As I mentioned in a previous post, I’ve found drug addiction fascinating for quite some time.

Drug addiction is just one small part of the Los Angeles Times story package I looked through.

Mexico under siege: The drug war at our doorstep focuses on one of the biggest stories of the past few years. According to the site, the LA Times has been chronicling this issue since June 2008, and they’ve got plenty of material to prove that.

Police Killed in Tijuana

Not only do they have the complete series of stories listed, which is capable of being filtered according to location or topic, but they keep the most recent story posted at the top closer to the multimedia links. The available links are an interactive map, a multimedia gallery and a video Q&A.

I’ve seen interactive maps used with stories before, but this is the most thorough to date. The map of Mexico has sheer orange circles varying in size spread out across the country. When the mouse is hovered about a circle, it provides the name of the city and how many drug-related deaths there were there in a two-year period. To the left of the map is a list of the major players in the drug war. When the mouse is hovered over one of their photos, it shows an extended profile and highlights the area on the map where they did most of their business. The page also features a bar graph of the number of deaths per week that’s tied to the map. When the arrow on the bar graph is moved ahead week by week, the orange circles on the map grow in size.

The next component of this package is the actual multimedia gallery which includes video, photographs, galleries and audio slide shows. I found a couple of their videos particularly interesting. One of them was based on a story about a Mexican artist who has been hired by the drug cartel on more than one occasion to paint murals on the tombs of the fallen narcotics traffickers.

The last multimedia component of this package is something I’ve never seen done before. They video taped interviews with one of the drug war journalists, photo journalists and a couple of professors who were knowledgeable on the drug war. Each person covers a different topic in a series of responses to questions that can be viewed individually.

I can’t imagine what else I would add to this story package. I really learned a lot more than I already knew about the drug war and I’m very impressed with how they put everything together.

The majority of the issues I have with this story are in regard to the video of the event. For one thing, I wish the reporter would have started filming earlier than he did because we miss a portion of the host’s introduction. While we can find that information in the text story’s lead, I think the video would have been closer to being complete if it started earlier so we could actually listen to the host’s words that were used in the lead.

Another issue I had with the video is that the second trio of interviewees went unnamed, but the first trio did not.

Keeping in mind that the video counts down to 00:00, when it reaches 0:57, a girl starts speaking, followed by a boy, but the only thing on camera is a large group of people pillow fighting. We don’t know who is speaking or what their names are because they’re not shown at that point in time. It could have been people from the first trio, but I think it deserves confirmation.

A fourth issue I have with the video is the excessive shots of the large group pillow fighting. In one part of the video, the host mentions the range in ages of the event’s participants and I think that would have been a good spot to sync up some video of those mentioned age groups of people.

A non-video related issue I have with this story is the internal links. The internal links only take you to search results for other stories on the Sentinel’s website. Part of the story says that “Feldman announced the location of this year’s fight — the corner of South Street and Orange Avenue — on Twitter early Saturday.” I would expect that clicking on the Twitter link would take me to Feldman’s account, instead I’m taken to a search results page of Twitter-related stories on the Sentinel.

If I could have covered this story, I would have filmed a better variety of shots and edited things differently and fix the internal links.

Despite those thoughts, I found a travel-oriented story package on the New York Times that I thought really fit the bill.

“A Paris Farewell” by Amy Thomas is a nearly 3,000-word feature that details her experience on both banks of the Seine and other regions of Paris. More than just a personal account, Thomas’ story includes a travel guide with links on where to stay, where to eat and what to do. The story package also includes a photo slide show of some of the most popular places to stay, eat and sight see, a map of Paris and internal links to Parisian attractions and other relevant topics.

So even though travel journalism doesn’t earn the same respect I give to other forms of journalism, I thought this was a really well-rounded piece that readers could use to learn about a potential vacation spot including its history and one person’s special experience.

On March 17, the Orlando Sentinel published Central Florida led state in growth since 2000, census shows by Jeff Kunerth.

According to Kunerth’s story “the region of Orange, Osceola, Seminole, Lake and Volusia counties gained 541,000 residents from 2000 to 2010, fueled largely by Orange County’s nearly 250,000 population increase. Orange gained more people than any county in the state and was the fastest-growing among Florida’s largest counties, with a 28 percent growth rate.”

Instead of just throwing a bunch of numbers down, the Sentinel made this story a complete package. There was a print edition that featured sidebars about what content was available online, more than 10 internal links in the online version of the story and other related media including photos, video, related stories and an interactive map.

I would say that out of all of the elements, the related stories and interactive map are most helpful to the story.

One of the related stories highlights growth of Hispanics specifically, according to census data.

The interactive map shows the parts of Central Florida by city/town as well as by census tract. When visitors click on one of the cities, a popup bar graph shows the population growth within that area in the last 10 years including the exact number.

My only complaint with this story package is that the colors on the map make the different regions somewhat hard to distinguish.

The piece started with the sound of a helicopter and the image of one flying through the city. The piece was also ended with the same sound which I thought brought the piece full-circle.

From the ten-second mark to the 20-second mark is a barrage of images of everything from people to street signs. This threw me off at first, but I decided it mirrored the chaos felt in New York City on September 11. Also, after watching the entire piece, I realized Farkas showed images of all of the individuals whose conversations he would be recording.

Filler images in between the conversational pieces included street signs, sirens flashing, restaurant fronts and a cup getting filled with coffee before cutting to a conversation between a server and a customer. I thought these were chosen well, especially the last one I mentioned.

At one point during the piece, two conversations seem to flow together, which I believe works well in this piece. I imagine people in New York City were discussing September 11 at least twice as much as everyone else in the country was, and I’m sure at some point it felt like conversations were starting to melt into one another.

Two-person conversations played a huge part in this piece and I think Farkas maintained diversity in a lot of aspects. Not only were the people in the conversations of different genders, ages and ethnicities, but they were also talking in a variety of locations including restaurants, the park and while leaning up against their taxis. I also appreciated the different angles he took on conversations. Some of them were straight on, some from the side and others at an angle where one person is shown more than the other.

I think Farkas did a great job of showing how New York reacted, especially since he included the fight between a server and a customer. While the rest of us won’t fully understand what it felt like to live there at that time, Farkas did a great job portraying what it was like.

This is the text on the first slide of “Never Coming Home,” a piece by Zac Barr, Andrew Lichtenstein and Tim Klimowicz.

This seven-part piece focuses on just seven of the thousands of lives lost in Iraq.

Some of my favorite parts of this piece are things I haven’t seen in the other pieces that I’ve watched. A drawing of Iraq with an influx of dots and ticking sounds in the background is used to illustrate the number of lives lots. I also like that the time in the top right corner looks like a clock being sped forward.

I also like that the creators of this piece borrowed personal photos of the fallen soldiers, which made the segments more meaningful.

After watching the presentation, I’m wondering of the title of the presentation came after it was complete or if the creators thought of it before. One of the family members in the piece mentions the moment she realized her son was never coming home, and I’m wondering if that’s what the title of the piece was derived from.

I like a lot of the photos, but there were points in some of the segments where I felt like they were too similar. This is something we discussed in class as not being good in presentations.

Whether it’s print, online or broadcast it seems like everyone has something to say about it and Toronto Star Photographer Lucas Oleniuk is no different.

Oleniuk made “Airsick: An Industrial Devolution” in an effort to bring attention to the global issue of climate change.

This piece presents itself a lot like a commercial, which I don’t like, but there are a number of things that I do like about it.

The first thing that caught my attention that I liked was the layered moving images. It shows a flower opening and closing and then a working oil rig. I also like how breathing sounds mirror the flower’s movements.

I don’t like how there isn’t any actually speaking in the piece nor do I like the music, but I do like the slide that says “The heat is on.” It speaks for not only how climate change is becoming a major issue, but how heat is literally a part of the issue.

In addition to presenting itself like a commercial and the lack of speaking and music, there are a couple more things I don’t like.

One of the slides has text that says “Coal is the single greatest threat to civilization and all life on our planet.” I would have liked to see some actual pieces of coal to go with that slide.

The one thing that tipped me off as to the profession of the creator of this piece was the pull quote at the end that was put in a red block. I’m honestly not sure if I like or dislike that part.

For whatever reason, I’ve always found addiction fascinating, which is why, for my third blog post, I decided to watch “The Ninth Floor” by Jessica Dimmock.

The opening image shows a frail, tired-looking girl. Something I noticed in this picture is how the artwork on the wall behind her, which shows a vampire that has just sucked the blood out of someone, is similar in composition. The image also mirrors the lack of life in her.

The first slide with text sets a time and a place for what’s going on.

“In 2004, anywhere from 20 to 30 young addicts lived in this large New York City apartment on the ninth floor overlooking Fifth Avenue. The apartment was leased to Joe Smith, once a part of the fabled New York art scene of the 1970’s and 80’s.”

Many of the photos mirror what I imagine drug addiction must be like. Darkness is a common element throughout the pictures and those that do feature some light still look painful. Blurred photos were also common throughout this project, which to me illustrates the chaotic, unclear life of a drug addict.

I like that Dimmock chose to follow the stories of three individuals, two of whom, Dionn and Rachel, started dating after being kicked out of the apartment.

A slide with text tells us how tumultuous their relationship was, how they could go from fighting one second to laughing the next, but the pictures also illustrate that clearly. What stuck out the most to me about their relationship through pictures was that we see Dionn smile for the first time when he’s holding their new baby, Matilda.

The one issue I really had with this presentation was the lack of natural sounds. Aside from participant interviews, the only other natural sound we get is the baby crying. A haunting melody plays throughout the piece, which is fitting, but I find it a little overused.