October 25, 2011 by pmelcher.

Picture yourself, if you will, at a baseball game ( or soccer, or basketball). Imagine that each player, from each team has a HD video camera following his every move throughout the entire game. A few seconds after the game is finished, 5 of the best frames from all the video feeds are send to to publications worldwide.

Just like that.

How is this possible you say ? It is not. At least not yet. But it is coming soon.

Researcher at the University of Washington are currently working on what could be called “machine based photo editing”

Using videos of people speaking at a camera, they can teach a computer to extract the best frames that would make perfect portraits.

How do they do it ? Simple. They first use real people to select the best faces in a feed. They then teach the computer the elements that make a good portrait, like a visible smile, an expression, open eyes, etc and that’s it. They compare the machine edit with the real people edit and see if they have a perfect match. when they do, they know that they no longer need humans.

This wouldn’t have to be limited to sports photography. The same could be done for movie premieres, press conferences, political rallies and so on. In the amateur field, this would be perfect to cover parties, weddings or any family/friends events. Imagine, you are filming and you camera could automatically pick the best images and post them to Facebook.

Harder would be coverages of wars or any brutally unexpected events.

The push for machine based editing is already happening. Microstock companies, for example, would be delighted to get rid of the thousands of free lance photo editors that comb through their millions of submissions and give it to a 24/7/365 machine that would never ask for a raise.

Most photo agencies would certainly also be  delighted. Since the advent of digital and with the continuous drop in prices of cards, they have seen the volume of images submitted to them increase dramatically. Being able to instruct a computer on how to pick the best frames would cut costs dramatically.

The possibility of quickly and reliably edit from a video feed will soon open up the doors to impeccable photo coverage without the need of ever using a photographer. When ? in the next 5 year. And you thought that declining space rate prices was a challenge.

Posted in technology, commercial stock, celebrity, wire service, editorial, Microstock | Print | No Comments »

October 21, 2011 by pmelcher.

Drop everything you are doing, you are taking a spaceship. Not the kind that goes up for a few minutes and brings you back down. No, you are talking the Major Tom kind, destination Mars.
You have not much time to pack and the agency, in its infinite kindness, let’s you take one photograph. Only one. Choose carefully because it could be the only one you stare at for a very long time. You might even need it to explain earth to some wandering martian.
Think you know which one to take ? OK. Now look at what 100 photographers from around the world ( mostly photojournalists) have chosen.

The result is quite telling. A majority seem to take family pictures, like a trucker going on the road. Otherwise pick from their own portfolio, probably satisfied with their own work, and finally the last group will take classics, Eugene  Smith being the top pick.
O ya, there are two that picked an image of the earth. A souvenir !
What is interesting here is how the mind works. Choices here are mostly emotional, thus the family pictures. Emotional too is the choice of their seemingly favorite pictures taken from their own work. Probably because it brings them back to a place and time of reassurance. But others have chosen highly disturbing images ( mummified faces kissing). Will they really want to stare at it for 100 years of solitude ?

Posted in magazine, Social Media, web 2.0, photojournalism, slideshow, editorial | Print | No Comments »

October 5, 2011 by pmelcher.

Goksin was a tall man. In a country where most men are small (you have Napoleon and two world wars to thank for that), he was even taller, towering easily in the  crowded office of the company he build and named after himself.
But Goksin was tall for other reasons. He was always above anyone else when it had to do with news photography. He was always looking further and higher than anyone else. He was a giant.
The ancient Greeks believed that sometimes the Gods would come down to earth and take human form to play tricks on us. If the Greeks had a God of photography, he would have certainly resemble Goksin, and acted like him. He had an uncanny ability to outwit, outsmart and outperform anyone in his field always delivering the “plaque” to the amazement to everyone. He knew photojournalism better than anyone and knew the impact of photography better than any editor in chief.
Like the Greek gods, he had an acute sense of humor as well as deep warm love for his fellow human. His generosity knew no boundaries. But more so than anything, no one could escape his charm.
In a few seconds of meeting him, you would fall into his inescapable charm and forever remain at his service, which you did with immense pleasure. It is hard to beleive that he ever heard the word “no”.
He was an unbelievable worker to the point that most of us thought he would die behind his desk. He had a foresight like no one else and believed in you more than you ever could.
There is hardly no one in the photo world today that he hasn’t touch and inspired and we are all his forever in debt children.
To say he will be missed is obviously an understatement but he has left so much to so many people in this business that it is hard to say he is gone. He continues to live in agency owners who thrive to replicate his style, he lives in the inside voice of thousands of photographers around the world who keep on hearing ” a little more” every time they are on a shoot. He lives in photo department everywhere when editors look for that images that will end up as a double page spread and sell more copies.
The passion for photography that Goskin had was unlimited and we are forever in debt to him. He was that shoulder we all stand on.  We will have to learn how to live like orphans because today we lost all lost a father.

Posted in SIPA, newspaper, magazine, photojournalism, finance, france, editorial, news | Print | No Comments »