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Tulsa World wins national award for multimedia journalism in "Sidelines" video series
Published: 2/11/2013 5:41 PM
Last Modified: 2/11/2013 5:41 PM

Watch all the episodes in the series at www.tulsaworld.com/sidelines.

Each week this past football season, Multimedia Producer John Clanton hunted for a story on Friday night that didn't necessarily involve the game.

Instead, he put the spotlight on some of the other people who contributed to make the night a memorable one.

The result was "Sidelines," his video series chronicling a Friday night through the eyes of a mascot, a parent, the students who held the flags in pregame ceremonies and others.

The series won a national award on Monday, being named a top 10 multimedia project by the Associated Press Sports Editors. Competitors in the contest included other newspapers from across the country with 500,000-2 million unique visitors. Tulsaworld.com averages 1.8 million unique visitors.

"There's a lot of people who work really hard who don't wear a jersey and play football," Clanton said. "This series gave them a voice and made them the star on that Friday night."

Back in high school, Clanton was part of the Sapulpa High School band and so his Friday nights weren't all about football. When he picked a project for football season, he decided to focus on the stories outside of the game. Among the stories he told were the Owasso mascot and the Jenks moms who sew for the color guard.

He did find one story on the field he couldn't ignore. He chronicled Fort Gibson High School's first win in five years against Hilldale. The victory returned "The Rock" trophy to Fort Gibson. The seniors had never beaten Hilldale and the win was an emotional one.

Some of Clanton's favorite moments included seeing parents dedicated to their children's passions.

"I like seeing parents supporting their kids," he said. "You could tell they cared. So much of that is behind the scenes and we don't put a focus on it when newspapers cover a Friday night in the fall."

Other papers named to the top 10 list include the Athens Banner Herald, Buffalo News, Des Moines Register, Eugene (Ore.) Register-Guard, Fort Myers (Fla.) News-Press, Knoxville News Sentinel and Louisville Courier-Journal.

Watch the other episodes in the series at www.tulsaworld.com/sidelines.

Clanton was also behind the Everyday People series, where he posted a portrait each day in 2012 of someone new. It was an incredible amount of work, every day, and tells a real personal profile of the city. Check it out at www.tulsaworld.com/everydaypeople.

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Reader Comments

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228576 (5 days ago)

Congratulations!

Barney Doyle (5 days ago)

Congratulations John and Tulsa World. Well done.

Mar (5 days ago)

Congratulations, job well done!

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Press Forward

The focus of this blog is to write about what we are doing at the Tulsa World to continue to serve readers in a digital age and how the Internet is changing journalism.

Jason Collington is the web editor at the Tulsa World, where he works on the company's digital products with a team of four web designers, two web production techs, a web content coordinator, a web advertising coordinator and nine web developers. Before moving to web editor in 2006, he was the web content coordinator for tulsaworld.com.

He also teaches a class at his alma mater, Oklahoma State University, called Internet Communications, where students learn to use online tools to create offline results.

Follow Jason Collington on Twitter

Contact by email: jason.collington@tulsaworld.com

What I read

Poynter Institute: Dedicated to teaching and inspiring journalists and media leaders

Gangrey: Great narrative journalism

Nieman Journalism Lab: Pushing to the future of journalism

David Carr: NY Times media columnist

Jim Romenesko: Latest media news

SmartBrief: Business of News

Reynold Journalism Institute: Ideas, experiments, research and solutions in journalism

Advertising Age: Ad and marketing news

Digital Desk: Everything you ever wanted to know about NewsOK.com

Freedom of Information Oklahoma: News about public records and opening meetings

The Daily O'Collegian: OSU's student newspaper

MediaStorm: Incredible videos

Fast Company: Design and tech

Inc Magazine: Tech advice

David Pogue: NY Times tech columnist

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