Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2013/06/02
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]Larry As I understand it, WTNH has been a distant number two in the news market for years, and they've been holding on to that for dear life against WVIT. Number one WFSB still does investigative reporting. On Sun, Jun 2, 2013 at 9:48 AM, Lawrence Zeitlin <lrzeitlin at gmail.com>wrote: > Jon Stanton writes: > > "Any thoughts about Chicago's "Oldest" Newspaper firing all 28 of their > photographers and then training their reporters to use iPhone 5's as their > cameras?" > > I can't comment on the personal issues for photographers since my "last > hands" on experience as a newspaper photographer was over 50 years ago. > However technologically speaking the change is long overdue. In my day we > used 4x5 Speed Graphics, extreme overkill for pictures published with a 65 > dpi screen. Leicas or even Minoxes would have sufficed. Reporters had to > specifically ask for a photographer to accompany them on assignments. Two > people, two salaries for a measly one column report on a ward alderman > political rally. Several years ago my son-in-laws TV station (WTNH in New > Haven, Ct.) issued iPhones to all it's on air staff. The reporters carried > the iPhone with them, a necessity to communicate with the office, and > photographed anything remotely interesting, sending it back along with > their verbal comments immediately. It worked. The station became known for > its excellent coverage of local news. Most of the staff photographers were > let go. > > It is hard for members of the LUG to realize that picture quality is only > of minor importance in newspaper work. Immediacy is all important. It is > much better to get a bad picture today than a great one tomorrow. In a > fight for survival against TV, cable, and the internet a newspaper that > equips every reporter with iPhones scores two major points. It > substantially lowers costs and it gets many more camera eyes in the field. > Picture quality suffers but few readers give a damn as long as they get the > baseball scores and the horse racing odds. > > It's the same problem faced by the typesetters many years ago. I can still > operate a Linotype. Does anyone care? > > Where was the union in all of this? > > Larry Z > > _______________________________________________ > Leica Users Group. > See http://leica-users.org/mailman/listinfo/lug for more information > -- Regards, Sonny http://sonc.com/look/ Natchitoches, Louisiana USA