Photography – Representation In Media

Photography is a hobby for many people and a professional for many others. Some people invest their time, energy and career in nature photography while some others do it for capturing the faces of injustice in a war torn country. Either ways photography plays a bigger role in bringing us closer to the world through pictures.

Photojournalism is one such career that many people opt for as it fulfills the dual need of journalism and photography.

Photojournalism is referred as still photography though news channels and television journalists like to shoot a video, which is a technologically advanced form of photography.

New breeds of photographers have started experimenting with candid photography, which for all its commercial purpose has been a success. Photography has indeed branched out in so many niche applications that it can now be seen as a full-fledged career option.

The credit goes to photojournalism, as this was the starting career option until it branched out into various other forms. The first event related photography can be dated back to the 1850’s and they were being printed as engravings. Some of the famous events like the Crimean War from 1853 to 1856 led to some pioneering works in photography by Roger Fenton and William Simpson.

The latter worked with the Illustrated London News. Their photographs of the War were engraved before they were published. The same was the case with Matthew Brady who took photographs of the American Civil War as they were engraved first before being printed in Harper’s Weekly. Some of the most acclaimed photographs were also displayed in Museums like the Fratelli Alinari - Archivi Alinari, George Eastman House, German Historical Museum, Helios, Museum Of Modern Art, New York and many more.

The Daily Graphic, New York published the first half tone photograph on March 4, 1880. This also meant that photographs don’t have to be engraved anymore before being published. Through progressive innovations, by 1897 it was possible to print a halftone photograph on the printing press. Many innovations later, with the dawn of 1930 started the Golden age of photojournalism. The commercial 35mm Leica camera was developed in 1925, and the flash bulbs followed between 1927 and 1930 to mark the start of the Golden era.

The Golden age between 1930 and 1950 helped magazines and newspapers build their reputation and readership through news articles with photographs. This was also the time when Mother Dorothea Lange brought out seminal photos of the Great Depression.

After the Golden age, in 1960 many other innovations took photography to a new level. The camera’s now had electronic flash, auto-focus, motor drives, good lenses and other enhancements that made it easier to take pictures of objects, people and motion. Then the micro-drive was introduced and it helped photographers store hundreds of positives on a single chip.

Today, technology has gone many steps ahead by bringing in digital cameras through which photographers can not only take hundreds of picture and save it but they can also change the background or improve the color with the help of computer software. We are truly in a digital world today where photography has adorned a three dimensional change.