Technology. Who can knock it ? In the last ten years the advancements in the digital imagery revolution have transformed the way in which press photographers work, think and play. The Canon EOS focusing system was so advanced that overnight the sporting arena quadrupled in the amount of photographers now able to cover football. In fact digital camera technology is so good, even primates can use them. And to what effect? Well, in reality a digital camera is just another highly sophisticated tool they can play with and they are probably not that interested in the end result. It focuses, exposes, sharpens and saturates for them, all they really have to do is point the camera in roughly the right direction and hey presto they have a usable image of Prince Harry leaving a London nightclub at 3 am looking rather worse for wear. Then to complete the picture, money exchanges hands for the rights to publish and voila, we have a bona fide chimpanzee.

I have never really quite understood those whose thought processes creak to the conclusion ‘I have a camera therefore I am a professional photographer.’  It used to be that a portfolio of prints (which then evolved to a CD)  was an absolute neccessity in order to obtain work. The physical process of watching a picture editor flash through your 20 best prints in mere nano seconds and then to be told “don’t call us…. “ was a sight to behold and an experience never to be forgotten. It was such a shock to the system that it made you invent ways of trying to keep a picture editor hovering over your pictures for just a few more precious seconds. Nowadays it’s, “ have you got a camera and a laptop?”. And there you have it. Invest a couple of grand in some sophisticated equipment and you too can see your pictures in lights and call yourself a professional. I always wanted to be an RAF test pilot, so maybe if I bought myself a jump suit and a pair of raybans I could become a top gun? Being a musician, if I bought the right drum kit surely Paul Simon might let me take Steve Gadd’s drum stool for the forthcoming Royal Albert Hall gig? Somehow I think not……and so what is it that gives those with no experience or qualifications the right to assume the mantle of professional photographer?

Technology. It is our friend and our enemy simultaneously. It has totally changed the way we work as professionals in this industry for the better. It has made our jobs less stressful from a wiring perspective, it has lessened the load on our backs and given us the opportunity to see what we do instantly and just as importantly allowed our clients to have a ready to publish World Cup final trophy pictures within 4 minutes of the shutter being released. However It has also allowed those who with little or no skill or experience to downgrade the picture quality of our industry. As long as people are prepared to pay for these images, these so called photographers will continue to invest in the latest state of the art equipment and continue to tar us with the same brush.

We all chimp, but that doesn’t make us monkeys. 

What is the difference between Hackney and hackneyed?

Hackney is an underprivileged east London borough which it is hoped will benefit greatly from new facilities, infrastructure and jobs created as London prepares for the 2012 Olympics.

Hackneyed are the dreadful “photo opportunities” devised by PR specialists in London, like this one intended to promote the 2012 Olympics.

Even with Lord Coe, two other Olympians, Tower Bridge, a double-decker bus, a cabinet minister and a chorus of Beefeaters, this was never going to set pulses racing. So why bother to send a photographer?

Well, with IOC inspectors in town to report on Londons progress there was a very good chance that the unveiling of the 2012 Olympics tour bus would reignite furious local controversy surrounding the official logo.

Tower Bridge was already there, but it must have taken considerable organisation to get bus, Olympians, politician and press in the same place at the same time, without the lure of free food and drink.

So what was supposed to happen? What was the concept behind it, the message they hoped to convey? Would everyone get a ride on the bus? Would the Olympians set it alight and dance round it. Would it be floated down the river with Lord Coe at the helm and the minister water-skiing behind or was the bus a cleverly fashioned hot air balloon which would, on cue, rise gracefully into the sky and float over the City of London carrying the Olympic message to the nation? 

Not a bit of it. The concept was, this is the 2012 Olympic tour bus. Not sparkling, but pictures might still have made the papers with a strong enough news hook to hang them on, except for one thing. At no stage during the planning of this coup de théâtre does any practical consideration appear to have been given to what the whole sorry shambles was supposed to look like through a camera.

Double-decker bus with Olympic logo, Tower Bridge, beloved British Olympians, head of the Olympic bid, cabinet minister and Beefeaters (sorry Beefeaters have cancelled, the Yeoman Warders are available); on paper it would have sounded like the picture on the lid of a souvenir biscuit tin, all it lacked was Mary Poppins.

Unfortunately the way things were staged it was impossible to make that picture or anything like it.

Would it have been so hard to seek the advice of a professional at the planning stage? There was a clue at the top of the e-mail sent by the PR team to all the picture desks it was a photocall.

They obviously know where we are, now to persuade them to talk to us.