Visual media has a role in saving the Chesapeake

Before the summer of 2014, I had hardly ever set foot in the Chesapeake watershed. Then I started a job that would take me all across its 64,000 square miles.

As a photojournalist, I document the region — its people, places and wildlife — for stories published on the Chesapeake Bay Program’s website. As a photo editor and archivist, I maintain a library of about 17,000 photographs, which are made freely available (with written permission) to support the restoration of the Bay watershed.

Every year, I field hundreds of requests to publish photos from the Chesapeake Bay Program archive. They appear in media outlets (including the Bay Journal), as well as reports, museum exhibits, interpretive signs, websites, field guides, and countless PowerPoint presentations. The popularity of our archive tells me that my work occupies an important niche. However, it also shows me that many organizations and outlets need staff photographers and visual editors.

A photo of microplastics in a lab at the University of Maryland is an example of a “record” picture. It provides basic descriptive information without much emotion, though a photographer may be able to employ creative devices to add graphic appeal. (Photo by Will Parson/Chesapeake Bay Program)

If an organization wants to grow and increase its impact, its storytelling capacity must grow as well. Strong photography is necessary if you want to engage donors, decision makers, community members, or anyone else who has a hand in restoring the Bay. I have some recommendations for organizations and individuals who want to see better visual stories in the environmental realm.

Show the ‘why’

Photography is particularly well- suited to answer the question, “Why should I care?” If you want people to care about water quality, don’t show test tubes, latex gloves and Secchi disks. Show real people enjoying clean water in your community.

And if you’re announcing a new report or initiative, people really don’t care to see officials and dignitaries standing at lecterns. They also don’t care for visual cliches, so maybe it’s time to retire that photo of a great blue heron at sunset — unless you want to tell people there’s nothing new to see. Instead, show how people stand to benefit, and use fresh, authentic and local examples.

Sometimes it makes sense to show the hard work behind environmental progress — the scientists in the field and the trees getting planted. But those are not always the images you lead with. Whether you’re asking someone to read your newsletter, hit the donation button or look at your social media post, it’s usually more engaging to frame your message around the end goal you’re hoping to rally people around.

Seeing a pair of hunters watching geese fly over a conserved farm in Queen Anne’s County, Md., shows the value of protecting the land from development, especially for an audience that values hunting. A wider “sense of place” photo showing the property itself wouldn’t be as compelling or eye-stopping as a lead, but might have descriptive value later on in the story layout. (Photo by Will Parson/Chesapeake Bay Program)

Train staff and invest in professionals

Even at smaller organizations, I recommend at least a basic training in visual storytelling. This goes beyond just a basic knowledge of how to use a camera and compose a photograph. It’s even more important to learn how to use photography on the page (for print or digital), whether or not you ever touch a camera. Learning photo ethics is also essential, to ensure you are treating both the people in your photos and the facts of the scene with respect.

Training helps you recognize the opportunities that lead to more compelling photographs, so that if you are able to send a photographer on an assignment, you will set them up for success. Even a Pulitzer-winner isn’t going to return with interesting photos if you hire them to photograph your funding announcement. But if you send them to a neighborhood most benefited by that funding, they might gather a compelling series of portraits and testimonials from people in your community.

Nikki Bass, vice chair of the Nansemond Indian Nation tribal council, poses for a portrait at Mattanock Town in Suffolk, Va., on July 27, 2024. Official ownership of the roughly 75-acre property was recently transferred to the tribe from the city of Suffolk. “I live right across from the Nansemond River, less than 20 feet away from me. My favorite thing to do is see who is on the river each morning. The day after the Mattanock Town settlement, I went out, and there was a dolphin right there,” Bass said. (Photo by Rhiannon Johnston/Chesapeake Bay Program)

Partner with local media

It used to be that nonprofits could depend on local media to communicate environmental issues. But environmental reporting, including visual storytelling, is an increasingly rare commodity. Their loss is a one-two punch against keeping residents engaged.

Some organizations attempt to fill the media void with more sophisticated storytelling in their in-house publications, producing high quality features fit for magazines and film festivals. But these outlets often struggle to reach large audiences.

This leaves the possibility of direct partnerships between nonprofits and media. Seek out publications that already have the capacity to reach the people you care about. They will have trained journalists who are good at turning important but wonky issues into engaging human-oriented stories. Perhaps you offer a small journalism grant that supports coverage of an important issue. Maybe a hypothetical agreement would enable you to republish excerpts in your organization’s annual appeal.

Seek the highest power of photography

At a basic level, photography has descriptive power. It can provide visual evidence of, say, pollution entering a stream, or it can show you what a species of fish looks like. It also has emotional power, especially when the photo shows a person expressing emotion themselves.

A photo of Edgar Riber onboard a menhaden fishing boat is an example of “real people doing real things” that tend to make for good pictures. (Photo by Carlin Stiehl/Chesapeake Bay Program)

At the highest level, photography has the power of empathy. It transports you to a place you’ve never been, and it makes you feel connected to someone you’ve never met. A caption and an accompanying story add layers that further your understanding — but often it’s the photo that first makes you look more deeply and imagine what’s beyond the plainly visible. A good photo is eye-stopping.

Nonliteral photographs, juxtaposition and visual metaphors sometimes suggest a certain feeling around complex ideas. From a story about Turner Station in Dundalk, Maryland—a community that is navigating equitable remediation of a Superfund site and other issues—a photo of a literal tug-of-war called to mind other tensions. (Photo by Ethan Weston/Chesapeake Bay Program)

Truly great photos are hard to come by. It takes work and planning to put yourself in front of something interesting to photograph. And it takes professional training to come away with an authentic, compelling image regardless of how challenging or sensitive the topic.

The photo that Backyard Basecamp farm manager Saj Dillard is posing for would reach a different audience than a photo by an outside photojournalist. A successful visual strategy might employ occasional professional photography for situations calling for one iconic photo, complemented by more frequent, less polished visuals on social media—where a story is more effectively told through the cumulative impact of perhaps hundreds or thousands of images. (Photo by Marielle Scott/Chesapeake Bay Program)

Photographers of any caliber have value, so I encourage everyone to make more pictures. But great photographs don’t happen by accident. Successful photography deserves an investment to match its central role in reaching people.

By Will Parson, Multimedia Manager for the Chesapeake Bay Program, staffed by the Alliance for the Chesapeake Bay