read the script with eloquence. I directed her by speakerphone and she was very receptive. She respected me in her style and approach. It didn’t take long for Geena to get the voice down for our story and after just a few minutes, she nailed it.

Obviously, actors and actresses are very talented, and Geena was similar to another actor I directed years ago, the star of 24 Kiefer Sutherland. Our ESPN Super Bowl coverage needed a voice to open the show and Kiefer, who was a complete class act, voiced our open. He read it dramatic, slow, fast and punchy. He gave us options. Kiefer liked to read the script three times through, then get feedback from myself and a production assistant who produced the tease, Mike Hughes.

After our voice over session, Geena and I spoke for a few minutes. She told me that she is completely impressed with Chelsea and “couldn’t believe a young girl could throw a knuckleball.”

Chelsea Baker’s story is compelling. I am glad Rod and Missy Mason and the entire family chose E:60 to tell her journey. The story airs July 20^th in the E:60 summer season premiere and includes some unreal super slow motion shots. Check it out.

Ben Houser is a Senior Producer for ESPN’s E:60.

Combine Demolition Derby

2010-06-24T11:45:00.000-04:00

The Combine Demolition Derby pits giant farm machines against one another in an eerie spectacle suggestive of a sci-fi ‘alien invasion’.

Producer Al Kahwaty was at the rural town of Lind, Washington – population 500 – to shoot the annual June event that began in 1988. His challenge, in 2 ½ days on site, was to capture the derby, and its context.

Lind makes a busy weekend out of it, with a car demo derby, truck races, soapbox races, parades, and a barbecue. The derby itself draws a crowd of 5,000 to the Lind Arena.

“It’s all in good fun,” Kahwaty said. “But economically times have been tough in Lind. The town depends on the derby – it donates money back to the community.

“I wanted to get a feel for the people in town and the event.”

Interviews with the mayor, the head of the Lion’s Club, and a married couple who met at a past derby helped establish the scene.

Meanwhile, Kahwaty attached himself to “Team Jaws”, the combine crew of Matt Miller and Josh Knodel, seven-time winners of the event.

In a specialty shoot inside the garage at Knodel’s farm, Kahwaty backlit the combine and shot through machine-generated fog. Fog was used to make the combine “seem more ominous”, Kahwaty said, as it enhanced the lighting. The shoot went smoothly until Miller unexpectedly hit the gas pedal and the combine lurched forward. The cameraman jumped to avoid being pinned against the garage door.

Later, outside the garage, Miller drove the combine in donut patterns, as Kahwaty recorded it on his I-Phone.

“I had no idea you could do something like that with a combine,” Kahwaty said.

For the derby itself, cameras were mounted on two driver’s helmets in two different heats and on a combine in a third heat. Another camera was at the perimeter of the arena.

“Safety is the first concern,” Kahwaty said. “You want to make sure the camera crew isn’t too close to the action. You don’t want the cameras on the drivers’ helmets to obstruct vision.

“The safety of the equipment is also a concern. It’s a challenge to see that everything is on tight and nothing flies off when the machines slam into each other.”

Kahwaty won’t say if one of his cameras was mounted on the winning combine – you have to watch E:60’s summer flight to find out. But he did hint at the music: “I’d like to find something ominous-sounding to connect Jaws the combine to its namesake.”

Posted by Steve Marantz, June 24, 2010

Behold...Jaws!!!

2010-06-12T14:08:00.000-04:00

Coming to E:60 this summer.
"Click here"

Mapping out stories for the summer run.

2010-06-12T14:02:00.000-04:00

Phil Laak Poker Record Day 2 1/2

2010-06-04T08:00:00.000-04:00

Friday June 4. 4:00 am. To celebrate the halfway mark, hour 40 of 80,
Phil Laak made a surprise announcement. With fans and fellow poker
players watching, Phil reached underneath the table and revealed a
stack of $100,000 in chips. He decided to up the ante in order to keep
up his energy and motivation as he enters the next phase of his
journey. Let's see if it pays off.

Submitted by Hillary Wasch

Phil Laak Poker Record Day 2

2010-06-03T23:31:00.002-04:00

Slow and steady. That's how I would describe day 2 of Phil Laak's 80 hour attempt at the Guinness record for endurance poker. He finally climbed out of the gutter and is now showing a profit.
In 32 hours, Phil has only taken six breaks- five 5-minute breaks and one 20-minute break. He has consumed only 4 bottles of water, and has eaten only five small meals, all prepared by his nutritionist, All-American Dave.

Phil's girlfriend, actress and fellow pro poker player Jennifer Tilly has been stopping by, offering hugs, kisses and words of encouragement.

He is still coherent and says he is feeling great. His only ailment so far is his back. He is combatting pain with a sturdy seat cushion.

The Bellagio poker room is packed on a busy Thursday night. Fans are crowding around the table just to get a glimpse at the history-maker

Submitted by Hillary Wasch
6/03/2010

Phil Laak Poker Record Day 1

2010-06-02T21:06:00.002-04:00

Phil Laak began his 80-hour poker playing journey today at 12 noon on the dot. He began with 4,000 dollars and was down 1200 in the first hour. He is wearing his signature grey hoodie and sunglasses, the uniform that gave him his famous 'unabomber' nickname. Laak has three staff members taking shifts to be with him at all times. They are logging his times and filming him nonstop for the Guinness book of world records.

There have been a few fans come to watch, and people are waiting in line to play at Phil's table.

So far I have seen him yawn twice.

Submitted by Hillary Wasch
6/02/2010

Corrective Rape

2010-05-13T08:17:00.001-04:00

E:60’s piece on ‘corrective rape’ in South Africa wasn’t going to be like any other piece – producer Beein Gim and shooters Bill Roach, Joel Edwards and Jesse Edwards knew it from the start.

Corrective rape is rape of lesbian women by heterosexual men with the intent of changing their sexual orientation. Its occurrence – believed to be on the rise - in South Africa’s black townships is under scrutiny because of the 2008 rape/murder of Eudy Simelane, a lesbian member of the South African national soccer team.

Gim’s crew wanted a look to suit the story.

“They said ‘we have a unique story and unique location – let’s do this differently,” Gim said.

Encouraged by executive producer Andy Tennant, Roach went after a ‘Slumdog Millionaire’ look. He opted to shoot in digital cinema – with a Panasonic P2 2700 and Canon 7D.

The piece is built around chilling interviews with two rape victims. E:60’s usual production calls for three cameras and movement for an interview. Shots of the correspondent, crew, cameras and monitors vie for attention. Not this time.

Correspondent Jeremy Schaap interviewed the two victims, Tumi Mkhuma and Mvuleni Fana, as well as the mother and friend of Eudy Simelane. Little of Schaap was seen in the interviews of Mkhuma and Fana.

“This was about the victims – the survivors,” Gim said. “We put the camera right in their face – got them staring right into the camera. So they were directly telling you their story – instead of the correspondent. The idea was to keep the feel of a first-hand account as much as possible.”

The piece begins with the caveat: “The following segment contains images that may be disturbing to some viewers.” But the candid accounts of Mkhuma and Fana were more “disturbing” than any images in the piece.

“That was the most surprising thing to me,” Gim said. “One thing we did was stop them from saying too much during the pre-shoot. We wanted it to be fresh.”

Since no images of the actual rapes existed, Gim resorted to images of the locations where the rapes occurred, and abstract imagery – children, flowers, water dripping from a faucet, laundry, men in the streets, men and boys lifting weights.

“The little girls and kids were images to contrast with a dark story,” Gim said. “They represented beauty and purity and domesticity.”

“The guys lifting weights were men being as masculine as possible – guys being guys. The little kids lifting weights showed kids mimicking what grownups do.”

To establish the homophobic attitude of men in South Africa’s black townships, Gim’s crew approached them on their turf. They rewarded her with unguarded expressions of prejudice.

“It was surprising to find guys who said those things,” Gim said. “In the U.S. people are careful about man-on-the-street stuff. It was like they didn’t have a filter.

“Maybe they hate lesbians so much they couldn’t hold back.”

Posted by Steve Marantz, May 13, 2010

Lake it Easy

2010-05-10T17:18:00.001-04:00

Submitted by Ben Houser
May 10, 2010

When I first saw the tattoo on Nate Winters’ left shoulder, I thought it read “Lake it Easy.” It was unique, and had the date “8-05-08” underneath it.

“Cool Tattoo,” I said to Nate as he was riding in to his dock on his jet ski at his Winter Park, Florida home.

“Thanks,” he responded. “On my 17th birthday, my friend and I got tattoos of our favorite sayings on our arms, his saying, ‘How are you doing?’ and mine being, ‘Take it Easy.’ I just got ‘Take it Easy’ because I’m an easy going guy. It’s just something that I like to live by and I got the date under my leg,” Nate continued. “I don’t know, now people kind of see mine as, oh, that’s cool, that’s something meaningful. They see Adam’s tattoo and think ‘you are an idiot’. Why did you get a tattoo of “How are you doing?” on your arm?”

It was just a couple weeks ago that I learned about Nate’s story when a colleague, Matt Mccormick, read a story on him and passed it along through our E:60 management staff. Upon reading Nate’s story, it was a no brainer for E:60.

I flew to Orlando on Friday April 23rd and was ready to see the local celebrity pitch. Around 4 pm, Nate pulled into the baseball field parking lot in his SUV.

“You must be Ben,” he said to me through the window. I had spoken with his father, Dr. Tom Winters on multiple occasions before I arrived in Florida with E:60 cameras.

It was the beginning of multiple meetings between the two of us that has blossomed into a deep respect and friendship. Over the next couple weeks, myself and our cameras would follow Nate to school, wake him up at sunrise, and take him back to the helipad at the hospital where his life was saved.

Nate stepped out of the car, jersey in hand, focused on the game that night against Lake Howell.

I asked him if we could film him putting on his pitching leg and Nate agreed. It is an interesting process. I have never seen someone pick up a leg, take one leg off and put another leg on. This has become Nate Winters’ routine. He holds up his walking leg and explains the difference of why he has two legs with distinct purposes.

“This leg right here is a hydraulic leg and I can throw on it but it will give out on me and that’s what I was using for awhile and it gave out on me like two or three times,” said Nate. “I ended up hurting my ankle and I couldn’t throw. The leg I have right here is called an XT-9 and it’s made for wakeboarding and skiing and sports like that. It has a built in spring so when I bend it doesn’t give out it, actually like pushes back on me and throws me up the other way which is great for pitching.”

The pitching leg, as he calls it, has been crucial to his success. Nate threw in the seventy mile per hour range before a tragic boating accident cut off his left leg and much of his right ankle and achilles in August of 2008. If you can believe it, now he can throw a fastball in the eighties..

It’s now three hours to game time. Nate gets ready and heads out to stretch and work out his arms. I have planned comprehensive coverage of Nate’s second varsity start since his accident. His miraculous return to the mound a few weeks earlier was a success, but Nate didn’t get the victory. He was still looking for win number one on one leg.

I have a JIB camera, a large camera you see at major sporting events that can pan over a crowd that is placed down the 3rd baseline right next to the dugout. I have another photographer, Phil Iglesias, one of the best in the business, shooting all super slow motion material of Nate on the mound. I also have a third camera shooting the entire game in 24 frames, the standard for ESPN features. I didn’t know if I would get another opportunity to document Nate pitching. This was the final regular season game for Winter Park High School. It turns out they would lose their first playoff game. It was a wise decision to capture the game with multiple cameras and I was supported by E:60 management. This is the only game we film of Nate in HD.

The crowd is very large, around five hundred spectators. Virtually the entire audience is there for the same reason as me, to see Nate Winters pitch. Multiple local athletes, including former New York Yankees pitcher, Dennis Rasmussen, who won 91 major league games, is in attendance.

“It’s why all of us were here,” said Rasmussen. “We all knew he was going to be pitching tonight and why all of you are here and all of the support he’s gotten. To see Nate before the accident he had outstanding ability and was looked at by many colleges and was kind of on their radar. Now, all of sudden to have that accident and to set him back, but knowing his determination he was not going to be denied he was going to get back, get back on the mound and here he is and that’s incredibly inspiring for all of us.”

I thought that our E:60 cameras would make the seventeen year old junior nervous. Well, I was almost correct. It was his Winter Park teammates who were nervous. They committed three errors in the first few innings of the game. Before I knew it, Nate and his Winter Park team were down 4-0.

“I was just like how is this happening, like you’ve got to pick it up. Then all of my team mates were like, come on man, you’ve got to pick it up, you’ve got it, you’ve got it,” Nate told me after the game.

His team rallied, and exploded with eleven runs the rest of the way. In the 6th inning, when Nate was pitching to his final batter of the game, (Head Coach Bob King, made us aware he had one more batter). I spoke to the umpire at home plate. I wanted to make sure he was alright with us moving our JIB in a different better position to capture Nate walking off the field. The umpire obliged and allowed us to put our camera down the third baseline.

Nate got his final batter to ground out to second base. Head coach Bob King jogged out to the mound.

“Everybody congratulated him, and then when he walked off,” said King. “I still have a vision of him tipping his cap once again, and everybody out of the dugout meeting him to a standing ovation and I just think – Nate’s back.”

As Nate is walking off the field, he says he was concentrating on walking so he wouldn’t fall. “That would be embarrassing!” Nate didn’t fall, and all three of our cameras shot him as he walked into the dugout.

Nate got the win. He talked to us after the game saying, “My first win with one leg, it’s a pretty big accomplishment to me.” I have had the pleasure of witnessing in person Adrian Peterson’s 296 yard rushing game and Mets outfielder Endy Chavez’s epic catch in Game 7 of the 2006 NLCS. Nate Winters’ moment is in the same class and in some ways more powerful.

On one of our cameras Nate can be heard saying, “I want to go take my leg off.”

It’s not a typical phrase you hear after a pitcher leaves the game, but then again Nate Winters isn’t your typical pitcher.

He is much more.

Ben Houser is a Senior Producer for E:60. Matt McCormick edited the video feature that will air on Tuesday night at 7 eastern on ESPN’s E:60.

E:60 Extra: Mariano Rivera

2010-05-05T16:35:00.000-04:00

E:60 Extra Mariano Rivera from E60 on Vimeo.

E:60 Liberian Amputee Soccer tes feat. Nas

2010-04-29T20:32:00.000-04:00

E:60 Liberian Amputee Soccer Tease feat. Nas from E60 on Vimeo.

Tuesday May 4th E:60 presents the story of the Liberian Amputee Soccer Team, featuring narration and music by Nas.

Second Impact

2010-04-29T11:38:00.000-04:00

Sports Science and Second Impact from E60 on Vimeo.

Last November, LaSalle University in Philadelphia settled a multi-million dollar civil lawsuit brought by a former football player. His name is Preston Plevretes, and his story highlights in vivid detail the dangers of athletes playing with concussions that have not yet healed.

The 24-year-old suffered a devastating brain injury, called Second Impact Syndrome, more than four years ago. His story highlights the need for athletic programs to treat brain injuries seriously.

To examine exactly what happened when Plevretes was hit by a Duquesne University player back on November 5, 2005, E:60 reporter Tom Farrey traveled to the Sport Science lab in Burbank, CA and met with John Brenkus. Farrey brought that actual helmet Plevretes was wearing in that game. Brenkus and his team analyzed the play that nearly killed the six-foot-two, 230-pound linebacker. They recreated the forces at work by having Jamal Allen, a former San Jose State football player, strike a crash test dummy approximately the same height and weight as Plevretes.

To learn about what Sport Science found, tune in on May 4, 2010, to ESPN’s primetime newsmagazine, E:60, to watch Preston Plevretes’ compelling story of lessons learned.

Art of the Reveal

2010-04-28T12:00:00.003-04:00

In the morning producer T. Sean Herbert showed colleagues a rough cut of his feature about Preston Plevretes, a college football player whose career was cut short in 2005 by Second Impact Syndrome – brain damage from a second concussion that occurs before a first one has healed.

The E:60 staff wanted more details on the game, the surgery, context on similar injuries, and involvement of team trainer and physician. It wanted more of Plevretes after the injury and fewer ‘specialty’ shots.

Someone suggested a “reveal” – an editing technique in which crucial information is withheld until the middle or end for a surprise.

A reveal was used in the E:60 investigation of retired wide receiver Marvin Harrison, and his alleged role in the shooting death of Dwight Dixon. E:60 built its piece on a 2009 interview with Dixon, and then revealed that Dixon later was gunned down in North Philadelphia.

Herbert used a reveal in his 2008 feature on MMA fighter Lee Murray, which held back that Murray was the mastermind of a bank heist in England and had fled to Morocco. In his piece on sprinter Oscar Pistorius the reveal was that Pistorius was a double amputee.

“It’s a tool to keep the viewers interested because the story is being told in an unpredictable fashion,” Herbert said.

In the afternoon Herbert huddled with editor Andre “Dre” Ninchritz over the suggested changes. Herbert also consulted with reporter Tom Farrey.

They decided to go with a reveal. Ninchritz began the search for pictures and sound to fill the front of the piece vacated by the information to be withheld until later.

Herbert’s ‘reveal’ won’t be revealed here – you have to watch May 4. That’s my reveal.

Posted by Steve Marantz, April 26, 2010

Scratch tracks for Nas.

2010-04-26T15:05:00.000-04:00

The MC drops by the edit suite Monday afternoon. After watching the piece, Nas takes 20 minutes for his voice over. Not giving anything away yet. But trust me, you'll want to hear him.

Michael Jordan's Race Team

2010-04-20T19:07:00.001-04:00

Frame by frame, producer Matt Rissmiller built his feature on Michael Jordan’s motorcycle race team.

The basic story was laid out in a day and a half. Now, in the fourth day of edit, Rissmiller and editor Paul Carruthers hurried to complete a rough cut to show supervisors.

About three minutes into the 10-minute feature Jordan’s introduction to the sport is explained. The section involves Hannah Storm’s interview with Jordan. Three cameras had been deployed. The “A” camera, a traditional shot without production equipment in the frame, had been on Jordan. The “B” camera, a/k/a “Rover”, had moved to several positions and captured wide shots that included production equipment and monitors. The “C” camera had been on Storm.

Why three?

“ If during an interview the subject is describing a story that takes him or her five minutes to tell you can cut up the answer,” Rissmiller said. “So you would use maybe one or two sentences on the A Cam and then you can cut to the B Cam later in the story as long as their inflection sounds natural. This allows you to condense the story.

“ If you had just one camera focused on the interview subject then you would have to cover that cut with B-roll. However, in E:60's case, since we have multiple cameras on the interview subject we have the option to cover the cut with B-roll or go right to the B Cam.”

Rissmiller and Carruthers came to Jordan’s most startling byte, and watched it over and over.

“Well, at first it was scary because some of the speeds that I was going on the streets ....they were not quite safe,” Jordan said.

“Like how fast?” Storm asked.

“Uh, I think on one straightaway we got up to like 157...which now thinking about it I must have been nuts.”

Jordan’s uber-celebrity, and his frank admission of a daredevil experience, shaped Rissmiller’s approach. He stuck with the A Cam for most of the interview.

“On this piece, I wanted to be conscious of just allowing the audience to see MJ,” Rissmiller said. “People most often see him on the sideline at a basketball game or fans remember him during his playing days in a jersey...we rarely get to see an all-access piece on MJ so in this case just seeing him on camera in this setting is more interesting than showing motorcycles.

“With that in mind, it's not necessary to cover the entire piece with B-roll or music...people just want to see MJ in an environment that they've never seen him in before.”

Posted by Steve Marantz, April 20, 2010

Opee the Motocross Dog

2010-04-16T12:27:00.001-04:00

Production assistant Max Brodsky was almost finished with a short feature about a dog who races motocross bikes. Actually, the dog, Opee, a 70-pound Blue Merle Australian shephed, rides with his owner, Mike Schelin, as they careen over California dirt tracks.

There’s no dog in Brodsky, who won’t quit on a piece until it’s just right. And something was wrong with the music.

He had started with “spaghetti western” music evocative of Clint Eastwood in “A Fistful of Dollars”.

“I looked for music that matched with the desert and dirt where they race,” said Brodsky.

It worked, to a point. Until one of Opee’s fans described him as “the fastest dog on wheels” as Opee and Mike gunned their bike. Then it didn’t work, observed producer Brian Liburd

“Right there - it needs something faster,” said Liburd.

Brodsky was dubious but searched the music library and found an up-tempo country rock sound. He, Liburd and editor Rob Berman tried it out. Doggone if it wasn’t better.

“I’ll buy that,” said Brodsky, and rolled over.

Posted by Steve Marantz, April 16, 2010

Yaron Deskalo Liberia Journal: Nas

2010-04-05T15:30:00.000-04:00

So part of the excitement about returning from a shoot - as you may recall - is looking through the footage.
The not-so exciting part? Transcribing interviews. It's not any easier when the interview subjects are a bit tough to understand: listen, scroll back, type, scroll back, listen again. It's a process that takes about three times as long as it should. That being said, nothing prepares you for the right soundbytes by actually hearing them say it, listening to their inflection, and watching their body language.
Still, after two full days, I've only gotten through four tapes. It's going to be a long week.
So that discussion is exactly why I've neglected to update you on the meeting last Friday.
If you've had any chance to watch the trailer that Brian Liburd (our webmaster) posted on the blog last week, you likely heard a familiar voice. Or at least a familiar voice, if you like my type of music.
The song - over a section we cut on the brutality of the Liberian civil wars - was called 'Shoot 'em up'. The artist: Nas.
When I thought about somebody who could lend his voice to this piece, Nas was one of the first that came to mind. Beyond the fact that he cut a remix with Statik Selektah called "Blood Diamonds are Forever" about the civil wars in West Africa that created a need for an amputee soccer league, Nas has the voice that bolsters the piece's credibility. For those of you who listen to his music, it carries a rich blend of rhyme, storytelling, and flow, with more than just a hint of grittiness. Not that you need his credentials, but it's why he's regularly considered one of the best MCs and his first album, Illmatic, is often cited as one of the greatest hip hop albums.
So after discussions with Nas' manager a couple conference calls and emails, I put together the four-minute trailer and asked if those guys wanted to see it. They would be in New York Friday. Good. I'll be there.
At the Standard Hotel, in New York's Meatpacking District, I pulled my laptop out, and in my 'makeshift office' in the hotel's restaurant, Nas joined me as we watched the trailer. He knew what he was getting into (we'd spoken on the phone before I went to Liberia). But this was a way for him to see what I'd shot, and most importantly, how I'd use his music in the piece.
From all indications, it seemed like he loved the direction. He was particularly struck by the images we used from the civil war to his music. He told me 'Shoot 'em up' was the right music cut for that part of the piece, which was music to my ears since I couldn't agree more.
So the next step? Transcribe. But after that, I'll write the script and start putting together the piece. Nas' manager suggests the best way for Nas to not only lend his music to this piece, but also voice the piece would be to have him up in Bristol, CT at ESPN and spend a day working on the piece. More music to my ears.
I've told people time and again that my vision for this piece - more than anything - is to transport people to Liberia for the 12 or so minutes of this piece. It's likely that no more than a handful of people who watch my piece in this country have ever visited Liberia, and another handful who ever will. So my task, in telling you the story of the amputee soccer team through the eyes of one of its players is to have you experience what Liberia is like. How desperate is it? How much does this team mean to the country and represent change? And most importantly, how does Liberia's past influence its present and plant seeds for what they say is a hopeful future?
Nas will help take us there. If there's one thing about his music - even though I grew up on Dre and Snoop - it's his ability for him to sound honest through his music. He's more poet than rapper. And that's a compliment. That's why I hope his voice can help translate that message and answer those questions.
Oh yeah, and it doesn't hurt to have a multi-platinum selling artist lending his music.

-YD

Sneak Peek: Liberian Amputee Soccer Team

2010-04-02T16:20:00.001-04:00

Click here to view

Editing Mariano Rivera

2010-04-02T10:45:00.002-04:00

On Thursday of Holy Week producer Frank Saraceno and editor Marlon Hidalgo began to edit a Mariano Rivera feature. Facing an Avid DS, they studied footage Saraceno shot of the ageless Yankee closer in his native Panama in the second week of February.

This was a labor of love for Saraceno, who grew up in Rochester and Syracuse, and for Hidalgo, who grew up in the Bronx.

This was the start of two-week process, for a piece that might run 10 minutes and have as many as 1000 edits.

“To me, this is the most rewarding part until the piece hits the air,” Saraceno said. “You feel like an artist and this is your canvas.”

Frame after frame moved across the Avid screens, at Hidalgo’s deft command. Saraceno scanned his index of logged shots and called out requests.

He chose shots of Rivera inside the partial construction of a new church, which Rivera financed, for the impoverished fishing village he came from. Saraceno liked one in which Rivera shook the hand of a worker in a hard hat.

He chose shots of Rivera, with his wife and son, as they handed out backpacks and school supplies to the local children.

Saraceno and Hidalgo especially liked shots of Rivera, as he drove slowly on the main street, and chatted and laughed through his open window with locals. The camera, in the passenger seat, saw the same adoring and admiring faces that Rivera saw.

A theme emerged.

Rivera is a good man. Saintly, you might say. Especially for allowing E:60 a rare glimpse inside his off-the-field life.

With the Yankees and Red Sox set to open the season on Easter Sunday, even a Sox fan – such as myself - couldn’t blame Saraceno and Hidalgo for a reverent take.

Posted by Steve Marantz, April 2, 2010

Yaron Deskalo Liberia Journal. April 1, Wash, D.C.

2010-04-01T19:09:00.000-04:00

I'm on the train headed north. Just left DC. On my way to New York.

This afternoon, we will finally able to nail down an interview with the U.S. Ambassador to Liberia, Linda Thomas-Greenfield. Amidst all the controlled chaos that was Monrovia the past couple weeks, I actually neglected to give her (or her PR person) a call for the first couple days I was there. I had, however, left a message at the U.S. Embassy shortly before I left to Liberia to let them know that an American TV crew was there. I'm not sure that message ever made it across.

It was simply fortuitous that I happen to get in touch with the Embassy. The Embassy spokeswoman just happened to be taking a walk when we were emerging from our hotel, moments away from our second shoot with the Liberian Crusaders of Peace. You see our hotel, the Cape, sits in the shadow of the Embassy -- a mere 500 feet away. She heard English and knew something was going on. I told her what we were there for and apologized that I had not been in touch. Attempting to seize the opportunity, I then requested an interview with the Ambassador. We exchanged cards. My instructions were to email. She'd see if the Ambassador could fit us in.

Turns out she couldn't. Understandably, we weren't as important as the visiting AFRICOM General or the opening of the National Elections Commission in Monrovia. We were assured, however, that the Ambassador was travelling back to the states, and it was in DC that we'd have our best chance.

So here we are.

And it was worth the wait.

Ambassador Thomas-Greenfield first visited Liberia in 1978. Seeing the destruction and devastation now in in 2010 has always led me to wonder what Monrovia was like pre-civil war. My only image came at the top of the Ducor Hotel, a once-five star spot that overlooks the city. We shot scenics from the roof and even an interview, as you may recall. One of the 'tour guides' of this abandoned building showed us a brochure of the place from the seventies. Monrovia looked peaceful. The hotel looked glamorous. As the Ambassador explained, it was all that.

"Like a small American southern city."

"Savannah?" I asked.

"Yeah, but not that nice."

She told me that even though it was very provincial, Monrovia was sowing seeds of conflict. The divide between the haves and have nots was widening. It was becoming increasingly tense. Soon, she said, there would be murders on the beach. The situation sprialled out of control. It would be less than a decade later before the country was fully engulfed in civil war. One that make Monrovia hell on earth. One that would go nearly uninterrupted for 14 years.

The Ambassador, like the Minister of Youth and Sport who we interviewed on our last day in Monrovia, was certainly critical of the amputees. The Ambassador has had contact with amputees. She works very closely with them, in fact. She told me how she implores the amputees to not think of themselves as ex-combatants. They need to move on. In meeting with students at a Liberian university, she met a young man who said that he was an ex-combatant, to which she replied, "What are you doing here at the university?"

He said, "I'm a student."

-YD

Clint Dempsey Shoot April 1

2010-04-01T18:56:00.001-04:00

After spending a day shooting at iconic locations throughout London, our crew headed to Fulham's stadium - Craven Cottage - for a Europa League tournament game against Wolfsburg FC (a German club). The atmosphere was electric. One thing that stands out at European football matches is the singing and chanting by passionate fans urging on their sides. Clint Dempsey showed of his skill and pace, at one point in the second half starting a movement that led to Fulham's second goal. The Cottagers (as the Fulham side are called) won the match 2-1, moving one step closer to a semifinal berth in the Europa League tourney.

Submitted by Dave Salerno

Clint Dempsey Shoot March 31

2010-03-31T17:50:00.000-04:00

We started a cold and blustery day at the Fulham training grounds shooting Clint Dempsey and his teammates running through some drills. After practice, Clint took us in his SUV for a short ride through London - a quick jaunt from the training grounds to an Italian restaurant where he met teammates for lunch. Finished the day shooting scenics at the team's historic stadium - Craven Cottage. Till tomorrow and the Europa League game between Fulham and Wolfsburg!!

-Submitted by Dave Salerno

Clint Dempsey Shoot March 30

2010-03-30T16:33:00.000-04:00

Despite the wretched weather, E:60 had spirited interviews with Fulham captain Danny Murphy and our main subject Clint Dempsey. Murphy broke down Clint's burgeoning skills on the pitch, while Clint talked about everything from what he misses about Texas to the upcoming World Cup to his recent injury and the wonder goal he scored against Juventus earlier this month. After the interview, we shot a few cool pieces of video with Clint - some at their indoor practice facility - you can see him getting ready for his close up in the attached picture!

Submitted by Dave Salerno

Clint Dempsey Shoot Photos

2010-03-30T14:50:00.000-04:00

The Fulham shield

Fulham training grounds

Paris based crew!

Clint Dempsey Shoot March 29

2010-03-29T14:14:00.001-04:00

I landed in London this morning and the weather - true to stereotype - was a bit grey with a light drizzle. I took one of the city's famous black cabs over to the Fulham training grounds and met with a member of their public relations staff. Took a tour of the grounds...much different than ths standard digs for an American pro team! The buildings around the practice pitch reminded me of something from an upscale boarding school!

I organized an itinerary with Carmelo, one of Fulham's PR gurus. Tomorrow, we are set to interview team captain Danny Murphy and then our second go-round with the main subject Mr. Dempsey. We will also be shooting some cinematic video of Clint in his Fulham kit!

Off to the pub for fish and chips.

Submitted by Dave Salerno

3/29/10

Clint Dempsey Intro

2010-03-28T17:37:00.002-04:00

Gutsy 27-year-old midfielder Clint Dempsey is one of Team USA’s best players. Growing up in the humble Texas town of Nacogdoches, Dempsey began his soccer odyssey traveling 6 hours round trip to play for a club team in Dallas.

But due to low family funds and the need to spread what little wealth they had, Clint’s parents put some resources into older sister Jennifer’s burgeoning tennis career. But less than a year later, Jennifer died of a brain aneurysm. Clint, a skilled freestyle hip hop/rap singer (stage name Deuce), was approached to make a video for Nike during the 2006 World Cup. The video, called Don't Tread, became one of Nike’s biggest promo campaigns during the ’06 Cup. He asked that local Texan musicians be used and that they film in his home town. At the end of the video, Dempsey places a flower on his sister’s gravestone. With his sister as one of his guiding inspirations, Dempsey continued his soccer journey and flourished.

Dempsey would star for the Furman University Paladins before garnering MLS Rookie of the Year honors with the NE Revolution. Dempsey now plays for Fulham in the English Premier League and has become a vital cog for the national team. Regarding his tough guy approach to the game – he once played for several weeks with a broken jaw and recently scored a crucial goal for Fulham against Italian giant Juventus in his first game back following a knee injury.

E:60 is on its way to London to interview & shoot Clint, some teammates, and possibly his parents - who are visiting while we are there...

Submitted by Dave Salerno

Yaron Deskalo Liberia Journal (Back in Bristol)

2010-03-26T21:28:00.000-04:00

Bristol/Friday

It's safe to say Bristol, Connecticut is a long way from Monrovia.
After a 30-hour travel day - Monrovia, Brussels, DC, Hartford - sleep in my own bed wasn't hard to come by.
And let me tell you, I couldn't put a price on my morning coffee after ten days of Nescafe.
The most exciting part about returning from a shoot is looking at what we shot. I don't often micromanage my crew and look at everything we shot through a monitor on-location. You always remember where your cameras were, but how they shot it is always a mystery.
Today, like a kid a candy store, I opened everything and took just one bite of each. Yes, my job is better than yours.
I quickly screened through half the video we shot. I can't get enough of the street scenes from Monrovia and the other areas we visited. There's something about those faces we shot. A curiosity I can't explain. Imagine the feeling of seeing something for the first time. For some that we saw, it was the huge $100,000 camera Gregg pointed at them. For others in extremely remote areas, as our security explained, it was a white person. And as I mentioned in an earlier entry, imagine a 6'4", 265 pounder.
Other highlights included our final practice on the beach and the music with the Liberian Crusaders for Peace. That stuff is stunning. More updates to come as I digest it all in the upcoming weeks.
But first, more pressing items, like the not-so exciting part about returning from a shoot: expense reports. And in a cash-only country... yikes.

-YD

Michelle Akers photo shoot

2010-03-25T14:25:00.002-04:00

Sutton, Ma. – Producer Heather Lombardo was drawn to a story about Michelle Akers, the retired soccer great who has turned her life to the rescue and care of abused horses.

Lombardo’s youth as a competitive rider, and now as a recreational rider, made her a natural for the story. And when she saw Akers’ photos of the abused horses, and of a heroic rescue during a flood last September, she was hooked.

But how to tell it? She knew Akers’ still photos would play an important role because they were the only visual record of a crucial part of the narrative. Her challenge was to use the photos effectively.

“I wanted to try and stay as organic as possible,” Lombardo said.

Most still photos are filmed in a studio. But Lombardo decided to film the photos outdoors, and to try to copy the feel of Akers’ Florida farm. Photographer Tony Melfi suggested Waters Farm, which was settled in 1757 and is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

Lombardo, Melfi, and grip Eban Hathaway arrived at noon, as sun broke through and wind rustled trees and bushes impatient for spring. The non-working farm was deserted.

They looked over the 120 acres, the stone walls and wooden gates, the 2-bay and 6-bay wagon shed, cook barn, and shingle mill.

Lombardo chose a weathered gate in front of a stone wall, and applied tape to the back of the photos. Melfi set up his Varicam DVC Pro HD.

Soon, thirteen still photos, taped to the gate, fluttered in the wind. Melfi dropped in a Tiffen filter to darken the sky. Lombardo watched the HD monitor and asked Melfi to come in tight.

Later, more photos were filmed against a gray fence next to the 2-bay wagon shed. Still later, another set was filmed inside the shed, in the shadows. Melfi shot through a hole in the shed’s wall, while Hathaway held a reflector above the photos, for minimal light.

“These photos are somber,” Lombardo said. “The background should be somber.”

- posted by Steve Marantz, March 25, 2010

Yaron Deskalo Liberia Journal Day 10

2010-03-25T08:00:00.000-04:00

Monrovia/Brussels

We spent our last day with the Youth and Sport Minister. She gave us a different side of the amputees. Why are they poor, homeless, and begging? Well, frankly, much of it falls on their shoulders, according to her. Or at the very least, their management.
It's not just about soccer, she told me. It's about becoming valuable members of society. That's what the amputees have neglected to do.
I hear her. I do. And to some of the players, it rings true. But others, like the many talented people we met over eight days in this impoverished West African country, are products of unfortunate circumstance. And even the strongest of men have a hard time digging themselves out of these ditches.
When you see the Liberian Crusaders of Peace perform in the piece, you'll understand. When you listen to Richard Duo, you'll understand.

We left Monrovia on the red eye. We had a special visitor on the flight: Liberian President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf. How about that? Too bad we packed our camera batteries. I would have snuck up front for an interview - one her communications dep't blew off... Though I couldn't have been happier with the way the Minister's interview went.

Leaving Brussels now. Bound for DC. Cheers to those that visit Monrovia in the future and can fly direct from Atlanta.

-YD

Yaron Deskalo Liberia Journal Day 9

2010-03-23T20:51:00.000-04:00

Monrovia, Tuesday

Last full day in Africa.
Our bodies have taken a beating and have been largely ignored.
Yesterday, our director of photography, Gregg Hoerdemann, walked down to the lobby. He said he was feeling signs of malaria. He was tired and achy.
Seven straight days of shooting in 100 degree heat with a marine-size load to carry. No, bro. You don't have malaria. You are just tired. As expected.
We ended our shooting today with our final practice with the amputee soccer team. After getting our meat and potatoes in the first two shoots, it was time to add a bit of gravy. We brought the squad to the beach, where they often practice, and had them scrimmage under a setting sun.

This is my first trip to Africa. But for those foreigners that now live here, they all say that Liberia is a bit different. The worst, some even say.
You think about that when you see these amputees practicing in such a beautiful, natural environment. We're here trying to tell their story, but tomorrow we leave, and life continues for them. That happens every time you finish a story, but the desperation here is, well, the worst I've seen.
Two nights ago, as rainy season slid its way into West Africa, the sky opened up with a barrage of six straight hours of consistent downpour.
Earlier that day we visited Joseph Kolobeh's inhabitable shack. He told us when it rains, the tin roof leaks. As I stumbled out of bed around midnight to the steady, comforting sound of rain, I thought about Joseph and all the others under their tin shacks. They're getting soaked. Trust me, it wasn't just him. It was everybody in his neighborhood.
When we saw Joseph today on the beach - the same guy who defends goal with just his right arm, but yet can't even pump water from the area well on his own - he reminded us of his situation. He asked us whether we could help him fix his roof; he wasn't asking for our carpentry skills.
I tell him and the countless others that have requested anything from a handout to a home for their daughter in the states that we can't do anything. We are journalists, after all. It's not that we don't have a heart, but we aren't aid workers. All I tell them is that I am going to put together the best piece possible. Maybe something good comes from it.
It's not the first time I've been asked. Or even the first time I said no. It's just the first time that I've thought that these guys aren't asking for something to make them feel better. They just needed something to make them feel normal.
We finished up just before seven. The sun had nearly descended into the Atlantic. The crashing waves welcomed the night. Four of us left in our comfortable air-conditioned van. The team watched. Some waved. Others began to pile into their 10-person van. Soon, it would be full with all 18 of them.
Soon, we'd be on our way back to the America.

-YD

Yaron Deskalo Liberia Journal Day 8

2010-03-22T22:21:00.004-04:00

Monrovia, Monday

This is a shoutout to our drivers. Hassan and ... Hassan (We also have a security guy named Hassan.). It seems ripe for some type of ultimate hilarity, but none has blossomed just yet.

Anyhow, driving in Liberia is no easy task. The city is a total sh*tstorm. There are no traffic lights and practically no lanes. It's a hodgepodge of Nissan Sunny yellow taxis, motorbikes and your occasional Japanese/Chinese/American car. It's enough to weave in and out of the traffic - which is accomplished by a simple double beep of the horn - but it's a total other to leave the confines of the city and travel down the much frequented two-lane 'highways'. When we traveled up to Gbarnga last week, a semi (one of the few I've seen) had toppled over. When we traveled back 30 hours later, the truck was still there, stationary on its side - though they were unloading its contents.

Today, we took the trip outside the city to Penson Gold Mine. We didn't know what to expect. We drove our normal route outside the city, where one mile can take 15 minutes in the bustling red light market.

Now, once you leave the city, you encounter potholes the size of half your car. No joke. It provides for a NASCAR like environment, weaving in and out of traffic. Then add cars coming at you in the other direction. Good times.

Passing 15 gate, I knew we were close to the turnoff.

And when we took the left down a jungle like road in Hassan's yellow Honda Odyssey, I hoped we were close.

I asked the owner of the mine, who we'd picked up on our way, how far away we were. 'Oh, close. Very close.' Translation: 'Well, we're a bit farther than you think, but should be there within the hour.'

We didn't go but 50 feet when we encountered your typical Liberian off-road: two totally different tiers of road separated by a ditch. Hassan took the road slowly and below us a huge sound bellowed from the car. It was one of those sounds that you don't expect to hear. Your axel smacking the earth and then scraping for 10 feet. I thought we were done, and we hadn't even gotten 'very close' yet.

It was the first time I questioned our driver. 'Hassan, you sure we can do this?' He got out of the car, peeked underneath, and gave his approval. 'Yes, fine.'

When you're on the road in a foreign country, you have to trust two people: your fixer and driver. Hassan said fine, so I said fine.

For the first time on the trip, I made sure we had our satellite phone somewhere in the back. Last thing I need is for the crew to drive deep into the jungle and our radiator blow, and we're stuck. Not a call I'd like to make to anybody - but at least I'd have the sat phone.

So 25 minutes later - the road did improve - we got to a little village. Every time we emerge from our car in one of these villages - populated by 50 or so people - the eyes of the community always seem to be transfixed on our audio guy, Chip. He's a big guy. He played college football. Maybe 6'4", 265 and built like a fridge. I swear they will be taking about the giant who visited the village for years to come. Always comical to watch the eyes of the children. Two days ago, he scared a pack of kids near Joseph's shack. He wanted to take a picture with the group of kids that had followed us. When he approached them, they scurried like he was the plague. He would later say the shirt with a skull on it probably wasn't the best idea. Funniest thing about Chip is that he's the nicest guy. He brought three soccer balls from the states and handed them out after one of the team's practices to the little kids who congregated around the field. Today, he was friendly as usual as we started our walk from the village.

We still had a journey ahead of us. 'How long?' asked our security guy, Abbas.

'Not far,' said the mine owner.

'Ok guys, let's go,' said Abbas. 'Thirty minutes.'

And it was pretty darn close, along a narrow path, winding trails, walking across single logs of water. I'm glad Indiana Jones was on TV the night before.

Mining is tough. These young men work hard the old school way - with their hands. They sift through pounds of dirt all for about 15 grams of gold per day - maybe $300. And of course, that mostly goes to the owner.

While diamonds were a contributor to West Africa's civil wars, gold also played a role. The mining still goes on today, deep into the jungle.

We spent about 15 minutes there, walked back, and drove to Monrovia. It couldn't have been more than 45 miles on Google Maps, but it was a good six-hour trip.

I'm not complaining, though. Not with Hassan behind the wheel.

-YD

Penson Mine

2010-03-22T08:05:00.001-04:00

They pull $300 a day here. Part of what started the conflict more than 20 years ago.