Pictures in the News | June 28, 2011
Tuesday, June 28, 2011
Monday, June 27, 2011
Documentary Photography Since the Sixties-Getty.edu
PHOTOGRAPHIC ESSAYS
LEONARD FREED
BLACK IN WHITE AMERICA
Photography shows the connection between things, how they relate. Photography is not
entertaining, this is not decoration, this is not advertising. Photographing is an emotional thing, a
graceful thing. Photography allows me to wander with a purpose.
—Leonard Freed (American, 1923–2006), interview in Worldview, 2007
While working in Germany in 1962, photographer Leonard Freed happened to notice a
black American soldier guarding the divide between East and West as the Berlin Wall was being
erected. It was not the partition between the forces of Communism and Capitalism that captured
Freed’s imagination, however. Instead, he was haunted by the idea of a man standing in defense
of a country in which his own rights were in question. The experience ignited the young
photographer’s interest in the American civil rights movement raging on the other side of the
globe. In June 1963 Freed headed back to the United States to embark on a multiyear
documentary project, published in about 1968 as Black in White America, that would become
Photography shows the connection between things, how they relate. Photography is not
entertaining, this is not decoration, this is not advertising. Photographing is an emotional thing, a
graceful thing. Photography allows me to wander with a purpose.
—Leonard Freed (American, 1923–2006), interview in Worldview, 2007
While working in Germany in 1962, photographer Leonard Freed happened to notice a
black American soldier guarding the divide between East and West as the Berlin Wall was being
erected. It was not the partition between the forces of Communism and Capitalism that captured
Freed’s imagination, however. Instead, he was haunted by the idea of a man standing in defense
of a country in which his own rights were in question. The experience ignited the young
photographer’s interest in the American civil rights movement raging on the other side of the
globe. In June 1963 Freed headed back to the United States to embark on a multiyear
documentary project, published in about 1968 as Black in White America, that would become
the signature work of his career.
The Black in White America series is a kind of visual diary with a moralizing purpose. It is
highly personal and socially engaged with an implicit goal of effecting change through
communication. While Freed made pictures of important events in the civil rights struggle,
including the 1963 March on Washington, he quickly found that his interests lay not in recording
the progress of the civil rights movement per se but in exploring the diverse, everyday lives of a
community that had been marginalized for so long. Penetrating the fabric of daily existence, his
work portrays the common humanity of a people persevering in unjust circumstances. His
sensitive and empathetic approach sought not to stimulate outrage but to foster understanding
and bridge cultural divides as a means of transcending racial antipathy.
The Black in White America series is a kind of visual diary with a moralizing purpose. It is
highly personal and socially engaged with an implicit goal of effecting change through
communication. While Freed made pictures of important events in the civil rights struggle,
including the 1963 March on Washington, he quickly found that his interests lay not in recording
the progress of the civil rights movement per se but in exploring the diverse, everyday lives of a
community that had been marginalized for so long. Penetrating the fabric of daily existence, his
work portrays the common humanity of a people persevering in unjust circumstances. His
sensitive and empathetic approach sought not to stimulate outrage but to foster understanding
and bridge cultural divides as a means of transcending racial antipathy.
Friday, June 24, 2011
Wednesday, June 22, 2011
Tuesday, June 14, 2011
Photo Essay Tips - photophilanthropy
Photo Essay Tips
HOW TO CREATE AN EFFECTIVE PHOTO ESSAY
As photographers, our camera provides entry into other people’s lives, emotions, traumas. It is an honor that people let us into their lives, and a privilege to see and capture the world through our lens.
Photography literally means writing (graph) with light (photo), and the Photo Essay is storytelling with photography. The PhotoPhilanthropy Activist Awards recognize photographers who can tell the story of a non-profit organization with inspiring photographs and few words.
Here are some tips that may help you to tell an inspired story:
1. Identify a topic: Photo Essays are most dynamic when you as the photographer care about the subject. Whether you choose to document the agency that runs the soup kitchen down the street, or the NGO that works to protect tree frogs in the Amazon Rain Forest, make your topic something that interests you.
2. Do your research: If you decide to work with the soup kitchen agency, get on- line and find out how they are funded, who are their clients, what are the statistics about hunger in your community, who else feeds the hungry, how many meals the organization makes in a day, etc. Consider talking to people that support the agency, or volunteer to serve. Read their mission statement. When you talk to the agency make a list of their activities and important employees that they want documented. All of these factors will help you in planning out the type of shots you set up for your story.
3. Find your story: After your research, you should decide on the type of Photo Essay you want to present – narrative or thematic. Narrative Photo Essays tell a story conveying a person or activity over time- for example; a Photo Essay about the International Red Cross’s response to the Chinese Earthquake, or the work of an agency responding to hunger in a community. Thematic Photo Essays focus on a theme and show photos relative to that theme- child poverty, or drought in the Midwest. It will help you to organize your shooting if you understand the type of story that you want to tell.
4. Convey emotion: A successful Photo Essay conveys emotion – anger, joy, fear, passion, excitement. To connect your Photo Essay with its audience you must draw out the emotions within the story and convey them in your shots. Consider the impact that the activities of your non-profit organization has on you, and the emotions that you see portrayed by those involved. Then consider how you will articulate this emotion through your photographs.
5. Plan your shots: It is often helpful to start out by creating a “shot list” for the story. You will want photos depicting the various activities of your non-profit organization in order to tell their story. Before shooting, walk around the agency, meet the people involved, pay attention to the light (look for natural light as much as possible; watch out for fluorescent bulbs which tend to give off a yellow light). Look for small details that will convey a story or a mood. Look for an interesting face, as well as environmental (scene setting) images that will help the viewer locate the story. Each shot will work like a sentence in a one-paragraph story.
You will want to open your essay with a powerful lead photo that draws the viewer in. Next often comes a scene setting image, one that describes the theme or narrative, followed by portraits and detail shots. Finally, use a strong summing-up photo to pull your story together, and finish with a powerful image that becomes the “clincher”, the image that you want the viewer to leave with.
An effective Photo Essay is made up of a variety of shots. You will want to include at least one of each of the following:
Scene setting or landscape photo
Portrait (a portrait showing your subject in his/her environment)
Detail shot
Action photo (showing the activity of the organization)
Above all, remember to let your photos do the talking.
HOW TO CREATE AN EFFECTIVE PHOTO ESSAY
As photographers, our camera provides entry into other people’s lives, emotions, traumas. It is an honor that people let us into their lives, and a privilege to see and capture the world through our lens.
Photography literally means writing (graph) with light (photo), and the Photo Essay is storytelling with photography. The PhotoPhilanthropy Activist Awards recognize photographers who can tell the story of a non-profit organization with inspiring photographs and few words.
Here are some tips that may help you to tell an inspired story:
1. Identify a topic: Photo Essays are most dynamic when you as the photographer care about the subject. Whether you choose to document the agency that runs the soup kitchen down the street, or the NGO that works to protect tree frogs in the Amazon Rain Forest, make your topic something that interests you.
2. Do your research: If you decide to work with the soup kitchen agency, get on- line and find out how they are funded, who are their clients, what are the statistics about hunger in your community, who else feeds the hungry, how many meals the organization makes in a day, etc. Consider talking to people that support the agency, or volunteer to serve. Read their mission statement. When you talk to the agency make a list of their activities and important employees that they want documented. All of these factors will help you in planning out the type of shots you set up for your story.
3. Find your story: After your research, you should decide on the type of Photo Essay you want to present – narrative or thematic. Narrative Photo Essays tell a story conveying a person or activity over time- for example; a Photo Essay about the International Red Cross’s response to the Chinese Earthquake, or the work of an agency responding to hunger in a community. Thematic Photo Essays focus on a theme and show photos relative to that theme- child poverty, or drought in the Midwest. It will help you to organize your shooting if you understand the type of story that you want to tell.
4. Convey emotion: A successful Photo Essay conveys emotion – anger, joy, fear, passion, excitement. To connect your Photo Essay with its audience you must draw out the emotions within the story and convey them in your shots. Consider the impact that the activities of your non-profit organization has on you, and the emotions that you see portrayed by those involved. Then consider how you will articulate this emotion through your photographs.
5. Plan your shots: It is often helpful to start out by creating a “shot list” for the story. You will want photos depicting the various activities of your non-profit organization in order to tell their story. Before shooting, walk around the agency, meet the people involved, pay attention to the light (look for natural light as much as possible; watch out for fluorescent bulbs which tend to give off a yellow light). Look for small details that will convey a story or a mood. Look for an interesting face, as well as environmental (scene setting) images that will help the viewer locate the story. Each shot will work like a sentence in a one-paragraph story.
You will want to open your essay with a powerful lead photo that draws the viewer in. Next often comes a scene setting image, one that describes the theme or narrative, followed by portraits and detail shots. Finally, use a strong summing-up photo to pull your story together, and finish with a powerful image that becomes the “clincher”, the image that you want the viewer to leave with.
An effective Photo Essay is made up of a variety of shots. You will want to include at least one of each of the following:
Scene setting or landscape photo
Portrait (a portrait showing your subject in his/her environment)
Detail shot
Action photo (showing the activity of the organization)
Above all, remember to let your photos do the talking.
Sunday, June 12, 2011
Friday, June 10, 2011
Thursday, June 9, 2011
Wednesday, June 8, 2011
Tuesday, June 7, 2011
Monday, June 6, 2011
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