Page 33 - Convergent Journalism an Introduction Writing and Producing Across Media

The Multimedia Assignment Editor and Producer

• Communicate with anchors who present the news. The
producer speaks to anchors via their earpieces.
• Write and copyedit scripts. This is especially true for voiceover
and copy stories and national/international stories that appear in
a newscast.
• Monitor news wires, such as Associated Press, for developing
stories.
• Time the show while it is airing live. The producer may have to
add or drop stories, depending on how the show is timing out.
• Interact with the technical crews, especially the director. The
director is the main technical person who oversees the staff that
puts the newscast on the air.
• Order or build graphics needed to enhance news stories. These
could be full-screen graphics or over-the-shoulder anchor
graphics.
• Write headlines and teases used throughout the newscast. These
are the devices used to capture and keep audience interest in the
newscast.
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The number of producers and their roles also depend on the market
size. In the smallest markets, one person may produce multiple news-
casts per day. In larger markets, multiple producers may work on one
newscast. In some places, one person may act as both the producer and
the assignment editor.
The roles of both the producer and assignment editor become much
more complicated in a multimedia or converged newsroom. The two
people must now think about more than what the stories are and how
they’ll be covered for a newscast. Now, they must determine the best
ways to cover the story for print, broadcast, and online platforms.
There is also a fundamental difference in how newspapers are struc-
tured, compared to broadcast media. In general, a newspaper covers
much more news than the broadcast media, because a newspaper has
much more space to fill. The words in a typical half-hour program
would fill about one broadsheet page. Few newspapers have a central
assignment desk. There are multiple page editors, copyeditors, and
photo editors.
Another key difference between each medium is the deadline. TV
and radio have several deadlines throughout the day depending on
when newscasts are scheduled. Newspapers have a set deadline, usually