When talking about breaking news, journalists usually mean information that appears unexpectedly and needs to be disseminated as quickly as possible. The word “yesterday” is never used in breaking news reporting. Breaking news is reporting on military actions, terrorist attacks, natural disasters, a prime example is reporting on the sinking of the Kursk submarine, the flooding in Lensk, or the terrorist attacks in the United States last September.
Peculiarities of working on a breaking news report
For a TV reporter, breaking news coverage is first and foremost about timeliness. Television reporters need to be on the scene when the event is happening, not when it has already happened. Therefore, if possible, the reporter must arrive at the most interesting moment and have time to do a lot of things in the short time while the events unfold. To have time to gather information about the event, make it into a coherent text, read it to the camera, and shoot the most exciting shots. The reporter has to decide when to shoot the plans of the place and the action and when to go and record interviews with eyewitnesses. Therefore, the journalist must be able to quickly plan his work and the work of the cameraman on the scene. Although the plans often have to be changed already in the course of the shooting, and that is why:
When shooting breaking news stories, it is almost always impossible to shoot everything the way it was originally intended, and the reporter must anticipate whether a particular event might take an unexpected turn. Where news is made, nothing can be calculated in advance with absolute precision at all. The journalist must therefore be able to react quickly to everything that is going on around him and to change his “shooting tactics” just as quickly. He must always remember that there are situations when an unexpected turn of events breaks all the plans made. For example, a reporter’s team goes out to shoot a story about the first spring rain. The editor thinks the report is “nonessential news,” and not much time is allotted, but the director says that the material should be as short in time as possible. The correspondent and cameraman agree on a feature story. The cameraman thinks it would be a good idea to shoot a few shots of people under umbrellas, a close-up of a drop on a green leaf that has just appeared. But the rain turns into a natural disaster. Instead of a frame with a drop on a leaf, the reporter’s team shoots streams of muddy water. The correspondent collects information about the damage and victims. The material is prepared in the genre of reportage – disaster. The editor and director also change plans: the story about the downpour will air at the beginning of the news program and become the main event report of the issue.
Journalists working on an event report face difficulties even in gathering information about the event. For example, a reporter needs to know the details and causes of an emergency in a city: a bridge that suddenly collapsed over a river has claimed several lives.
Who can you ask about how it happened? First of all, eyewitnesses. But eyewitnesses are not always able to speak objectively about what happened, their opinions are influenced by their emotions. People who took part in the event cannot evaluate it with an “outsider’s eye. The fact that a person participated in the event does not mean that he/she can speak about its causes and consequences.
The people who are responsible for the condition of the bridge will hardly talk about the real causes of the accident. One must always take into account the personal interest of such a source of information. A representative of a construction firm is unlikely to say that the bridge collapsed because of the negligence of the installers.
Ways of broadcasting an event report
There may be several options for presenting an event report:
- A fixed report, filmed a few hours before the broadcast and edited before the broadcast. In this case, the reporter can follow the course of events from the studio and, if necessary, make necessary changes and new facts to the voice-over narration.
- Live reporting from the scene. Mainly used for breaking news. Journalists notice that the event will reach its climax shortly before or during the airing of the news. In such a case, a mobile television station (PTS) goes to the place of filming. A live feed is broadcast in which the reporter can not only talk about new facts, but also show what is happening “right now. Lately, such live feeds have become an integral part of the newscasts of some television stations. Now we can even talk about the development of so-called interactive television, which will be based only on telling what is happening at the moment. For this, the television company must own equipment that allows live broadcasting from any location (a sufficient number of PTCs). Also, interactive television implies a high degree of awareness of reporters, the ability to quickly navigate to the scene of the event, to extract information and express it clearly, clearly and simply.
Also for the presentation of the event report to the viewer can be used form of uncommented direct report, or broadcast. But it is used only when what is happening on the screen does not require commentary, for example, when broadcasting important social or cultural events: sessions of legislative bodies, press conferences of statesmen, sports competitions. The broadcast of the opening of the Winter Olympics, for example, required almost no commentary. Finally, the broadcasting of some concerts or plays also somewhat corresponds to the genre of uncommented television reportage. Broadcasting is the simplest form of event reporting. It is not used in thematic reportage because the video sequence of thematic reportage requires commentary in any case.