History Is Made: Press Photographer Covers Live Presidential Speech

 

 

By Donald R. Winslow
© 2011 News Photographer magazine

WASHINGTON, DC (June 22, 2011) – A little bit of White House photojournalism history was quietly made behind the scenes tonight: for the first time an independent press photographer made live photographs of the President of the United States during a televised address to the nation.

Until tonight, the old White House practice was to keep photographers out and then let them make pictures afterwards. All that changed after President Barack Obama's speech about the raid to kill Osama bin Laden.

When it became a matter of public debate over President Obama "reenacting" about 30 seconds of his live address after the bin Laden announcement, for the benefit of five still photographers in the White House pool who had been kept out of the East Room during the actual speech, the White House press office decided to call a halt to the old policy. White House press spokesman Josh Earnest said the practice "was a bad idea."

Negotiations between the White House and the White House Correspondents' Association resulted in a new agreement: a Pool situation that would allow one still photographer to photograph the President's live TV addresses – under some strict guidelines to control camera noise, and restrictions on motion so as not to distract the President as he speaks.

Doug Mills, of The New York Times, is a board member of WHCA and he negotiated the new photo pool agreement on June 1. Tonight's application of the Pool plan was the first time since the bin Laden speech to try out the new photo strategy. The first member of the Pool to draw the historic assignment tonight was the Associated Press. And the photographer was AP's Pablo Martinez Monsivais.

"We had two cameras in the room," AP Washington photo chief J. David Ake told News Photographer magazine tonight minutes after the speech.

"Both cameras were covered in soft blimps. One was mounted on a tripod directly under the TV camera. It was operated in Live View mode and trigged by a hard-wired cable. The other camera was hand held off to the side by Pablo Martinez Monsivais. It was also operated in Live View mode. He used a WiFi module attached to the camera to push four pictures to me as I sat in the Briefing Room. These images were moved [to the Pool members] live, during the actual speech."

Ake said that after the TV address, the camera's memory cards were ingested and from the entire take he edited more images. "A total of 10 Pool photos were distributed simultaneously to the major news organizations by a pushed FTP server maintained by AP," Ake said.

During President Obama's speech in May about the raid to kill bin Laden, the only photographers inside the East Room were White House photographers Pete Souza and Chuck Kennedy. Using cameras on Live View mode that night, Souza and Kennedy photographed the President as he spoke and those images, and the two photographers' success, were the real-life template that was used to discuss the new technology that was applied by Martinez Monsivais tonight. That set-up was worked into the the terms of the new Pool photo agreement.

The members of the new photographic Pool agreement are the Associated Press, Agence France-Presse, Reuters, and The New York Times. The Times has taken the place of the Magazine photographer in the White House tight pool. The Independent Still Photographers (ISP) are not part of the tight pool.

In his first live televised address to the nation since the bid Laden speech in May, tonight President Obama spoke about the war in Afghanistan and said that all 33,000 additional U.S. forces that he ordered to Afghanistan in December 2009 will be out by September 2012.

Within minutes of his address beginning, the President's photograph shot by Martinez Monsivais from the cut-away position where he was seated was on the front of The New York Times web site.

 

 

 

 

 

NPPA Marketplace

Insure Your Equipment

You go where the action is….so should your insurance! Hays delivers comprehensive insurance for your gear - covering cameras, computers, editing equipment and rental.

Join the NPPA

NPPA members receive a wide range of benefits, from educational opportunities to mentoring, exclusive discounts, insurance options, business tips, and much more.