#shaw suffers from a lack of style AND substance. and he thinks he can make up for it by addressing Big Ideas

[britneyshakespeare]

If I learned one thing from reading Major Barbara by George Bernard Shaw it's that if I ever feel inclined to suffer through one of his plays again I'm going to opt for watching it, because it does not stand up to the labor of reading

[thelifeofm]

Contests Schmontests: a few thoughts

It’s that time of year again… AKA photo contest time. I wrote this post 5 years ago after judging POYi for the first time, and housed it on a blog I’ve long-since scrubbed clean. But figured it was worth reposting now since the same conversations are happening now about the winning images. 

----- Judging POYi is such a unique experience that I wanted to share some thoughts and insights with you. From February 2-6, 2015, AP Photo Editor Jacqueline Larma, South African photojournalist (and last year’s 2nd place POY portfolio winner) James Oatway, WIRED Magazine Director of Photography Patrick Witty and I looked at about 10,770 unique images at the University of Missouri’s 72nd annual POYi competition. 

We were judging the News Division — with categories ranging from Feature and Portrait to Human Conflict and Issue Reporting to Portfolio of the Year.

It was an incredible honor to look through the best pictures of the year to determine the VERY best. For me, the goal going into the week was not to not only recognize a very high level of work done this year, and give it a second life, but also to help establish the benchmark for the next year’s work. The magnitude of that task weighed heavily. And I guarantee you, it wasn't taken lightly.

One thing we kept returning to as a judging team was that, above all, this is a photojournalism competition. At its most basic level, the photography has to be there. The quality of the pictures is paramount.

We removed several really good pictures from the competition because of carelessness on the photographer’s part (or sometimes on the part of the entry coordinator — yes some publications actually still have people that enter contests for their staff — which amazes me). Small things like a dirty sensor, poor toning, low res images and crops that left lines or borders on the edges were difficult to get past. This contest is for Pictures of the Year. Before you enter, take a second to ensure there’s nothing detracting from your image.

On a higher plane, come the intangibles. What is this picture saying? Is it truthful? Does the photographer have a voice and a vision, are they moving photography forward with their image? It’s not enough to simply show up (f8 and be there), point, and shoot. When everyone with a camera phone fancies themselves a photographer, we have to set ourselves apart by approaching situations skillfully — photography is, after all, a craft.

Moments always weigh heaviest for me. But there are other elements like mood, composition, light, and what the photographer is trying to say, that we took into account as well. It’s not enough to show up, you have to bring something to the image as well.

That said, judging is a very subjective process. Put different judges on any year's contest jury, and the winners might be different. I think the phrase “best” isn’t necessarily a qualitative term, it’s a quantitative one. A majority of the judges have to agree that it's the best, not all...

We asked ourselves: which pictures resonate with us…. four people from totally different and diverse backgrounds. One thing that was obvious is that when you respect what the other judges bring to the table, it’s an incredibly fascinating process to go through. We talked about the pictures, a lot. You have to be able to articulate why something is good, not just that it is. 

But perhaps the biggest thing I learned from this process is that good judging is about compromise and consensus. It’s not a perfect process, no contest is, but when done right... it’s incredibly fair. Ultimately, the other three judges and I had the utmost respect for the work we were looking at, and wanted the best of the best to be recognized. 

I say that because I got text messages, emails and phone calls after judging was over asking why a certain story didn’t win, or a certain issue not rise up and be recognized. And the bottom line is this: it's hard to second-guess judging because it doesn't come down to one person's opinion... it comes down to a collective vote by just a handful of people that you've put your trust into.

I'll also say this: you can only judge the work that’s there against other work that’s there. I know that there was some powerful work done in 2014 that wasn’t entered. I know that we saw better pictures of certain events or moments on the wires or newspapers, but that work wasn’t entered. You can’t judge a best of anything contest against the ideal stuck in your head — that’s not fair. You have to weigh the strengths and weaknesses of what’s on the screen in front of you — the end. (On a side note: I hate contests that refuse to award a 1st place, and just give a 2nd and 3rd... It's a contest of, the year, you judge what's there. Because that's the best of what you've got. Period.)

Issue Reporting story was, in my mind, one of the strongest categories this year. And it was my favorite to judge. It shows how deeply people are digging in their own backyards to tell important stories.

Brad Vest’s look at the residents of a Memphis Housing project took us inside this place, put a face on the people there, had heart, and a beautiful aesthetic. The pacing and editing of it really felt like every picture pushed the narrative forward a little bit more, adding something to the story. Lisa Krantz’s story on obesity took us inside the life of San Antonio’s Hector Garcia. It had intimacy and depth. It told an important story about a powerful issue and did so with beauty and dignity for the subject. And notice how both of those photographers also had winning portfolios, because those issues, those in-depth stories, those important and incredible moments, carried them through.

The Staten Island Ferry Portrait Series that placed second resonated with me for the same reason: it’s such a good reminder that you don’t always have to go far or seek out the exotic to make interesting and compelling images.

Feature Picture Story was (again, in my mind, I’m not speaking for the other judges here) one of the weakest categories. It felt like a dumping ground for event coverage, for collections of images photographers were lumping together, for fluff that lacked both substance and style. Without purpose, 12 pretty photos from the State Fair do not a picture story make. Make those pretty images, but then ask yourself what you’re trying to say about this place, these people, this thing… AND FIND A WAY TO SAY IT. The feature stories that won, did so deservingly — especially the first place winner which is a quiet, yet almost lyrical way of telling a story. Different, yet emotive. Powerful, yet thoughtful. But the drop off was steep after the ones that placed.

Before we began judging the Newspaper Portfolio round, contest coordinator Rick Shaw reminded us that there’s no such thing as a perfect portfolio. And he’s right. Although some portfolios came close, ultimately, picking a winner came down to weighing the strengths and weaknesses of a body of work. For me, stories held more weight in the portfolio, because that’s really when you get to see a photographer’s strengths: how they work through a story, how they edit it, how their ideas translate into moments. And then how do the singles back this up?

It helps to look at things in a grid form, all together in a contact sheet, to see how things not only look, but feel, as a group. Are there any clunkers that are bringing it down? Is there a frame there that because of aesthetic or approach feels like it was shot by a different photographer? Are you putting a weak sports or spot news photo into your portfolio to fill a hole or is it really necessary and does it add to the work? It’s definitely given me a lot to think about when assembling my own portfolio for future contests.

The state of the newspaper industry is lousy right now. With layoffs and buyouts, losing experience and expertise hurts. I saw that come through in the editing time-and-time again. There were stories and portfolios that were too long, redundant, or full of too many pointless unnecessary photos. Those we eliminated. It sucks thinking, this is a great photographer… if only they had a good editor.

But the winners give me some hope for the industry. There’s no question that there’s still some amazing work out there by photographers who are findings ways to get it done. There are brave photographers willing to risk their lives to make images that show us the suffering, brutality and inhumanity of conflict. There are inspiring and innovative photographers who are finding new and different ways to make images. And there are concerned photographers digging deeper into their own communities to shed a light on the darkness.

Contests aren’t perfect. And entering them isn’t either. Just because a set of judges doesn’t pick an image doesn’t mean it’s bad. It just means it didn’t resonate with those judges in that place on that day. 

And if you win something and have a photo that places, congratulations. It’s a feather in your cap, a pat on the back and hopefully some validation to take back to your bosses to remind them why we need the time and space to do what we do.

The opportunity to see how your own work stands up to the work that’s being chosen is a learning experience. And if your work’s not quite there this year, you know where the bar has been set. Hopefully it’s a motivator more than a deterrent. More than anything though, what I hope people get out of contests is the conversations they spark. The debates about photos are healthy, as long as they’re constructive.

And with all that said: the most important thing to remember is judging is incredibly subjective and it depends on a lot of factors coming together and aligning perfectly — one of the biggest being luck.

[harvest-honeymoon]

So I had a revelation last night, folks. I know the reason why the Minutemen feels unfinished to me. Before anyone jumps on this claiming it's Preston's fault for being badly written or badly implemented as an introductory faction mechanic, /stop./ No. Preston is far from that and gets the shitstick because he's the first you meet. No one /ever/ gives any shit to Dez, Carrington, Tinker Tom, PAM, Rhys, Haylen, Teagan, Quinlan, and others I'm sure I'm missing but I feel redundant in mentioning because they're quest giving characters. The rough thing about the Minutemen is while it's a cool concept, a build-your-own faction, it lacks a lot of the substance of other factions because the game doesn't question the morality of the Minutemen nearly as much as the other factions. The Minutemen have Superman syndrome and it really limits the dynamics it can have with other factions in the Fallout universe, which is a damn /shame/ because what little pieces the player is given are incredibly fascinating. Take Deacon and Preston's conversation when you switch them out for each other. If you switch Deacon for Preston, the dialogue goes like so: Deacon: (sarcastically) Oh boy, it's an honest to goodness Minuteman. And here's me without my autograph book. Preston: Deacon. You ever want to fight for a cause bigger than a handful of people, you get back to me. They don't interact if you switch Preston for Deacon, because it's clear they have ideological differences. The Minutemen and Railroad are both decent factions with desires to help people who suffer under oppression and poverty, but the Minutemen don't acknowledge the nuance of synthetic existence at all. They see everyone as equal and capable, and more than anything, they don't want to see the commonwealth oppressed by a higher power like the Brotherhood or the Institute. They mirror the Patriots of the Revolutionary War, in this way, from their clothes to their armaments, all the way to their beliefs. This sort of dynamic is super interesting, especially considering comments you can hear from others about the Minutemen where they're seen as a bunch of redneck hicks who can't cooperate with each other. The Minutemen fell apart due to ideological differences and a lack of cooperation from settlements, after all. On top of that, part of why the Minutemen don't work as well is because you only have Preston but no opportunities to meet others in the faction, save for Ronnie Shaw (who arrives during Old Guns), Clint (who betrayed the Minutemen for the Gunners), and Sturges (who's weirdly off to the side with the whole thing save for teaching you how to build a settlement and getting into the Institute if you choose the Minutemen ending??). Anyone else is mentioned completely in passing or is glanced over because they're dead, and when you resurrect the Minutemen, a bunch of random schmucks just... Join your army. You don't meet /any/ of these people or choose them from your settlements, which you'd think is a /General/ thing to do, but no, apparently not, because Todd Howard wills it. You're suddenly just powerful enough to wield an army because you happened to slap down 2 Tato plants, a water pump, and a Turret on some random guy in bumfuck-nowhere's settlement. It's even funnier if you think about it related to the female SS's backstory. Unlike her husband, who has a military background, she's a fucking /lawyer/. That's a far jump, even if a lot of law practicing folks got involved in the Revolutionary War, but they still needed to network and protest in order to earn respect in the Revolution! And yet there's basically /none/ of that in the game other than the settlement mechanic, which while pretty good, gets tiring /really fast,/ because you have one sort of quest from one guy revisiting the same locations over and over again. Now here's where I think it could've been fixed. Fallout is known for both its large and small factions you meet along the way, but Fallout 4 lacks in small factions you can join and interact with in the vanilla game. The only major one I can recall is Covenant, which I felt was interesting and well executed, especially regarding the new dynamic that comes with implementing synths as a race. Everyone else you kill or hardly interact with, save for DLCs which either supplement old factions in sort of janky way (im looking at you Nuka World) or add new factions in specific locations that don't contribute to their equivalents back in the Commonwealth. This got me wondering... What if you could run into splinters of the Minutemen and recruit them back into the Minutemen's fold? Think about it; the Minutemen have deep parallels with the Patriots of the Revolutionary War. They're a pure distillation of the ideology, methods, and aesthetic of the people who founded the United States of America, in /Boston./ If there's any place ripe for American political commentary, it's here! They're already hitting those notes by including the Railroad and the debates related to synthetic kind. That and they did it in other games!! Fallout 3, with its inclusion of the Enclave, satirizes America's attitude during WWII by parodying FDR and Harry S. Truman through President Eden and his views of the Wasteland. These two presidents eventually lead to America's first dropping of the Atomic Bomb, which makes complete sense in the Fallout universe and it's very appropriate since its set in Washington DC. Satirizing American philosophy and foreign policy in the form of these tiny factions would be totally in line with their brand of satire. You could get quests from Preston where he tells you about a rogue group of Minutemen popping up after retaking and reoutfiting the Castle. He'll give you a location they've settled down it, so you head down and meet them. They each have a leader, they've got different outfits and weapons, and they're all interested in your display of power. Talking to them, you have a number of actions you can take, all of which the companions of the game could react to in differing ways. You could convince them to rejoin your army via bribing, charisma checks, or threats. You could explore the history of the Minutemen, how the different factions might want to do things, and have it influence your play style as General. You could kill them or make enemies with them if they didn't line up with your views and have them be a new, occasional enemy to attack your settlements. That, and if you successfully recruit them, they're people you specifically brought in that you got to know and took the time to negotiate with, which makes your accomplishments as General feel more genuine. They could also give you quests, which lessens the load of the quest giving role for Preston and makes him more approachable to players instead of a meme. I'm going to add to this as I think more on it, feel free to add on this