Well, here's an interesting situation. Moving from Sears to the local paper.
I hope at a minimum you're getting paid by the hour. I hope you'll
be getting more than $.25/mile reimbursement, since your cost of
operating your car is probably actually around $.65 but recent polls
indicate that most papers don't reimburse more than around a quarter,
and not even a 100% silver one at that.
If you're not actually on staff, not working at least 35 hours a week
with benefits, you need a contract, and one thing it should include
is a provision that your copyright rests with you, not with the
paper. In addition, if the paper feeds to the AP, make sure you fill
in all the IPTC info in your digi downloads and put in all the AP
restrictions so your work won't be used and resold by the AP without
compensation to you. If you're not on contract and you can't get
them to agree that your copyright belongs to you, then either you
need to get on staff with benefits, or you need to continue to try to
get the copyright issue resolved before you sign on.
Finally, you will shoot 80 shots per assignment, maybe, and then two
will get into print. The rest are not available to anyone for
reprints or release to officials of any sort. Release of them to the
public puts the paper into the position of having to accomodate
anyone who asks, included the lawyer for the defendent in a murder
case that you ended up photographing something which could be
evidence. You do not want to align your paper with any side in any
dispute. Cooperating with the police/courts/lawyers looks like
taking sides. If the paper you're about to begin work at doesn't
understand this, try to help them see how bad it would be if they
looked like they were supporting a side in an issue anywhere else but
on the editorial page. Newspapers generally should attempt to be
neutral without losing their gusto for the work.
Sometimes it's hard to do.
Join the National Press Photographer's Association and its discussion
list. http://www.nppa.org Take advantage of their courses and
weekend workshops.
Now, on to the job. With any luck you'll be stuck shooting grip 'n'
grins. Try to avoid, both by creative means and by researching
assignments ahead of time, shooting such stuff. It's advertising and
you should be being paid much more for that sort of work. The same
applies to the annual menu guides, business guides and similar things
that every newspaper sends its staff out to shoot. That work is for
advertising. It should be shot by freelance pros, or at the very
least for a real-world fee by the advertising department at the
paper. And you can bet the paper will have a well-paid advertising
department. Advertising is what newspapers are about, not news.
You may also shoot sports in dark spaces. What a wonderful
opportunity to learn how to use remotely fired lighting equipment,
and to learn each game and anticipate the shots. Remember that the
time you spend learning, following the kids and perfecting your
skills is on the clock and don't do any of it for free. If they
don't provide you with adequate equipment, make certain they pay for
it when you offer them the chance to improve the look of their paper.
If they don't respect your need for accuracy and understanding of
relationships, do it anyway and charge them for it and then you'll
have a vastly more useful skill for the next step.
Try not to be offended by the brutality of HS sports. Ice hockey is
unspeakable ugly, brutal to the body, football is hardly any less so.
Shoot at least 5-7 shots per situation, not per assignment, per
individual situation. Cute kids on pony rides = at least 25 shots
(6-8 for each kid), first day of school = 60-80 shots, you're not
going for the perfect shot, you're going for the cutest kid, the most
serious kid, the overall situation shots, the closeups, the
meeting-new-teacher shots, the anxious principal, or toddler shots.
The whole shootin' match. You're telling stories and there are many
little steps in the telling. It's a lot more like video - telling
these stories, because the stories move, the people move and kids
move, the situation is always in motion. Be constantly thinking
about what the story line is, and how you can best be telling it with
the camera. But don't pass up the beauty shots along the way.
People buy them too when they're run.
Get good at burning CDs and learn how to set up actions in Photoshop,
so your color adjustments and IPTC info inputting goes faster. I'm
assuming you're not just going to shoot and turn in your card for a
blank one. You're going to be in there at the computer, and probably
eventually at meetings more than you're going to be out shooting
assignments. As junior staff you're going to shoot Football on
Thanksgiving, big snowstorm on Christmas Day, car accident with local
mayor's inebriated under-age son on Saturday evening etc.
Always introduce yourself to the people you're going to photograph,
by name, and get their names right away. Address them according to
their age (remember they're most of them not infants being posed, or
new parents) and if you determine that they're honchos in town, treat
them with humor and respect but not an excess of deference. You are
there to do your work, not to serve them, but you need to create an
environment where you can manage them so you can get your job done
well. They really could give a s__t about the quality of your work
and you'll have to help them learn that they need to care about that.
Wear your press pass visibly at all times. Introduce yourself to the
Police and Fire people and do it before you need their cooperation to
do your job. If they try to boss you around, be cooperative but
resolve infringment of free speech issues quickly. Try to get your
paper to back you up.
Read all the newspapers you can take the time to read and look at how
the captions are composed.
It's a blast, but newspaper work is the bottom of the pay and rights
totem pole. Especially as a part timer the beancounters at the paper
will see you as a cog in the wheel and one they can always afford to
use on the cheap. Lower than Sears portrait studio.
Good luck.
--
Emily L. Ferguson
mailto:elf@cape.com
508-563-6822
New England landscapes, wooden boats and races, press photography
http://www.vsu.cape.com/~elf
