Multimedia journalism

Post’s onBeing 2.0 and Times’ [LENS] blog launched

While I was away, two exciting projects launched: Washington Post updated their onBeing series with a new 3-D interface, and the New York Times introduced [LENS], a photojournalism and multimedia blog with horizontal scrolling. Both of them caught my eye initially because of their innovative interfaces, but held my interest because they will provide top-notch multimedia content from a variety of sources.

onBeing 2.0
Steven King announced the onBeing 2.0 launch on his Cujo’s Byte blog, and referred to a press release for more information. Included in the 2.0 version is “a new flash video player and an innovative design concept to encourage conversations around a particular video. Users can post thoughts or reactions to a video vignette and easily follow threads of conversation. The comments are displayed in a visual ‘web’ that makes the most active comment box larger and connects comments directly related to one another, creating a visual conversation.”

Furthermore, “a three-dimensional navigator allows for more control and easy movement between thumbnails of videos in an optional carousel or tiled-view. Users are able to manage their visual experience by viewing the videos individually or in groupings.”

King mentioned that he would blog more about how this project came about in the near future, so I will keep my eye out for that to post here.

[LENS] blog
Zach Wise announced the launch of the New York Times’ new photo blog [LENS] over at his blog, digitalartwork. Interestingly enough, this blog isn’t just to highlight content from New York Times producers. Wise noted, “Lens will be a showcase for the work of Times photographers, but it will also highlight the best images from other newspapers, magazines, news organizations and picture agencies, and from around the Web.”

Wise also noted that he would provide more insight into the project “once the dust settles.” I will hold him to that, since I was particularly impressed with his post about another of his projects, “Thirst in the Mojave.”

Other posts that might interest you:

• Zach Wise produces New York Times’ demo reel
• New York Times uses 3D animation to recreate Taliban kidnapping
• New York Times aggregates plethora of 2010 Winter Olympics multimedia coverage

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