Frozen Pier – Saint Joseph, MI

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With the advent of Instagram and other photo sharing sites such as Tumblr, Flikr, 500px (along with countless others), we are overloaded with a daily influx of imagery that far surpasses that of not only any other generation, but any other decade. There is a lot to be said of both the good and bad sides of this. For me, however, it keeps driving me to keep making great images that maybe, just maybe, will one day “go viral” or suddenly gain me thousands of followers.
It also serves as a daily reminder that many many times my photographs pale in comparison to images from photographers that have visited the same places. Even worse, places that I couldn’t even be bothered to photograph while I was there.
Such is the case with the pier at Saint Joseph, Michigan. While I had never been there, I did live within a couple hours drive for a lot of my “formative” years….and always pooh-poohed the idea of shooting any of the lighthouses or piers along the Lake Michigan shoreline.
That all changed when I started seeing post storm images of the lighthouse in St. Joe. The lighthouse and elevated walkway were covered in ice……. not just normal thin ice, but ice that was thick and wind sculpted…..shapes that were beautiful and yet ethereal.
Once I saw them, I knew that I needed to figure out a way to be there when they were covered in layers of ice. Luckily, I work quite often in Milwaukee, WI, which is just a few hours from St. Joe. I always travel with my camera (and usually a tripod shoved into my checked baggage), and one lucky week the conditions seemed primed for some photogenic ice to form on the St. Joe pier.
The forecast was for extremely cold temperatures the entire week, and Friday night there were to be high winds (out of the west), and large waves on Lake Michigan.
I was scheduled to be shooting Mon-Fri, and luckily I had arranged my flights in and out of Chicago due to cheaper airfares. My flight out of Chicago on Saturday morning wasn’t until around noon. I figured that if I got up around 3:00am, I could drive to St. Joe, shoot for an hour or so, and then drive back to Chicago with enough time to make my noon hour flight home.
Friday night I stopped by Walmart to get some waterproof pants, spikes for my shoes, and some dry bags to try and waterproof my camera with. I spent an hour or so with the dry bags, and felt pretty comfortable that my setup was as close to waterproof as possible. I got up at 3:00am, and proceeded to drive the four and a half hours to St. Joe. Once I started getting close, there was a white-out from blizzard conditions due to lake effect snow. I made it through that, and was excited to pull up at the pier in St. Joe a little before sunrise.
It was heavy overcast, making it obvious that there would be no “sunrise” images. Due to the heavy overcast, I was forced to bring my ISO up to around 800 in order to be able to shoot. I slipped on my spikes, waterproof pants, and took my “waterproof” camera rig out into the storm.
It was still quite windy as I slowly made my way out onto the pier. Everything was covered in thick ice……but not the beautiful clear ice I was looking for…..rather, the ugly, brown ice that is the result of so much dirt being airborn while water drops are being frozen the second they touch anything.
There was only one other person on the pier that morning, and he was out watching for waterspouts.
I had the pier to myself, and I carefully walked, hopped, and jumped over giant blocks of ice, mounds of partial rime ice, and smooth sections of perfectly slippery puddles of ice that had frozen over.
I spent around an hour photographing, and by the time I got back to my rental car, my right hand had become so cold that it was numb and pretty much useless….and then it hurt immensely as it warmed back up. I headed south, and made it to Chicago in time to return my rental car, hop the shuttle to the airport, and catch my flight back to Portland.
It was surreal being on the pier that morning. Ice was forming/covering the lake, and what should have been large 12-15 foot waves were being compressed and silenced by that ice, and more resembled 2-4 foot ankle slappers. The wind whipped around, freezing airborn water and turning it into stinging spikes that hurt the face. The waterproofing of my camera worked, and I had no problems whatsoever from the cold or moisture.
All in all, my gamble had paid off and I was able to squeeze in a fun shoot between a commercial job and my flight home ☺

Thanx for listening.

Making it Rain…..

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One of the more memorable jobs that I have had in the field of photography involved freelancing as a printer for the Getty Museum in Los Angeles. A few times a month I would drive over to West LA, take the tram from the parking garage up to the museum, and smile to myself as my employee pass would allow me to “go behind the curtain” as it were to see behind the scenes of one of the top museums in the world.

While there, I printed black and white repro prints. I would be handed a stack of dupe negatives of pieces of artwork in their collections, and would fill print orders from around the world. These images were inserted into books and used for research, among other things.

During my lunch hours, I would quickly eat a sandwich and then stroll through the buildings taking in the amazing artwork on display (If you have never been, you owe it to yourself to visit the Getty. The site is amazing – set on a ridge overlooking Los Angeles… the buildings are impressive – they supposedly emptied an entire quarry in Italy for the facades…..and the gardens are simply unbelievable. Oh, and admission is free!).

While I was touring the museum, the staff photographers that worked there would be sitting at their desks reading, or occupying the remains of their lunch hour with some other banal activity. When I asked if they had seen any of the things that I have discovered during my adventure, they answered that they rarely, if ever, ventured out to see what was on exhibition in the museum. I, to say the least, was dumbfounded….. but not necessarily surprised. The museum had simply become a job to them…..and they didn’t want to spend their free time “working”…..no matter what they were missing out on.

It was not uncommon to talk to photographers, for whom photography had simply become a job. I like to think that we all got involved in photography because it was something we loved and felt extremely attached to…..but some photographers had lost the love along the way and were simply doing it because they needed to keep the $$$ coming in.

Back then I vowed to myself that if I ever “made it” (whatever that might mean), I would remain a passionate photographer for the rest of my life…..while secretly fearing that I may not have the talent/aggressiveness/connections/whatever to actually make a living as a photographer.

What does all this have to do with a photo of some leaves?

I’ve been a photographer for around 25 years now, and I feel that I am well past that point where I might have become burned out or lost interest. I still get excited about shooting. I still look forward to exploring new places with my camera. And I still use my camera bag as my carry on whenever I fly….lest I land somewhere without a camera when something amazing presents itself.

I like to think it’s because I’m so passionate about photography…..but I know that there are other reasons that are more manufactured. Those reasons are Stock Photography, and Instagram. Stock and IG are two things that I pursue, and both help me to remain hungry looking for photographs that will either sell, or gain me more followers. My goals are to upload 1000 images per year to my stock agency, and to upload one photo every business day to Instagram.

The photo of the leaves and rain above is a perfect example of how these two things keep me excited to try new things. I had been trying to come up with some photo ideas for the beautiful fall that we were experiencing in Boston this year, and felt that simple photos of the leaves were not what I wanted….I wanted something that would hold a little more interest. Enter the spray bottle!

As I traipsed around the bushes and underbrush near our apartment, I would position myself so that everything was backlit. Then, while holding my camera with one hand I would start spraying water to get the “rain” to fall onto the leaves.

In the end, I played around for 30-40 minutes and got some fun results. I also learned a bunch about how still you think you can hold a camera, and how still you ACTUALLY are holding it (due to some amazing, but slightly soft images). The usable images supplied me with a number of images for Stock, and a week’s worth of IG uploads.

Thanx for listening!

Here are a couple of other shots from that day…..

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Fatbikes on a Trail in Golden Fall Light

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One of the great things about being with a stock agency is that it not only brings in some $$$, but it keeps you motivated to shoot…..and gives you a great reason to try new things that might result in images that are unlike anything in your agency’s collection.

I had an idea that I’ve been wanting to try, and last weekend gave me the chance with some decent weather. My wife and I loaded up our fatbikes and drove over to Wompatuck State Park. Once there, I rigged up my Canon 5D to sit off the back-left side of my bike. This entailed a Manfrotto Magic Arm, a Couple of Super Clamps, an Atom Clamp, and a few other various pieces of grip equipment (see photo below). Testing had shown that I needed to use an extremely wide angle lens, and so I rented a Canon 8-15mm zoom (I kept it between 13-15mm).

I used two Pocket Wizards to trip the shutter – one (receive mode) mounted on the camera hot shoe and connected to the camera using their Remote Trigger Cable…… and one (transmit mode) duct taped to the right side of my handlebars.

We started riding and everything went smoothly for about ten seconds. That’s when I kicked one of the ratchet handles on the magic arm and the whole thing basically fell off. This happened just as some people were walking by, and immediately one of the guys started asking me questions about what I was “filming” (There’s nothing worse than trying to sort out a problem with a complicated setup while someone is asking what your favorite f-stop is).

I got everything mounted back up, double checked that everything was tight, and then rotated all handles out of the way of my feet while pedaling. We cruised around on some pretty mellow trails (no catching air with this set up!), and I experimented with shutter speeds and lighting direction. This image is one of the stronger ones and was shot at 1/25 of a second. There was a real balance going on between a shutter speed long enough to allow the ground to blur…..yet short enough eliminate camera shake.

One of the things that I really love about digital imaging is the improvements in lenses that have resulted. 10 years ago if I shot this on film, there’s no way I could have shot into the sun and not had the image ruined….lens flare would have exploded across the frame. With current cameras/lenses though, it’s no problem 🙂

I didn’t actually take a photo of my set up that day, but here’s a shot from a couple of days before when I was testing everything out on my regular mountain bike. A few of the angles are different, but all the gear is the exact same as I used….

Thanx for listening!

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Mistakes in the Woods

IMG_8726When I have time…or get bored…or distracted….or maybe have a deadline that I want to ignore….I’ll sometimes head out on my mountain bike with my camera. Recently we had a beautiful fall day and I did just that.

The trees were a combination of green and yellow, and the trails were a golden pathway leading through the woods. I truly love photographing action when Mountain Biking, but being alone ruled that out. I started thinking about the various ways to introduce motion into a photograph with stationary subjects. Exciting motion photographs come down to one of three situations:

 

  • The subject is moving.
  • The camera is moving.
  • They are both moving.

 

Since it’s pretty difficult to photograph myself while I am riding, I had to settle for having the camera move. I have played around with a longer shutter speed and zooming before, but wanted to try and add a little something more. Something that might be a little more identifiable.

This kind of experimentation really lends itself to digital. With film, you’d have to shoot a roll, and then wait a few hours to see what you got. Then, you may or may not remember what you did exactly to be able to reproduce anything that you got that was acceptable. Being able to see the image immediately allows you to build upon small successes as you go.

As any photographer can tell you, a lot of successful images are actually failures that turned out better than expected. Such is the case with this shot. I was kneeling on the ground next to my bike (that was propped up against a tree), and trying to introduce some motion into the image by zooming while I rotated the camera. Normally when doing this, I really try and keep the camera rotating around the middle of the lens….but this time, I was a little off balance and ended up rotating the camera around on point that is very close to the middle of my front tire. This left the tire almost intact (and very identifiable), but allowed the rest of the frame the movement (blur) that I was looking for.

Here is an example of doing exactly what I wanted:

IMG_8728 In the end, I liked both images…..but the mistake of rotating around a point off center of the middle of the lens allowed the tire and wheel to by much more sharp and identifiable, which in turn, makes it a more interesting image.

 

Thanx for listening!

AL

Flat Track Racing at Aztalan Raceway in Wisconsin

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I enjoy shooting any type of sports…and if it happens to involve some kind of racing….that enjoyment turns to love. Running, riding, driving…if it moves, count me in!
A few weeks ago I found myself in Milwaukee for the weekend with nowhere to be and plenty of spare time. As I was driving up to Devil’s Lake State Park (a place that I’ve wanted to check our for a long time) I happened to drive by Aztalan Motorcycle Complex and see that they had an event going on both Saturday and Sunday. After a bit of hiking and photographing at Devil’s Lake, I hightailed it back to Aztalan where I arrived in time to catch some of the Flat Track (or Short Track) racing program on Saturday night.
I quickly parked my truck in the camping area (gotta love free camping in the pits of the motocross track!) and gathered my gear and headed for the Flat Track. As I approached they had kids racing four wheel ATV’s and I found a place in the fence that had a hole just large enough to get my lens through. Each time another race started, I changed my position on the track and was able to get a different angle or view of the racers.
As they started the heat races and main events, the light was getting better and the racing more intense. The motorcycles came out and I was totally blown away by the lack of control it seemed the racers had over the machines. As I watched more racing, I came to understand that they actually had total control, it just didn’t look like it!
As you can see by the first photo, riders would slide through the corners by applying the throttle halfway through the corner and allow the rear wheel to spin a little as a way to come out of the corner faster.

I love shooting action with a panning motion to really accentuate the blur of the background. Panning seems like a such a simple thing….yet it can be extremely hard to accomplish without a lot of practice. For me, I usually end up with about a 50% success rate when shooting like this.

Also, I couldn’t not include a shot of the little kids that were racing motorcycles on the flat track. Just too cute…..

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Thanx for listening!

 

AL

Desert Dweller

IMG_4924My wife and I were recently in Morocco for a few weeks exploring the country. We did a large clockwise route around the country, and we spent a couple of days near the town of Merzouga, in the Erg-Chebbi Dunes.

On the night that we arrived, we walked out into the dunes from our hotel to see if maybe there would be a decent sunset. The hotels are situated mere feet from the dunes, and between the hotel and the dunes was a group of camels that are used for camel treks into the dunes.

As we walked out into the dunes, a couple of guys that I guessed were camel handlers started walking towards us, and when they got near one of them asked where we were from (this is the favorite way for Moroccans to engage tourists, and we were probably asked this question hundreds of times in the days that we were there). He spoke a little English, and a little Spanish (which my wife is fluent in) and we talked a bit as the four of us walked into the dunes. I was keeping one eye on the sunset (which never occurred due to high winds kicking up too much sand and blocking out the sunset) while listening to the conversation. We finally reached a point where I could tell that I wouldn’t be taking any photographs, and we stopped walking and stood talking for a few minutes.

That’s when the sales pitch started….

Tourists are seen as a way to make a living in Morocco. Not unlike everywhere else in the world. Unemployment is huge, and there aren’t a ton of ways to make money. This makes for some very uneasy conversations…… There wasn’t a single person that started a conversation with us that didn’t ask us to buy something, or come right out and ask for money. At first, it was hard to say no. By the end of the trip however, we found it extremely easy to ignore a friendly “hello”, because we knew it would lead to a conversation about $$$.

Our two “friends” that accompanied us into the desert had some fossils and handicrafts for sale. Morocco is huge when it comes to crystals and fossils, and there are shops and roadside stands everywhere in the desert that have shelf upon shelf of them.

In the end, we bought one thing from each of the men that we were talking to. Naturally, I asked to photograph them (I now considered them paid models) and this image of the older man that spoke no english is one of my favorites of the trip.

Plenty can be said when it comes to tourism, and paying people to photograph them. I don’t always think it’s a good idea, but sometimes I feel it’s appropriate. Everyone is trying to make a living….just like me. Some people will say that you should never give $$$ to anyone that you photograph, but if models get paid here in the US, why is it wrong to pay them abroad?

A few times on this trip I was yelled at for taking photos of fisherman in one of the villages that we were in. I wasn’t happy, but I put my camera away. No need to get into an argument when there were about 100 fisherman and just one of me. I wanted to explain that the tourists taking pictures of them were the same tourists that were buying meals at the restaurants that they sold their fish to….but it’s probably a moot point for them. They just don’t want to be photographed, regardless.

It’s always interesting to see what happens when you start pointing a camera at people. Some people shy away, some people love it…..while others see it as a way to make money.

In the end, we bought some souvenirs from some guys that obviously could use the money. I got a few photographs that I really like. It’s that simple….

 

Thanx for listening……

My Experience with Stock Photography

This post is in reply to a discussion from another site that I was involved with concerning my experience with stock photography….or more specifically, selling stock photography.

First things first. I am represented by www.istockphoto.com. The company that started the downfall of stock photography pricing as we know it. I know photographers in general have nothing good to say about istock. For a long time, I was one of them.

This post is not going to address anything about the stock vs. microstock business model….or about how things aren’t what they used to be…..or how I’m helping to kill the market for imagery. These arguments have been around a long time, and I’m not really interested in rehashing them…..

About ten or fifteen years ago, I became interested in getting involved in selling stock photos. I sent images off to every stock agency out there, and was turned down by all of them. It was hugely frustrating (of course, looking back now I can easily see why). Around the same time istock had started, and was undercutting the big stock agencies by huge margins….and gaining a huge segment of the market. I cursed them, seeing that they were cutting into my future earnings (if I could just get into an agency).

At some point, a friend of mine was accepted as a contributor to istock. We had conversations about what they were doing to the market, but when he started to make a little money I started paying a little more attention. Eventually, I applied to istock to see what it was all about. It should be noted here that way back then, it was pretty easy to get accepted – take a test and submit three images that needed to be technically excellent.

Eventually, I started getting images accepted into their collection….and lo and behold, I had a sale! Back then, istock was very different from other stock agencies in that you had instant visibility to your sales (no other stock agency had that ability). I started to sell an image every week or so, making anywhere from twenty five cents to a couple of dollars each time. The more I uploaded, the more I started to sell, and the more money I made. First my goal was to make some extra beer money, then it was my lunch money every day…..and eventually, my truck payment. After that, I aimed for the big time – I wanted to make my mortgage payment (it was around $1000.00 at that time). It took me a couple of years, but I got there. All the while, I was uploading images. Not a lot…..I had maybe a few hundred images over the first few years…..but they kept chugging along. I should add that most of this time, I was on staff, so this was “extra” money that was coming in.

Then, I lost my staff job (I lost the house, too). Suddenly, istock became a lot more important…..

Not only was it my main source of income for a short period, it gave me something to do during the day. It was my “job”. The reason to get out of bed in the morning.

Since then, I’ve been freelance, then back on staff a couple of times, and am currently freelance.

Over the last five years, my stock income has dropped around 50%, even though my number of images with them has increased around 300%. Not a very good return. A lot of people will think it stupid to continue.

I have a few reasons for continuing my relationship with istock:

1. It gives me something to do during the weeks that I’m not working. And, keeps me from going totally crazy when the phone hasn’t rung in a few weeks.

2. It keeps a small amount of $$$ coming in, no matter what else I do.

3. In a few years, my wife and I would like to take a year or two off to drive around/through Central and South America. The work that I put into stock now will pay dividends during that trip in that we’ll still have something of an income while we are traveling.

4. It keeps me involved. When I was younger, I worked with sooooo many photographers that let their passion die when photography became their job. Photographers that shot during the day, and then never picked up a camera any other time. Photographers that worked at the Getty Museum, but never cared to see any of the amazing work that was on exhibition.

5. Stock photography is something that I can, and will do the rest of my life.

6. Eventually, a number of my images have been picked up from istock by Getty Images (they bought istock a while ago), which lends a little more credence when I talk to other photographers.

Stock photography can also be very vexing. The best images don’t sell (at least mine don’t), but random ones do. Here is a great example:

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Here is a page from my istock account with info for a picture that I took of road construction. I was bored and sitting in my car, and thought “wth”……I jumped out and took the shot. If you look at the bottom, it shows that image being downloaded over 300 times. Yeah……I don’t get it either.

It’s not a horrible shot. It’s in focus. Ugly flat lighting. Shot close to wide open so it has some depth. One of those shots that you would never think would sell once, much less 300 times. But here’s the thing…..It fills a need. There aren’t that many photographs available of road construction signs. Around 2000 on istockphoto.com right now. And this one comes up on the first page. Search placement is huge….if one of your images comes up on the first page of a search. It will sell. Doesn’t matter how good or bad it is.

So there you have it. That’s my story. When I was assisting, I talked to a photographer that was making almost 200k in stock….in his spare time…..and I don’t think that was unusual. There are still guys out there making that, but they have specialized and that’s all they do. Nowadays, it’s simply one more revenue flow that helps me to make a living doing what I love.

Thanx for listening.

 

Lighting Test with Cyclist

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I have a love-hate relationship with fill in flash. I love the way that it separates a subject from a background. It helps add depth, lightens shadows. Lot’s of pluses…… But, I hate the way it’s so obvious. You normally get a very distinct shadow, or drop shadow, coming off the back of the subject, or to the right/rear if you happen to be shooting vertically.

If you are not familiar with this technique, it’s normally used when a subject is backlit (or maybe sidelit….or just plain underlit) outside. Normally you would get deep and dark shadows across their face or the part of your subject that is facing the camera….but with fill flash, you use your flash or strobe to “fill” in those shadows so that your subject is more evenly illuminated. Nowadays, a lot of DSLR’s and even point and shoot cameras have a Flash Fill setting that will give you the desired effect.

There are a few ways to get around the dreaded drop shadow that is the normal telltale sign of fill flash. The easiest is to simply point your flash at the ceiling or a nearby wall (if you are inside) or use a bounce reflector that hooks onto your flash (if you are outside). These work somewhat, but they don’t always eliminate the shadow. They also cut about two stops of power off your flash. And, if your flash isn’t adjustable directionally, you are out of luck.

A fellow photographer, Jim Bastardo, was telling me that he had started using a ringflash for some indoor lifestyle/party shoots that he had been doing. It didn’t have the obvious look of an on-camera flash, and didn’t necessitate him having to light an entire party scene to be able to move through it photographing lots of people. That got me wondering about other uses for this tool that is normally used for macro photography. A ringflash (or ringlight) hooks onto your camera and actually surrounds the lens so that the light seems to be coming from directly behind the lens….thereby eliminating any shadow.

I had purchased one, and was looking for a good way to test it out. I really enjoy combining auxiliary lighting with fast moving adventure sports, and  came up with the idea of shooting a cyclist on a road bike during a descent of a hill. I really wanted the photograph to have the feeling of speed, and there were two ways to achieve this.

1. Have the cyclist ride past me while I was on the side of the road and use a “panning” action to photograph him as he rode by. This would work but I was figuring on having to take 20-30 shots to get something that I would be happy with. That would mean my model would have to ride by me 20-30 times, then stop, turn around, and ride back uphill for the next attempt. Most of my friends are pretty good sports, but I figured that would really be pushing the limit……

2. The other option, and the one that I decided to use, was to sit in the back of a car with my camera and have the cyclist follow me down the road. I contacted my friend Justin Jensen who said he was up for modeling for me. I also asked my girlfriend (now wife) Jennie if she would be willing to volunteer her car and her driving skills.

We gathered at the top of the road to our local ski resort, and the three of us had a discussion on how to keep us all safe. Jennie had to drive with one eye on the road and one eye on the rear view mirror making sure that Justin was still behind us and that I hadn’t fallen out of the car. Justin had to keep approximately the same distance from the car the whole time and listen to me as I yelled instructions. I laid on my stomach in the back of the Subaru with the hatchback open and held my camera out, sometimes up to my eye, but sometimes as low as I could get it to the ground to get an aggressive angle.

I thought we might have to make 2-3 trips up and down the mountain, but in the end I was really happy with what we got during our first descent. We kept our speed between 20-25 MPH, and I shot at 1/30 of a second to get a little bit of blur in the background, but minimize it on Justin. The ringlight functioned perfectly, actually working as a keylight as we had waited until we were totally in shadow so that I didn’t have to fight the sun coming from different directions as we made our way around the switchbacks.

As you can see in the photo, Justin is illuminated a touch brighter than the background, which really makes him standout. There also isn’t any shadow coming from the ringlight, thereby eliminating any hints about how it was lit. There is a nice amount of blur in the foreground/background to give the feeling of speed. All in all, everything worked out perfectly and I was extremely happy with the results.

Thanx for listening.

 

Human Remains in Ntarama Church – Rwanda

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Did you see Hotel Rwanda (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0395169/)? If so, you are most likely aware of the Rwandan Genocide that took place back in the mid 90’s. If you haven’t seen it, you might want to check out this – http://www.unitedhumanrights.org/Genocide/genocide_in_rwanda.htm for some background……

In short, misguided civil and moral upheaval resulted in systematic killing of over 800,000 people by their family and neighbors, along with the assassination of Rwanda’s President. Most of these murders were undertaken with machete’s (they didn’t want to waste money on ammunition), and dead bodies that didn’t rot in the sun were dumped into mass graves.

Over twenty years later, and Rwanda is still dealing with the aftermath of this (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gacaca_court).

There is plenty to read about what the United Nations did or didn’t do during this time to stop what was going on. There are also a lot of parallels to what has been going on in Sudan. I’m not going to get into the politics of either situation here. What I would like to do, is tell you about the photograph above, which was taken in Rwanda in late 2006 while I was on a trip there……

Over a few weeks in Rwanda I was able to visit three different Genocide Memorials in and around the capital city of Kigali. One was the “official” memorial, complete with an audio tour and signs in english. The other two, however, were more simple….and in my eyes……much more powerful.

Ntarama Church was one of the churches where people fled because they erroneously felt that they would be protected. In the end, most of these people perished.

We arranged for a driver to give us a ride to the memorial, which is a story all unto itself….

When we arrived at the church/memorial the gate was locked, but a local woman/caretaker came and let us in. There was nobody else at the memorial, and we walked around in an eerie silence. There were no signs and no stories. There were no windows or lights, just sunshine filtering through elaborate bricks arranged to allow for air flow. Large holes in the concrete wall of the church shows where grenades exploded. The floor of the church was littered with personal belongings of victims that have remained since the massacre. In the rear of the church, wooden shelves held hundreds of human skulls.

Skeletons and bones were still being unearthed, and this bag had recently been dug up. They were to be cleaned up and added to the shelves with the others.

At the time, I was shooting a Nikon F3, with T-Max 3200, and printed this image using the “lith” process.

Another blog with more details: http://notesfromcamelidcountry.net/tag/ntarama-genocide-church-memorial/

As you can see from their images, some changes have been made at the church…..

 

Covershot for Bestop by Mark Waldron

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This image was captured during a shoot for Bestop in Moab Utah.
We have been shooting for Bestop for many years and have been on some great jeep trails with them on past shoots but this was one of the best! We were down in Moab for a Jeep Jamboree in February, as you know it can be 75 degrees and sunny or 15 degrees and snowing. We had scheduled a trip with Dan Mick aka “Father Time” the best guide for off roading in Moab. We were lucky enough to have picked the right day for this shoot as the day before it rained and the day after snow showers. These two jeeps had the newest tops at the time and Bestop wanted to showcase them out on the trail. We didn’t take off until 9:30 that morning because a couple of employees from jeep decided to tag along and test out a cool Israeli military 5 cylinder diesel jeep. Needless to say we got some killer images of these jeeps doing some crazy stuff, none of it they can use because “all 4 wheels must be on the ground” according to their lawyers. We got to the end of one of the trails that had a fantastic view of the valley and the Colorado River in the distance. The guys from Jeep let me climb on top of their jeep to capture this image as the clouds and light just worked out perfectly for about 5 min.
MW

http://studio2seven.com/

mbwjeep