Its About Integrity

This photograph ran in the Houston Peach Yesterday, from a Perry/Peach County baseball game. It was taken by fellow staff photographer Grant Blankenship. Grant is one incredible sports shooter, very innovative in what he does. He told sports writer Robyn Disney he was gonna rock the Peach, and he did.

Someone called me yesterday to ask about the photo, didn't think it was real. Asked if the picture was enhanced in the computer, did Grant place the ball in the photo. Said the ball was too sharp, yada, yada, yada. I explained that we do not do that. What you see in our pictures is what we capture with our cameras. We are bound by our ethics to be honest with our work. You don't add anything, you don't remove anything. Don't even crop out part of the photo that will alter its integrety. We don't set up our pictures either. Some media folks do, but we don't. Altering a photograph will get you fired, and it should. But it is not the fear of loosing a job that keeps us away from digital diddling. It is a huge pride in what we do. And by the way, the Photo Department of the Telegraph is a bunch of very professional, highly skilled and gifted people. Don't question our skills or integrity.

Like Grant said yesterday "What would be the fun of doing it in Photoshop. The fun comes from the challenge of getting the photo." Yes fun. Grant is like me, What we do is fun, meeting the challenges that come with what we do. We play. We shoot to get the money shot, the one we gotta have to cover our butts, then we play. That is how you keep learning, how you get those pictures that just pop off the page. And the Telegraph photos usually pop. Statewide professional journalism contest results were just released. 14 of 18 won by the Telegraph were for photos.

This was not an easy picture to shoot. It was done with a 300mm f2.8 lens and a 1.4 extender, making a 420mm lens.No depth of field. Pre focused on a spot between the batter and the pitcher. Grant said he has been trying to shoot this picture for the last 4 or 5 games. Tuesday it worked. "I was dissatisfied with pictures shot from that particular angle," he said. "I spent time at each game working on this before getting down to business. There are pictures you have to get."

"It's kinda cool when it works. You can't do it more than once. Creating it in Photoshop would not have been rewarding at all." You go, Grant. This is what we are, photographers...photojournalist. Not graphic artists.