Photojournalism: Is a photographer determined by his equipment?

In a world of DSLR cameras and interchangeable lens, it is perfectly normal to run into a professional photographer whose camera bag contents can cost more than their house. Award-winning photographers are very elitist about the appropriate equipment to use, and are quick to discredit those who do not utilize top of line cameras. Which leads into the question: is a photojournalist defined by his equipment? 


Damon Winter is an award-winning photographer for the New York Times. He recently was awarded third place in the Feature Picture Story category of Pictures of the Year Internationally. Winter’s story covers follows Delta Company, a US Army Infantry Regiment, on a six-day mission in Nahr-i-Sufi, Afghanistan. He documented their travels using the Hipstamatic app on his iPhone. 

Renowned photographers who pride themselves on the quality of glass in the camera bag are outraged that Winter was awarded such a prestigious award with photos taken on a cell phone. The photographs won because they provided an inside view to a US soldier’s life defending his county in Afghanistan. Does the apparatus with which the story was captured affect the story itself?

I agree that iPhone photography is not the most professional way to go about telling a story. However, for this particular story-- a behind the scenes approach-- the iPhone seems like an appropriate choice. The familiarity of cell phone photography allowed the soldiers to be more comfortable and continue their typical activities. If these photographs had been taken by a professional man with a huge camera, the same intimate approach would not have been achieved.

Photojournalism is the act of telling a story through photographs; not the profession of uppity photographers who care more about the aperture of a photo than the story behind it.