[potatolicious]

Photojournalism has never been about depth-of-field shots nor long telephoto shots. Photojournalism has always been primarily wide, deep depth of field, and more about lighting and composition than anything else.

Shooting "real" photojournalism with an iPhone is more than doable. Hell, the iPhone's field of view is a 28mm equivalent, which is perfect for photojournalism.

I don't disagree with the overall point about the failure of photojournalism, but photojournalism has never been about the capabilities of the camera.

[jonknee]

Perhaps, but most of the iconic photos I remember aren't ones that an iPhone could take. Just take a scroll through Boston's Big Picture blog.

[scrumper]

Exactly. "What settings did you use for that picture, Mr. Photojournalist?" "Easy son, F8 and be there."

[kfury]

And my comment wasn't about photojournalism. Thinking journalists can become photojournalists by telling them to snap pictures (with their phone or with professional glass) is even more ridiculous than the Sun-Times is being.

Don't conflate News Photography with Photojournalism. The second is a subset of the first. News Photography is a field that requires greater diversity than 'being there at f/8 (in daylight, with a fast lens and a ready camera)'.

There are sports photographers, portrait photographers, close subject photographers, artistic photographers and, yes, photographers who need to be on the scene at breaking events, where a wide shot and being close are key.

I agree with everything you said, but it doesn't negate anything I said.

[hnriot]

it does negate what you said, you argued that shallow depth of field and telephoto shots were what's needed, and this is wrong, as was pointed out.

[kfury]

Read it again, and note that not all news photography is photojournalism.

[corresation]

but photojournalism has never been about the capabilities of the camera

Fast frame rate. Very bright lens (e.g. f1.4). Large, high-sensitivity sensor.

It is very much about the capabilities of the camera, because the truth is that lesser cameras miss most shots, especially in a moving situation where you get a momentary window of opportunity. The iPhone camera may get there eventually, but in that situation right now the failure rate to get a shot is going to be incredibly high (obviously a chance is better than none -- the camera you have in your hand is better than the one at home and all -- but we're comparing to ready to go photojournalists).

We shall see how this decision plays out, but personally I think it is a horrible choice because it removes one of the few remaining differentiators between old media and the citizen news, which is that generally in the former you could find great, unique pictures by professionals who know what they're doing.

[sk5t]

You're right on target about the iPhone's unsuitability for photojournalism. There's the horrendous shutter lag, inability to control aperture/sensitivity/shutter speed to any meaningful degree--I can make all these adjustments using dedicated controls on my D3 without taking my eye out of the viewfinder. A big storage buffer, fast frame rate, and removable, redundant storage modules and replaceable batteries also remain essential. Oh, and interfacing with lighting systems, and of course proper lenses.

In a dynamic/dangerous situation, you need to get on the viewfinder and crank away on continuous-high shutter, and you'll take 200x the photos of even an ambitious iPhone user. Now think that out of 1,000 frames, maybe 2 will be head-and-shoulders above the rest... these are probably frames that the iPhone user had a vanishingly small opportunity to capture at all.

[corresation]

It would make for an interesting (and almost certainly viral) test to concoct artificial scenarios of a "newsworthy" event, having participants armed with each type of capture device. Instructing them that something important is going to happen in a few moments (already giving them more information than they would usually have) and then having a staged shoot out go through the scene, or a pretend robbery, etc.

[zaphar]

The announcement said they fired all of their photographic staff.

Which combined with your comment leads me to wonder about their sports section. Taking sports photography is very definitely about the capabilities of the camera and even more importantly the lens. An iPhone is not going to do very well for sports photography.

[snogglethorpe]

> An iPhone is not going to do very well for sports photography

Though it would be amusing to see the attempts... ><

[Seriously though, it sounds like they're simply going to use freelancers for photos from now on, many of whom will presumably have all the fancy kit you need for sports etc...]