Good briefs are everything

I once commissioned a well-respected, vastly experienced and talented photographer to take some pictures for a new campaigning publication. When the contact sheets arrived and I showed them to my boss whose idea the book was, I could see we had failed. “Garbage in, garbage out”, said the boss. Photography is all in the brief, apparently.

When I was asked to judge the SUN Awards my past error came back to haunt me despite having briefed many a photographer, often with great results, before and since. Would I be able to spot a winner?

There were hundreds of entries but there was nothing to worry about. The best photographers are still the magicians and the storytellers producing something beyond the brief, maybe humour, warmth, joy or soulfulness.


















The best brief in the world will get the right photographer in the right place at the right time, focussed on the job in hand. Nothing can replace the ability to see an image, a split second before it has fully revealed itself. Knowing how to capture the moment technically can no doubt be taught but a truly great image stirs emotions in the viewer: the photographer sees it, we feel it.

Despite a lack of chemicals in photography nowadays, Robert Pogson's 'Alpine Choughs', shows that in the creation of winning images, alchemy prevails. And all the technological developments of the last 20 years won’t replace the centuries old touch of humanity that is the ability to tell a story. The images in the SUN Awards book illustrate the point better than words can. They show that the right touch on the button creates something you can’t quite put your finger on.