One of the most interesting things we do at a newspaper every day is selecting the lead picture for Page 1. Sometimes the choice is obvious; sometimes it’s agonizing.

Photo Editor Bryan Bosch brings the choices to the Page 1 meeting, which occurs at 7 a.m. each morning, Monday through Friday; the weekend meeting is Friday afternoon.

The point of the meeting is to decide which local, state, national and international stories should be on Page 1. The decisions often are influenced by the pictures and graphics that are available.

We often ask ourselves: Which picture would our readers prefer? Which would influence people to pick up the paper at a newsstand? Which would lead to a conversation around the water cooler?

One morning this week, we had a reader at the meeting, so we could ask the question directly.

Evening News Editor Deborah Saul has created a readers advisory panel, and new members of the group are dropping by the office to get acquainted with how we operate. One of them, Don Anspaugh, attended our daily Page 1 meeting Tuesday morning.

Bryan offered three different photos of flooding along E. Front Street. After discussing the photos, Mr. Anspaugh was given the first choice. He picked the photo above - more of a closeup of the action. Bryan, whose opinion, as photo editor, carries the most weight in these discussions, agreed. So did Stacy Sominski, the presentation editor, who also is intimately involved in the decision every morning. She’s the editor who actually designs Page 1. Sometimes how the photo relates with other elements on the page influences the choice.

While the photo they selected doesn’t give as much of an overview of the scene as the top photo, it’s more dramatic. And it doesn’t have as much action as the photo at left. But you can see the grim expressions on the faces. That’s what made the difference for me. I wasn’t at the meeting, but it would have been my choice, too.

The new readers advisory panels – so many people responded that Deb decided to have two groups – will be a valuable resource for us as we make all kinds of decisions. They’ll discuss The Evening News and how we operate at their regular monthly meetings. But even their informal visits can give us useful information.

We’re acutely aware that we’ll only succeed as a business if we’re meeting our readers’ needs.

This entry was posted on Friday, February 22nd, 2008 at 10:44 am and is filed under The Evening News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.