Robert Capa's Lost Negatives

Image © Tony Cenicola/NY Times-All Rights Reserved
The New York Times features an interesting article about the discovery of “the Mexican suitcase”, which held thousands of negatives that the legendary war photographer, Robert Capa took during the Spanish Civil War before he fled Europe for America in 1939.

The suitcase — actually three flimsy cardboard valises — contained thousands (around 3500) of negatives of pictures that Robert Capa, one of the pioneers of modern war photography, took during the Spanish Civil War before he fled Europe for America in 1939, leaving behind the contents of his Paris darkroom.

According to Brian Wallis, chief curator at the International Center of Photography, the Capa negatives appear to be remarkably good after being stored in what "essentially looks like confectionery boxes."

Here's a look at the New York Times' interactive feature showing the contents of the suitcase. I think that the suitcase has more mystique, more atmosphere and more flair than any of the current hard drives put together.

PDN Interview: Steve McCurry

Image © Steve McCurry-All Rights Reserved
PDN just published an interview with Steve McCurry. I can't say there's anything new or exciting to be learnt from McCurry's answers, but I found this one to be right on the money:

"When asked what those two years of travel taught him, McCurry says simply, “Just because someone’s wearing a turban, doesn’t mean it’s an interesting photo.”

PDN's Steve McCurry: An Interview with PDN

Multimedia: The Whale Hunt

"In May 2007, I spent nine days living with a family of Inupiat Eskimos in Barrow, Alaska, the northernmost settlement in the United States. The first several days were spent in the village of Barrow, exploring ramshackle structures, buying gear, and otherwise helping the whaling crew to prepare for the hunt. We then traveled by snowmobile out onto the frozen Arctic Ocean, where we camped three miles from shore on thick pack ice, pitching our tents about ten feet from the open water. Boats were readied, harpoons prepared, whaling guns loaded, white tunics donned, a snow fence constructed, and then we sat silently in the -22 °F air, in constant daylight, waiting for whales to appear."

This is how Jonathan Harris starts his statement on
The Whale Hunt, a multimedia storytelling experiment. He documents the adventure by taking photos every five minutes and in times of high adrenaline, increasing the pace to match his heartbeat. Starting at the Newark airport and ending with the butchering of the second whale, Harris took a total of 3,124 photographs over the course of nine days."

The Gaza Ghetto

Image Copyright © Ibraheem Abu Mustafa-Reuters-All Rights Reserved
I think this is one of the more poignant photographs of the Palestinan exodus from Gaza over the past few days. Egyptian officials estimate that about 120,000 Palestinian have crossed into Egypt since the border was toppled by Hamas militants on Wednesday. Palestinians have been returning with consumer goods that have been lacking since Israel closed its own border with Gaza last week — everything from cigarettes to televisions, generators, washing machines, milk, cheese, sheep, goats, cows, camels, diesel fuel and gasoline.

Maybe the Nobel Peace prize winner, Elie Wiesel will speak out; after all, he's the one who said "..."...to remain silent and indifferent is the greatest sin of all..."

From the Washington Post's Gazans Break Border Wall

Canon EOS 450D / Digital Rebel XSi

Canon has also announced a new compact digital SLR, a 12.2 megapixel EOS 450D (Digital Rebel XSi). It boasts various improvements and enhancements over the EOS 400D. The estimated list price is $800, and its main features are:

* 12.2 Megapixel CMOS sensor
* Canon’s EOS Integrated Cleaning System
* 3.5 frames per second
* 3.0” LCD with Live View shooting
* 9-point wide-area AF system with f/2.8 cross-type center point
* Picture Style image processing parameters
* DIGIC III image processor
* Digital Photo Professional RAW processing software
* Fully compatible with all Canon EF and EF-S lenses

The interesting improvements from my standpoint are the spot metering (4%) and the Live View. The fps rate is 3.5 and the FoV is 1.6

The 450D is okay....but let's be serious, where's the successor to the 5D?

Further details at Digital Photography Review

New Canon EF200mm

Canon has issued a press release introducing its Canon EF200mm f/2L IS USM at PMA 20. The lens is claimed to be significantly lighter (2520g/5.5 lbs. vs. 3000g/6.6 lbs.) than its predecessor, the renowned EF200mm f/1.8L USM lens, while adding OIS and a weather-resistant design. It has a close-focus setting of 1.9 m/6.2 feet and a circular aperture system that enhances its background blur rendition at wide apertures.

The new Canon EF200mm f/2L IS USM is scheduled to be available in April at an estimated retail price of $6,000...and if you think that's not much, Canon has also introduced the new Canon EF800mm f/5.6L IS USM scheduled to be available in May for an estimated retail price of $12,000.

TTP: One Year Later...

As I wrote a few weeks ago, I had no expectations that The Travel Photographer blog would become so popular and read in such large numbers. I'm flummoxed but immensely gratified by the response. It's been educational for me, as well as great fun...so I look forward to another year of blogging about interesting photography projects from existing and fresh talent, about innovative ideas and news affecting documentary-travel photography, about new hardware & software...and naturally, to post my occasional rants.

Marcus Bleasdale: Rape of A Nation

Image © Marcus Bleasdale-All Rights Reserved
MediaStorm brings us Rape of A Nation, a gut-wrenching multimedia feature of Marcus Bleasdale's work in the Democratic Republic of Congo, where an estimated 5.4 million people have died since 1998, the largest death toll since the Second World War, according to the International Rescue Committee (IRC). It also reports that as many as 45,000 people die each month in the Congo. most of which are caused by malaria, diarrhea, pneumonia, malnutrition, and neonatal problems; results of a devastated economy.

The feature is by Marcus Bleasdale, a photojournalist (now with VII) who spent eight years covering the brutal conflict within the borders of the Democratic Republic of Congo. Widely published in the UK, Europe and the USA in publications such as The Sunday Times Magazine, The Telegraph Magazine, Geo Magazine, The New Yorker, TIME and Newsweek and National Geographic Magazine, Marcus has received acclaim for his work over the years, including several prizes and awards.

This is a top-notch production merging all visual elements of multimedia: quality photography, heart-thumping video and a strong narration. The transitions from still photography to video are very well done...and although I'm not a fan of mixing B&W with color photography, I didn't mind it much in this feature.

Shane Bauer: Darfur

Image © Shane Bauer-All Rights Reserved
Shane Bauer is a freelance journalist who aims to expose social, political, and economic issues around the world. Fluent in Arabic, his work has largely focused on the Middle East and North Africa, where he has spent much of the past five years. He has also worked in Chad, Sudan, Ethiopia, Cuba, and throughout the former Yugoslavia. His writing and photography has been published in the US, UK, Middle East, and Canada including publications such as the San Francisco Chronicle, The Nation, Aljazeera.net, and E: The Environmental Magazine.

His website features a very well done multimedia slideshow titled Darfur Rising. I especially commend his ability with ambient sound and narrative.

Darfur Rising

NY Times Magazine: A Cutting Tradition

Image © Stephanie Sinclair/NY Times-All Rights Reserved
This Sunday's New York Times Magazine brought us an 8 pictures photo-essay by Stephanie Sinclair titled "A Cutting Tradition" which accompanies an article authored by Sara Corbett on female circumcision in Indonesia.

I was initially glad to finally see a serious topic addressed by the Magazine in a photo-essay format. After all, it's about the cruel, abhorrent and abominable tradition practiced in some Islamic countries on the pretext that it's condoned by Islam. However, the tradition of female circumcision does not originate from Islam nor from the Qur'an, nor is it condoned by either. For more on this, here's a link from the BBC. The tradition has been banned by many Islamic and African countries, and the internet is replete with articles from reputable news organizations confirming this.

However, after reading the accompanying article and looking at the photographs, I regret to describe the photo essay as 'lazy'. I'm not claiming that the photojournalist was lazy; just that what was published as the photo essay was lazy. Stephanie Sinclair's work credentials are impeccable, and her humanitarian efforts are praiseworthy. She founded Operation Azra, a charity aimed at helping a Pakistani woman who burnt by acid thrown by a male relative. So I have no questions as to her professionalism and compassion.

What I'm unclear on however, is whether the photo editors chose these photographs to shock or to inform? There is no narrative thread in the photo essay...none. All of the photographs are of unfortunate young girls going through the procedure, looked over by their mothers and medical attendants. Where is the narrative 'texture'? Where are the contextual photographs? Where are the photographs of the mothers consoling their children as they arrive? Were the mothers saddened or happy with this horrible procedure? Where are the portraits of the mothers and their daughters after the procedure? Having seen other examples of Stephanie Sinclair's work, she must've photographed all over the place, especially as the article mentions that she had full unfettered access at the clinic to photograph at will.

On the other hand, I found the article as authored by Sara Corbett to be fair and even-handed , although I was surprised that it quoted a dubious statistic. I'm not an statistician, but its parameters are risible.

So here's a photo essay limited to these 8 narrowly focused photographs...was is the editors' decision to cull them down to these 8 based on layout design, space, or was it just lazy editing, or for their shock value....? I can't answer that. All I know is that I expected better from the photo editors of the Sunday Times Magazine, especially on an issue such as this one.

The article ends with this: "Nonetheless, as Western awareness of female genital cutting has grown, anthropologists, policy makers and health officials have warned against blindly judging those who practice it, saying that progress is best made by working with local leaders and opinion-makers to gradually shift the public discussion of female circumcision from what it’s believed to bestow upon a girl toward what it takes away."

The photo-essay: Inside A Female Circumcision Ceremony

The article: A Cutting Tradition

TTP Recap of the Week

For your convenience, here's the past week's (January 14-January 20, 2008) most read posts on TTP:

Fazal Sheikh's The Victor Weeps
1 on 1: Candace Feit
Shahidul Alam's Brahmaputra

Fazal Sheikh: The Victor Weeps

I won't describe Fazal Sheikh as documentary photographer because he's much more than that. His subjects include Indian widows, Sudanese and Somali refugees at camps in Kenya, survivors of the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan, the indigenous people of Pantanal, Brazil, and immigrants from Mexico.

He makes formal portraits of his subjects; he interviews them and tells their life stories...he lives among them and lives like them. His are portraits of human dignity. Nothing else I can write will adequately describe his craft and his humanity.

In a previous post on Fazal, I wrote: "Here's the work of a photographer who, by any definition, is the pride of this profession; Fazal Sheikh not only makes pictures, he presents us an unblinking, but immensely compassionate view of the poor and disenfranchised...he doesn't only photograph, but interviews his subjects about their lives, he adds his own commentary on the people, their country, and the situation in which he finds them."

Fazal starts The Victor Weeps with this: "To Sheikh Fazal Ilahi, the grandfather I never met but for whom I am named." I, too, was named after my grandfather and never met him...and my father was named after his grandfather and he never met him. Perhaps that's one of the many reasons I found this photo essay so compelling.

Here's the agonizingly beautiful The Victor Weeps...it's an incomparable photo essay that must be savored over time...slowly viewed and read. The prose is as beautiful as the photographs, and give them texture and meaning.