Do photographers make as much as writers?

We have a photographer that actually learns stuff about the program I cover before I do, then tells me this stuff. She's really chatty and since she's holding a camera instead of a notebook, people seem to just tell her shit they would never say to me. It's a valuable asset.

 

Do they mix up it's and its?

 

I worked for a large newspaper, back in the day. We had a photographer who was constantly bringing in pictures with captions in which a name was spelled differently from the name that was in the story. We counted on the desk one month; it happened eight times.

All eight times, the photographer was right.

 

We have more problems with the photo desk than the photographers themselves (aside from the one who consistently turns in unusable photos, and the one who rarely stays more than half the game). They make bizarre calls on which photos to use, and get very prickly when you suggest something else might work better.

 

Our photogs make as much as our writers at my shop. They do good work, too. And they bust their asses, running around to several assignments. They are definitely as busy as writers, just in a different aspect.

This is all at my one shop; it could be different elsewhere of course.

 

We have that policy. God forbid you should cut 8 inches of open sky over a subject's head to make room for a little more copy. That's akin to tinkering with the Mona Lisa, to their way of thinking.

 

Good photo editors are more rare than good copy editors.

The reason for "no crop" rules is that few people who design pages have a clue about what a good crop and a bad crop might be.

In an ideal situation everyone works together to create a page that will interest and inform readers. Unfortunately egos all too often get in the way. I know more than a few writers who get bent out of shape if a story is trimmed or changed. They seem to believe that the spelling, grammar and facts should be checked and that their masterpieces should run as is.

Good writers and photographers understand that they won't get exactly what they want and how to communicate and campaign for the ideas that are important to them.

 

Never have worked at a "no crop" place, but when I have seen an image that we were going to significantly alter (say, turning a vertical into a horizontal), we'd either talk to the shooter or the photo chief. That way, the artist/artist boss has a hand in the process. Akin to re-writing a lead ... wouldn't YOU want the desk to call you? We also had a rule at my latest stop that spelled out the process of placing copy over image -- run it past the graphics editor and/or photo chief. That was more to keep from fouling up something half-decent.

I have had shooters routinely say "what's the story?" -- and that invariably makes for better art. Same goes for game art. The ones who get with me/us at halftime and say "well?" are the ones who can both fill the needs for sidebars and such, and present the best main images.

rb

 

I am a very delicate cropper. I've seen the horrendous crap that gets done.

Unless you only send me one shape for a live event.

Spell the names right and send me one horizontal and one vertical. Do that, and I'm your best friend.

 

WFW. We have a soft no-crop policy in place. You're allowed to crop, with approval from the photog, or failing that, the SE or ASE. But our photogs will either come up to you before they leave, or call you from the field and ask you what you need. I have no complaints, and have never really run into a huge problem on deadline.

 

I'm so glad we do not use full-time photo editor anymore. The one we did use came as part of one of those package deals, which is another subject for another thread.

As confounding as some of the choices were, there was something about USC-UCLA games where true brain-lock set in.

This is the photo I wanted . . . one that was all over the national media that week (NY Times, SI, Time Magazine).



What was I given? Reggie Bush running through a hole up the middle . . . despite my "hint" to the photo edtor that "Reggie Bush is the story. He was hurdling UCLA defenders . . "

The next year, UCLA stuns USC 13-9 to knock the Trojans out of the BCS hunt. Key play was when Eric McNeal deflected a pass, then dove and intercepted it.



What did photo editor give me? Two UCLA players hugging . . . even though "USC loses!!!" was the story, and having a Trojan in the photo was needed because of this.

 

I was covering a road race one day here on the East Coast. Some poor sap from San Diego blows out a knee turning a corner and is writhing on the ground in agony for a couple of minutes.

I turn to the photog next to me and say, wow, wouldn't that be a good shot? Sort of an ``agony of defeat'' moment?

And he sniffs and walks in exactly the opposite direction.

I later interview the injured runner, who talks about how he's desperate to get home on his scheduled flight that night so he can see his daughter get married in a day or two. He also turns out to be a Gulf War I vet who'd served at our local military base and he'd come back to run the race and see old friends.

Good thing we didn't get his picture.

I must say I wasn't torn up in sorrow when said photog got nailed with a line drive into the dugout at a minor league game later that same year.