Press Pass

by Geoff Dale, HarperCollins, $49.99.

I met Geoff Dale in 1988 in Auckland while attending the Qantas Media Awards to pick up my 1987 Qantas Junior Press Photographer of the Year Award.

He's no stranger to the awards himself, having won five Qantas Press Photographer of the Year Awards and three Qantas single best photograph awards in his 40 years as a New Zealand Herald and freelance photographer in Auckland.

Geoff gave me a sound piece of advice at the Qantas awards: "Don't drive like a lunatic racing driver to cover breaking news events."

The context for this advice is based on the belief that as a newspaper photographer there is little difference between being five minutes late and five hours late if you want to take a great news photograph of a breaking news drama.

Well-known journalism lecturer and media commentator Jim Tully has written the foreword in Press Pass describing his days working with photographers at the now defunct Auckland Star.

"Photographers routinely heard about spot news before the newsroom; they handled cars like rally drivers; they could race back to the office with a roll of film and produce a rough print in literally a handful of minutes."

Much has changed for the modern newspaper photographer: the driving is better, as are the cars and the roads, and modern technology means a photographer with a digital camera and laptop computer can send a photograph from a news event in 10 minutes and not have to race back to the office like a lunatic.

Geoff Dale's book features many photographic moments that have defined the past 30 years in New Zealand.

The bombing of the Rainbow Warrior, the Queen St riots, the state funeral for prime minister Norman Kirk. However, my favourite is a December 1980 photograph of David Lange, Michael Bassett, Roger Douglas and Mike Moore eating fish and chips after Lange had lost a caucus vote to take over leadership from Bill Rowling.

Many people will be familiar with this photograph as it prompted the label of "fish and chip brigade" for the Labour MPs who would eventually make David Lange leader of the Labour Party and prime minister.

Geoff comments in his introduction that the newspaper industry has changed a great deal and is "somewhat of a sunset industry, with high-quality images coming from nearly every mobile phone".

But, like him, I still believe that despite the proliferation of digital cameras and phones, there is a place for photographic professionals such as newspaper photographers to be in the right place and right time.

• Martin de Ruyter is the chief photographer for The Nelson Mail.

- © Fairfax NZ News