“Promises are like crying babies in a theater, they should be carried out at once.” – Norman Vincent Peale
February 29, 2024
NEWS – It’s all local
What happened in the industry this month?
#ONPA MATTERS
1/ The still portion of judging of the 73rd ONPA Still & Multimedia Contest will take place at Sunday, March 3, at 9 a.m. via ZOOM. Sessions will be recorded and made available to view on our YouTube channel. Multimedia will be judged independently. All results will be posted to our website as usual.
2/ A reminder: The annual ONPA Convention will take place on Saturday, April 13, 2024 at the Fawcett Center on the campus of Ohio State University in Columbus.
Terry Clark is the featured presenter for the event. Clark will share his project 50 Photographs / 50 Years in the morning and will give a live small-light portrait workshop after the break.
We are staying at the Crown Plaza Columbus North, Worthington, 6500 Doubletree Ave, Columbus, OH 43229. The Room rate is $99.00 per night. Let the person booking the reservation know you are with the Ohio News Photographers Association.
A continental breakfast and buffet-style lunch will be provided.
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3/ Swearing in of the new Board will happen this year at the convention.
4/ My sincere apologies to our newly elected treasurer Kristin Bauer for spelling her first name incorrectly. We’ve been publicizing it Kristin with an ‘e’. Names are hard – probably the hardest part of our job at times!
#OTHER INDUSTRY MATTERS – It seems more dire than ever
Where to begin? Where to end?
1/ AXIOS – The newspaper savior complex
“Deep reservoirs of individual and philanthropic wealth are being tapped in an attempt to save or rebuild the news industry. In reality, however, large amounts of up-front liquidity never seem to be the solution to the problem.”
2/ The Atlantic – You’ll Miss Sports Journalism When It’s Gone
“The ranks of sports reporters are thinning—making it easier for athletes, owners, and leagues to conceal hard truths from the public.”
3/ Poynter – Opinion | A Boston Globe columnist crossed journalistic lines. Should the Globe still have run his story? While reporting on a woman who sought assisted suicide, Kevin Cullen got personally involved, putting the Globe in an ethical dilemma.
4/ The Exponent – The Exponent in print is here to stay
At a meeting with the Exponent’s executive board on Friday, President Bob Helmer confirmed that the print edition of the newspaper will not be cut amid the budget crisis.
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6/ Nieman – “A Lot of People Got Really Rich Off of What Happened Here:” How Hedge Funds Helped Destroy Local News Margot Susca’s forthcoming book, “Hedged,” unravels the history of how the ultrawealthy are taking over America’s newspapers
7/ Stop the Presses: Obsessing on gaffes is lazy journalism
“One candidate is old and makes verbal flubs.
The other candidate is old, makes verbal flubs, faces 91 felony counts and wants to be a dictator.
If you focus only on the age and the verbal flubs, the two candidates are about the same, right? In fact, the one who doesn’t face 91 felony counts has a brain that’s three years older than the other one, so the “younger” guy is better, right?
Um, no.”
8/ It’s still contest season, and the (new to me) World Sports Photography Competition is still open.
9/ Reading the Pictures: Throwing Shade: The Disturbing Visual Fallout From the Special Counsel’s Attack on Biden’s Competency
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10/ Neiman Labs – Google has been testing removing the ‘news’ tab from search engines/results. Ugh.
11/ Congratulations to members of the Akron Beacon Journal Newspaper Guild for securing a contract, which took 6 years to accomplish! You can read more about it in a statement on the guild’s FB page, here.
12/ NYT: (Tough to read, but important) – How the Media Industry Keeps Losing the Future
Roger Fidler tried his best, but the excellent business of journalism is gone for good. Can the idea of “news” survive in a digital world?
13/ The Drone Girl: DOES THE NORTH AMERICAN DRONE MARKET HAVE ROOM TO GROW IN 2024?
#PEOPLE
Movement, Highlights & More
1/ Lisa Scalfaro, staff photographer at the Kent/Ravenna Record-Courier for 19 years, has taken on the added duties of photo staff management at the Akron Beacon Journal.
2/ Aaron Self, KSU grad, was recently laid off just after taking the university photographer job at Baldwin-Wallace College, according to Bob Christy, KSU university photographer and friend of ONPA. A couple recent parallel job openings were forwarded to Aaron. As we continue to navigate this perilous media landscape still employing photojournalists here and there, I encourage you to help others in any way possible when you learn of job losses.
3/ Jenna Watson, KSU 2015, has left the IndyStar after 8 years on staff there for a new role. She is “also president of the Indianapolis NewsGuild, a union whose mission is more than just workplace betterment – we are fighting to preserve local news,” according to her online bio. Congratulations, Jenna!
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4/ Lucy Nicholson named DOP of AP, first woman to hold the position in the organization’s history!
#RESOURCES and #INSPIRATIONS
Helpful things and eye-catchers
1/ 2024 Eclipse info:
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- If you’re planning on covering the upcoming full solar eclipse, Ohio Festivals dot Net is actively tracking and publishing festivals devoted directly to the astronomical event. These are great ways of almost guaranteeing good pictures of the event – whether you plan to photograph the actual eclipse or not. (I personally prefer making and looking at pictures of everything except the eclipses.) *free
- NASA: Scientific Visualization Studio – Good maps! *free
- AP: How to capture to the eclipse, an online webinar with … JULIO CORTEZ! *costs money
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- Adorama: (passed, but still viewable) Feb. 28th – An eclipse how-to hosted by Stand Honda. “Stan will be covering what safety procedures you need to have in place, which gear is best to use, how to plan your shoot properly, what camera settings and techniques will work best, and much more.” *free
- Rocky Mountain School of Photography: How to photography the eclipse *free
- Of course if you’re the planning type and you really should be for this event one of the gold standard planning sites/apps is THE PHOTOGRAPHER’S EPHEMERIS
- Bruce Bishop, chief photographer at the Elyria Chronicle-Telegram, will be hosting a live, in-person how-to photograph the eclipse, Thursday, March 14 at 6:30 p.m., at the Avon Public Library. You’ll need to register. Bruce is a pretty popular photographer, so I bet space will fill up quick.
- NPPA: Want to photograph the April solar eclipse? Randall Benton knows what to do: Prepare. Pack. And drive.
- PetaPixel: Plan Your Trip to Photograph the 2024 Total Solar Eclipse With This App
- A helpful computational tool online for tracking the path of the sun.
- Filters
- Time and date location tracker online for those planning
2/ Winners in the first Professional Baseball Photographer Association (PBPA) contest have been announced. The results represent a collection of some pretty inspiring work. Take a look!
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3/ Peter DaSilva has re-launched sales of his OverExPosed camera plates and risers.
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4/ #JOB: Getty sports intern
5/ Inspirations:
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