On Tue, Nov 24, 1998 at 04:12:51PM -0800, Bradley Mabb wrote:
> >I understand your point, but for me personally, I would never consider
> >missing a picture of someone else's suffering as missing "the shot of a
> >lifetime"...
> Missed the point entirely, Lee. It's seeing the professionalism and
> training of the firemen in operation that makes it the great photo,not
> the suffering of the victim. In fact, the great shot would probably NOT
> include the victim inside, just the firemen at work.
This is one of my hot buttons...I spent 17 years as a volunteer
EMT/paramedic.
Great photojournalism of accident scenes and such does not require, or even
suggest, showing the victim in an identifiable way. I've never understood
why news photographers - especially TV news cameramen, but also newspaper
photographers - feel compelled to move around until they can get a clear
shot of a patient's face, or why they get so irritated when the requirements
of patient care mandate that I get between their lens and the patient.
The public's right to know does not in any way supersede a patient's right
to privacy in his time of distress. When I have to grab a camera by the
front of the lens and push to get the back door of my ambulance closed,
something's wrong.
As Brad mentioned, you can get great, expressive, compelling, whatever
you're after shots of accident scenes without showing the victim at all.
What's more interesting, anyway - a face covered in blood, or a team of
rescuers trying to gain access to an overturned truck with the cab crushed
inward?
I agree with Lee's sentiment, as well...but the two are not mutually
exclusive. I would love nothing more than to have paramedics put out of
business for lack of work...but it just ain't gonna happen, so we have to
make the best of it.
ObOM: I'd like to get some good photographs of accident scenes, and the best
way to do so unintrusively at night is available light - of which not a lot
is sometimes available. If I go to some kind of superfast film and nice fast
lenses (100/2 or so), am I gonna be able to take pictures that I can show
people later, or will the grain or the camera shake or the wide variations
in exposure from where the medics are pointing their flashlights and the
rest of the scene conspire against me? Will I need to go out and get an OM-4
to have any chance of getting reliable meter readings?
Have a safe and happy Thanksgiving, folks, and don't operate heavy machinery
after you've had a few...lest you become the subject of someone else's shot
of a lifetime, instead of being on the other side of the camera.
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