When I started working in broadcasting in 1997 the industry was going through an upheaval.

New technology was redefining how news and current affairs was being produced, between 1999 and 2001 video journalism, or solo journalism became more and more the order of the day.

Going from a team with a producer, a journalist, camera operator and sound recordist, to the situation were the journalist produces, shoots, edits and often presents his or her own material. Lightweight digital cameras and camera mounted sound equipment made it possible to document any event while it is still occurring. The move toward this form of cheaper lighter broadcasting production was first seen in the smaller terrestrial channels and satellite channels. I started being introduced to this way of working while working for a production company making news programmes from a studios just outside Brussels.

Today this system of working is the norm in news rooms and used by online newspapers for web tv. The growth in video journalism coincides with changes in video technology and the cost of this technology. As quality cameras and editing systems have become smaller and available at a fraction of their previous costs, the single operator method has spread. Video journalists are able to get closer to the story avoiding the impersonality that may come with larger crewing. This can be seen by some as a dilution of skills and quality driven by TV management cost cutting incentives.

The image you see on this page is from the documentary Musa Anter Peace Train: The Road to Diyarbakir this was the first time I became aware of the change in production methods towards what can be defined as video journalism. A two person team myself and Paul Delahunty, a professional Hi8 camera a stick mic, eleven tapes and two one hour batteries. Given that we were away from any electricity supply for 36 hours during that trip, it is amazing how we got the job done. We took turns on camera during the trip. I was the producer and ended up being trained to edit material using Final Cut Pro.

The version of the material you see on this site was edited by myself on a mac laptop using Final Cut Pro version 1.0 in 1999. The analogue Hi8 tapes were digitised and saved to an external Firewire HD. Firewire had brought a further shift in possibilities, this documentary has a unique aesthetic based upon all the factors above.

The original material shot during this project was transferred to Betacam SP and edited into news reports at the time. However, I particularly like the experimental nature of this version of the material, an example of an early experiment in the use of a lightweight pro analogue Hi8 camera, an analogue/digital converter and final cut pro version 1.0 on an apple pismo laptop. A testimony to a transition in video production methods.

Joseph Cooper