I think that all those things that you mention (news, understanding graphs and all) are important. As many people are guided by them, you can somehow predict tendences by knowing how people usually react to those signals.
However, I think you can get an edge somehow being vigilant of just the trading history everyday. When you see a lot of "sells" coming in, you know that thing is likely to continue selling for a while. Same thing when you see a lot of "buys".
Seems to simple, but it's so true. At the very least the buys indicate that if you buy now, you (very probably) would be able to see 1% higher, doing some profit.