Horrible way to break into Photography?

[Scik]

Thanks for all the wonderful comments and interesting ideas. I feel much better about the decision I made to avoid this issue. If it had been my job already, or I had been there, it may have been a different situation, but as it is it best for me to stay away.

I have to agree that, given the chance, if a photographer is in a position to report a story to the world, they should take that opportunity. Unfortunately, I would not have been doing anything more than hundreds of others were already doing in a inappropriate hope that I would get a chance in the profession by capturing an image. Which I still feel is the wrong way to go about it.

I think my main holdup was my reasoning. Had my reasoning been to document the tragedy, and not for personal gain, I probably would not have stopped myself.

I feel much better about the entire situation now. Thanks again!

[rediguana]

I have no problem if you are being paid to do a job. I imagine that I would be paid to do mine.

Where I feel the line is crossed however, is where photographers try to make a good little additional income from the continual sale of photos well after the event. That I feel is inappropriate in the case of disaster. I have no problem with attribution, just the desire of photographers to create arecurring revenue stream from other people misfortune. Just my personal opinion of course.

The increasing democratisation of photography means that the whole issue will become relatively mute in the not-to-distant future as your average Joe Blow decides to sell his shots for 1/100th the price of a professional photographer on a stock photography website, or even for free. This will make it that much harder to monetise the shots anyway as the professional will no longer be able to demand such a high price. (Of course this is not just an issue for disasters, but photography in general - just look at some of the changes that blogging has had on the traditional media.)

A case in point is perhaps all of the amateur footage - both photo and video - that appeared after the Boxing Day earthquake and tsunami.

Cheers Gav

[Saralonde]

Interesting thing about photographing people in the midst of personal tragedy. There is no way I could do it, yet some of the most emotional photographs I've ever seen do this. To show a far off bombing in a war detaches us somewhat; to show a burned naked little girl running from the bombing rips your heart and strengthens your resolve to help end a useless war. Showing dirty, weary 911 workers digging through the rubble or carrying a dead priest or even the falling bodies of the people jumping to their deaths is shocking and horrifying, but it personalizes the tragedy in a way that haunts us forever. Photographs of concentration camp victims from WWII showed the world the unthinkable. Oftentimes it is the human element that we remember most.