When the photo doesn't match the story

Our top story in the paper this week was about the school board and district union reps reaching an agreement calling for teachers to make about $3 million in concessions (pay freezes, no training, etc.) to help balance the budget. My boss ran the story with a photo of a lady smiling because she was named the teacher of the year. When I saw that come off the printer, I told my boss the picture didn't go with the story. His response: "I wanted to get that picture on the front."
Um, how about putting the picture elsewhere on the front? Our office manager looked at the paper and asked, "Why do we have a smiling lady with a story about budget cuts?" My wife asked the same question, so I can only imagine what kind of responses we'll be getting from readers.
If the picture had something to do with the story, that would be one thing, i.e. "Jane Doe, shown accepting her Podunk Teacher of the Year award Monday, was among those who negotiated a labor deal..." Even that would be borderline. But this photo had NOTHING to do with the story, instead making it look like the teacher is happy because she isn't getting a raise.

 

I'm not looking for sympathy. I can take a garbage shot with a $400 SLR from Sears. To get a lens that can actually get close enough to get a truly good shot? More money. A lot more. Money the paper isn't spending for the actual photographers....much less to give to untrained sports writers. If your shops are giving you equipment and telling you to shoot, congrats. Its not happening here.

 

A smiling teacher is lead art?

 

We had D1Hs. They weren't great, but they got the job done.
Last December, they crapped the bed. The estimate to get them and some of our lenses fixed was over $1000.
Solution? They asked the IT guy what camera we could get that would do the job just as well. He picked out some point and shoot that would be great for stills and outdoors. This was in the middle of winter season.
Since the camera wouldn't work, we used our freelancers. Two of them we pay $50 a week, but they retain rights to the photos and we credit them and their website in our pages; we used a third and pay her $40 an assignment.
In about two months, we spent $800 on the third freelancer alone.
When the bosses saw the numbers, the finally got our equipment fixed. Basically, it took them spending more money than it cost to fix the cameras for them to realize they screwed up.
The only thing that really annoyed me was for what they spent fixing, screwing up and paying the freelancers, they could have bought a new camera for the department.
Three weeks ago, the wife and I bought a Nikon D7000 (we're expecting a baby in late July); I've been using it for work and it's a mindblower. Now I never need to worry about matching photos with the story, because nine times out of 10, it's up to me what shots I get.

 

Reading threads like these remind me that sometimes it's good to be shooting your own stuff.

My real frustration used to be conference wrestling tournaments. The good photographers understood, went for the semis and got the local kids winning, or made an extra effort and went for the finals.

The no-clue people get some out-of-town kid sticking another out-of-town kid in a wrestleback. (Or maybe something a little better)

 

Yes, the biggest advantage of having a camera hanging around your own neck...good communication and tight windows with photographers also help a lot.

 

With wrestling, we sent one freelancer to cover the morning matches and had another do the semis and finals - with six papers, not everyone had a wrestler make it to the night matches.