Just as I was putting pen to paper to write this article, my neighbours alerted me that a drone had landed on my roof top. On checking my terraces I discovered that in actual fact the quadcopter drone with a camera had landed on the rooftop opposite my house.

What was this ‘spying’ machine doing, hovering over our private homes? Is it legal for individuals to photograph other people’s private terraces without permission? The French couple on the other side of my house did not relish this occurrence as they indulge in ‘full-body’ sunbathing and like most foreigners in the area use their roofs regularly, especially during the warm months.

The fact that drones start to inhabit our skylines is brought to our attention in a picture on page three accompanying Ray Bugeja’s elucidation on the nature of surveillance photography in the introduction of The Times Picture Annual 2014 published by Allied Publications, ‘The Ubiquitous Electronic Eyes’, contains a reference to George Orwell’s iconic fiction novel Nineteen Eighty-Four.

My favourite TV series comes to mind. The American science fiction crime drama, Person of Interest, created by Jonathan Nolan is about the machine – a mass surveillance computer system designed, after 9/11, to predict terrorist attacks and now employed to prevent crime in general.

This is how far the invention of photo­graphy has gone and, within almost two centuries of having recorded every nook and cranny on this Earth, is now bringing the far corners of our mystical universe to our eyes – images which have occurred millions of years ago.

A professional photo­journalist has a formidable task to get his pictures noticed and that means the images have to be above the rest

Engaging in surveillance is only one aspect of photography and probably, in terms of aesthetics, the most unattractive side of it. Perhaps what should be the focal point for discussion in this collection of photographs is the fact that these images have been made under the pretext of journalism. They have to go beyond complementing writing... they have to convey a message. They have to decide between fact and fiction, between a staged photograph or one created by chance.

Their decisions must be made on the blink of an eyelid, for a picture could vanish/ change within seconds. Should they react by taking as many photos as possible, knowing that they may not get what they want under a plethora of different technical tricks, like lens change, filters or lighting, keeping in mind that the most important aspect of all is the composition.

Photojournalism has its origins in the Crimean War.

The Illustrated London News pioneered the birth of photojournalism by printing photographs of the war taken by Roger Fenton and the iconic photograph of the ‘The Valley of the Shadow of Death’ with cannonballs spewed all over the barren landscape.

Between the 1930s and 1950s, photo­journalists became more popular as the demand for magazines increased. Just to mention a few photographic works in this genre that subsequently influenced public opinion around the world: Werner Bischof’s photographs of the Indian famine victims in the early 1950s and Don McCullin’s photographs of emaciated Biafrans in the early 1970s and Nick Ut’s iconic Vietnam war photo, ‘Napalm Girl’, for which he won the Pulitzer Price. These are but a few of the thousands of images that captured the moment brilliantly and provided insight into the human drama, which no amount of words could convey.

So, how do our local photojournalists fare with this increasingly demanding genre of photography? Even more so now with the advent of digital photography available on our mobile phones making it easier for everybody to take pictures on the ‘scene of the crime’ as the events unfold?

Citizen journalists are now producing images that get published, even if these are not up to the standard of quality prescribed by the editor. This is, because more often than not, blurred or crude images emphasise the element of chance and get published nonetheless because of their authenticity.

Consequently, a professional photo­journalist has a formidable task to get his pictures noticed and that means the images have to be above the rest. A good example of this is British Photo Journalist of the Year (2012) Matt Cardy, and his agonising photograph of locked-in syndrome sufferer Tony Nicklinson after he lost his battle to end his own life.

Let’s now turn and view some good examples from The Times Picture Annual 2014. The cover features the cropped version of a photograph with Prince Andrew, Duke of Cambridge, being ferried on a Dgħajsa tal-pass. This ‘paparazzi’ style picture, especially since it features royalty, qualifies automatically as a front cover.

Nothing scares us more than the onslaught of death. This is portrayed in a low angle shot which further emphasises the horizontal position of the lifeless body, tucked in an alley following a murder. The viewer and the dog share the same gaze, although from different angles. The dog seems as puzzled as we are with this tragic circumstance and Darrin Zammit Lupi (p 55) makes this picture fully charged with the type of narrative which photojournalism demands.

Zammit Lupi gives us another frame of an instance, this time an instance from the celebration of the Holi Festival by the local Indian community (pp82-83). Looking at this action photograph could actually convey multiple meanings. This captivating dualistic picture is initially charged with a false sense of violence, albeit truth is then revealed and reassured by the caption.

A remarkable juxtaposition of a mundane situation on our main street in Valletta is turned into a delightful picture which warrants an in-depth cultural study on its own merit. Chris Sant Fournier’s photograph on page 89 features a migrant woman’s portrait within a portrait... that of a reproduction of the Mona Lisa. The red colonial postbox stands like a sentinel in a picture abounding with temporal and spatial contradictions, reminiscent of surrealist and metaphysical art.

Wildlife in captivity has become a major issue, even more so when the intention is to entertain and create spectacle. In an immaculately composed photograph (p93) Sant Fournier manages to capture an extra­ordinary instance of procreation, stifled by the rigid grids of caged spaces.

Human drama is again represented in a spectacular photograph by Matthew Mirabelli (p167). Performance art is a minefield for photographers and the balance and contrast this picture contains is a reminder that the camera in the hands of a skilled professional enhances the experience of photographs... an aesthetic to which everyone is now addicted.

The inspirational poet and critic Stephane Mallarmé remarked: “Everything in the world exists in order to end in a book. Today everything exists to end in a photograph.” His fin de siècle remark, inspired soon after the invention of photography, still echoes today in a society choked by images.