A picture paints a thousand words

A picture paints a thousand words, as the old saying goes. Whilst not always accurate, in the pursuit of press coverage, an impactful image certainly does catch the eye and the reader’s attention. Indeed, at a recent meeting with a business editor of a newspaper, he reiterated that it could ‘make or break’ the chances of getting a story published, proving the value of businesses investing in quality images.

Every year the press spend millions on purchasing images, and the advancement of digital photography has meant that pictures can reach newsrooms in a matter of seconds. Similarly, the chances of a major event being caught on camera have risen considerably.

So whilst some pictures are opportunistic, some are carefully planned and choreographed. Here we take a look back over the past year, and pick out a few of the images that spoke volumes.

One of the big sports stories of the year was (and still is) the corruption claims at FIFA. In a publicity stunt, UK comedian Lee Nelson showered FIFA president Sepp Blatter with fake dollar bills. The resulting images made front pages around the world. (photo credit, Philipp Schmidli/Getty Images).

A little closer to home, The Yorkshire Post have pursued a bold picture strategy and maintained a great team of photojournalists amid a wider climate of regional media cutbacks. Ilkley Photographer, Bruce Rollinson, was on hand to capture the closure of Kellingley Colliery, the last deep coal mine in the UK. I suspect given his achievements, there’ll be pictures Bruce is more proud of this year, but this front page summed up the mood perfectly. (photo credit, Bruce Rollinson/Yorkshire Post).

The migrant crisis has made headlines around the world, and demonstrated the importance of agency photographers in capturing world events. Yannis Behrakis of Reuters showed dedication to his art, which resulted in much emotional turmoil as well as the physical strain of 18 hour days. (photo credit, Yannis Behrakis/Reuters).

To end on a more light-hearted theme, this is one of my favourite stories and images of the year. Originally covered in the Western Morning News, but later picked up by others, from Buzzfeed to The Daily Mail. A Cornish woman made the headlines by knitting jerseys for ‘rescue chickens’ formerly from battery farms. Not only does this demonstrate the condition of human kindness, but also gives us all a good chuckle. (photo credit, James Dadzitis/SWNS).