Where are the economic depression photos?

There has been no shortage of words in the media about the nation’s economic depression — editorials, news articles, political messages, opinion pieces and blogs — but relatively few powerful images of these difficult times have emerged.
The Great Depression, which followed the 1929 crash of Wall Street, was chronicled by famous writers like John Steinbeck whose book, The Grapes of Wrath, was later made into a movie. The era was also recorded by photographers like Dorothea Lange, whose black-and-white images of sharecroppers, pea pickers, migrant farmers and dust bowl refugees are indelibly etched into the nation’s collective memory. The faces captured by Lange’s lens were often found at soup kitchens, in bread lines and fields, and along dusty roadsides, broken men with bindlestiffs over their shoulders. Food handout lines wrapped around city blocks.
Images of this caliber seemingly have not emerged over the past decade, and while the Occupy Wall Street movement generated countless news pictures, these didn’t tell the larger story of a nation in peril.
Perhaps the face of economic suffering has become less visible. Consider this: Most people receiving government unemployment benefits obtain them by pressing a few numbers on their cell phones key pad to file a weekly claim. Checks arrive in the mail. The benefits system also allows filing via the Internet and offers the option of direct deposit. Those on food-assistance programs are issued plastic cards instead of food coupons to eliminate embarrassment at the grocery checkout.
Consider this: Factories seldom shut down in a single day. The trend is to slowly downsize until no employees remain. It’s much more difficult to capture this with a camera.
Some days, words alone are not enough.

Working in a vacuum

One of the most difficult things about being a photojournalist is working in a vacuum. If you have a home office like I do, days can be spent at the computer editing photos, handling emails, sending out pitches and talking to editors on the phone. There’s very little face-to-face human interaction. You talk to the dog when taking a break. Drink another cup of coffee or tea. And some days finding inspiration is a challenge.
But you can’t just do nothing.
John Harrington, author of “Best Business Practices for Photographers,” recalled a line from Nelson DeMille, one of his favorite writers. DeMille wrote, “The problem with doing nothing is that you never know when you’re finished.”
So Harrington advises, “When you are making the strategically smart decision to decline assignments that are below your threshold where you can earn a profit, you must maximize that time “doing nothing” by doing something. Go out and search for new clients, whether by doing research at the magazine stand for prospective editorial clients or online for prospective corporate clients, or even by cold-calling prospects in the marketing or corporate communications offices of businesses that are located in and around where you live.”
Sound advice, I think.

Jennifer Wu and painting with light

Hadn’t given much thought to how a simple flashlight might transform an otherwise dark image into a masterpiece, at least not until last night when I attended a presentation by photographer Jennifer Wu at the Greater Lynn Photographic Association in Lynn, MA.

Wu is a Canon Explorer of Light and her images of twilight and night skies are unforgettable. She occasionally uses flashlights of various intensity to illuminate her subjects during time exposures. The flashlight with the incandescent bulb delivers a warm light, the one with LED a colder blue. She even uses a red light setting available on some flashlights to paint around doorways or otherwise enhance the image.

Anyone interested can find her work at www.jenniferwu.com.

A garden walk with award-winning chef Melissa Kelly

A few days ago I was privileged to take a garden walk with Melissa Kelly, who just won the prestigious James Beard Award for Best Chef in the Northeast. We strolled the farm that surrounds Primo, her restaurant in Rockland, Maine. The light wasn’t perfect because it was early afternoon, but Melissa obliged by saying hello to her ducks and piglets while I clicked away with my Canon 1Ds Mark III. If I had been thinking ahead, I would have brought along a macro lens to capture the color and texture of the flowers and vegetables. If she’ll have me again some day, I’ll make sure we meet in late afternoon when the sun casts its golden rays across her little slice of Paradise. I took this photo as Melissa was explaining that the piglets are clean, healthy, intelligent, and will continue to grow for seven months before they become table fare.

Tough photo shoot today

Had to shoot in a movie theater today where they serve gourmet food during the film showing. First shoot was in the concession area where the lighting was a mix of incandescent, florescent and LEDs. Light bouncing all over the place and made hotter by the glass candy display cases. Had to put a 750watt strobe on full power and dial up the white balance to Kelvin 5200 just to get it all to balance.

The image of two chefs — the gourmet guy, John Ingalls, from the attached Palmer’s restaurant, and the popcorn guy, Harold Blank — comparing their respective menu items (pork slices with side dish versus five bags of popcorn — came out fine after a long sweat. Then it was into the screening room to shoot four models at a table with the movie-theater gourmet fare — mostly sliders and shrimp cocktails with wine glasses on the table.

Nate, the movie manager, helped by heading for the projection room and running the film trailer, then stopping it as a still frame so that I could use a slower shutter speed. I first tried the strobes but they washed out the screen and turned it white. So I had to resort to a time exposure coupled with a modeling light turned up to full power for the food and people. Ended up using five- and six-second exposures that put the food in the foreground in focus, made the people somewhat softer, and the movie on the screen still recognizable. One of the hardest things with a time exposure that involves people is explaining they must remain absolutely still in order for me to capture the scene. Seems five seconds is a very long time for some folks to stop moving and talking. But they did it.

Also shot Ingalls in the kitchen of Palmer’s, cooking with plenty of flame in the pan on the stove. Had to boost the ISO to 800 to get that without a flash. Kitchen was small and super busy, so bringing in a tripod with strobe wasn’t feasible. Lots of drama in the flame shot, which also shows the liquid hitting the pan.

Commercial work hones your skills in different ways

Commercial work — corporate brochures, annual reports, catalog images — may seem boring compared to chasing a big news story, but ultimately the work pays off by honing your photography skills in different ways. I’m currently shooting an annual report for the YMCA in metropolitan north Boston that at first mention sounds dull, but in actuality involves a variety of settings. I’m shooting Zumba exercise classes, elderly Russian immigrants learning to swim in an Olympic-size pool, senior citizens taking a Thai boxing class, Cambodian kids in an after-school activities group and pre-schoolers getting into whatever creative endeavor the teacher has in mind. Point is, the work is all good. You have a camera and a laptop and are earning a living with those tools. Go for it.

Who you gonna call if injured far from land or out to sea?

Read the full story in the February issue of Practical Sailor Magazine about air ambulances and companies that specialize in rescuing people stranded and injured in remote locations. After all, who you gonna call if you’ve been gored by a rhino in the middle of the African plains and need to get airlifted to a hospital?

Click to read the article

Patterned Photos as Page Fillers

Magazine editors often request I submit a few photos that are mostly patterns, such asthe stack of yellow wire lobster traps here, or pebbles or shells on a beach, or rows of planes, boats, buses. The pattern images can be used by the editor or graphic artist as background for text on the page, or to provide a visual theme for the overall multiple-page story spread.

The Right Moment

WYSIWYG (What you see is what you get), isn’t always what is. At least when it comes to photography.On assignment for an industrial trade publication, my task was to show how a trash-burning facility blends in with the surrounding natural setting as if it were a true wildlife sanctuary.
For nearly two hours I waited in my Jeep Cherokee, parked atop the landfill where geese often rested by the hundreds. I rolled down my window, set my DSLR to high shutter speed and rapid-fire, then rested the camera body on a bean bag for stability. When over 100 geese had gathered, I made sure the facility was nicely framed in the wide-angle lens before sounding the Jeep’s horn. Instantly the startled geese flew up and away. Click. Click. Click. Click. It was all over in seconds, but one of the more than 20 images was perfect. It showed exactly what had been in the viewfinder at that very moment. WYSIWYG.

Dawn on the Water

Spent yesterday on the waters of Oyster Bay, N.Y. with sailing celebrity Dawn Riley whose Oakcliff Sailing Center is bursting with energy. Crews on four Swedish Match 40s raced in winds that gusted to 30 knots while Riley and her staff of coaches stayed close by in high-powered RIBS to explain what was being done right and wrong.

Luckily the rain tapered off and the bright sun remained hidden behind layers of thin clouds, creating the softbox effect that photographers love. Certainly helps make photos pop. Sure beats a day in the office.

Oh no, dust on the digital sensor and I don’t have an air brush

While aboard a sailboat on the Florida Panhandle where I was photographing jet fighters taking off and landing from a nearby base, I soon realized the black glob on each image was being caused by a fleck of debris on the camera sensor. Knowing it isn’t sound practice to touch the sensor or mirror, I reached into my backpack for a finger-squeeze air brush. Of course it wasn’t there. But there was a deck of cards in the cockpit. I removed the lens from the camera body and, while holding approximately half the deck in my hand, fanned the cards to create enough draft to blow off the nuisance particle. Unlike in a studio, photojournalists usually work on the run and that means making due with whatever equipment is available.

What’s a picture story?

In the heat of trying to photograph an event on deadline, it’s sometimes easy to forget the basics of what constitutes a picture story and what’s required to capture it. I’m reminded by the late Henri Cartier-Bresson, who notes in the book “Photographers on Photography”, that a picture story involves a joint operation of the brain, eye and heart. He put it this way: “The objective of this joint operation is to depict the content of some event which is in the process of unfolding, and to communicate impressions. Sometimes a single event can be so rich in itself and its facets that it is necessary to move all around it in your search for the solution to the problems it poses — for the world is movement, and you cannot be stationary in your attitude toward something that is moving. Sometimes you light upon a picture in seconds; it might also require hours or days. But there is no standard plan, no pattern from which to work. You must be on the alert with the brain, the eye, the heart; and have a suppleness of body.”

Like waiting for clouds in “Aviator”

Just spent three days on a photo shoot in Rockland, Maine, waiting for a few clouds to appear to give depth to the endlessly bleak and white sky. Not a shred of blue anywhere. Only a white horizon on white background, the kind of light that hurts the eyes after a while and gives you a headache.  The situation reminded me of the scene in the movie “Aviator” when the filmmakers working for Howard Hughes, played by actor Leonardo DiCaprio, realize they need clouds to show the speed of the warplanes dogfighting in the sky.

Covering international yacht races

A chase boat with a skilled driver is essential to getting good images during a fast-moving yacht race. This is a photo of the supermaxi Ran racing off Antigua. It was taken from a bouncing RIB (rigid inflatable boat), which means you have to hang on tight, keep the water off your lens and set a very high shutter speed to help reduce the blur. This image was published in the April 2013 issue of SAILING Magazine.

Light-weight, fast planing hulls are state-of-the-art in sailboat racing.

A Day in the Life of a Photojournalist

Photojournalism can literally be a ticket to ride. I wrote a day-in-the-life piece after crewing aboard the supermaxi yacht YuuZoo in the Rolex Sydney-to-Hobart Race, one of the most challenging competitions in the sailing world. Simply being able to travel to Australia on assignment for SAILING Magazine was amazing, but sailing offshore about 700 miles on a fast boat from Sydney to the port city of Hobart on the island of Tasmania surpassed all my expectations.

Nature photographer Mark Bowie’s Watery World

Nature photographer Mark Bowie gave a presentation last night to the Greater Lynn Photographic Association on how to photograph water. Bowie sees photo opportunities in all things water — lakes, streams, rivers, marshes, ponds, oceans, snow, ice, fog, waterfalls, rain drops.
Here’s a tip from Bowie on photographing moving water: Flowing water is rendered differently at various shutter speeds. The effect also varies based on the water’s flow rate and the photographer’s angle to it. Generally, shooting at fast shutter speeds, about 1/30th second or faster, freezes the motion of the water—which illustrates its power, but is not usually pleasing to the eye. Shutter speeds in the 1/4 to 1/30 second range will usually freeze some motion, giving the water texture, but still allowing for some blur. Even longer shutter speeds give the water a silky, graceful appearance with fewer textural details. Experiment with different shutter speeds and consult the images on the digital camera’s LCD screen to determine the look you like best.
A native of New York’s Adirondack Mountains and an instructor at the Adirondack Photography Institute, Bowie regularly leads field trips and workshops on nature photography. See more of his work at www.markbowie.com. He’ll even show you how to use Google Earth to preview what a shooting location will look like as the sun rises and falls on any given day. “It will let you see the shadows so you’ll know the best time to shoot,” he says.

Can’t live with ’em, can’t live without ’em

News coverage of the tragedy in Newtown, Connecticut has riled the public, prompting some critics to lash out at journalists for exploiting and sensationalizing the story.
But most people haven’t a clue as to just how difficult covering such a story can be, particularly for photojournalists on the scene. After all, the public clamors for images and details and complains vociferously when the journalists don’t deliver. How quickly the conspiratorial theories of a cover-up begin to emerge. But as soon as the gut-wrenching images and interviews appear online, on television or in print, the same public slams the news media for having the audacity and callousness to present them.
Certainly there are no winners in Newtown. Innocent children and teachers are dead. A madman’s work has left the world stunned. A community has been brought to its knees and likely will never fully recover. Yes, some journalists went over the edge, interviewing children and witnesses with such zeal it was obvious getting the scoop outweighed any sensitivity.
It’s one of those can’t live with ’em, can’t live without ’em scenarios, but I truly believe those colleagues toting cameras in the face of such carnage are doing so for the right reason, and that’s to hold up a mirror to the society we have become.

Adapting to a digital world

After years of working as a traditional print journalist and 35mm film photographer I’m still adapting to a digital world. I’m shooting with a Canon 1Ds MKIII and an assortment of L-glass Canon lenses. I no longer use my PC, having dumped it for a Macbook Pro. I can crop, resize and adjust images in PhotoShop and other programs, and now I’m learning WordPress, which will allow me to manage my own website.

This latter skill followed nearly five years of struggling with a website that required knowledge of HTML. I just didn’t like it and never learned the language. Instead, I depended heavily on friends and, later, tech professionals to create my photography website and make changes to it every six months or so at my request. It was a cumbersome process that bred plenty of frustration for everyone involved.

My first attempt to take control of my professional online presence occurred earlier this year after attending a Kelby workshop in Boston. As fate would have it, I won a raffle prize: One year free subscription to the professional version of SmugMug, which allows you to easy create online galleries, add photos, and sell them. It’s a cool program, but I’m not going to renew because it costs $300 a year.

Luckily, my tech-savvy son Zack convinced me to switch over to WordPress. That was less than a month ago, and yet, here I am, a middle-aged techno-peasant, creating photo galleries, a biography, contact page, and yes, this photojournalism blog. I have entered the digital world where I no longer get inky from changing spools on my Royal typewriter or yellow fingertips from immersion in darkroom chemical baths.

Although the technology continues to change, some things remain constant. I’m still a good writer and photographer. So as I plug along, I’ll embrace what works and cast aside what doesn’t. And I’ll share my experiences here so that others won’t have to make the same mistakes.

Holiday Photo Tip No. 3: Move in closer to reduce red-eye

Here’s a a third holiday photo tip. Move closer to your subject instead of standing 15 feet away. Otherwise, you risk capturing too much background. Gettin closer also reduces the chance of red-eye. Some cameras have a red-eye reduction feature, which fires a strobe just before the shutter is released. The strobe forces the subject’s pupils to shrink, which, in turn, lessens the likelihood of reflection. Red-eye is a common culprit in holiday photographs.