Shooting out of the collaborative minds or various students, faculty and staff of RIT the Innovation News set out to create an on demand, scalable, cross medium newspaper that displays the news as fast as it is created: “It was made possible by the collaboration of experts across a broad range of disciplines from computer science to systems engineering to visual and verbal story-telling, and demonstrates RIT’s leadership in enabling these kinds of collaborative efforts to solve the complex problems of the future,” Frank Cost, associate dean of the RIT College of Imaging Arts and Sciences. The entire project was developed in response to the call for innovations for the Imagine RIT Festival.

In a joint effort with RIT’s Open Publishing Lab, a cross-disciplinary center that focuses on researching new methods of content creation and developing innovative applications to publish across various media, the Innovation News brought together 25 student photographers and 12 student writers who sent content through open source applications created for news content management in Drupal. The content was sent through a custom made XML import feed that connected Drupal to an InDesign layout. With the help of RIT’s Print Application Lab, Digital Publishing Center, and HUB, using Cannon C1, Xerox 6060, Xerox 7000, Nextpress 2100, and Indigo 5000 printers the newspaper was created in print ready form, free of charge, and actively distributed through the Image RIT Festival. Printing four editions in total, the Innovation News was able, through the quick response of festival attendance, to scale the amount of newspaper being printed to correlate production with circulation.
The photographers in the field were given wireless cameras, generously provided by Nikon, to capture activates occurring in the Imagine RIT Festival. Located in the action was photo faculty member Doug Rea who managed the photos students working with the project; while in the pressroom Gunter Cartwright, an associate professor of photography, and Pulitzer Prize Winner William Snyder of the Dallas Morning News ran 350 images through imaging workflow to make them print and web accessible.
Circulating through the Imagine RIT festival, student journalists reported on activities occurring throughout the day. The students submitted their findings through RIT’s wireless network on personal laptops through a Drupal created account. One student even managed to successfully submitted two stories via an Apple iPhone to contribute to the spirit of the innovation of the festival and give expandability of technology to the Innovation News project spectrum. Overseeing newspaper project as Editor-in-Chief, assistant professor of color imaging and publishing, Michael Riordan along with the help of Myrtle Jones and Christine Adamo edited incoming article and prepared them to be distributed to web and print based production.
Found on the Innovation News website, the team created PDF copies of each printed edition made accessible to the public masses. Attached to the upper right corner of each printed edition, the Innovation News created a QR code that when scanned by a users cell phone would direct them to the Innovation News website, giving access to all reported stories. In keeping with the spirit of innovation presented at the Imagine RIT festival, the Innovation News in alliance with the CollaboRITorium created a GoogleEarth connection where individuals could locate direct story activities as they were being reported on with a virtual 3D map of RIT’s campus. To date this application has successfully only been applied by one other newspaper, the New York Times.

Upon completion, the Innovation News was found to be a remarkable success and RIT hopes to further extend its capabilities for the future endeavors.

If you are a student, faculty member, alumnus, parent, or in any way associated with RIT, then you should be aware of the Imagine RIT festival next week. The much-anticipated festival has been discussed and planned for several months. However, there will be so much activity going on that day, that it is hard to keep track of it all. The festival will take place on Saturday, May 3 from 10:00AM to 4:00PM at several venues all across campus.

RIT has long been acclaimed as an excellent technological and innovative institute of higher learning. RIT has also been known for having a diverse selection of programs ranging from engineering to photography to liberal arts. These programs are divided into colleges, but they may overlap occasionally. The first annual Imagine RIT festival plans to bring together technology and artistic creativity, or in President Bill Destler’s words “a collision of the right brain and the left brain.”

Exhibits at the festival will showcase the work of students, faculty, and staff. Each event falls under themes such as alternative energy, healthy living, interactive activities, and live performances. In all, more than 400 different exhibits and displays will be featured.

One of the main attractions of the Imagine RIT festival will be the Xerox WOW! Center, also known as the Gordon Field House. It will feature many cross-disciplinary exhibits from each of RIT’s eight colleges. One of the projects, entitled “Innovations in Publishing” will include “The Innovation News”, a real-time web and print based newspaper that will be published during the festival. Another activity is a virtual social networking game developed by the Open Publishing Lab.

The festival will be open to the public, and Dr. Destler hopes to attract around 30,000 guests. Imagine RIT will undoubtedly be a great, unforgettable celebration of RIT’s unique creativity and innovation.

Additional information can be found at http://www.rit.edu/imagine/

During PUB Access Week, Bill Towler, from Rochester’s fast-growing City
Newspaper, spoke about City and how the paper came to be. Towler discussed City’s history and how RIT played a pivotal role in the paper’s development. He explained that City works toward putting out the best possible Rochester newspaper that will focus on specific issues, while covering the local arts. Towler predicted that many papers will eventually grow to be free dailies or free Sunday issues.

In response to questions from PUB members, Towler answered that the City staff currently uses PageMaker to design the paper, but will move to using InDesign this spring. City Newspaper is located on Goodman Street near the Village Gate. To learn more about City or the possibility of an internship, contact Bill Towler at btowler@rochester-citynews.com.

Twenty graduate and undergraduate students were fortunate enough to attend the annual School of Print Media’s Alumni Social this month in New York City. Not only were students able to sit and speak with alumni both young and old, but they were also given the opportunity to see some amazing facilities (Pantone and Time, Inc.). They listened to a short presentation by Howard Kaneff, former CEO of Arkay Packaging, and were able to network with representatives from companies of the likes of Vertis, Inc., The New York Times, The New York Post, and One Source Printing.