AFAR Magazine

Candace Feit emailed me saying that her photograph made in the Moroccan Atlas mountains was published as the cover of the premiere issue of AFAR magazine.

Coincidentally, The New York Times (and other newspapers) published articles announcing AFAR's "birth", hailing the courage of the two entrepreneurs who started the venture in the current economic climate, despite their lack of experience.

The founders, Greg Sullivan and Joe Diaz, describe their magazine (based out of San Francisco) as having an emphasis on "experiential travel". While the magazine will carry conventional travel features, it will stay away from articles on luxury hotels and designer golf courses.

AFAR is scheduled to be published six times of year, with a newsstand price of $4.99.

"Intro To Multimedia Storytelling" Class

Three participants in my Intro To Multimedia Storytelling class at the Foundry Photojournalism Workshop (FPW) produced stunning slideshow photo essays, and I thought it would be interesting to write about their contrasting photographic and personal styles.

I taught my class' participants to concentrate on the story, rather than on the application, and how to make quick work of slideshow production (SoundSlides), using their own images and audio generated in the field, and to produce a cogent photo story under the simulation of publishing deadlines.

Except for Dhiraj's slideshow which is already online (see below for link), the two remaining slideshows will appear on The Travel Photographer when Mohit and Yasin upload them on their own websites/blogs.

Photo © Dhiraj Singh-All Rights Reserved
My Name is Dechen by Dhiraj Singh

Dhiraj Singh is a photojournalist and editorial photographer in Mumbai, whose work has appeared in various international publications including Newsweek, Vanity Fair, The Wall Street Journal, MSNBC among others.

For My Name is Dechen, a gripping tale of Tibetan woman afflicted with psychological problems, Dhiraj received the top student award for photography during the Foundry Photojournalism Workshop's final evening. He worked incredibly hard and creatively to produce this multimedia black & white photo essay. He was already quite comfortable in producing slideshows using SoundSlides, so it was a matter of editing his images, and sync'ing Dechen's audio with the stills.

Dhiraj quickly grasped the flip book technique, and inserted well-paced scenes of Dechen singing and dancing. No one can produce such an intimate photo essay unless he or she possesses the interpersonal skills to gain the confidence of the subject. There's no question that Dhiraj's work with this photo essay underscores his inherent compassion (he confided to me that he teared up more than once while photographing Dechen), patience and kindness.

Here's is the complete multimedia My Name Is Dechen.

Photo © Yasin Dar-All Rights Reserved
Shyam, The Street Barber by Dar Yasin

Yasin is an award winning photojournalist, and stumbled into photography after studying computers in South Indian city of Bangalore. He contributes regularly to the Associated Press and Onasia, an international news agency based in Bangkok. His work appears in leading international publications including Washington Post, New York Times, Time Magazine, and others. He won international and national awards recognizing his work.

He participated in a FPW panel discussing the difficulties of photographing in South Asia, and explained that by living in Srinagar, he was confronted on a daily basis with unimaginable violence and bloodshed. It was therefore very interesting from my standpoint (and presumably, from his) to see him tackle a comparatively sedate and non challenging task as photographing and interviewing a street barber in Manali. Used to dodge bullets, canisters of tear gas, policemen's lathis and demonstrators' abuse, Yasin smilingly told me that this assignment "felt different".

As I wrote in an earlier post, Yasin photographed and recorded his chosen project in an hour or so, basing it on the One in 8 Million series of the New York Times.

Photo © Mohit Gupta-All Rights Reserved

Thankas by Mohit Gupta

Originally hailing from Himachal Pradesh, Mohit Gupta is an independent photographer based in New Delhi, who specializes in travel and documentary photography. He received his tertiary education in one of India’s most prestigious engineering schools – BITS, Pilani, and upon completing his studies in Computer Science in 2001, he joined Adobe Systems. It's a no brainer as who was the man to go to when anyone in our class needed technical assistance!

For Mohit, photography is a serious medium for expression. A self taught photographer, he is mainly interested in documenting culture, traditions, rituals and religion, and has traveled within South East Asia to do just that. He also works with NGOs and helps them documenting their work.

A perfectionist with a keen visual eye for colors and shadows, Mohit spent a number of days improving his presentation. Not easily satisfied, he was constantly refining his audio recordings until he got what he wanted, and then spent hours sync'ing it as precisely as humanly possible.

As I said in my opening remarks at the Foundry Workshop, I learned from the class participants much more than they did from me. I hope it's obvious why.

Functionality & Style

Readers of this blog will perhaps recall my pre departure post in which I agonized over which camera bag I would take with me to the Foundry Photojournalism Workshop in distant Manali. I eventually chose to take my delightfully small (but capacious) Domke F-8 and an IDF Messenger Bag, which I combined into a single (sort of) carry-on by using a couple of carabiners.

In fact, Steven Frischling of the Flying With Fish blog has written an interesting article about combining two bags to create a single carry on for photographers who fly, which is based on the same concept.

The combination of the Domke F-8 and the IDF Messenger Bag worked perfectly, especially for the marathon bus drives from Delhi to Manali and back.

The above was about functionality, but let's address the element of style.



Style to photographers and photojournalists (especially the latter) is very important. Excluding the scarf, which is a must accessory for every self-respecting photographer, what one wears on his/her feet is key to the overall personae.

Hence, my Chelsea boots which -as seen above- may have seen better days some 20 years ago, got an unexpected face-lift when I found an obliging cobbler near the bus-stand in Manali, who stitched all of its tears in a matter of a few minutes and for the princely sum of Rs 40 (less than $1). In London or New York, I would have paid the equivalent of a monthly mortgage payment to have them fixed up.

Having watched how well the Manali cobbler stitched them up, I would wager that he added another 20 years to the boots' lifespan. I'll let you know.

NY Times: One in 8 Million

Photo © Todd Heisler/NYTimes-All Rights Reserved

One of the "props" I used very effectively during my Intro To Multimedia Storytelling class at the Foundry Photojournalism Workshop is the stunning work done by The New York Times photographer Todd Heisler (along with others) with the One In 8 Million series. The class participants watched The Medical Tourist, and realized how effective a few stills and well edited audio can be in storytelling.

One of the participants in my class, Dar Yasin, was so captivated by what he viewed that he decided to base his multimedia SoundSlides project on the One In 8 Million series, and produced a black & white photo essay on The Street Barber, a 3 minute window into the life of Shyam, a barber in the streets of Manali, India. Dar shot the project in an hour or so, and recorded the audio at the same time.

The New York Time has featured a "shoptalk" with Todd Heisler, in which provides insights into his work. Interestingly, he tells us that he photographs a subject over two to three visits, makes a broad edit of 80 to 100 images, narrows them down to 25 to 40 images, then sits with a sound producer and start pacing the images with the final sound edit.

I know I've said it before, but for anyone interested in multimedia, done simply and very effectively, One in 8 Million is a must-see.

Matt Brandon: Bangla Sahib Gurudwara

Photo © Matt Brandon-All Rights Reserved
Matt Brandon of The Digital Trekker blog has produced Bangla Sahib Gurudwara, a SoundSlides photo essay on the most prominent Sikh gurudwara (or Sikh house of worship) in Delhi. The gurudwara is known for its association with the eighth Sikh Guru, Guru Har Krishan, and for the pond inside its complex, known as the "Sarovar", whose water is considered holy by Sikhs. It was built by Sikh General, Sardar Bhagel Singh in 1783, who supervised the construction of nine Sikh shrines in Delhi in the same year, during the reign of Mughal Emperor, Shah Alam II.

It is situated in the Connaught Place area of Delhi, and is instantly recognizable by its stunning golden dome. While in Delhi for the Foundry Workshop, I was told of a massive Sikh religious festival occurring at the gurudwara, but I was too tired to attend it. Perhaps next year.

Tyler Hicks: Afghanistan's Elections

Photo © Tyler Hicks/NYTimes-All Rights Reserved

The New York Times is featuring Tyler Hicks' photographs of the currently under way Afghan elections in a slide show titled A Precarious Election. The accompanying article is by Carlotta Gall, and this caught my eye:

"With Taliban insurgents active in half the country, many Afghans remain doubtful that the Aug. 20 election will take place at all. The Taliban issued a statement last week calling for a boycott, a threat that could deter voters in much of the south, where the insurgency is strongest."

Reading the rest of the article, i couldn't help wondering if what we describe as the so-called Taliban are merely Pashtuns who are alienated from the increasingly corrupt government infrastructure. The pervasive and venal governance of Hamid Karzai and his acolytes is well documented, and the electoral results will surely reflect not only "irregularities" (as the New York Times rather quaintly describes them) but outright fraud. This does not bode well for Afghanistan.

I was also struck by the above photograph showing the portrait of Ahmad Shah Massoud, the Lion of Panjshir, prominently displayed. If he hadn't been assassinated in 2001, Afghanistan would look very different than it is today.

National Geographic Photo Contest 2009

The National Geographic Society has announced its international photography contest 2009, for which English-language-edition readers in Australia, Canada, India, New Zealand, Republic of Ireland, South Africa, the United States and the United Kingdom are eligible to enter up to a total of six photographs across three categories: People, Places and Nature.

The contest began Wednesday, Aug. 5, and ends Saturday, Oct. 31, 2009. The entries will be judged at National Geographic headquarters by a panel of three judges: National Geographic staff photographer Mark Thiessen; design editor of the international editions of National Geographic magazine Darren Smith; and White House photo editor Jenn Poggi. First-place category winners of the English-language-edition competition will win a digital camera kit.

As in all and every photography contests, I strongly encourage all interested photographers to make sure they carefully read the contests' terms and conditions, especially since misunderstandings between organizers and contestants over terms, prizes and other issues sometimes occur.

Via Imaging Insider.