The four best online and multimedia professional journalism groups — The National Press Photographer Association

The National Press Photographer Association
http://nppa.org/

Organization background and purpose:
Traditionally a photojournalism organization, the NPPA is morphing into a visual journalism organization. There have been two factions in the NPPA – the still-print photojournalists and the broadcast-video journalists – whom don’t seem to mix too often except on the printed page in articles placed next to each other in the monthly magazine, News Photographer.

Organization vibe:
Very professional and excellence based. There are lots of big names and some big egos but overall the NPPA offers a great opportunity to hone the craft of photojournalism. Kinda like your local auto parts store where people hang out and rap about cars and life. (Readers from Midwest towns with classic car culture may be the only ones who get this reference.)

Cost to join:
Professional – $110 annually
Student – $65 annually
Retired Professional – $65 annually
Family Membership – $60 annually

Benefits / “What you get”:
The NPPA has pretty diverse benefits that are actually quite useful. Read their official schpeal

The conference experience:
It’s a regular conference. Large ballrooms with speakers. Networking. Hotel coffee. Lots of great work to be viewed and cool people in the mass. The energy is mixed.

Other events, workshops:
(Full disclosure: I was co-chairman for the first Multimedia Immersion Seminar last year and will be again this year.) This is where I think the NPPA shines. The flying short courses, TV video training courses, storytelling and new multimedia courses are some of the most intense, targeted learning experiences you’ll get outside of a college degree.

My favorite things about being a member:
+ The monthly News Photographer Magazine is excellent as is the end of the year Best of Photojournalism glossy magazine. (Although the old book-style publication they used to do was much cooler.) But there is still lots of great information and photojournalism work in their publications.
+ The NPPA actually goes to bat for photojournalists, testifies before Congress on their behalf fights legal battles to protect journalists rights in a time when they are constantly eroding and news organizations are backing down from fighting the battles to support their staffs.
+ The NPPA has several monthly and annual contests for still and multimedia work, which is a great chance to get your work judged, recognized and critiqued. Colin Mulvany, the NPPA Multimedia Contest Chairman, and has pulled together a great (FREE to members) site to enter and judge monthly multimedia entries. It’s the best monthly competition I’ve seen out there with copious amounts of inspiring work.
+ The NPPA has a job board that’s fairly regularly used and as a member you can also add yourself to a freelancer database, which will probably get you leads for freelance gigs (I’ve received several from it).
+ The NPPA magazine also discusses business issues for photographers, which most journalism people have little to no experience in, so it’s very helpful in understanding how to survive financially in the photojournalism business.

My least favorite thing about being a member:
- The organization is in transition right now, recovering from some financial troubles and sagging membership. I hope they’ll finish the transition and rock out further. There’s great potential here

The most exciting thing to look forward to from this organization:
If the Video/TV journalists and the still/print journalist wings fold together soon and start making sweet, sweet photojournalism, the NPPA is going to be even more awesome. Both sides have so much to learn from each other but egos, technology and traditions have kept that apart. The Internet is changing that and they two sides coming together to make babies that are the future of photo-video journalism will be really cool.

Read more reviews of the four best online and multimedia journalism professional organizations.