This paper reads selected photographic works of "The Sunflower Movement" and analyses some of the main problems that long existed in mainstream journalistic/ documentary photographic practices, which inherited the eye-witness tradition that originated from the West. Photographs awarded the Pulitzer Prize are representative of such a tradition, stressing the emotional/affective effect of images that create a theatrical ambience. While it may be indispensable to apply the eyewitness function and emotional effect of political reform movements in 1980s Taiwan, this paper argues that duplicating such concepts in "The Sunflower Movement" could only simplify, if not nullify, either photographic discourse or social movements.