Janet Worne - Thoughtful Photography

Merry Christmas

The Future of Newpapers

I googled “The future of newspapers”.

The first story I read (from Time Magazine) started out: “The word newspaper is going to disappear.”

Further down in the article is a line that explains quite a lot:  “The cost to reach 1,000 people is $20 for newspapers, but just $5 for those online.”

And: “Today, teens don't read newspapers and they never will. If there were a newspaper strike across America today, almost no one under the age of 30 would notice.”

What started me thinking about this stuff is my visit yesterday to the Lexington Herald-Leader where I worked for 18 years. I’m back in Kentucky for a 12 day Christmas visit with family and friends and you know what? It really is hard to go back. It’s hard to go back to the place I once worked and see the shell-shocked faces of former co-workers who have fresh memories of the latest round of layoffs. The photographers no longer blame my departure for increasing their workload, now they say I may have saved a job by leaving.

I find it intolerably sad to see this once-great industry die a slow death this way. I have had a wonderful career, full of exciting memories. I talk with many young photographers who hope for the same kind of career and sometimes I don’t know what to tell them. What kind of career will they have in this fast changing world? Should I tell them to turn back now while they can and go into something more marketable?

But then I think, there will always be news and when there is news, people will always want to see pictures of it. The trick is to stay on top of the ever-changing ways of delivering it. We may not view those pictures in a newspaper in the future (as sad as that makes me feel). Our news consumption may be entirely web-based or there may be other technologies yet to be revealed. The important thing is to stay flexible and keep up with it.

For now, learn all you can, shoot video as well as still, stay fluent on the web and keep your eye on the future—there will be photography there somewhere.

Paul Caponigro Quote

“Photography, like music, must be born in the unmanifest world of spirit.”
                --Paul Caponigro

Snow Day

Winter is here. It's snowing in the mountains today. Anyone who has ever worked for a newspaper has spent lots of time chasing down weather pictures. Even during blizzards when most people get to stay home from work news photographers not only have to work but are often called in on a day off.

I thought I would share a couple of my favorite snow pictures from over the years.

The antenna farm peeked out through the clouds on top of the Sandia Mountains after a snow storm.
Thirty minutes later the setting sun turned the snow a peach color.
Years ago a Lexington sign provided a measure of the city's snowfall.

Duane Michals Quote

“Photography deals exquisitely with appearances, but nothing is what it appears to be.”
        --Duane Michals

B&W or Color?

Which do you prefer? There are arguments on both sides. Many "purists" make the blanket statement that they like Black and White over color for everything. Others only shoot color. My answer to the question would be "It depends". I think the important thing is to think about your answer and know why you've chosen one way or another. Remember, this choice is a storytelling tool like anything else.

I've included some examples below to make my point about how color or lack of it can make a difference in the message a photograph imparts.

Here's a picture with an emotional back story that I used in a recent post. One of the biggest arguments for using Black and White for people pictures is that it strips away colors that could distract from the emotion of the moment. Instead of your eye being drawn to the green trees or the yellow lettering in the t-shirt, it is drawn into the expression on the faces and the body language. Perhaps since this picture has fairly subdued colors to begin with it wasn't a good choice for this example, but imagine if the shirt was orange.

This image is a matter of personal preference and what it is you want to emphasize. The color version draws attention to the scenery and the time of year. The second emphasizes graphics and shapes. Beyond that it is a matter of what you like. I happen to like the B&W version better.

This picture cries out for color for practical reasons as well as the fact that it just makes a prettier image. The plight of the Kentucky player is made much more dramatic and obvious by the fact that he is surrounded by a towering mass of orange. In the B&W version the viewer has to work harder to figure out what is going on.

When I started out in this work we shot slide film and B&W film. We didn't use color negative and convert later so we had to decide on the spot which to use. Each kind of film used a different approach--a different kind of thought process in order to do each justice. I think you can begin to see why in these examples.