Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 1999/02/15
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]At 06:23 PM 2/15/99 -0800, you wrote: >Gosh, those modern fools >like Galen Rowell, Annie Leibovitz, et al they should know better than to >use color slide film. Annie does black and white, sometimes. Ted, who needs no defense, uses color. But to take the devil's advocate (I prefer color for much of what I do) the judges for the most prestigious newspaper photojournalism contest - Pictures of the Year (which ranks higher in newspapers than the Pulitzer itself according to Rich Clarkson, former dir. of photo at National Geographic, and Pulitzer judge himself), last year the five top newspaper portfolios were all black and white. Well, there was one color story by one of the guys who won honorable mention. The judges commented on that fact. Saying that much of the best work they saw this year was black and white. That pretty much indicates that black and white is alive and well in photojournalism. It should be noted those five photographers' work is still printed black and white. Which may have something to do with it since they think black and white when they shoot, even though for several years they've shot color negative. They were all from the Washington Post. First time in the 50+ years of the contest the portfolio category was swept by one paper. It will be interesting to see how they do next year now that the Post is color. Actually, I think the judges were trying to make a statement, and ignoring the fact as well that newspaper photographers can't always take the time to look for the best light. But then, maybe in those situations, black and white might be the best choice. I can think of one picture story from the past year where I could have run black and white that would have strengthened it. That's because the light was so horrible. Except for one photo - the steaming horse and cowboy picture on my web site (now inside since it got bumped by a picture from Victoria B.C.). Eric Welch St. Joseph, MO http://www.ponyexpress.net/~ewelch Artificial Intelligence usually beats real stupidity.