by jackiemejia
Jim Seida is a senior multimedia producer for MSNBC.com.
He managed to converge mobile tools and reporting by experimenting with using an iPhone 4 to report on a story about test driving an electric car from Seattle to San Francisco in two days. Seida used nothing but his phone to report and found that some particular apps helped him get the job done.
Seida used iMovie in order to edit the footage that he shot on his phone, Dragon Dictate to type out the text that he was writing for photo captions and Almost DSLR in order to capture pictures.
Seida says that although apps can help in reporting, the tools cannot be an excuse for sub-par work, and should be used with the same efficiency that professional tools require.
He is still a little skeptical about finding the ‘perfect’ app though.
“There are new apps coming out all the time…it’s honestly a challenge to stay on top of them all. The perfect app for most of what we need to do still doesn’t exist and likely never will.”
No matter what he decides to film, Seida says
“never underestimate the importance of locking a camera down (when shooting video). If you attach your iPhone to a tripod as opposed to hand-holding it, your finished product will look much better online.”
Although Seida had success in reporting from his iPhone, in an interview with the Poytner Institute, he said,
“I don’t think professionals will use it [iPhones] as their primary reporting tool. I won’t. The important thing is that I CAN if I need to. And for non-pros, people who don’t have the hardware and software to do this kind of work […]”
Aside from working as a producer, Seida has also taught classes at NPPA’s Multimedia Immersion, Eddie Adams Workshop as well as boot camps at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and the University of Miami.
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