Access To The Front Line
As an industry I believe we need to look to ourselves for the reasons behind this unco-operation. This attitude to the press is fuelled by the public perception of the business brought about by the actions of the red tops who thought they were above the law and used subterfuge and illegal means to create stories to entertain the nation. Had these stories been investigations into wrong doing in public or political life then maybe the end would have justified the means. But this wasn’t the case, it was done purely in the search for an entertaining read. The result has been that whilst we are supposed to be an open and transparent society we have in fact become more closed than ever, more closed than many other countries, as has been demonstrated by the access given to photographers in Italy and Spain and elsewhere to document this crisis. When I first started as a newspaper photographer back in 1975 access was rarely an issue. Indeed you could make a quick telephone call or sometimes simply turn up to be given access to pretty much anything. Journalists were respected by most and not viewed as the scavengers of society. Here are a couple of pictures from 1977, when I was just two years into my career, that I think demonstrate a far more respectful attitude to the press. The fire, police and ambulance services had no issue with me arriving on the scene of a nasty road traffic accident and as long as I didn’t hinder their activities I was allowed to get in close to get my pictures. Things didn’t look good at the scene but they respected my journalistic judgement and gave me the access and time to document the story as it unfolded. Only when it had been ascertained that the young man had survived relatively unscathed were the pictures published in the following weeks paper with a story about a miracle escape. The young lad himself requested a set of pictures as a momento of his brush with death. I believe that at this time the professionalism of the press wasn’t in question and the emergency services on the scene knew that a journalistic judgement would made on whether to publish any images from the incident. Admittedly the whole thing wasn’t being confused by the presence of hoards of camera phone wielding members of the public eager to instantly splash someone else’s misery over social media. Unfortunately these days I think the authorities confuse the professional media with the social media amateurs who answer to no-one and publish without a thought to the consequences. Yes there is a need to record what is happening on the front line but as a professional and responsible industry we must demonstrate to society that we have changed before we can earn their respect again. Maybe it won’t happen in time to document this crisis but for the future we must somehow regain the trust of the nation. For the record I shoot little press these days having made the move to PR and corporate work but I have worked most of my life as a newspaper photographer and picture editor.
Keywords:
Business,
Cardiff,
Coronavirus,
Corporate Photographer,
Covid19,
Editorial Photographer,
Event Photography,
Journalism,
Marketing Photographer,
Mediaphotos,
Photography,
PR Photographer,
PR photography,
Press,
Press Photography,
Roger Donovan,
Wales
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