Photojournalism - War Photography

• Describe the different circumstances that these photographers experienced as Photojournalists in WW2 

Robert Capa and Tony Viccaro had quite a hard job as photojournalists back in world war 2 because of the danger of being shot or injured during mid battle. They risked their lives for photography and in one of the photos Tony almost died when approached by a tank "it was photography instead of life", and risked his life just for a photograph, which in time became one of the most iconic photo image of world war 2.

Photojournalism became and way of life for Tony and Robert, although Robert was given more expensive equipment to get the images, Tony had to work with what he got given and even produced the film through soldiers helmets.

Robert Capa and Tony Viccaro had quite the opposite job roles, as Capa worked for 'Life' magazine and Viccaro was actually a soldier at the time. The fact that they both worked in very different jobs this changed the picture style, and what was going on in the picture, as Viccaro was a soldier he could get close up shots of what was actually happening in the war, they were a lot more graphical and more decisive as the event is actually unfolding around him, however Capa would mainly get shots of the aftermath of the battle, this changed the way the war was portrayed, as Capa was taking photos which told a different story compared to what Viccaro was capturing...

The editor of Life magazine described Capa as a "good journalist" not photographer, because he felt that Capa did well to take photographs to portray a story that may or may not be reliable however it told a story for the audience of the magazine and was only used to back up the article surrounding the picture. Capa did well to create a story within the photo where the audience could imagine their own story and have there own opinion of the event.

• Examples of Robert Capa/Tony Viccaro's photography work.

Vietnam
Nguyen Ngoc Loan, South Vietnam's national police chief, executed a prisoner who was said to be a Viet Cong captain. AP photographer Eddie Adams won a Pulitzer Prize for this picture. This image is so powerful, and is what we would call a decisive moment at its finest, the fact that if the image was taken 2 seconds before or after it would not have the same impact as it did. The use of this image was to shock, as american's had no idea these type of events were going on, and that they were blindly supporting it. This image was used to shock and bring reality to what was going on in the world and the disaster that was unfolding.