Post 10: Photographic storytelling
A compelling still image has more lasting impact than any other communication method of our time. And you can talk all you want about angle, composition, perspective, framing and lighting, the most important characteristic of a still image is content – what is it about?
When you sift through your mind to recall most major news events taking place since cameras became a common information-gathering tool, you often think of each event from the perspective of your recall of the photo that has come to be known as defining that event. Kenny Irby, a veteran photojournalist, told Poynter workshop participants, “Audiences don’t care about form; they care about impact; great photography is about singling out a moment; photographs create context.”
He quoted former Life magazine photographer and picture editor John Loengard:
“The reader sees before he ever reads and may never read if there is nothing interesting to see.”
Irby said you should consider these points when developing effective visual coverage:
1) Understand your mission. But be flexible enough to change it if you see something more important developing as you proceed.
2) Remember the best visual communication achieves intimate impact that resonates on an emotional level. While visuals can be informational or graphical, the ones that are best remembered are emotional.
3) Understand that emotion can’t be forced and sometimes it is optimal to achieve simple, clear, honest, edited and useful information.
4) Visual coverage should be inclusive, reflecting accurately the diversity of views, community, issues, everything.
5) Your best work will be based on the trust relationships you form with sources; consider the work involved in making, not just taking photographs or shooting video.
6) Don’t just take the obvious angle when making a photograph; look for visual variety and try to make it a habit to document images from three different perspectives in each setting, location or subject. Explore options on different plains, perspectives, angles, targets for focus, etc.
7) Think in story terms while working, seeking a beginning, middle and end. Wide shots, medium shots, tight-tight-tight shots that accent specific details should be included in every set of images you record.
Multimedia online producers like Brian Storm, who produces Media Storm (http://mediastorm.org), sponsored by the Washington Post, use a mix of still and video sequences to communicate. They work to tell stories in the most effective way possible through the visual image.
Mona Reeder of the Dallas Morning News won an American Society of Newspaper Editors community service award for her series of photos that illustrate the human face of the statistics we read every day: http://www.dallasnews.com/photography/.
When you study these images, you can see how important still photography is and how vibrant it will continue to remain in a world that seems obsessed with discussing the impact of videos, YouTube and the moving image.
Another place to see great images is at the National Press Photographers Association site, where the Best of Photojournalism award winners are displayed. Irby was one of the judges in the most recent competition, and you can see the images from it at http://bop.nppa.org/2008/.
Irby suggested that you should always make at least three frames of each still image you want to capture, to be sure to cover yourself for any potential problems and to up the possibilities for the use of a sequence of photos in your communication. He added that you should look for layers of information as you assess where and when to capture images. “Look for life in its simplicity and complexity,” he said.
Another outstanding photojournalist that most teachers are using as a role model for news photography is Rick Loomis of the LA Times (http://www.loomisphotography.com/).
The three most-used software packages for working with still photos are Photo Mechanic (http://www.camerabits.com/site/index.html), Photoshop - I’m not linking it, because everyone knows it well – and Soundslides (http://www.soundslides.com/).
Photo Mechanic is used for sorting, cropping, data retention and archiving. It allows you to sort through your work, categorize and archive it easily and manage the photos well. Photoshop is still the most sophisticated and popular photo fine-tuning software. Soundslides is an effective tool that allows you to easily assemble slide shows that include an audio track. It allows you to package highly effective presentations.
Good photographers start by processing their images into Photo Mechanic, move to polishing the final images in Photoshop and – if they want to package a series of work in a presentation – they put together a Soundslides presentation.
Participants in the Poynter workshop were issued Canon Mark II cameras and worked in pairs, taking turns with the cameras in an exercise, capturing photographs and then processing them briefly through Photo Mechanic and Photoshop. No time was spent on Soundslides, but the software was discussed.
There’s a transition coming in the field of photography from image-making on separate platforms – still and video – to multiplatform cameras that can be used to capture quality images in both formats.
Photography is becoming more streamlined all the time, but multiplatform journalists still have tough decisions to make regarding gear: do you take one or two heavy, professional-model cameras out with you on every assignment; do you make that decision from assignment to assignment; do you sometimes take a consumer-model point-and-shoot that fits in your pocket and works well for web-resolution photos on a screen no larger than 20 inches?
My opinion, not Kenny’s: While the pros at Poynter say you should really take the best documentary gear with you all the time, the reality of journalism in the trenches is that a pocket-sized point-and-shoot camera is sometimes all you need for minor assignments requiring only tight close-ups with no action sequences.
Not having to lug the gear saves your energy and it also can serve to make story sources more accessible, because the more gear they see the more wary they are about talking to you. However, if you do this out of convenience you are occasionally going to get burned and miss something due to the limits of the tools you used. If you can afford the more-expensive gear, you should have it along on all assignments, keeping it available in your car but at the ready if you think it best to go without it on some occasions.
NEVER go to an assignment completely unequipped for visuals. ALWAYS expect to capture still photos and realize that you should be capturing video and sound when the source/s will allow it.
Irby offered this tip for those who use consumer-model automatic cameras: to soften the harsh light given off by the flash, try placing one or two small strips of transparent tape over it.
Irby said photojournalists for a number of top communications companies have begun using video as the dominant capture system for both still and video production. Photographers at some of the largest U.S. papers – folks who have been documenting news with “still” cameras most of their careers – are finding benefits in shooting video and stills with the same camera.
The most-talked-about tool in the industry today is the Red (http://www.red.com/cameras),
The camera body for the Red-One is selling for about $17,500, far in excess of the standard $2,000 to $3,000 for standard professional still cameras today. The Red can record 4,250 by 2,540 pixels video at up to 60 frames per second (to put that in perspective, the best high-definition televisions today offer a resolution of 1,920 by 1,080 pixels). It is primarily used by feature filmmakers at this point because of its cost, but the cost of this kind of technology will come down in the next few years.
You know when a camera gets a big write-up in MIT’s Technology Review that it is probably something special (http://www.technologyreview.com/Infotech/20657/?a=f).
Irby mentioned Henri Cartier-Bresson (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henri_Cartier-Bresson) several times during the week. The French photographer is considered by many to be a founding inspiration for modern photojournalism. I have always been a fan of his work, and I was fortunate to see an amazing showing of it at the Walker Gallery in Minneapolis a few decades ago that still inspires me.
Cartier-Bresson captured amazing images and is best known for the street scenes he documented – landscapes of light, form and perspective. He also did amazing portrait photography of dozens of the leading artists and politicians of his time.
He generally used a small, black Leica, wrapped with black tape to keep his tools inconspicuous; he did not use a flash; he believed in composing images in the act of capturing a scene – not in a darkroom. His work is amazing, and anyone who is serious about documenting life should study it; the most profound viewing experience is had when you see the work enlarged to gallery size. Fantastic.
