Happy birthday, Brian Cragin
Let’s pause a moment to wish a happy VizEds birthday to Brian Cragin, graphics editor of the San Diego Union Tribune. Brian turns 34 today.
Brian’s had a busy week. Over at the News Artists’ Organization bulletin board, Brian explained how the rapidly-shifting nature of the fires in Southern California caused his team to resort to pinning info on Google’s MyMaps.
MyMaps allows Brian’s folks to show not only the extent of the fires, but also to add links to photos and video directly to the map. Hey, Google’s been sponging off newspaper web sites for years. It’s about time someone learned how to use Google’s tools to help us cover the news.
Check it all out on The San Diego Union-Tribune web page.
I never would have thought of using MyMaps. That’s why Brian is Brian Cragin and I’m not.
Brian posted at NAO Tuesday:
The VP of Web ops told me [Monday] morning that we normally get 1 million page views in a day. Yesterday we were getting 500,000 every hour. I think he told me in the evening we had over 6 million page views by the evening.
And, naturally, the week has become only more busy for Brian and his peeps. Follow the NAO thread here.
Brian’s crew is doing a great job in print, too, of course. Click on the thumbnail to see Thursday’s print map:
Even before this month, Brian had extensive experience with fire graphics — as you can see from the second sample from the left:
See more of Brian’s work, of course, in Brian’s NewsPageDesigner portfolio.
Brian shares a birthday with Reid Brown of the Cleveland Plain Dealer, Presidential candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton, TV personalities Jaclyn Smith and Pat Sajak and actors Cary Elwes and Bob Hoskins.
Plus, today is Mule Day. Seriously.
Happy birthday, Brian! I hope you have a nice vacation next week.
And to all our friends in Southern California: Please take care.
July 31st, 2009 at 10:24 pm
Charles,
Can I ask where you got the jpg you have posted above (briancraginprintmap.jpg)? Thanks.
July 31st, 2009 at 10:35 pm
I’m not sure, Matt. That was nearly two years ago, so I’m a little fuzzy on that now.
It would have come from one of three sources. These are typically from where I get stuff like that:
1. Perhaps a PDF was posted on the Union-Tribune web site at the time.
2. Perhaps Brian had posted a high-rez JPG to his NewsPageDesigner portfolio.
or 3. Perhaps Brian e-mailed me the file.
Are you looking for a larger copy? E-mail Brian and ask him. Or, if you like, e-mail me. I’d be glad to forward your note to him.
I hope this helps…