Austin or bust

More catchy music in this video dispatch, where I took my camera aboard Amtrak's Texas Eagle for a seven-hour train ride from Dallas to Austin.

Gas: $4 a gallon. Peppy music: Priceless.

We've all seen the TV standups and news-you-can-use checklists lately about how to cope with rising gas prices and eke out a few more miles per gallon. In this video, I tried to spice up a well-traveled topic by using music and text slides while veteran DMN automotive writer Terry Box offered a series of helpful tips.

Jenna Bush's wedding

Residents of Crawford, Texas, aren't exactly buzzing about Jenna Bush's private wedding at the Prairie Chapel Ranch this weekend. But I had fun spending a few days there for this video and story. If you like the video, be sure to check out this new documentary about Crawford when it comes to your town or hits cable TV later this year.

"You can't even take your family to the movies no more"

With gas prices at an all-time high in Texas, I spent an afternoon at a gas station talking to drivers about how rising fuel prices are affecting their personal budgets. The video, edited by ace colleague Randy Eli Grothe, aims to humanize the impact of skyrocketing gas prices.

Bunnies, ducks and squirrels, oh my

Videos about cute critters never fail to attract viewers.

Surprise endings

Web readers who choose to watch a news video are clicking on good faith that the video will be worth their time. Every now and then, it's nice to reward these readers with an ending that surprises them and makes them glad they took the time to watch. My colleague Richard Michael Pruitt pulls this off masterfully in today's video about Dallas area residents enduring their second day without electricity after a ferocious storm. I tried to take the same surprise ending approach in my accompanying story, but if you compare both examples, you'll see how video trumps the written word in taking readers to the scene to experience the moment themselves.

Capturing breaking news on camera

While many of us love the meticulous craft of producing feature videos that take weeks or months to complete, breaking news events almost always attract the most hits on newspaper Web sites these days. Mark Lorenz, chief photographer at the Salem News near Boston, captured compelling breaking news in this video showing a firefighter's escape from a burning second-floor apartment. (Click on the video on the right side of the screen.) Mark held his shot and let his sources tell the story.

Building anticipation

This video about a new apartment complex for homeless people in Collin County was my second attempt at a before-and-after approach. I interviewed each subject one month before they got the keys to their new apartments, then returned for move-in day. While editing, I tried to reflect a sense of anticipation in the first half while building toward the climatic conclusion in the second half. I took the same approach last summer with this video, when I shadowed a fourth-grade teacher as she prepared her classroom for a new school year. Does it work?

Willie Nelson and the Dallas Symphony

It doesn't get much more Texan than this: Willie Nelson, decked out in his cowboy hat and boots, soulfully singing one of his classics backed by a full orchestra. I can't believe I got paid for this, serving as camera #3 alongside DMN videographers extraordinaire Randy Eli Grothe and Richard Michael Pruitt. Enjoy "Funny How Time Slips Away."

Drumroll please ...

Looking for some inspiration? Here are the NPPA Best of PhotoJournalism video winners for 2008. The Poynter Institute has put together this site to view the winners. DMN alum Rick Gershon, now with Getty Images, brought home some serious hardware. Makes me a little wistful to think of the airplane story and video that he and I worked on together when he was just starting to learn this video stuff.