Behind the Viewfinder - Guest Journal - Tom Hubbard

June, 1998

Tom Hubbard

All this week in June 1998, I'm dragging 15 years of stuff out of my office in the Ohio State School of Journalism building. I'm thankful for my industrial strength photographers luggage cart. On each trip to the elevator, I have to negotiate through throngs of incoming freshmen, here for orientation.

I want to say, "Your are in for a heck of a ride," or, "This will be the forming experience of your life. Use it, waste it, just try to notice what's happening."

I say, "Coming through."

I'm grateful for this opportunity to say something more thoughtful.

Webmaster's note: The education of a photo journalist takes many forms. Some are formal, college based; others are self taught; some chose an informal apprenticeship, learning from observing the work of others.

We have two perspectives of education from two "freshmen".

Tom Hubbard, now a photojournalism consultant and recently retired from Ohio Sate shares his last week at school, first week in the world journal.

Joe Jaszewski Behind the Viewfinder member, shares his journal from his first week at Ohio University.

You come to college to blossom as an individual. Well, college is a big place. It's going to force you to be what IT wants you to be before you have a chance to become what YOU want to be. It's an unintended result. Some students never notice and go on to become professional drones, living off the ideas of others. They may be great ideas but if you don't go beyond them, you are a drone.

Learn to recognize when you are going along with the crowd. More importantly, learn when you should be going along and when you should hold to your individuality. Sometimes, you have to invent a public persona to hide the rebel within. Ask yourself the first two Ws, who and what, do I want to be?

Physics used to be the most certain science. They dealt with the really solids like rocks and steel. When the electron microscope magnifies enough, you find nothing is solid. Physics now deals with reconciling our perceptions with the reality they have discovered with their instruments. That's a good goal for photojournalist, reconciling our perceptions with the reality we discover with our cameras. Think of reconciling instead of proving something on an assignment. Photojournalism should find significance, not a succession of chiches.

As a student, watch the sequence of what is happening. You learn how things ARE before you start to consider how they SHOULD be. Some students miss the switch and become conduits to pass on what they learned. No one has been able to find the balance in this predicament. College should expand one's thinking but it closes your thinking before it can expand it to your unique self. Coaches call it "learning the basics."

Schools reward uniformity with "A" and "B" grades. This is terrible negative training. Uniformity is necessary on the job but the finest professionals go beyond expectations. .

Well, I've moved everything out of my OSU office. I've had a heck of a ride and it's not over yet. I was lucky to be a television director before being a photojournalist. In early television, we invented it every day. I was shocked when I began daily newspaper photojournalism. Everyone wanted to do it the same way as yesterday. I've never quite adjusted to that. Teaching at Ohio State has allowed me to explore new ways of doing it. Now that I've retired, I don't want my next career to beunpacking all these boxes. I'm more interested in photojournalism consulting. It's easy if you think of that block of ice. Photojournalism may be a certain thing now but you can improve it by remembering its past and thinking about its future.