Mark E. Johnson – Visual Journalism

September 20, 2019

And We’re Back …

After being down for a month (long story and, while I gravitate towards long stories, I really don’t want to talk about this one), Visual Journalism is back up and running. Mostly. We did lose all of the Category assignments for the last 12 years worth of posts. Hoping we can recover them, but I think that may be a...

Journalism/Tech Talk

August 7, 2019

She Learned to Hear by Seeing

I love this quote from The New York Times story on the late Ida Wyman: Taking pictures enabled me to hear the stories of the people I photographed. Listening is such an integral part of journalism – if we cannot listen it is incredibly difficult to see the stories unfolding in front of us. And listening is a very different...

Advice & Learning/At Work/Good Work/Photojournalism/Thoughts & Theory

August 6, 2019

Photographing Apollo 11

This is one of the coolest things I’ve ever seen online, if you’re a space geek, you’re about to lose part of your morning.

Craft/Photojournalism/Tech Talk

August 6, 2019

Building a Sense of Place at Woodstock

The New York Times takes a look at the (ahem) three rolls of film Roger Ballen exposed at Woodstock, 50 years ago. This exchange alone makes it worh a read: You’ve said that so much of photography is actually rooted in having experiences and not just sitting behind a camera or computer. Yeah, this is the truth of the matter....

Advice & Learning/At Work/Good Work/Photojournalism/Thoughts & Theory

July 29, 2019

20th Century Journalists

The Associated Press Images Blog has put up a collection of photos of AP photographers and reporters form throughout the 20th century – great fun to see how our roles and appearances have changed.

At Work/Journalism/Photojournalism

June 12, 2019

New Photojournalism Assignments

It looks like I need to add a Translucent Document assignment to my Advanced Photojournalism course this fall. This will go with the Spelling Document and Empathy Document assignments. The learning objective: Pay attention to details.

Photojournalism/Thoughts & Theory

June 10, 2019

Visual Journalism Fellowships in the Bay Area

This is an interesting idea – CatchLight Local is coordinating three, three-month long visual fellowships in the San Francisco area for later this year. The fellows will partner with local newsrooms to help show the story of the community. (Application info and more details available at the link.) Research has shown that visual journalists have been eliminated from newsrooms at...

Business & Industry/Photojournalism

May 20, 2019

When We Take Away What We’ve Made

Two decades ago, Susan Meiselas published a project that looked at how the visual history of the Kurds had never belonged to them – it was made by outsiders, taken away by those outsiders and then, essentially, banned by outside entities. Magnum has published an excerpt from the 1997 work and it has given me great pause as I wrestle...

Ethics & Legal/Photojournalism/Thoughts & Theory

May 16, 2019

Starry, Starry Fakes

I may have a new hero – Dr. Elisabeth Bik, a microbiologist who has been looking at ethical issues in science journals, has turned her eye to some astrophotography published by National Geographic. One of the great losses of the last 20 years has been the relationships between photo editors and photographers. It used to be that those relationships were...

Business & Industry/Ethics & Legal/Photojournalism

April 23, 2019

American Masters: Garry Winogrand

PBS’ American Masters took a look at the life and work of Garry Winogrand and I highly recommend this – it gives a fascinating insight into his street photography and acceptance into the art world. It’s available online through May 17.

Craft/Good Work/Photojournalism/Thoughts & Theory

Author: Mark E. Johnson