Some Points about Photojournalism

I feel that photojournalism does a lot of things better than print journalism if it is presented right. I feel firstly that it provides emotion that words cannot express. An example from the video that shows Nachtwey’s view of this is “Journalism provided a a channel for peoples natural sense of generosity and the readers had responded” this was in relation to the picture of the family living on the railroad embankment. By taking a picture that at the time had no real meaning to the photographer but yet appealed to people (the readers) generosity and thus had made people want to donate and help a person that they saw in just one simple photo. Another thing that photojournalism does better than other forms is that it is a way to show all aspects of a story. I personally, when reading an article from the New York Times online like to go through slide shows associated with that story after I read it so that I get all parts of the story and understand what it actually looked like. A good quote from the video that Nachtwey says about explaining how photojournalism tells all parts of a story is “Photographers go to the extreme edges of human experience to show people whats going on”. A comment associated with a photo can also tell a full story. I enjoyed how in the video how Nachtwey read the title of each photo after telling the story behind it. I feel that even if there is a vague explanation for a group of photos I gain a general sense of what is going on. There are however somethings that print and other forms of journalism do better than photos. One of the major things that other forms do better is that they can be much more detail and tell an intricate story through one type of journalism. Photos can tell a story but the details have to come through print or narration. I feel that this is the main thing about photojournalism that other forms can do better. In the end I feel that Photojournalism alone can tell stories with narration or extended comments however I enjoy it more when it is coupled with some other form of Journalism such as print because I read the story for the details then look at the pictures to tell what certain details in the story look like.

http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/james_nachtwey_s_searing_pictures_of_war.html