What is photojournalism?

South Africa, 1998. This is not the moon, but the virgin landscape of KwaZulu between Johannesburg and Cape Town. © Marc Riboud 1998

Photojournalism is a form of communicating the news through photographs. This would include aspects of journalism like timeliness, objectivity and narrative. When practicing photojournalism, you are able to tell a story through a set of images in a timely manner of something that is happening in the world. Photojournalism incorporates aspects of news that are not often shown in a traditional news. News outlets like newspapers, television and radio show the news and sometimes images corresponding to the story but photojournalism on the other hand as the power to impact people with a still photograph.

Photojournalism is a form of photography that documents a moment in history without being altered. Photojournalism is different from street photography because street photography is not used in the news. Photojournalism is meant for storytelling and street photography documents people interacting and living their lives, on the other hand photojournalism has the journalistic aspect of newsworthiness. Photojournalism uses the newsworthiness as a type of objectivity for delivering news.

Many photojournalists make between $25,000 and $60,000 a year according to payscale.com. Photojournalist can either work under a company but many also work as freelance photographers. The photojournalists that work as freelance photographers many times go out and shoot an event or story that is happening and then sell their photographs companies to publish.

Even if some people work as freelance photographers there are also associations they can join like the National Press Photographers Association or most commonly known as NPPA. Being a part of an association benefits photojournalists in many ways because it allows photographers to network with each other as well as promote photojournalism. NPPA does have an annual fee of $110 and $65 for students. NPPA also offers their subscribers many benefits such as discounts for workshops and seminars.

The golden age of photojournalism is considered to be between 1930’s and 1950’s. During the Great Depression many of people’s hardships were able to be seen and preserved through the art of photojournalism. An important photographer during this time is Dorothea Lange. Lange published one of her most famous photographs of this time titled “migrant mother.” Along with Dorothea Lange other top photographers of this time were W. Eugene Smith and Robert Capa.

A photojournalist that I look up to is Marc Riboud. Riboud was a photographer that seemed to have been at many very important events in history and as an aspiring journalist I would want to have the ability to go out and shoot a story regardless of the situation

Works Cited

Barbiaux, John. “The Difference Between Street Photography And Photojournalism.” PhotolisticLife. N.p., 26 Mar. 2015. Web. 03 Sept. 2016.

“Join NPPA.” National Press Photographers Association. N.p., n.d. Web. 03 Sept. 2016.

“Photojournalist Salary (United States) United States Home Change Country Don’t See What You Are Looking For?Get A Free Custom Salary Report ».” Photojournalist Salary. N.p., n.d. Web. 03 Sept. 2016.