Artificial Intelligence, press photography and The BPPA’s position

This image was altered from a photograph taken at Kew Gardens in under five minutes using text commands and the new Generative AI functions built into Adobe Photoshop by a user who had never tried this function before. If this is what a beginner can do with no training, imagine what someone who knows what they are doing could achieve.

At a time when Artificial intelligence (or AI for short) is being simultaneously hailed as the technology that will change all of our lives for the better and for the worse it has become obvious that it plays two very distinct roles in press photography.

There’s “good AI” that helps us to caption images faster and more accurately as well as toning and even cropping pictures with greater accuracy and speed. On the flip side we have a form of artificial intelligence known as Generative AI that has made its way into our industry and which has rapidly become one of the greatest threats that press photographers have faced in recent times.

Generative AI creates artificial pictures using text prompts alone. It doesn’t take your existing image and “improve” it – it’s far cleverer than that. Trained by Machine Learning (ML) with access to billions of real photographs it uses your words and creates something that can often be frighteningly good at the same time as being, well, frightening. Most of the pictures that this form of AI uses as its source material have been copied without either the permission of or payment to the photographers who took them. This constitutes a breach of copyright on an industrial scale.

Generative AI threatens not only our intellectual property rights, but the also the ethics and aesthetics of who we are and what we do. A large percentage of the public have already learned to be sceptical about the honesty of images. “Oh that’s been Photoshopped” is an all-too-common refrain whose potency will be dwarfed by the mistrust of imagery that will become commonplace should AI be allowed to take a hold.

Getty Images has reacted to the general release of the latest Adobe Creative Cloud tools saying that “Getty Images does not accept files created using AI generative models. This includesAdobe’s recently announced Creative Cloud tools, which are now available with its Firefly‑powered generative AI tools built in”.

In our mission statement The British Press Photographers’ Association affirms that we exist “To promote and inspire the highest ethical, technical and creative standards from withing our industry”.

Our highly talented and dedicated members create authentic photographs of reality, drawing on their talent, insight, experience and inspiration. Generative AI produces false, sterile, artless and soulless images, draining all that is human out of the visual arts.

By creating utterly fake but seemingly realistic pictures, of people and events with no existence beyond the computer screen Generative AI threatens public trust in press photography and photojournalism.

We are the eyes of the public. The public trust us to provide an accurate and honest depiction of the news, essential to the functioning of a democratic society.

Fake news threatens both them and us. To separate fact from fiction and truth from falsehood it is now essential to identify both AI images and genuine photographs, putting their provenance beyond doubt.

The BPPA welcomes proposals for legislation, by amongst others the UK and the EU, to enforce the labelling of all AI pictures. We are in support of schemes such as the Content Authenticity Initiative which would allow our members to be part of a program to assure the credibility of genuine photographs and in turn maintain the reputation of press photography.

Assignments 2023 travels to Wales

Following a hugely successful showing of Assignments 2023 at the Bargehouse in London, we are delighted to announce that the exhibition is now moving to Wales.

The exhibition will be available to view in full at Ffotogallery in Cardiff from June 8 until July 22.

All are welcome to come to the opening night on June 8 where we will also have a talk by Joann Randles, our 2022 Portrait Photographer of the Year.

The BPPA are delighted to bring ‘Assignments23’ to Wales for the first time following on from our London exhibition. It is our aim to take the photographs on from their initial showing to other parts of the UK, giving them a wider audience and we’re delighted to be working with Ffotogallery to bring this incredible representation of British press photography to Cardiff.” – Chair of the BPPA Paul Ellis

More information can be found at Ffotogallery’s website

Amendment to the Public Order Bill

Suella Braverman attends a Cabinet Meeting, 31st January 2023. ©Jamie Lorriman

The Guardian has reported that the upcoming Public Order Bill will be amended to give journalists covering protests extra protection following the unjustifiable arrests of photographers, a filmmaker and reporters at Just Stop Oil actions last year. The House of Lords recognised that changes were needed to the bill and voted for changes to be made. According to The Guardian, Home Secretary, The Rt Hon Suella Braverman MP, will table her own amendment to add extra protections saying that

“A constable may not exercise a police power for the sole purpose of preventing a person from observing or reporting on a protest”.

The BPPA has been lobbying for all UK police forces to make sure that their officers understand the role of the media. If changes to The Bill are made and, if this amendment is included, this goes some way towards meeting what we and other organisations have been calling for.

The BPPA’s Press Photographer of the Year 2022 Results

We are delighted to announce that Reuters photographer Hannah McKay has been named as The BPPA’s Press Photographer of the Year for 2022. More than 2000 photographs taken throughout the year were entered into the 10 categories by photographers working in the UK and abroad. Members of the association were then invited to vote for they favourite entries in each category with members of the board then choosing the overall winning portfolio from the category winners..

Category Winners

  • Arts & Entertainment- Robert Perry
  • Business – Simon Hulme
  • Essay – Simon Townsley
  • Essay (death of a monarch) Victoria Jones
  • News – Hannah McKay
  • Portrait – Joann Randles
  • Royal – Max Mumby
  • Sport (action) – Ben Stansall
  • Sport (away from the action) – Eddie Keogh
  • Young Photographer – George Cracknell-Wright

Highly Commended

  • Arts & Entertainment – Julian Simmonds
  • Business – Danny Lawson
  • Essay – Kiran Ridley
  • Essay (death of a monarch) – Ben Stansall
  • News – Chris Furlong
  • Portrait – Chris Furlong
  • Royal – James Whatling
  • Sport (action) – Shaun Botterill
  • Sport (away from the action) – Justin Setterfield, Michael Steele and Neil Hall
  • Young Photographer – Molly Darlington

Comment from the Chair:

It’s been another great year for The BPPA’s competition with an increase in the number of entries on last year and also the number of members of our association having their say as to who should be named as winners of each category. The quality of the images is absolutely first class.

It felt that 2022 provided more breaking news and sporting events to focus on than ever before. With the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee in the summer and then the time following her passing later in the year, I feel that the galleries of photographs in the ‘Royal’ and ‘Photo Essay – Death of a monarch’ categories show how incredibly high the standard of press photography is in this country.

The war in Ukraine has demonstrated the skill and bravery of photographers and many of their images are displayed in our ‘News’ and ‘Essay’ categories. On the sporting front, The Commonwealth Games, World Gymnastics as well as The World Cup and Premier League provided just a few of the subjects on show in the sporting categories.

The Arts, Business and Portraits really do show how creative photographers can be. Also, I’m delighted that once again we have a winner from the regional press as well as freelance winners based in Scotland and Wales representing press photography across the country.

I’d like to thank everyone for entering, judging and to the team at The BPPA for their hard work to run this competition on behalf of press photographers.

Paul Ellis, Chair, The BPPA

We would like to thank our friends at Canon for their continued support

The BPPA’s Press Photographer of the Year Competition 2022

We’re delighted to announce that The BPPA’s Press Photographer of the Year will be open for entries on Monday 16th January.

The format remains the same, ten categories to enter including an essay category to highlight the work of photographers following the death of Queen Elizabeth II. And once entries are closed judging by members of The BPPA will follow before The BPPA board meet to judge the overall ‘Press Photographer of the Year’ from the category winners.
Paul Ellis, Chair of The BPPA said “I’m very excited for the return of The BPPA’s Press Photographer of the Year competition, now in its third year of running. The competition has shown the best of British press photography and after an extraordinarily busy and exciting year I’m sure the entries will continue being of the highest standard. The turnaround is much quicker this year, with much more coming for members of The BPPA later in the year, so photographers will need to get their entries in promptly.”
The categories :
News Photographer of the Year
Arts and Entertainment Photographer of the Year
Portrait Photographer of the Year
Royal Photographer of the Year
Business Photographer of the Year
Sport Photographer of the Year (action)
Sport Photographer of the Year (away from the action)
Essay Photographer of the Year
Young Photographer of the Year (under 25s either in full time photography employment or students studying photography at a further education institution)
Replacing the Covid-19 essay category, we introduce – Essay Photographer of the Year – ‘death of a monarch’.
Each entry will consist of a portfolio of upto six images taken between January 1st, 2022 and December 31st, 2022 – with the exception of the two essay categories which will consist of ten images.

It’s a much tighter turnaround this year so get your entires ready!
Timeline:
Mon 16 Jan – open for entries to all categories
Sun 22 Jan – entries close
Fri 27 Jan – voting opens
Tue 31 Jan – voting closes
Fri 3 Feb – winners announced
Good luck!

Just Stop Oil Arrests Update

Just Stop Oil Arrests Update

The report into Hertfordshire Police’s actions in arresting members of the media during recent Just Stop Oil actions has come out. We received a request for a response from reach plc and gave the following reply:

“The BPPA is pleased that the report confirms that no blame can be apportioned to the four members of the media who were wrongly arrested and detained. We have a number of criticisms of the report:

  1. It makes no mention of the arrest of another press photographer at another JSO event the previous month by Surrey Police. This was clearly wrong and lessons need to be shared between forces -especially where they are working together on these larger operations.
  2. There is no proper consideration of the duration of the detentions and the culpability of custody officers in not recognising those detained as being members of the press.
  3. The search of one of the homes appears to have been authorised long after it must have been obvious that they were holding a legitimate member of the media who had repeatedly tried to point out that he held a UK Press Card.
  4. The attempt to verify the UK Press Card several hours after the arrest was poorly conducted and the relevant information required was not sought from the holder. Had the verification been carried out before the arrest most of these problems could have been avoided.
  5. The fifth and final recommendation says that “Hertfordshire Constabulary should consider ensuring that all officers engaged with public order activity complete the NUJ package and identified learning is shared.” It may well be dismissed as formal police language but when it says “should consider ensuring” rather than the more appropriate “must ensure” our concerns are nowhere near addressed.

We would highlight the following sections as being important:  

Point 3.6 of Chief Superintendent Jon Hutchinson’s report says that “Having reviewed the evidence and the information available to the officers at the time there seems to be a disconnect as to how they arrived at the outcome they did. The interactions of officers suggest that arrest was the likely outcome regardless of the information obtained”. Unpacking this we would suggest that members of the Hertfordshire Constabulary got it badly wrong.

We are also pleased that in section 6.1 the report notes that “All officers engaged with public order operations (including level three and all tiers of Command) are required to watch and complete the CoP National Union of Journalists (NUJ) video which explains the rights of reporters and photographers during public order situations. There is a requirement to refresh this every 3-years.” 

We note that in 6.3 the officers arresting two of the four members of the media were not compliant with that requirement. If this is representative of the level of compliance across this, or any other,  force then that is both worrying and disappointing. This point is emphasised in 9.5 where the report simply says that “It was believed that officers had a lack of understanding as to the role of the media and how they operate.”

Police powers were not used appropriately. Section 10.24 admits this and goes on to say that “There is evidence to suggest the potential for the arrests to amount to an ‘unlawful interference’ with the individual’s freedom of expression under Article 10 ECHR.”

The BPPA looks forward to working with the National Police Chiefs Council to reinforce the findings of this report and make sure that the correct training and procedures are followed in the future.”

Our Associate Member scheme is now open

Our Associate Member scheme is now open

At the association’s AGM in 2019 we started the ball rolling towards the creation of a new category of membership of The BPPA.

As part of our role of “inspiring” we chose to do this by helping to guide and mentor the next generation of photographers wanting to join the profession. This is now becoming a reality and we are delighted to announce that the doors are open to anyone fulfilling the criteria:

Any person who is not yet working full-time as a press photographer but who is striving to achieve that goal either through working part-time in the industry or by studying on a course specialising in news photography, photojournalism or related editorial photography.

Starting with a mentoring group based on Facebook the association will be inviting anyone who would like to apply for Associate Membership to do so by contacting us.

We have been working with relevant courses at Falmouth University and the University of Gloucestershire to develop the concept and hope to expand to other institutions as well as anyone who has chosen to make their way into the industry through other routes. The team of mentors has been put together and consists of a broad range of experience and specialisms. It includes agency and newspaper staff photographers as well as experienced freelancers.

Associate Membership is open to any person who is not yet working full-time as a press photographer but who is striving to achieve that goal either through working part-time in the industry or by studying on a course specialising in news photography, photojournalism or related editorial photography. Accordingly there are two routes into Associate Membership of the Association:

RULES OF THE SCHEME

Independent photographers working part-time in the industry and anyone studying on a non-approved course

  • Portfolio review by two or more members of the sub-committee
  • Interview in person or via tele-conference to include questions about copyright, metadata, ethics etc
  • Agreeing to sign up to the The BPPA’s Code
  • The length of the Associate Membership offered should be agreed after their interview and be part of the offer of Associate Membership but not less than twelve months

Those Currently studying on, or who have recently graduated from, an approved course

  • Students on an approved course just have to sign up, agree to abide by the The BPPA’s Code and they will be eligible for associate membership.
  • Courses will be approved by a sub-committee of The Board based on whether they are specialising in news photography, photojournalism and related editorial photography and teaching a list of topics such as copyright, metadata, ethics etc
  • The length of the Associate Membership offered should be not less than the duration of their course for students on approved courses plus six months and in extensions of a year thereafter.
  • The BPPA will offer an on-line based mentoring scheme where all Associate Members will have access to a panel of experienced press photographers. From time-to-time we will extend offers to Associate Members and try, wherever possible, to include them in the activities of the association

Notes:

  • There will be no option of a UK Press Card being issued to Associate Members. The press card is only open to full members.
  • Associate Members would not be offered their own galleries on our site and would not be eligible for the Find-a-Freelance system.

Roger Bamber – Out of the Ordinary

Roger Bamber/TopfotoRoger Bamber/Topfoto

Back in the early eighties Nikon had decided to consult press photographers how to improve their flagship F3 camera for news work. Modifications included a hot shoe, covered shutter release, a stop on the film rewind to create the F3P. But at first only the ‘Nikon Favoured’ could lay their hands on one, and those so honoured would flourish their cameras at every photocall. Rare and special maybe, but most exclusive news camera of them all was The Gold Nikon.

Stuck on a more than usually pointless doorstep of a bleak moor in the aptly named ‘Dark Peak’ of the Pennines thanks to a tip off to The Sun that evil Myra Hindley, would take police to the buried body of one of her child victims meant days of tedium for The Sun team with Roger Bamber. As the days turned into weeks, Roger passed the time meticulously chipping the black paint off his elderly battered Nikon F, revealing the solid brass body underneath. And hence was born, with a little later help from Brasso, Roger’s unique Gold Nikon.

Back in 1963, and at just 19, Roger decided he would try his luck with the then best picture paper in the Street. Heading to the forbidding Daily Express building, he found the picture editor was busy, but the chief photographer Terry Fincher gave out some timely advice: Roger had a good folio, but there were 38 staffers on the Express as well as many freelances. Better to try the Mail. Round Carmelite House went Rogers’ book, to Arts, Sport, Features, News, and after two hours to his astonishment he was offered a job. Roger’s long career in Fleet Street had begun.

Bob Aylott remembers “I first met Roger back in 1967 when I joined Keystone. Micky Webb was the picture editor and he advised me that if I stood near Bamber or Fincher I’d never miss anything!”

When The Sun launched in late 1969, Roger was there on the first day, working alongside such legends as Beverly Goodway, who went first from football to studio ‘glamour’ on Page 3, and Tony Prime who later went to The Observer, being imprisoned by the Argentinians during the Falklands.

In 1989, after nineteen years on The Sun and winning ‘News Photograph of the Year’ twice, Roger made the move to freelance, and basing himself in Brighton, the city he had lived since 1973. He quickly built a reputation at a very different paper, The Guardian, with his mix of humour and creating something special out of the ordinary, whether that was transforming an old battered camera body, or creating a magic photograph from a simple Punch and Judy tent on the beach. Roger’s distinctive style then won him ‘Ilford Press Photographer of the Year’ in 1992, making a nonsense out of the so-called divide between the ‘redtops’ and the ‘heavies’. Roger strode across them both.

Roger first met Guardian staffer Denis Thorpe covering the investiture of Prince Charles in 1969 at Caernarfon Castle. They took their positions on a high scaffold tower early for the ceremony with firm instructions to stay put.

“I can’t really remember what we did when ‘nature called’, we were stuck up there together for hours, forbidden to move!” said Denis.

In the nineties, Roger and Denis having both once worked on the Mail, now found themselves working on the same newspaper again, The Guardian.

Denis recalls “Roger had an irresistible charm. He could persuade anyone to do anything. We had a very different way of working, but I guess we formed a mutual admiration society. I observed the surreal moments of ordinary things and Roger created wonderful pictures out of the ordinary. His pictures were like theatre.”

For Roger, Brighton beach became his studio, and his creative eye saw the potential to shoot striking pictures in the most ordinary scenes, winning huge shows time and time again from a perfect mirror reflection of the Brighton Pavilion, to striking images of his beloved steam trains, Roger showed that he could win space in the busy news agenda without heading to war zones, or winning favour on a Royal Rota.

What do I remember of the tall slim man sporting the trademark white trousers, always atop the tallest ladder in the pen? That above all Roger Bamber was the friendliest press photographer you could ever meet. He would talk to anyone, including this young ambitious local London weekly snapper hoping to ditch his Pentax for Nikon, and work in Fleet Street alongside the finest news photographers in the world. Roger told me that he’d soon see me dropping my film into the darkroom. And he was right, later when I joined The Times, within months we were sharing the same darkroom at Wapping, and Roger greeted this very ‘wet behind the ears’ new boy like an old friend.

Roger never really retired, his images recently gracing the cans of the local Brighton brewery ‘Unbarred’, driving higher sales. Next year, Spring 2023, to coincide with the launch of his book ‘Out of the Ordinary’, the Brighton Pavilion will host a retrospective exhibition both of his photography and his life. They’ll not only be his most celebrated pictures, but amongst press passes, his Rollie, cuttings, portfolios, Roger’s widow Shan Lancaster plans to polish up The Gold Nikon to join the display.’

Aperture, Life Through a Fleet Street Lens by John Downing MBE

It seems so odd to be reading Aperture, Life Through A Fleet Street Lens, by one of The BPPA’s founders and its chair, John Downing, without a drink being shoved into my hand, albeit cranberry juice, without a crumbled blunt in an scruffy suit chipping in unwelcome corrections, without the occasional well-wisher, old friend, colleague resting a hand lazily on John’s shoulder as he passes smiling cheerfully in my direction with a large theatrical wink as if to say, “it’s all made up this, son, don’t believe a word”.

Except of course it isn’t made up. Nor my vivid memories streaming back of hearing these stories from John, known universally as JD when I first started shifting in Fleet Street. I see him now sporting a thin leather tie over a poorly ironed shirt, perched on a stool by the bar at the City Golf Club off Fleet Street, that was neither part of ‘The City’, nor anything to do with golf. But unusually amongst the legendary staff news photographers I came across early in my career, JD would take the time to talk to someone like me, yet another ambitious news photographer dreaming of following in his footsteps.

The City Golf Club of course, now long gone, was named to get around the laws on ‘closing time’. Fleet Street had many pubs, but badly needed a watering hole that could stay open well into the small hours. Instead of being subject to licensing laws, it was exempt as a ‘sporting club’. An idea I found JD had borrowed as a description for our Association when he asked me to become Treasurer. New to the role I had been called to meet with the Inland Revenue keen to understand whether we had taxable income. We didn’t. And cheerfully our Chair quipped to his nervous Treasurer when I asked what exact sport did we represent?  “Sport: How better could our wonderful job be described?”

Indeed for JD I’d say press photography was often a sport, a competition to get to the nastiest places on the planet and not only survive, not only manage to take pictures, but return to the office with rolls of film for the darkroom. This was at a time before Nikon neg transmitters, satellite phones, and long before digital cameras that file images from the camera to the desk ‘in real time’. It was an incredible audacious skill that JD escaped from many of his assignments not only with his life, but with delicate exposed film from places as murderous as a jail in the seventies Uganda ruled by insane dictator Idi Amin.

If you never had the privilege to meet John Downing MBE, winner of British Press Photographer of the Year seven times, hear his stories, you’ll be amazed at this wonderfully evocative read of a world now gone, the ‘Black Lubyanka’ the gleaming ‘Art Deco’ Daily Express offices in Fleet Street. There, slung above the smartest entrance which suggested you were entering a grand hotel, lay slung low ceilinged filthy noisy offices of at one time, the finest picture led newspaper in the world. Newsrooms where hard metal upright typewriters crashed out copy on near transparent thin sheets of paper, the office where you always ‘had to get back to’, that darkroom who ‘could dig you out the shit’, and budgets that were, well, irrelevant.

John died two years ago after a battle with terminal cancer, sorely missed by so many. In his last years he would often refer to ‘when I’m gone’ and casually bat away any of us that saying we were sure he’d beat the odds. Those odds he knew he could not beat but he carried that astonishingly stoic attitude to fate and chance that had served him so well in his long career.

Reading Aperture, Life Through A Fleet Street Lens makes me fondly recall that JD had a story for every occasion. Years later when he’d left the Express and although semi-retired was still keeping his hand in doing shifts on The Sunday Telegraph, I called asking if he would be a judge for our Press Photographers’ Year (PPY) competition. He’d been keeping a very much hands off approach to the newly reborn British Press Photographers Association. He had said to me that he knew only one or two of the people now running the show, wished us all well, and felt the new generation should be left to it.  Then he asked: “But how did you get not only a competition, an exhibition, but also a book off the ground?”  I told him that we’ve had some but not enough money from Canon, and that I’d managed to get the rest in sponsorship from Diageo, who owned amongst other brands, Johnnie Walker.  “Have I told you about the fake Pernod I brewed and the bottle of Black Label I got with it when I was in Afghanistan?”, he asked.

And if you haven’t heard that story, I suggest you read the book.

Aperture, Life Through a Fleet Street Lens by John Downing MBE published by Seren Books £19.99

www.serenbooks.com

Tim Bishop

Letter to the joint Chairs of The Conservative Party

One of our members who regularly covers the party conferences brought the fact that the Conservative Party has introduced charges for media to attend their annual conference. The BPPA Chair Paul Ellis wrote to the joint Chairmen of the Party to ask why this was. Here is the text of his letter:

To: Ben Elliott & The Rt Hon Oliver Dowden CBE MP

Dear Sirs

For as long as any of our members can remember the major political parties have welcomed members of the media to attend annual conferences and, as long as they registered in good time, they were invited to do so without charge. We acknowledge that the cost of additional telephone lines and private office spaces were always subject to fees but this years Conservative party Conference appears to have broken with convention and imposed an application fee for independent and freelance members of the media – payable before their accreditation was assessed.

As an association working on behalf of press photographers we are disappointed that, as the governing party in our country, The Conservatives have broken with long-standing convention which has always allowed the wide reporting of your conference by accredited media to take place without there being a fee.

It isn’t clear whether this is a revenue generating exercise, a way of limiting access to the conference or merely an oversight by a junior member of the organising team.

We would be grateful if you could let us know which of the above is the case and we would be equally grateful if you could withdraw the fee for media wishing to attend.