Street Shooting with Peter Turnley

[stunsworth]

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Sounds a lot like street photography huh?

 

My definition would be that a photojournalist is someone who takes photographs and assembles them into, for want of a better word, a story. So someone like Salgado is a photojournalist, but Turnley most certainly isn't.

 

At the end of the day we're arguing over definitions, personally I prefer to look at photographs. I would never claim that Turnley is the world's best photographer, but on the other hand he isn't anywhere near as bad as has been mentioned above.

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[phatnev]

My definition would be that a photojournalist is someone who takes photographs and assembles them into, for want of a better word, a story. So someone like Salgado is a photojournalist, but Turnley most certainly isn't.

 

At the end of the day we're arguing over definitions, personally I prefer to look at photographs. I would never claim that Turnley is the world's best photographer, but on the other hand he isn't anywhere near as bad as has been mentioned above.

 

I agree about Turnley being good, not the best, and certainly not bad. However I think you absolutely have to categorize him as a PJ, there's not even really an argument to be made to the contrary. The following link is some of the finest photojournalism I've seen in a long time and is indeed Turnley's work:

 

Peter Turnley - 20th Anniversary: The Fall of the Iron Curtain - Digital Journalist

 

I'm a photojournalist myself, and in my experience the vast majority of photojournalism is produced to accompany something else, most times a written story in a newspaper/magazine/website. I've put together a few pieces that are worthy of being called "stories" but usually it's just accompanying art to an article. Doisneau was certainly a photojournalist, and a lot of his photographs can also be considered "street photography" and I believe the same can be said for Turnley.

[stunsworth]

I think you absolutely have to categorize him as a PJ, there's not even really an argument to be made to the contrary. The following link is some of the finest photojournalism I've seen in a long time and is indeed Turnley's work:

 

Peter Turnley - 20th Anniversary: The Fall of the Iron Curtain - Digital Journalist

 

I stand corrected, there are some excellent photographs in that article.

[glenerrolrd]

Some interesting responses to one of my original posts. Going back to it made me think about how this brief two weeks changed my approach to photography. Spending the time out on the street ..walking around with a pair of Leica M cameras is a joy in itself. The most important learning was that ....if I could just slow down and look around ..there are wonderful opportunities to photograph everywhere.

 

Regarding the quality of Peter s work.....some of it was done for its specific news value(he was a feature photographer for Newsweek for a number of years and had 40 covers) and other assignments have a fine art style. Everyone can be a critic but there shouldn t be much doubt that Peter is an excellent photographer.

 

But that wasn t the point of the original post. I was commenting on Peter s value to me personally as teacher and a coach.

 

Since I originally posted this ....I have done numerous trips for the purpose of street shooting and have taken over 40K new images. I need serious improvement in my editing process!

 

That level of inspiration is priceless.