BEST PICTURE

ABOVE: NewsWire reporter Charlotte Hilling (left) and her laptop help National candidate in Wellington Central Stephen Franks and his wife, Cathy, get disappointing news of his loss. PICTURE by NewsWire journalism student William Liando.

WHITIREIA Journalism School’s news website, NewsWire, operated a 17-hour day on Election Day to report, gather and file 64 news reports, about 50 still images and some video.

Our rolling “run-of-play” account of developments was probably unique on the internet, comprised as it was of timed items filed just after they happened. The last was posted about 1am.

The coverage  – a first for a NZ journalism school – was interesting, quirky, professional, and our growing audience obviously thought so, too. NewsWire page loads qualdrupled by Friday and Saturday, with thousands viewing our coverage.

Here’s some pictures taken in the Cuba St newsroom as the night unfolded:

ABOVE: From left, Miyuki McGuffie, Aaron Caskey, Bill Southworth (rear) and Jessica Dixon work on a video report about first-time voters.

ABOVE: Chief subeditor and tutor Virginia McMillan in the newsroom.

ABOVE: Charlotte Hilling (left) and Kristina Keogh check the blogosphere for election views.

ABOVE: Political analysts Paul Mcbeth and Sandra Dickson work on one of their several lead stories during the night.

ABOVE: Analyst Reesh Lyon prepares for the onslaught.

ABOVE: Analyst Melissa Kinealy checks websites as results roll in.

ABOVE: Luke and Aaron watched over by a friendly face (found on reporter Jenny Meyer’s lawn by her young son).

ABOVE: Luke checks caption details with analyst Jono Mckeown.

ABOVE: Virginia keeps an eye on my subbing. 

THE TEAM

On Saturday night:

• Sarah Coddington (front row, first left) was at Labour HQ in Auckland to report Helen Clark’s historic resignation, and the tears that flowed from distraught supporters;
• Liz Woods (back row, third from right) zipped around New Plymouth to see the man who once had the biggest majority in the country, Harry Duynhoven, narrowly miss out by 314 (and then over to the National winner’s HQ to report Harry’s concession speech);
• Queenie Rikihana (seated, third from left) and Dave Banks travelled to Wanganui to Tariana Turia’s marae HQ (where they – and mainstream media – discovered the limitations of cellphone coverage);
• Jenny Meyer (back row, first on right) and Laura Frykberg (front row, second from right) covered Peter Dunne’s narow escape in Ohariu-Belmont;
• Anne Cornish (back row, seventh from left) and Hinano Andrews reported Nathan Guy’s win in Otaki;
• Sinead Ogilvie (middle of back row, to right of Anne) and Carl Suurmond (partly obscured, back row, third from right) were with Ron Mark when he failed to take Rimutaka;
• Charlotte Hilling (standing, third from left) went to Stephen Franks HQ in Wellington and let him view his defeat on her laptop;
• Sophie Scarf (front, third from right) covered the Greens HQ in Wellington;
• Alexandra Johnson (back, third from left) reported Grant Robertson winning Wellington Central;
• William Liando (seated, first left) was at the Backbencher Pub (where several MP hopefuls are expected to gather);
• while Miyuki McGuffie (Virgin Voter), Jessica Dixon and Kristina Keogh interviewed first-time voters in Wellington city.

Back in NewsWire HQ – where a lightning strike caused a power surge on Friday that cooked our main computer – we had Sandra Dickson (orange top, standing, sixth from right), Melissa Kinealy (front, second from left), Jono McKeown (beard, standing, seventh from right), Reesh Lyon (standing, first left), Miyuki McGuffie and Paul McBeth (standing at back, centre, partly hiding to right of Anne) watching election results and coverage and providing run-of-play analysis as the evening unfolded.

Aaron Caskey (standing at back, sixth from left) ran our primitive system (computer whiz  that he is).

Picture editor Luke Appleby (standing, second from left)  handled a flood of still imagesand posted them into stories.

Chief subeditor and tutor Virgina McMillan (seated, second left) subbed stories, spotted mistakes, and kept everything calm.

Former JTO executive director and television journalist Bill Southworth (seated, second right), who has been teaching TV story-telling during the past week or so, directed video coverage.

Sabrina Dankel (seated, far right), an exchange student from Germany, last week wrote a NewsWire article comparing our elections with those back home.

The student team, 20 from the National Diploma in Journalism (Multimedia) and six from the National Certificate in Journalism) filed nearly 200 stories, pictures and video stories during the last week or so.

Our communication needs have been boosted enormously by generous Baha Marbruk, right (who laughed this week when I sent him an email addressed to Barack), proprietor of First Mobile in Newtown, who has loaned us Vodafone vodems for the night to ensure the people in the field can get their stuff back.

Judging by the great help we’ve had from Baha from the start of NewsWire in July (he supplied all our Nokia N95s at a brilliant rate), I’d recommend him to anyone wanting cellphone kit. His website address is: http://www.007mobile.co.nz/

And now – well it’s back to court reporting and shorthand. Sigh…