For the second PhotoTALK event with the World Photography Organisation the subject was how to gain commercial success. Discussing this topic at the Frontline Club on Tuesday 22 January, chaired by designer Stuart Smith, were the managing director of Balcony Jump Management Tim Paton, Magnum Photos photographer Chien-Chi Chang, director of Panos Profile Francesca Sears and photo editor, advisor and photographers’ coach Monica Suder.

Each of the panel first took the audience through what they do within the photographic industry and Suder was asked to detail the key mistakes that photographers make.

“Procrastination,” she said. “Not wanting to promote yourself and . . .”

“Bad editing,” Sears added.

Suder continued:

Yes, very bad editing. . . . Half the time they don’t really know their strength. They don’t know who they are. . . . What is your vision? What are they about? What do they want to say to the world? Because if you don’t have anything to say, you’re history.

Smith asked Paton what the best way to get attention from an agency is:

It’s a combination of the perfect storm; I get an email from the photographer, I’ve seen some work of theirs in a great piece of editorial, a couple of art buyers are talking about them, a couple of stylists are talking about them and all of a sudden this guy or girl is on the scene and you’re hearing about them quite a lot. So you sort of need a combination of a lot of things – a straight email, unless it’s absolutely exceptional . . . [shrugs].

Paton added later on:

It’s all about your website, absolutely all about your website . . . that’s the first port of call. . . . Work out your website so that you get to the images quickly, you don’t want: “I picked up a camera at the age of eight.” You really don’t need all that. You just want to get the images nice and quickly and give a good description of what you do fairly early on.

On the subject of still photographers diversifying into moving image, because now the cameras they use for stills can do video too, Sears responded:

It’s really, really hard because the general market for that is online and the budgets aren’t there yet. . . . You’re not going to make money back on making a multimedia. And the worst part is that photographers on assignment are often expected to shoot video as well, sometimes during the same period of time and barely getting compensated differently.

To which Chang added:

We are talking about at least six different skill sets at least, we’re talking about still, moving image, sound and then the editing. That’s a complete and utter different skill set. So for me working with the right editor – it’s very important. It takes time to develop that kind of trust and understanding.

Do students get the right training in their colleges before they enter the commercial world?

Paton answered:

A lot of the students I see coming out of college are not commercially minded which I think is a shame because they should be. They need to be.

Suder continued:

It’s a good idea for a student after they’ve finished their studies to work with a photographer they admire or someone in the same direction, in the same type of photography. They can pick up a lot. What to do and what not to do . . . What really is great is to listen to them on the telephone: how they handle a possible assignment, how they talk to their clients, how they present themselves on the phone and negotiate. These are things that take a while to get good at.

Sears added:

If I was looking for a course I would be really vigilant to find the modules that will help you in the real world.

How important is social media for photographers?

Sears:

If you’re on a big project or you’re on a campaign and you’ve got something to say then maybe fine. But for most of them, it’s not yet working because they don’t have their own brand. For those that have their own brand [such as Magnum’s Alec Soth], have a following, are building it, have something to say, have a message to convey, are working with an NGO or it’s an ad campaign, then there’s probably a reason, but otherwise [it’s not really important].

Paton:

As an example, Lara Jade has got 25,000+ followers on Twitter. It doesn’t work out as often as you might think. My theory on this, it’s probably the wrong theory, is that her generation of 23-year-olds, they’re not commissioners yet. So in five years time when they’re 28–29 and they’re starting to commission, they’re picture editors, they will be used to receiving Twitter feeds and seeing work on that. I think the commissioners now are not engaged with that so much.

Sears:

I don’t think you can ignore it but I think it’s a space to watch like it was with multimedia. We’re still working it out. I definitely wouldn’t dismiss it.

One of the final statements from the floor was about the overriding feeling that the old ways of contacting people about your work still stand:

What does come across . . . is that we should probably get off the computer and get back to old fashioned business tools and communication skills. I feel . . . everyone forgets about making the phone call. . . . I don’t think that at university we learn those skills at all and I think that’s a learning curve.

Paton finished by saying:

I think it’s a very important thing to get out and do more face to face.

Watch the full discussion here:

By Will Spens

The recent demonstrations across the Arab world, unrest in Ireland, Greece and France and the student protests in Britain have highlighted what appears to be an unprecedented revolt against power structures around the world.

Chaired by Steve Crawshaw, author and international advocacy director for Amnesty International, the discussion focused on the role of social media in modern uprisings and how the mainstream media  is responding to the use of social media in facilitating and reporting people movements.

Turi Munthe, CEO of the citizen journalism newswire, Demotix discussed how social media tools were being used for rallying people, organising protests as well as for conveying news of events, adding that the audience for such information is generally supportive:

It is absolutely clear that there have been protests over time but the question is now: does social media have an impact? It may be a zero sum game [if both sides have the technology] or do these tools serve dislocated people power better?

We’ve learnt these things more and more. One of the reasons social media has been so driven is because the audience is mainly pro what’s going on. It’s a very particular demographic.

Jacky Rowland, an Al-jazeera English correspondent based in Paris agreed that social media was an important tool but added that in previous revolutions she had covered young people had always used tools that were available in creative and courageous ways:

Yes social media provide tools, but what we are looking at here is the sheer guts and determination of young people who use what they have at the time. When you have no information about what was happening, you couldn’t read the tweets – and so you get on the streets.

Guy Aitchison, co-editor of openDemocracy’s UK blog, OurKingdom and phD student in politics at University College London, who was involved in the occupation over student fees, said social media was a way of subverting corporate influence driving aspects of mainstream media and likened it to political activism going ‘open source’

Is the consumption of news being driven by certain corporate agendas? I’d like to see these agendas being challenged through social media. Twitter is a tool like any other tool. It undermines the monopoly over information and collective actions

Paul Mason, BBC Newsnight economics editor, when asked whether social media is changing the way people protest, rather than just being a tool, said:

It is technology and the communication revolution that has done this to protest. It breaks up some of the power structures that we used to think of. The point is this – if they [protestors, for example in Iran] can’t have revolution, they will create an area of control that exists with the power structure

As to how social media has influenced the coverage of media organisations, he came up with what might have been the most memorable quote of the evening:

If you give Frodo Baggins a mobile phone, the plot of Lord Of The Rings becomes a lot shorter – social media allows you get to the end of the story a lot quicker.

 

Prior to that I consulted with my former journalism students and working reporters on what we might want emergency workers to know and how we’d like them to interact with the press so it would be the most effective. Journos advised not to perceive them as vultures who are ready to tear apart already miserable survivors. They also dislike to have an image of someone who is just "chatting around" and "distract rescuers from their noble activities".

We talked about the professional tasks of both sides and how they differ and where they overlap.

I wonder what your advise would be – what would YOU like future emergency workers to know about reporters – so that the interaction would be mutually beneficial and effective (for the, after all, common goal, which is serving the public!)

I guess after accumulating some experience I will soon be ready to report what works and what doesn’t in teaching trauma to journalists. So far I’m trying to be quite cautious, so everything works more or less

Several of them are writing papers on the course – actually only two submitted it on time, but I don’t really mind. Others promised to finish it by the end of the next month (should I believe them? haha). The topics are quite various – psychology of a reporter in extreme situations, tips on interviewing sick kids, reporting on terroristic attack and interviewing hostages, programs of support that editors and managers ought to offer to their reporters, stress and perception – how traumatic environment skews our ability to (critically) process the information (and how media can manipulate the masses by “nightmaring” (*) people).

(*) “Nightmare” is a noun, as well as its translation in Russian. But recently there is a slang form made up by creative journalists which makes “nightmare” into a verb in an expression like “tv reporters are nightmaring their viewers” – i.e., showing them too many gory news reports, blood, negative and discouraging information, etc.

Anyway. I’m looking forward to reading all those papers, and have a hope that these young reporters will learn how to report trauma delicately and thoroughly, and not how to “nightmare people”…