Outside of the Classroom; NPPA
Why I Get Involved with New Things
by Ashley Crichton
Hello everyone. This is Ashley Crichton writing again for RIT Photo!
This week, I will be talking about National Press Photographers Association, or NPPA. The RIT chapter of NPPA part of a National Organization that is dedicated to promoting photojournalism and creating a community of photojournalists. Although it is geared towards PJ students, the club is open to anyone to attend, even non photo majors. It’s a great place to go and learn about an aspect of photography that I don’t talk about in ad photo classes. I think that even if you can’t see a direct connection between your work and another area of photography – if it’s something you’re interested in –you should pursue that interest. NPPA lets me explore my interest in photojournalism without any pressure to actually make work.
I started going to NPPA meetings because I have a couple friends who were on their eBoard. They thought I would enjoy it and talked me into going to a meeting. It was a “Picture of the Month” day, where students submit images they have taken in the last month to be judged by the other club members. The images get projected on the screen at the front of the room and all students attending the meeting that day talk about why they like certain images. As they talked about the images that day, I was surprised by which images they were choosing. The photos I liked were the “pretty” ones. I quickly learned that in PJ, pretty doesn’t necessarily mean good. A technically weak photo with a strong moment is a better photo than a beautiful photo with a weak moment. The way PJ students look at work is so different from how I look at images in ad photo and there are some things that I still don’t really understand about it.
NPPA doesn’t just do Picture of the Month! During some meetings there are documentary screenings or SKYPE calls with photojournalists who can speak to what it is like out working in the industry. Just a couple weeks ago Kathleen Flynn video conferenced with the us and talked about a documentary called Unprotected that she was the Director of Photography and the Producer/Director for. Kathleen was a visiting professor here at RIT last year and I had her as a professor in a class called Journalism & Trauma. Her documentary is an incredibly powerful documentary about an American charity in Liberia that said it was saving some of the world’s most vulnerable girls from sexual exploitation, but the girls were being raped by someone within the organization. It was amazing to listen to her talk about how she had used the techniques we learned about in class to help protect those affected by the story.
These days, NPPA plays an even bigger role in my life. Since I’m so passionate about increasing collaboration between Ad and PJ, I decided to run for a position on the club’s eBoard. I am in charge of Public Relations for 2019 and I hope that by being on the eBoard will show other photographers that there is nothing to be scared if you’re an ad student showing up to PJ events. Collaboration is an import part of being in school and NPPA is an easy way to start getting involved in the photojournalism community!
About Ashley
Ashley Crichton is a 3rd year advertising photography student from California. You can read more about Ashley by following this link.