ATTRIBUTES OF A FEATURE ARTCLE
Generally feature stories are entertaining because these articles are less of essential reading. The basic actual information has already been published in other news articles, reported and published the same day on which the event occurred. Features give a supplementary way of knowing about the event and suggest a second point of view on situations. Factual information useful for daily efficiency is in new stories; feature articles seldom have information with the same degree of immediate physical and direct impact. Features don’t tell off a traffic slowdown on the highway that would delay a return home from work or relate when and where to vote on county real estate taxes or announce a regulation or judicial decision.
Features are, in a second sense optional writing. We read features not because we need to but because we choose to. Further more a feature article offer us something more than the initial new story. The feature articles for example may suggest a new understanding of a situation through a clearer analysis of statistics or facts, or it may give us a heightened awareness of what a certain event mean to us or a particular group of people or it may provide us with the simple pleasure of reading or dramatic, suspenseful or verbally dazzling presentation of reality.
Features offer an alternative secondary presentation of information; feature writing often lacks the sharp urgency toward publication that characterizes news writing. Features lack what journalists call timeliness. Feature writing is thus sometimes called simply “non deadline” writing because features are not written under stringent deadline pressure. This lack of urgency and rigorous deadline pressure influences feature writing in all sorts of ways. The features relative in imperishability permits it to be written through a different process from straight news and to have a different style and different construction.
Features generally offer a secondary supplemental understanding of occurrences and events. They entertain in the sense that there is no compulsion of reading them. Feature story structures are not prescribed and features do not follow rigid structure or patterns. Because a slightly relaxed deadline pressure feature can be edited judiciously rather than cut from the end.
Features are unique creations reflecting the individual writers’ angle of vision and choice of form and expression.
WHAT MAKES A GOOD FEATURE
While feature writing is written using some of the methods and means of creative fiction writers, and while it is more expressive of the writers subjective feelings and opinions than news, it nonetheless preserves its objective, journalistic nature. Features are written by journalists committed to accuracy and striving to focus on real life subjects rather than themselves.
Features also use many traditional journalistic writing techniques, writing skills particularly emphasized by journalism schools and by high quality news papers and magazines. These techniques are part of the historical canon of good journalism; they are the tools writers have traditionally used as they strive to be clear, powerful and concise. Some of these techniques, considered shared implements of all journalists re also true for feature writers are:
- Using simple words and simple sentences to keep meanings clear;
- Placing actors close to action (subjects close to verbs), descriptions close to what they describe (adjectives close to nouns), time and sequence close to actions,(adverbs close to verbs)
- Using specific physical details to convey a sense of reality and indicate degree;
- Finding the precise exact word for every nuance of meaning; and
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Avoiding repletion and redundancy, except where repletion creates clarity.
The basic importance of the features is fullest explanation and explication of the difficult point so as to make it interesting and understandable for the general masses. In feature, the background of the particular news story is presented side by side the present situation. For detailed information all the facts are include in a feature.
Feature writing also contains relevant photographs, turning it into a colourful and pictorial writing which naturally increase their interest and entertainment value. It has been justifiably said that a feature is actually a news story but converted into detailed, attractive and interesting form. A feature is a drama or a narration from the point of view of its description.
A feature shall be considered as consummate and perfect only if gives both sides of the picture of an issue, event or a problem. Feature reflects the real life and gets data and material from a living society. This is the reason it is essential to give quotations in feature articles. Features are incomplete without quotes. Exact names of places, persons and ages of people are strongly recommended to be included in the features.
A feature can be further adorned by relevant and meaningful headlines. Captions always attract readership.
The objectivity is the moot question of the feature writing which forms the basis of success of any newspaper, journal, magazine or a periodical.
Without the above mentioned things the features would have been considered as drab writings, particularly in this age of awful pre-occupations and lack of leisure even more when thousands of voices and messages and writings follow man.
WHAT MAKES A GOOD FEATURE WRITER
In consonance with the demands and nature of the feature article, it takes a lot be a good feature writer. Most of the times journalists start their careers as feature writers thinking it to be the easiest form of journalism, but hardly a few excel at the same. A good feature writer is the one who can do much more than reporting plain facts.
A feature writer has ample period of time under his disposal to compose a really worth wile feature, so it becomes the foremost duty of a feature writer to use the time given to him in such a way that the feature becomes a most interesting piece of writing.
To write a good feature of course u need to have command over language. Otherwise it is difficult to express what you have seen. In opinion of many feature writers are born writers, who are blessed with the aptitude of writing. What ever it takes it to be, a feature writer must be acquainted with the linguistic idiom of the written language.
Another cardinal characteristic of a good feature writer is his keen sense of observation to detect those interesting points which usually escape the eyes of a common man. He should be a man to have a keen nose to sense the matters of interest around his environment particularly the social set up in which he resides permanently. Without keenness and curiosity, he shall not be bale to find out the matters of common interest, and nor shall he be able to share that interest. It implies that a good feature writer should be mentally alert to interpret matters of common experience.
A feature writer must not be a asking people for ideas, he should possess a special knack and experience to choose and select the subjects of common interest, which shall form the central ideas of his feature article. The recognition of subjects should be invariably deep be deeply related to the interest of the common lot of readers. It mans that he should be mentally and psychologically fit to recognize those subjects which are related to the welfare and deep interests of the readers.
As mentioned earlier interviews are an integral part of a good feature. Among major requisites are that an interview should begin with a lively and attractive phrase to catch the reader’s attention; to filter in the necessary facts that give the feature a reason and topicality; to sketch out the character of the subject as clearly as possible, to keep the subject of the interview who is and should be made interesting; to intersperse paragraphs of description with direct quotations and lastly to keep up the steam until the reader is completely hooked.
Another basic characteristic and attribute of a good feature writer is to compose his collected material and data efficiently. The underlying point is his skill abd ability to write clearly, accurately with imaginative appeal. He should adopt a style of writing commensurate with the public genius and popular consciousness to make it a delectable and entertaining piece of prose. It should be simple idiomatic and commonly intelligible to absorb the attention of the readers generally.
A feature writer should never be biased; he should present the facts as they are. A feature writer’s job is very much like that of a researcher who is not allowed to be prejudiced. Some times feature writers take up a type of feature writing called “personality column”, who filter the news through the mesh of their own personalities to give it an individual touch. Some times these feature writers give an idiosyncratic slant to their features.
Feature writers are thus like news writers in that they must value factual accuracy, not only in matters large but matters small. For instance; if a writer was writing a personality profile of a famous actress, you would need to relate accurately not only information about major events in her life, but also information about such details as what she was wearing while the interview was going on.
CONCLUDING THE IMPORTANCE OF A FEATURE FOR A MAGAZINE
The increase in number and variety of features stories, and the expansion in the length and depth of features have often been described as the “magazining” of news papers: newspaper, today, in volume and variety of their features stories (and other stories), seem more like magazines. Today’s newspapers not only publish feature stories on front pages but also publish entire daily feature sections under sections such as “ Shehr” “Focus” , “Life Style”, or “People”. Newspapers may also publish supplemental Sunday feature sections on topics such as travel, food, entertainment, health an d fitness issues, a lot of news papers publish their own Sunday magazines e.g. The News on Sunday.
A magazine cannot survive without features since the treatment given to features is all what a magazine reader would demand. Magazines are read for:
- Leisure
- Entertainment and
- In depth / detailed information
Magazine readers have ample time to finish reading their magazine since periodicity of magazines varies from weekly to yearly. Therefore a magazine reader would expect that the magazine he is reading would give him a clear and complete picture of what he wants to know.
Features in magazines are some times found to be biased because magazines are usually biased for instance in a magazine for women one cannot bring about a lot of anti feminist views. This is one restriction feature writers face when they are writing for a magazine.
To sum up magazine journalism makes no sense without features. In fact it would be hard for a magazine to survive without features. The issue may be serious or light only hard news are not enough to satisfy his or her curiosity. Plus a reader also needs some entertainment which he finds not in newspapers but magazines through good features.
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BIBLIOGRAPHY
- The New Journalism, Tom Wolfe
- Exploring Journalism, Mirza Muhammad Yousaf
- Stalking the Feature Story, William Ruehkmann
- The Preliminary Process
- The Handbook of Magazine Journalism
REFERANCES
- content.monster.com/resume/resources/objective
- www.museummarketingtips.com
CONTENTS
- ITRODUCTION TO THE CO-RELATION OF MAGAZINES AND FEATURES
- DEFINING FEATURE
- SUBJECTS OF FEATURES
- ATTRIBUTES OF A FEATURE ARTCLE
- WHAT MAKES A GOOD FEATURE
- WHAT MAKES A GOOD FEATURE WRITER
- CONCLUDING THE IMPORTANCE OF A FEATURE FOR A MAGAZINE
Hand book of Magazine Journalism
Reference: Exploring Journalism chapter 13
Dr. Willard G. Bleyer (founder of feature writing)
www.dispatch.com/NIEonline/NIENEW/ images/teachernewsfeature.html
reference: Stalking the Feature Story, www.kidsfreesouls.com/featurewriting.htm
Exploring Journalism Chapter 13