Internship Interview

I've been contacting local newspapers to see if they have any staff photographer jobs, which of course hasn't yielded any promising results. Most are happy to still be in business at all, much less in a hiring mode. I did have one bite, however, for an internship position. I have an interview in a few days.

My schedule is full enough without worrying about a non-paying job on top of everything else. But, I want to check this out anyway. Any chance to work in this type of setting will provide valuable experience and the opportunity to make local contacts. Any suggestions going into this? Questions to ask? Should I put together a portfolio?

In addition to the experience it will look good on the resume and add to your credentials. I would think a portfolio would help. Good Luck!

I would do it if it didn't take up too much time. As far as a portfolio, we should all probably have one on hand, never know what might pop up.

Absolutely do it! While it may seem that with your already busy schedule, a non-paying job may not be worth the time, find the time. The contacts you may make could prove to be invaluable. Plus, if it is a shooting internship, not just an office or tag-along gig, the tear sheets you will add to your portfolio will go a long way to getting you a paying job down the road.

When I was a senior in high school, I was fortunate to get an internship with the local paper. Through this internship I was able to meet, work side-by-side with and learn from three photographers that would that year, and within the next two years, win the Pulitzer Prize: Skeeter Hagler, Larry Price and Jay Dickman. All three are still my friends to this day, some 30 years later.



Skeeter Hagler & Jay Dickman, on our trip to PMA 2007

Yes on the portfolio. Be sure to direct them to your websites and blogs, and good luck! They'd be lucky to have you!

Best of luck mate, I have done a few freelance jobs for my local paper and a lot more 'freebies' for them, while I haven't made much money I have been moved out of my comfort zone to shoot things that I wouldn't be interested in normally (I am ashamed! LOL) It has made me develop as a photographer and has made me a lot of friends and contacts through the usual type of photo assignment that a local newspaper covers. I don't have a portfolio but I have pages from the paper where my shots have been used. I would take it mate, I know how difficult it is to fit everything in, but for experience and learning it has been invaluable. I would advise that you grab it woth both hands.

I got the job.

Well done mate, hope you enjoy it

Anthony Hereld said:

I got the job.

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Congrats! What paper?

Congratulations, Anthony! Enjoy the experience!

Anthony Hereld said:

I got the job.

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How cool is that!! Congrats, bud. I know you'll do well at it, and the experience gained will be invaluable to you.

Had my first assignment today. Nothing major, just a local high school baseball game. Got another shoot to do early in the morning, so I'm off to bed!

Anthony, as soon as the editor becomes more comfortable with your shooting capabilities you will get the "major" assignments. Years ago I shot for two news papers, the Baton Rouge Advocate and the Times Picayune in New Orleans. The biggest headache you will have is meeting the deadline for the next edition. And if you miss a deadline it won't matter how good a photographer you are you can be out of a job or sent back to shooting high school basketball games. I would also recommend you get into the habit of shooting all assignments in RAW+jpeg. On a major assignment and a short deadline you may have to send jpegs back to the editor almost as fast as you shoot. The RAW versions are for followup requests from coaches, law enforcement, attorneys, the courts, insurance companies, private investigators, or other interested parties that have a need for your pictures. I would also get in the habit of handing out your business card to anyone who might have an interest in your photos. You would be surprised at the follow up sales of shots that can be made.

All good points, especially shooting RAW+Jpeg...which I didn't do. They're not set up to work with RAW files, so I had to go home, edit, and then go back to the paper to upload photos. Lesson learned. I made a shortcut in My Menu to alter shooting modes right away LOL.

I had a more creative assignment this morning already.

Sounds like you're learning a lot!

Joseph Bautsch said:

The RAW versions are for followup requests from coaches, law enforcement, attorneys, the courts, insurance companies, private investigators, or other interested parties that have a need for your pictures. I would also get in the habit of handing out your business card to anyone who might have an interest in your photos. You would be surprised at the follow up sales of shots that can be made.

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Check with your editor first before soliciting sales of images or furnishing images to law enforcement, insurance companies, etc. Their rules may allow you to do this, maybe not. As an (unpaid) intern, the rules may be different than if you were a (paid) staff photographer. Now if you were a stringer (freelance), then of course you are free to do whatever you wish with your images. But, even though you are not being paid by the paper, your access to the events you are covering while on assignment for them (media credentials) may constitute "work for hire", and therefore the paper might own the rights to the images. Even if the paper cannot claim ownership of the images, soliciting sales of images while acting as a representative of the paper could be considered unprofessional and cost you your internship.

Yep, LensWork is right. Check with the paper you are shooting for. If they do allow it, it probably will only be for shots they don't publish. When I was doing this there was no such thing as an "internship". It was all freelance work but even then the only shots I could sell were the ones the paper did not buy. Back then you had to put in at least a couple of years as a freelance before the paper would consider hiring you as a staff photographer. You had to prove you would endure the rushing to meet two deadlines a day life style before they invested their time and effort in you. I suppose they now use the internship as their proving ground for a staff position.

Here's a tip I'll share (you may already know this), when shooting sports for publication, after you shoot a scoring play, interception, or any significant play, take a photo of the scoreboard. This will help place the image in context and aid the tag-line (caption) writer (this might even be you, the photographer). For example, a batter hits a homerun in the bottom of the 5th on a 3-2 count and you get a shot of the batter being congratulated at home plate by his teammates. By shooting an image of the scoreboard immediately after the homerun, as the editor is going through the images, he/she will have the info necessary to write an accurate caption. There may be times, especially at a small paper, when there is not a writer from your paper covering the event also, so the paper will depend upon you to provide notes for a writer to caption your images or write an accompanying story. Without the shot of the scoreboard, are you going to remember that the homerun was hit in the bottom of the 5th inning? It also is always a good idea to get a roster of the teams so that the players can be properly identified in a photo's caption.

I'm able to keep the images I take in order to build my portfolio, the paper doesn't own exclusive rights to them. However, part of my workflow is to upload photos to an online server where people are able to purchase prints (through the paper). I wouldn't try to undercut their prices and risk my credibility just to earn a few extra bucks selling prints. I've been encouraged by my mentor to use this as a networking opportunity, just as long as I'm not shoving my business card in everyone's face at every turn.

Networking and portfolio building is why I accepted this position. This is a small community (48,000 as of last census) and there are still a lot of folks who read the paper here. My name is included on every photo I take. I wanted to add some credibility to my name as a photographer, and use this as a stepping stone. Yes, I could be used as a stringer in the future. The paper could use another staff photographer (currently only 1), and they are always over budget for stringers. I doubt this will lead to a staff position though.

LensWork: Part of my workflow includes writing cutlines for my images. The who, what, when, and where. Reporters don't use our cutlines verbatim, though I'm sure they assist in locating files and any other number of things, mostly the "who" is in the photos we take. We're required to include parents names for any child under the age of 18, unless its a sports photo...just because that would be a big mess with 15 kids in a single photo. For my baseball assignment, I was required to get 2 captures, and when I determined my keepers, I simply approached the coach and asked who the players were. We're not required to get names of any non-local team members.

In todays newspaper business they have to make as much profit as they can. So as an intern they can take your best shots and sell them on line, can't blame them for that. Sounds like you are making the best decisions to break into the professional photography business. Building a name and reputation is the key. You have the skills so keep plugging away at it and you will do well.