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"How's it goin' 2000 man?" The question of what the future holds for newspaper shooters seems perennial these days. Not unlike my childhood promises of flying cars and robot servants, the claim keeps being made that high-quality still images will be pulled from video and used regularly (and ubiquitously) on the web, and [gasp] print. The traditional image, some contend, is in its last throes, at least as far as newsprint is concerned. Think that's more fantasy than reality? Consider a recent PDN Online article ... With the advent and growing affordability of High Definition video recorders, the line is being toed by newspaper photographers such as Richard Koci Hernandez of the San Jose Mercury News, The Detroit Free-Press' Craig Porter, and of course Dallas Morning News senior staff photographer David Leeson. They believe the high-quality of HD recording has made the idea of still pulls a certainty in the print side of things. To his coverage of last year's Hurricane Katrina, Leeson lugged his newly-acquired HD digital camcorders. "I could not believe the quality level of the image, and I knew from that moment everything would be different," he said. Yet not all are convinced. Is the quality really there, or just 'good enough'? As Jack Rowland, deputy director of photography for the St. Petersburg Times, states, "Going to video grabs seems like a step in the opposite direction for us on the quality front." He adds, "Just because we work for a newspaper doesn't mean we shouldn't be working with magazine-quality pictures on the front end." Interesting read, through and through. I still have faith in the still image, but I likewise won't be surprised to find a video cam in my Domke some day. In the meantime, somebody make me that flying Honda and robot butler (and I don't care if it can walk up stairs). 20+ years of promises is getting old. 
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