ShutterSpeed

the mobile home heaven was one of the best feature assignments i’ve had in a while (courtesy of reporter baylie evans).

when i first heard of the rock community life center, a church housed within a mobile home, i knew that i wanted to produce a multimedia piece for it.

in order to shoot a piece in which we use more than a single image and add sound bites, we have to adjust our style of shooting slightly. fellow staffer shauna stephenson taught me that a good multiple photo piece should play like a movie, in that shots vary focal length, depth and composition since a film rarely uses just a single angle. in addition, a variety of detail shots should be used to support the content.

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There are several types of photos that run in newspapers. Most of them are taken for assignments. Some go with stories, and some run by themselves. And some come along from breaking news stories. But when those photo assignments are not available, the photographer working that day is charged with going out and finding a photo to fill a page, occasionally with little time available.

That’s when things can get exciting. Where do you go? Most newspaper photographers have their favorite places. Places where people are plentiful. Places where you can get that photo, fast! Or a place where the photographer has seen something happening last week and now dredges up that memory. But many times the photographer ends up driving around the area to find things that he or she thinks will be interesting to the newspaper reader.

It can be a difficult task, and some days aren’t as productive as others. But it can also be rewarding when you sometimes find that gem of a photo hiding around the next corner.

Larry Brinlee/WTE staff

Sometimes during a photo assignment a great scene presents itself for the camera like this one when Chris Nicholas was conducting the University of Wyoming Western Thunder marching band before a football game at UW this past season. The assignment was the football game, but an editor will usually make room in the news section of the newspaper for a photo like this.

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I think it takes a ton of guts to let two journalists into your home for any length of time. Not only do we ask a lot of questions, we take pictures, too. And sometimes as journalists it’s difficult to ask those questions and take those pictures.

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One of the most difficult aspects of being a photographer is editing your images. The process starts when the photographer is in the field shooting. Elements such as lens selection, depth of field, exposure and lighting can help the photographer edit within the camera the subject or event as it happens.

I take a little more than a hundred frames on average, depending on the assignment. For example, when I cover a football game at UW, I might shoot 800 frames. On the flip side, a feature or portrait might yield 25 or 30 frames. In any case, choosing one image from a hundred can be difficult.

I recently struggled with an editing decision on the WTE’s coverage of the deployment of local National Guard troops to Kuwait.

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Sometimes you don’t know what to expect when going to an assignment. Today, I headed to a tax day protest in front of the capitol expecting 10 or 20 people. As I drove up, I was amazed that more than 300 people had gathered to protest government spending and taxes. Protests offer photojournalists many opportunities to make great images. And I have to admit, I get excited over the prospect of covering a situation of potential conflict.

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