It is finally starting to happen: the good people of the Web are welcoming radio producers with open arms. For as many Web outlets that faltered in the late days of the dot-com bust, there are new ones springing up all the time. Take a look at www.SixBillion.org, where Nancy Updike and her colleagues produced a beautiful Flash story about Palestine. Or meander on over to www.Transom.org and check out Fair by Jason Rayles. It's an extravaganza of photography and audio that'll inspire anyone with a penchant for this new medium (and a fast modem). NPR.org has shifted gears a bit too, and this year it has started to emphasize Web features.

But there are still miles to go before the magic formula is attained. By "formula," I mean the right combination of visuals and audio produced for a medium that is still slow and viewed largely from one's cubicle at work. This is not sit in your driveway kind of stuff, or something to chop garlic to. Multimedia stories on the Web have to be good enough, compelling enough, and fast enough to pull audiences away from their multitasking. Has anyone seen one of those?

This is where independent radio producers come in. All the newspapers out there are sending their reporters into the field with poor-quality microphones and no training in radio reporting to create multimedia stories for the Web. Take a look at The New York Times multimedia packages. They are beautifully produced, informative, and full of great photographs, but they could use a little nudge in the audio department. There is no ambience, no storytelling that licks your eardrums, and no sultry voice that makes you lean into the computer. So, have a story idea that has some visual component to it? Knock on the door of your local newspaper. You might be surprised by their willingness to work with you to produce something that puts their website on the map.

This is a complicated medium, and very few people can do it all. The only person I know who can photograph, record audio, tell a good story, ruthlessly edit it down for the Web, and program in Flash is Jason Synge over at NeonSky. But say you are human, like the rest of us, and don't know a thing about Flash. Find a collaborator. Or work with the new media department at an online site. Same with photography--unless you know what you are doing with a camera (and Photoshop and HTML), team up with someone whose work you admire to accompany you out in the field. This medium is so new that people are quite willing to play...and to take a few risks. It's a good time to put together your team of collaborators.

If you do want to try your hand at producing the whole thing, give yourself plenty of time, stock up on caffeine products, and sit down with http://journalism.berkeley.edu/multimedia/. These tutorials are designed specifically for journalists, so you can jump right in to the meaty stuff and skip the bouncing ball and barking cat demos.

Ready to produce? Here are some things to keep in mind:

• Storyboard your project. Unless you like sitting at your computer for days on end, sketch your story on paper first. It'll force you to answer questions before they become problems. For example, what happens to the navigation when the viewer clicks on the very last link? Or, how many images will you need to accompany your audio? (You can estimate about six seconds maximum for an image on the screen.)
• Over-collect in the field. In addition to your main photographs you might also need graphics for a background, buttons, the intro, etc. You might want to use ambient audio as the piece loads or for transitions.
• Skip the eye candy. As enticing as it is to show off your new Flash skills, your audience will thank you--and they will be more willing to go along for the ride if you keep your story as lean and tight as possible. (And forget the Ken Burns-pans over the still photographs. It just takes up bandwidth and most viewers will get nauseous from the shaky movement.)
• Keep it short. Two to three minutes is a long time for a multimedia feature. Think about your story in chapters if it is longer than that. Let people opt in. Give them a little taste of the story before you demand that they wait five minutes to hear the whole thing.
• Make it small. Most monitors are still 800 x 600 pixels so your whole presentation should be much smaller than that. I am partial to the 520 x 480 pixel ratio but experiment to see what works for you.
• Keep it on the cheap. Macromedia has a 30-day demo for Dreamweaver and Flash. Download it when you are ready to work on your story and use those days wisely. The software license fee is a doozie--$600.
• Experiment now. It's only going to get more interesting for producers. (Think mini- documentaries on cell phones.)

Here are some websites to check out along the way. Good luck.

Tools:
http://journalism.berkeley.edu/multimedia/
http://www.maynardije.org/programs/xmedia/workshop/resources/
http://www.joeweiss.com/
http://www.inms.umn.edu/Elements/index.php
http://www.macromedia.com/

Inspiration:
http://www.interactivenarratives.org/
http://www.journale.org/
http://digitaljournalist.org/
http://www.sixbillion.org/

Sue Johnson is a multimedia journalist who has co-produced several award-winning websites, including 360degrees.org and sonicmemorial.org. She lives in South Africa with her husband (and fellow independent producer) Joe Richman. Her e-mail address is: johnson_suej@yahoo.com.