The Art of Seeing [antikvár]

mmimmimikzi mimm THE ART OF SEEING FOREWORD In 1985 Reuters entered the news pictures business. From its black-and-white origins, the Reuters News Pictures Service has become the world's leading and most technologically advanced picture agency. Back in those days, once back at the darkroom, it often took an hour for a photographer to develop the film, edit, make a print, and transmit it to an editing centre that could relay it to clients. A huge amount of equipment was necessary for this. Often, it would have been easier to charter a cargo plane than to battle with irate airline ground staff while attempting to board an aircraft with what seemed to be a mixture between a rock star's equipment and a mad professor's laboratory. Travelling through hostile environments carrying this strange load made you wonder what kind of a profession you were in. Since that time technological advances have revolutionized the industry: digital cameras and ultra-light laptops have truly changed our work practices. For example, during the World Cup finals in France in 1998 Reuters capitalized on its investment in digital camera and transmission technologies - and, as Brazil scored the opening goal of the tournament against Scotland, newspapers and magazines were amazed to receive images of the moment only seven minutes after the ball had hit the back of the net. These new technologies mean that on any particular day Reuters photographs from around the world are seen by millions of online, newspaper, and magazine readers. The Internet itself has also impacted upon the business: the fast-evolving world of Internet news demands pictures that meet constantly updated deadlines for ever-changing online pages. We are moving towards the age of the real-time pictures service. However, it is obviously not just speed-to-market that is important for a news service or its clients. The Reuters News Pictures Service embodies the core values of the world's largest information and news provider. Our clients trust our content; they know that the image in front of them has not been altered electronically and that the events recorded in the picture are genuine. Not only that, our clients can always be assured as to the quality of the images we can offer. Being a Reuters photographer is about skill and commitment and the thrill of being in the fast lane of a fast business, where news never stops and there is always a deadline somewhere in the world. In this environment dedication to the job is paramount. Our photographers have to be in the right place at the right time, and even then they have to exhibit real vision and talent as they may have to get a certain angle to record a split-second moment and capture an image that is the definitive, truly newsworthy photo. These are perhaps the essential characteristics for the best photojournalists: a nose for a story, an eye for a photo, and a finger on the button. The work of our photographers has been honoured with many prizes, and you will find in this book one of this year's winning World Press Photo images. Yannis Behrakis' picture of a Kosovo Albanian funeral (p.54) was part of his winning portfolio in the General News category.