>>3164952Again, your critique is just "I don't see any thoughtful composition here". Doesn't mean it's not *there*, just that you don't *see* it. I see it. The photographers who took those shots saw it. The Pulitzer judges see it.
>I think those three just look like centering the subject, zooming in enough and taking the shot.Also:
1. Waiting for the right moment to take the shot for the most emotional impact (e.g., when the man walking down the road was kissing his little girl)
2. Getting to the right spot to take that shot. Often this involves a huge amount of work in the macro level (e.g., getting permissions from governments to go shoot in restricted areas) and the micro level (e.g., finding a good vantage point that doesn't also make you a target)
3. Following the story for weeks or months at a time to make sure that when the right shot presents itself, you're where you need to be.
4. All of the standard compositional rules which you're somehow ignoring
It's like saying "Anyone who was standing in front of Half Dome could've gotten that same picture" and ignoring the months Ansel Adams spent paying attention to the weather patterns and the moon and hiking around Yosemite.
Pic related; one of Daniel Berehulak's Pulitzer-winning photographs from this year's prizes, covering the brutal crackdown of drug dealers/users in the Philippines right now. It looks as carefully put together as a Gregory Crewdson photo. Is that a fluke? No, because so do the rest of the images in his entry from the same story:
http://www.pulitzer.org/winners/daniel-berehulak-freelance-photographerMotherfucker knows what he's doing.
