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Describing the Job |
| There are some differences between a graphics editor and a graphics researcher that may vary among organizations. The biggest difference is that a graphics researcher usually does not have supervisory responsibilities and a graphics editor may have supervisory responsibilities. Below is an example of a job description of a graphics editor from The Washington Post and a graphics researcher from El Mundo. The graphics researcher description for El Mundo is almost identical to the description I created for this position for Knight Ridder Tribune graphics, Washington, D.C., as director of the service.
Graphics editor position at The Washington Post:
The metro graphics editor is responsible for all graphics accompanying metro stories. This editor must have solid news judgment, strong writing skills, and the ability to report and research independent of other reporters, editors, and researchers working on a story. The editor must also have experience communicating with visual images. Since graphic artists usually produce the visual images, the role of the graphics editor is conceptualizing, reporting, and editing graphics for the section. In addition, the graphics editor must be in constant communication with metro editors, reporters, the news desk, and the copy desk.
Specifically, the editor is responsible for:
Conceptualizing, reporting, and writing stand-alone graphics that present news without a story.
Being the link between metro and news art. This includes brainstorming with art directors and artists, taking and suggesting ideas, and keeping a handle on the workload.
Attendance at regular meetings to discuss weekend and project stories to determine the best way to present the news in a visual format. This often requires adjusting those ideas as reporting and research take the story in new and different directions.
On-site reporting of breaking stories, gathering news, translating it into a solid and sophisticated visual format, and then, on deadline, writing copy for the idea.
Reading daily budgets and providing any maps, breakout boxes, or charts as needed.
Graphics researcher position at El Mundo, Madrid, Spain:
Contribute to daily news meetings and advance planning meetings.
Organize and coordinate research efforts among graphics and all other news departments.
Assist in training and developing the graphics research staff.
Work independently to research and report graphics assignments, generate ideas for informational graphics, and research and report projects.
Generate and edit computer graphics at the direction of the department manager.
--George Rorick | |
It happened one afternoon at a major newspaper I worked for some years ago. And it shows why newspapers need graphics editors and graphics reporters.
Here's what occurred. A very competent city editor asked me to do a graphic that would illustrate a construction error. The problem? Builders found a mistake when they connected the final two cement slabs at the center of a newly constructed 12-mile bridge. One slab sat an inch higher than the other. It left a sizable bump in the middle of the multimillion-dollar span.
With such sort notice, I had to rely on the city editor for all the details. So, I asked her some questions. Why did this happen? Were there any details on the cause of the construction error? Did she have any idea how the problem would be corrected?
She couldn't answer any of my questions. I told her I didnΉt have any facts with which to do an information graphic.
The city editor disagreed. She insisted I do "some kind" of a graphic. The newspaper had no photos and no lead art for 1A. We must have a graphic, she repeated.
She suggested I do a line drawing of the bridge illustrating the one-inch variance in the center of the bridge. I held fast. The situation got tense. The deadline drew closer. Eventually, we agreed the graphic could not be justified. We lacked sufficient information to support it.
Sound familiar? It's not an unusual experience in newsrooms or graphics departments. But it can be avoided. We can reduce unnecessary deadline tension and use our time more productively by creating the position of graphics editor or graphics researcher. This graphics staff position would be one of the most vital, productive, constructive, and creative positions you could add to promote and foster better journalism.
Would it be a good idea for your news organization? Here are some questions and answers to consider:
Is your reporting staff experienced in visual reporting? The bridge graphic showed that the newspaper did not allow the time, or have a plan in place, to do professional visual reporting.
Does your graphics staff have the time, on deadline, to do research for breaking news stories? It is virtually impossible for a single graphic artist to research and write professional graphic text, in addition to illustrating the graphic on deadline. The New York Times double- and triple-ups on the number of graphic artists assigned to do breaking news.
Does your graphics staff have the writing expertise equal to the writing skills of your newsroom staff? The graphics staff seldom has the writing and reporting skills required by the newsroom. So, management often finds itself frustrated and disappointed by thevisual department's attempts at writing. Adding a graphics researcher to the department is a big plus. Improving the writing skills of the visual department is also necessary.
Does effective communication exist between the newsroom and the graphics department? How often are facts in the story and the graphic contradictory? Do photos and graphics support similar geographic perspectives? Are stories missing graphics they should have? Do headlines and text in stories correspond accurately with text and headlines in graphics?
Soon after I took the job as assistant managing editor for graphics at The Detroit News, I received a call from my boss, Bob Giles, the publisher and editor. He was responding to my request for visual writers. "Are you sure you know what youΉre doing?" he asked. "You are asking to replace three members of your graphics staff with word people. I don't see the necessity for this considering we have a newsroom full of reporters who are capable of writing appropriate text for graphics assigned to their stories. Why are you doing this?"
My goal was to make The Detroit News a more visual newspaper. At that time, about a year after Gannett purchased the paper from the Evening News, there were 22 people in my department. They were all graphic artists and page designers. Some remained. But most requested buy-outs. I had several positions to fill.
My first three new hires at The Detroit News were graphics researchers and a graphics editor: Pegie Stark Adam, Laura Varon Brown, and Michele Fecht.
Stark Adam is now an associate professor at S.I. Newhouse School of Communications at Syracuse University in New York. She's also an affiliate at Poynter. And she's a designer with Garcia Media, a multimedia design firm owned and directed by Mario Garcia, also a Poynter affiliate.
Varon Brown is now the editor of the Detroit Free Press's Oakland County edition. She runs the satellite newsroom with more than 20 editorial personnel charged with producing a separate daily section for Oakland County - the area the Free Press identified as critical to circulation growth and a vibrant, powerful county that influences all of Michigan. Following her tours of duty at the Detroit Free Press, Varon Brown was graphics director and director of the national children's newspaper, Yak's Corner, and spent two years as news editor, overseeing the night operation and the execution of page 1A.
Fecht now does free-lance writing for the Chicago Tribune and corporate publications. She often writes about children's issues. She is a PTA president and chairs a number of community boards.
These three people contributed immensely in changing a newsroom's negative view of graphics in less than a year. Within two years, The Detroit News became one of the most visual and award-winning newspapers in the United States.
I followed the same policy at Knight Ridder Tribune, in News In Motion in Washington, D.C., KRT Europe, and, most recently, at El Mundo in Madrid, Spain.
I found it difficult to convince the management at El Mundo to put writers and researchers in an editorial graphics department. In fact, El Mundo turned down my proposal. Then Brenna Maloney, graphics editor for The Washington Post, agreed to come to Madrid and demonstrate how the Post had successfully integrated the position of graphics editor into its graphics department. That prompted a reappraisal of my request.
Juancho Cruz, El Mundo's graphics manager, spoke about the newspaper's success after hiring a breaking-news graphics researcher just two years ago.
"I now have one full-time person and two interns dedicated to breaking news research for breaking news graphics every day of the week," Cruz said. "When any one of these people have the day off, I have three free-lancers available to fill in as needed. All visual journalists working on the graphics staff at El Mundo do their own research and their own writing for advance and project graphics."
El Mundo is famous worldwide for its design and visual journalism expertise. Alberto Martinez, the new graphics editor at the Austin American-Statesman, offers another perspective.
"Though our blueprint to guide us is currently a work in progress, we do have some clear expectations from the graphics editor position, which I am undertaking," Martinez said. "They are: to coach reporters and assigning editors on visual reporting; to improve the gathering and quality of information for that report; to do it early and do it often. Ultimately, our goal is that the visual reporting the Statesman gives its readers is accurate, relevant, timely, enlightening, and worth the time we are asking them to spend with us."
I've addressed this issue of having a graphics editor and/or a graphics researcher often during the past 15 years. In each case, the idea was met with resistance from management. But once managers tried it, they found it highly effective.
At first, it may appear to be difficult to answer the resistance. It usually takes an effort to make your case. But take it from me, and others who have done it, it's time and effort well spent.
