The Editor’s Desk

I’m going to admit to a mistake. We had terrific, terrific video on the site this week of the tornadoes forming over Reno County on Tuesday — and we let it fly under the radar (so to speak) on the site.

So I’m going to take this opportunity to trumpet the video. If you’re at all interested in severe weather — and what kind of Kansan are you if you’re not? — you’ll enjoy it. Click here, and it will pop up in a new window.

That video was shot by Kansas.com photographer Travis Heying, who was out with Kansas.com reporter Amanda O’Toole looking for the big storms that the Eagle and local meteorologists had promised for Tuesday. I asked Travis to write a bit about what was going on that evening:

Spring time in Kansas usually means violent weather, and several forecasters were saying that Tuesday was shaping up to be a real doozy. Reporter Amanda O’Toole and I decided to position ourselves to intercept any thunderstorms that might threaten the Wichita area. With a dryline coming in from western Kansas, we parked ourselves in Kingman.

This was Amanda’s first storm chase.

Two hours of sitting in a gas station parking lot watching rader imagery on a laptop told us that maybe things weren’t going to play out like some forecasters thought. We were getting ready call it a day before deciding to have a closer look at a thunderstorm building in southwestern Reno County.

We saw a lot of funnels and few small tornadoes. We also saw a lot of gawkers out trying to get a closer look. When you’re out looking for storm photos, thrill-seekers driving down dirt roads while staring up at the sky pose a much greater threat than the weather.

I chased storms for seven years before I saw my first tornado. Amanda saw one on her first try. I think I’ll bring her along next time.

This is just one more of our new experiments in video journalism. On Sunday, I urge you to look out for Travis’ work using video in our multimedia preview of Wild West World.

— Nick Jungman

It was a tough and fascinating news week on many levels. The tragedy that jolted Virginia Tech, and all of us, on Monday morning brought home the challenges journalists face in this era when news is available around the clock from outlets all over the Internet. It was important to weigh how to reflect what had happened in our newspaper in a compelling way, without hammering our print readers with news they were sure to have seen already on TV and the Web. And we had to act fast to provide updates on this story at Kansas.com whenever new information surfaced.
One thing I always find interesting when a big national story hits is to compare how newspapers around the country handle coverage. The Newseum’s website is a great resource, where each day you can check out more than 500 front pages from newspapers around the world. On Tuesday morning, I noted that most U.S. newspapers presented bold, short headlines: "Rampage," "Bloodbath," "Massacre," "Campus carnage" were repeated in cities everywhere, accompanied by photos of mourners and police and victims on campus.
I know that headline writers across the country faced the same challenge we did at The Eagle– crafting a headline on an important story that we knew would be familiar to our readers well before anyone’s newspaper landed in the driveway.
The word "Why?" struck a chord with me as we were brainstorming possible headline options Monday in our newsroom, because that question just kept ringing in my brain the more I tried to understand this awful, incomprehensible event. On Tuesday when we studied our page with that bold headline at our morning newsmeeting, some of my colleagues sdiad they didn’t feel it was particularly effective. We heard from some readers who praised that choice. I noticed two other papers at the Newseum site used the same headline. I’m interested in what any of our other readers think.
The media was criticized for many aspects of how it handled coverage of this story. In our newsroom, we debated about which photos of Cho Seung-Hui to publish, and of course, NBC News was slammed by many for releasing those photos at all. However, I must say that when I saw those photos on the NBC News website, I immediately said to the editor next to me, "Oh my God, look at this."
And by publishing two of those photos in The Eagle I felt we were saying the same thing to readers.

Theresa

Our front-page story on Easter Sunday about scientific and popular cultural critiques of the resurrection succeeded on many levels.

First, there was Joe Rodriguez’s analytical story, which talked to believers, scholars and clergy; then there was Coryanne Graham’s design of the front page that immediately drew readers into the package.

But one of the most successful elements was the illustration by Brent Castillo, which encapsulated the story in a beautiful, elegant, eye-catching way.

How did he do it?

Brent tells us:

"For Easter, The Eagle was planning to write a story about how people viewed the resurrection story of Jesus. I was asked to create an illustration that captured the essence of the story. I talked with my art director, Arlice Davenport, about ideas. We decided that an iconic image of Jesus resurrected would be the focus of the illustration. But, in keeping with the story content, we would use a visual metaphor of having part of the image being chipped away by a hammer, which would represent the critics.

"To carry this metaphor through, I needed to give the impression that the image was on a stone tablet. I found an image of an ancient stone tablet, and with an imaging program, I layered on top of it a painting of the resurrection. The first choice for the painting was Matthias Grünewald’s
‘The Resurrection.’ at top left. But his stylized painting with a sunburst behind the head of Jesus proved too hard to read in the space we were alotted. So I searched for a simpler, less-stylized painting and chose Carl Bloch’s ‘The Resurrection,’ at bottom left.

"After layering Bloch’s painting on the tablet, I removed parts of the image’s lower corner to make it look broken. Then I added cracks to enhance the illustration’s realism. Next, I found an old rock hammer, lay it on top of the tablet image and added shadows.

"An illustration should quickly relay the gist of the story. My hope was that the juxtaposition of a hammer and Jesus would intrigue readers enough that they would read the article."

It did.

There are many ways to tell a story. Using vivid imagery, like Brent’s illustration, to express conflict and drama is one of the most effective.

Good work, Brent.

Arlice

We have received several e-mails and phone calls from readers wondering when we will resume publishing the comic strip "Umbert the Unborn" in the Saturday Faith & Values section.

We regularly publish only one comic strip in Faith & Values: "Kudzu" by Doug Marlette. The strip features the preacher Will B. Dunn as its main character. At left above is a panel from last Saturday.

"Umbert the Unborn" is actually a paid advertisement that is designed as a comic strip. The ad most recently appeared in the March 17 edition of Faith & Values.

It has also been published in other sections of The Eagle.

Whether "Umbert the Unborn" will be in the paper again is a decision the advertiser will make, not the newsroom.

"Kudzu" provides a humorous look at religious life that many of our readers find enjoyable and refreshing.

As always, if you have questions or suggestions for improving our coverage of faith-related stories, please feel free to let us know.

Arlice