Harassing Jeffrey Pollack, Part 2.
For my profile subject, I was lucky. I have an instant in because his daughter Hilary is one of my best friends. So when I initially called Mr. Pollack, he suggested that I accompany Hilary to their house in Palo Alto (where she hangs out most Sunday nights even though she lives right here in the city), spend the night and then do all my reporting the next day, Monday.
So on Monday morning, I began the reporting process at around noon. I began by interviewing Mr. Pollack for the text story, and the main challenges there were all the phone calls he was getting, from friends or from his restaurant Nick’s Lighthouse in the city, that interrupted the flow of the interview. In the end that turned out to be OK because I got some priceless soundbites out of some of his phone calls that I ended up playing with during the making of my slide show.
I realized a mistake I made when I was putting together my slide show. When I asked Mr. Pollack to explain the vast number of photos of famous musicians and people he’s worked with over the years that line the walls of his office, I should have known how fast he would go. He explained everything so quickly and with such vigor that I got swept up in his descriptions and stories that I forgot about taking all the photos and closeups I should have. As a result, my slide show is a little lacking in detailed photographs of the things he’s explaining (although the soundbites are AWESOME). I should have thought of that before hand. I think the main reason why that happened was because I use my digital camera to record audio, so I can’t take photos simultaneously.
My advice to a future Digital News Gathering student is an obvious one: think about EVERYTHING before hand, and how you’re going to capture all the sound, information and visuals. Make a list if you need to detailing the process and steps. The worst thing in the world is feeling like you’ve missed something after the interview, when there’s no way to go back and make up for it (I just don’t have time to go down to Palo Alto again to make up the missed photos). No one likes to feel helpless.
