A Brief History of
‘Camera, clicks and capture’
Sayan Dey

Life, a weekly, immediately hit the stands and many
others like Look, See, Photo, Picture, and Click joined the
queue. Look went out of business in 1972; Life suspended
publication the same year, returned in 1978 as a monthly, and
finally, folded as a serial in 2001. But during World War II,
pictures of the conflict were not so common in newspapers,
unlike the weekly photojournalism magazines. Till the
1950s and even the 1960s, most of the photojournalists used
Speed Graphic and Crown Graphic, two large handheld
cameras by the Graflex Camera Company. These cameras
used sheet film, sliding a holder in between clicks; bellowsstyle
focusing and a pretty crude range-finder were seen as
disadvantages. In the 1950s, a 120-format camera, under
brand name Rolleiflex, came into being, with greater
mobility and a smaller negative size. By the time of the
Vietnam War, the 35mm camera was selling like hotcakes,
with better films, easy usage, wide-angles and zoomed
lenses, making it obligatory, and it is till date. During
World War II, ‘Weegee’ (Arthur Fellig), Eugene Smith and
Robert Capa were very successful faces. However, Capa
was killed during an assignment in Indo-China, and Smith
was severely injured on an assignment in Japan. 35 mm
was now paving its way into administrative setups as well.
The Federal government’s Farm Security Administration
hired a group of photographers to record the difficulty of
the farmers in the Midwest. In a nutshell, the golden era
of photojournalism ranged from about 1935 to 1975.
Technology and photography, always have been
whispering around machines. By the 1990s, photojournalists
were using computer technology to scan the
film directly onto the design and, by the new millennium,
digital photography had become universal, courtesy
speed and profit. But, even then, if we compare published
photography of today to that of 25 years ago, we will find
fewer candid photos, less spontaneity, fewer feature photos
of people clicked at work or doing something outside.
The shift in paradigm revisited! There’s no doubt that the
quality of the image has improved, with better lighting,
sharper focus, and lush colour, especially primary colours.
But is photojournalism better today? I don’t think so.
Thinking of the Gulf War, we are reminded of a photo of
a wounded soldier crying over a dead comrade. Think of
the Vietnam War and the execution of a Viet Cong, or a
female napalm victim. Think Protest Era, and the woman
grieving over students shot at Kent State University.
The single image still holds some defining power in our
society.