The kind of eyelight you just can't bottle up and buy... If so? I'd carry it with me always for long nights like this.
When some of the final images you make, despite being exhausted and completely discouraged, may be your very best of the night.
Tuesday, March 16, 2010
Sunday, March 14, 2010
objectivity in 2010.
2 days into Audio Storytelling,
& we had ourselves a heated, little debate about Kevin Carter & his controversial image of the child with the vulture..
http://www.mukto-mona.com/Articles/kevin_carter/hungry%20child_1.jpg
here's my take on the situation that he was so haunted by, receiving heavy criticism for not doing more to help the child...
Combat and famine photography is not for everyone. That's a simple truth. Not every individual can stomach watching another human being starve to death, especially a child, and sit by helpless to do nothing to aide the child's discomfort. That's simply being a compassionate human being, unable to allow another person to suffer in front of you. But there has to be a professional line. You have to, personally, draw a professional line within yourself and understand the instances where you interfere to help a person and where you stand back and remain an objective observer.
I, personally, strive to have a career in combat photography and look forward to having a career in overseas conflict photography. I have a very well-defined line that I keep morally. I'm a journalist first. I know that the title isn't an easy burden and once you decide to pursue a career in journalism wholeheartedly, a lot of sacrifice has to be made. Even working at a daily paper. There is a code of ethics to live, and die, by. And most people do just that.
You almost completely sacrifice your freedom of speech. You cannot publicly support a politician or have any sort of supportive propaganda on your car or in your front yard. You do everything you can in your private life to appear as neutral and objective as possible. [at least as a print journalist, I know you do.] But I doubt that photojournalists are any different.
Kevin Carter received heavy criticism for his continual change in answers about whether or not he helped the starving child in the picture he won the 1994 Pulitzer for. My interpretation of this situation? I'm a journalist first. Snap the picture. Get the photo. Complete the assignment. then decide on your morals. We're given a job to do. Take the pictures, however painful they may be, and then hope we can do some good with the images that are publishes. Relief workers tolerate your presence because they know you are there with a purpose, without media attention.. no help will come to the area in need.
You're not a member of the W.H.O. or UNICEF. You're a photographer. You have a camera. Not a scalpel and a set of penicillin injections to help infected war orphans. Just a camera. That 5-7 lb of metal hanging around your neck is the only means you have of helping anyone. If you can't stomach death, suffering, and the general dehumanization of other human beings and get the pictures you do need to do anyone there any good..
then what the hell are you doing out in a war zone?
& we had ourselves a heated, little debate about Kevin Carter & his controversial image of the child with the vulture..
http://www.mukto-mona.com/Articles/kevin_carter/hungry%20child_1.jpg
here's my take on the situation that he was so haunted by, receiving heavy criticism for not doing more to help the child...
Combat and famine photography is not for everyone. That's a simple truth. Not every individual can stomach watching another human being starve to death, especially a child, and sit by helpless to do nothing to aide the child's discomfort. That's simply being a compassionate human being, unable to allow another person to suffer in front of you. But there has to be a professional line. You have to, personally, draw a professional line within yourself and understand the instances where you interfere to help a person and where you stand back and remain an objective observer.
I, personally, strive to have a career in combat photography and look forward to having a career in overseas conflict photography. I have a very well-defined line that I keep morally. I'm a journalist first. I know that the title isn't an easy burden and once you decide to pursue a career in journalism wholeheartedly, a lot of sacrifice has to be made. Even working at a daily paper. There is a code of ethics to live, and die, by. And most people do just that.
You almost completely sacrifice your freedom of speech. You cannot publicly support a politician or have any sort of supportive propaganda on your car or in your front yard. You do everything you can in your private life to appear as neutral and objective as possible. [at least as a print journalist, I know you do.] But I doubt that photojournalists are any different.
Kevin Carter received heavy criticism for his continual change in answers about whether or not he helped the starving child in the picture he won the 1994 Pulitzer for. My interpretation of this situation? I'm a journalist first. Snap the picture. Get the photo. Complete the assignment. then decide on your morals. We're given a job to do. Take the pictures, however painful they may be, and then hope we can do some good with the images that are publishes. Relief workers tolerate your presence because they know you are there with a purpose, without media attention.. no help will come to the area in need.
You're not a member of the W.H.O. or UNICEF. You're a photographer. You have a camera. Not a scalpel and a set of penicillin injections to help infected war orphans. Just a camera. That 5-7 lb of metal hanging around your neck is the only means you have of helping anyone. If you can't stomach death, suffering, and the general dehumanization of other human beings and get the pictures you do need to do anyone there any good..
then what the hell are you doing out in a war zone?
Thursday, March 11, 2010
I heart Hot Lights.
Airell Marie Lord poses for a series of portraits in the shower on March 5, 2010 in Las Vegas, Nev., for a series of images exploring the interaction of water and the human body (L.M. PARR/ BROOKS INSTITUTE ©2010).
More portraits taken of my willing friends, always patient with whatever crazy photoshoot I may conceive of next. Even if it involves throwing them into the shower at four am... Hours after the hot water has run out from my constant change of idea.
Color temperature has become an obsession, as of late, in my continual experiment of playing with the feel of light.
Photography Gets Me Wet
Only in the literal sense of that statement, of course.
Water & the human body is a beautiful thing... Something I've really been inspired by lately.
There's emotion to water, as there is light. Other than the obvious variations in temperature, water very much has a mood and an emotion to be conveyed. Showers can sway my feelings from happy and content in a warm bath to very much isolated in a cold shower, water pounding down your back. This is something I wanted to explore further.
Person at Work Portrait
David, "Spicy," Sachs performs a routine oil change on a customer's 1991 Honda Accord Ex in Las Vegas, Nev., on December, 14, 2009. (L.M. PARR/ BROOKS INSTITUTE ©2009)
Stills taken for a "Person at Work" assignment for class in the fall. Another experiment with fill flash and manipulation of light, using rear-curtain sync for my lighting class PJN150.
Cars are my passion in life, as well as photography. I'm so intrigued by the way oil and grease seems to find its way into each and every crevice of the hands while working on an engine, something I tried to convey in my photos.
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