Block that shot

I'm not sure if it's a Denver thing, a small-market thing or a postmodern thing, but I surely do despise a species of camera shot that infests the local TV news.

Not since a drunken sailor operated the cameras at "NYPD Blue" has my attention been so urgently drawn to the camera rather than the subject. Denver's "photojournalists," as one station calls them, frequently capture the reflection of a person being interviewed in a shiny object such as a window or a glossy-painted car, rather than the person himself or herself. So we'll hear, for example, a sheriff's deputy saying, "The suspect fled at a high rate of speed," and what we see is the deputy's distorted face reflected in the fender of his squad car.

I can't imagine what this technique adds to any story. The print equivalent would be something like writing, "If anybody could have heard the deputy speak, this is what they would have heard: 'The suspect fled at a high rate of speed,'" rather than simply, "'The suspect fled at a high rate of speed,' the deputy said."

Stop being fancy-pants, "photojournalists," and just get the story.