Greg Cohen: Laos

Photograph © Greg Cohen-All Rights Reserved
Greg Cohen is originally from the East Coast, and is now living in Los Angeles. His biography tells us that he first picked up the camera in Tennessee in 1993, while living in the Smoky Mountain region. He has lived throughout the United States photographing along the way, and is now developing projects in central Africa and Southeast Asia.

I've chosen a photograph from Greg's portfolio of Laos to illustrate this post, but I urge you to explore the rest of his galleries...I stopped at one of his photographs in his India gallery of a young person (probably a girl because of the henna markings) with the most wonderful of expressions. It's #12 and was photographed in Cochin. In my view, an award winning candid photograph!

Greg Cohen

Dilemma: Keffiyeh or Krama?

The blogosphere (and cable news) are buzzing with the hilarious news that a bunch of ideologues forced Dunkin Donuts to pull an ad featuring a celebrity chef because she was wearing what was erroneously seen as a keffiyeh. The ideologues of course, consider the keffiyeh as a "symbol of violence and of anti-Israel sentiments".

This utter stupidity is compounded by the fact that the scarf is a traditional head gear worn by many tribal societies in the Middle East. The king of Saudi Arabia (currently our administration's best friend, our suppliers of oil and buyers of our government's Treasury Bills) wears one...the king of Jordan (another of our allies) wears one, as well as members of Jordan's elite military forces.

But setting this silliness aside...what are photographers and photojournalists to do now? Do we wear our keffiyehs (right) and risk being labeled as Arab sympathizers by xenophobes? What if we wore our krama (left) scarf instead? Would we be labeled as Khmer Rouge sympathizers? Oh my gosh, this is a "serious" dilemma, folks.

POV: Technogeek vs Luddite?

A recent email received from a photographer questioning technological advancements affecting our business made me think about how these made it so much easier for me to manage and operate my photo expeditions.

One of these tech advances is the blog, which can be harnessed, not only to tell the world of one's periodic musings, fantasies, etc, but to maintain a record of each photo expedition's experiences. This is true for me, as a photo expeditions leader, and for the expeditions' participants with their own blog journals.

For instance, while on a photo-expedition or on a solo photo assignment, I always carried a Moleskine notebook, in which I would scribble each day's events, filling it with notes, ideas, sketches and information. I still do that on occasions, but my current preferred method of maintaining a journal of my photo expeditions and assignments is in a private blog.

At the end of each day in the field, I devote an hour or so on my laptop to type up the day's main events, key points to remember, impressions and ideas, for eventual transferral to a blog. This creates a useful (and easily accessible) source of referral whenever I need it. My final verdict on each of my photo expeditions is also entered, and that allows me to refine and improve future expeditions.

I maintain yet another private blog in which I amass all sorts of useful and usable information; from affordable hotels in Delhi (difficult these days), recommended guides/fixers' names and contacts to exotic rituals and festivals. A sort of compendium that I can call on when I plan any of my photo expeditions.

Yes, it is sad that writing journals in longhand is on the wane...dusting off an old journal and reading its contents is romantic...but technological advancements are so practical and are such good time-savers that it's difficult to resist them.

Mahesh Shantaram: Shanghai

Photograph © Mahesh Shantaram-All Rights Reserved
Having seen my post on Justin Guariglia's Planet Shanghai a few days ago, Mahesh Shantaram reminded me that he was very recently commissioned to work on a photographic project featuring the urban culture of Shanghai.

Mahesh tells us" In these images, there are two streams of narrative running in parallel. In the background is the infrastructure story, for which Shanghai is reputed. In the foreground is street documentary photography that plays on some of the social observations I made during my eventful stay. Together, they put a human face to infrastructure development in one of the greatest cities of the 21st century."

He's right. His photographs have two strings running through them; the urban background and the traditional street photography with blurry characters. An interesting viewpoint.

Shanghai: Model City

Alessandra Meniconzi: Hidden China

I've written about Alessandra Meniconzi over a year ago, and consider her one of the best travel photographers I've come across. She's a travel photographer in a classic sense, and her work is pure travel photography with no ambivalence.

Her biography reveals that she was born in Lugano and studied graphic design. She specializes in Asian countries, and prefers the wilderness as well as documenting the daily lives of ethnic minorities. Her exploration of the peoples of the ancient trade routes required her to make several trips to Asia over a 10-year period to document the people and cultures of the "Silk Road", the 2,000-year-old trade route linking the Orient and the Occident.

Her new book "Hidden China" will be published in Fall 2008, and will be available from Amazon and other bookstores.

Alessandra's website features her superb landscapes and portraits of ethnic minorities. Here are her images of China. Her website would benefit from a facelift, but I guarantee you'll be spending a lot of time exploring her galleries.

Abbas: Soul Hunt: Magnum In Motion

Here's a multimedia slideshow featuring photographs by Abbas from the Magnum website. It's about pagan rituals, performed by the shamans of Siberia, the Voodoo in Haiti, the Dogon of Mali, the Shinto in Japan, and the Bari of the Amazon.

Having photographed the Indonesian traditional healers in Bali, I was naturally very interested in seeing this body of work. While I deem Abbas' work to be superlative, I have to say that this slideshow is disappointing. I fault its unimaginative production rather than the photographs...which appear muddy (is it the compression for the slideshow?). It is uninformative, and I had to visit the thumbnail page to read background information on the photographs, as the slideshow itself has no captions or narration. What it does have is a truly awful soundtrack. Too bad.

Abbas (he only uses his first name) is an Iranian photojournalist living in Paris, France. He has covered wars and revolutions in Biafra, Bangladesh, Northern Ireland, Vietnam, the Middle East, Chile, Cuba, and South Africa during apartheid. He photographed the revolution in Iran, to which he returned in 1997 after seventeen years of voluntary exile.

His interest in religion led him in 2002 to start a new long-term project about the clash of religions, defined as culture rather than faith, which he believes are replacing political ideologies in the strategic struggles of the contemporary world.

Abbas' Soul Hunt

Canon 5D Mark II Book?

I promised myself I wouldn't add fuel to the fire, but members of the DPreview forums have seen a 5D Mark II Field Guide listed on Amazon. The book has a release date of November 10, 2008 and a price of $20. The author and publisher are the same as the ones for the 5D Mark I field guide, which you can buy now online or in a bookstore or camera shop.

The Photokina Fair is scheduled for the third week of September 2008, and it may be a logical venue for an official release for the Canon 5D Mark II...while the release date for the book is November 10.

I've taken a partial capture of the Amazon screen (above) just in case it's taken down.

Via Imaging Insider/1001 Noisy Cameras

Memorial Day Weekend

Photograph © Tewfic El-Sawy-All Rights Reserved
The Travel Photographer will not be posting over the long Memorial Day weekend.

My Show Off: Whirling Dervishes

Photograph © Tewfic El-Sawy-All Rights Reserved
Here's another of my weekly Show-Off features with an example of my personal photography on The Travel Photographer's blog. Click on the photograph to view it larger size. I used one of Lightroom 2.0 standard presets to accentuate the photograph's colors.

It was photographed in Istanbul while Mevlevi dervishes perform a sema ceremony with a traditional orchestra at Istanbul's Galata Mevlevihanesi in Beyoglu. The sema is derived from Jalaluddin Rumi's habit of occasionally whirling in ecstatic joy in the streets of Konya. The whirling dances are just one of the physical methods used to try to reach religious ecstasy in Sufism.

Justin Guariglia: Planet Shanghai

Justin Guariglia's latest book, Planet Shanghai, is his attempt to preserve the city's unique culture, traditions and its people. The ICP will be having a book signing event with Justin Guariglia on Friday, May 23 (6:00 pm - 7:30 pm) at its store on 1133 Avenue of the Americas at 43rd Street, NYC.

Here are some samples from Planet Shanghai

From the New Yorker magazine:

It’s amazing how much you can accomplish in Shanghai while wearing pajamas. In recent years, Shanghai newspapers have worried that this sartorial habit will give the city a slovenly image, but it seems that many natives see little divide between public and private space. Justin Guariglia, an American photographer who lived in Asia for nearly a decade, captures the city in its most informal moments. His book includes dozens of portraits of pajama’d Shanghainese: visiting the supermarket, riding motorcycles, walking dogs, playing mah-jongg, going to McDonald’s, smoking cigarettes. Guariglia works close to the ground; he shoots the undersides of bridges and the sheen of vegetables at the market, and includes no fewer than sixteen pages of footwear, a common Chinese obsession. His search for street style uncovers moments of unexpected beauty: a rainbow pile of scrap wire, a heart-shaped decoration on an anti-theft gate, a boarded-up door crisscrossed with lines as straight and true as a calligrapher’s best brushwork.

Ben Curtis: Bakhtiari Wedding

Photograph © Ben Curtis/AP-All Rights Reserved
Ben Curtis of SnapperTalk blog, brings us his work on a Bakhtiari Wedding while traveling in Iran. The audio was captured using a Zoom H2. Listening to the soundtrack, you'll hear the women's ululations, an ancient and traditional form of celebratory expressions in the Middle East and beyond.

The Bakhtiaris, who are Shi'a Muslims and speak a Persian dialect known as Luri, are one of two main nomadic groups in Iran, along with the ethnic Turkic Qashqai group. Iran has one of the largest nomadic populations in the world, an estimated 1.5 million in a country of some 70 million, according to the government's agency for nomad affairs.

Ben Curtis is currently based in Cairo, Egypt where he is Middle East Photographer & Photo Editor for the Associated Press.

Here's Ben Curtis' Bakhtiari Wedding

National Geographic Assignment

As reported by PDN Online, the National Geographic Society launched a new photo assignments division to handle commercial representation for 27 photographers.

National Geographic Assignment will represent the following photographers: William Albert Allard, Stephen Alvarez, Ira Block, John Burcham, Jimmy Chin, Jodi Cobb, Pablo Corral Vega, Bruce Dale, David Doubilet, Annie Griffiths Belt, Justin Guariglia, Bill Hatcher, Beverly Joubert, Tim Laman, David Liittschwager, Michael Melford, Michael Nichols, Paul Nicklen, Michael O’Brien, Randy Olson, Jim Richardson, Joel Sartore, Brian Skerry, Steve Winter, Gordon Wiltsie, Alison Wright and Mike Yamashita.

The new division will be managed by Alice Keating, a 13-year veteran of Geographic's stock and syndication arm, the National Geographic Image Collection.

Via The Click

Marie Arago: Oaxaca

Photograph © Marie Arago-All Rights Reserved
Marie Arago is a Brooklyn-based photographer, who studied film at the Academy of Art in San Francisco, and photography at the ICP in New York. She spent many years photographing in Cuba, and worked for a newspaper in Costa Rica.

I spent a while deciding between her Mercado in Oaxaca gallery or her Cuban gallery for posting to TTP, and opted for the former...only because I've been in Oaxaca in February so it's fresh in my mind. I liked the above photograph taken in a market in Oaxaca the most from her gallery.

Epson: James Nachtwey Interview

Epson has put together a new website called Focal Points which features a number of stories, both written and in video (mov format) showcasing a number of photography's leading professionals, as well as their work with Epson products.

There are quite a few photographers' interviews, but I chose the James Nachtwey interview to feature here.

B&H Digital Audio Recorders Guide

Here's a useful comparison of various digital audio recorders from B&H's Sam Mallery's newsletter.

From the newsletter: "All of the recorders in this article were designed to capture professional-quality audio. Great care has gone into the design of the built-in microphones and inputs. They are used in broadcasting, professional journalism, music production, podcasting, and by hobbyists. These are more than just Dictaphones— they are professional audio recorders with better signal to noise ratios, more file quality options, and file compression capabilities.

My hat's off to Ralph Childs for the link.

Jim McKinniss: Venice

Jim McKinniss is a photography enthusiast, who taught university mathematics and owned a small company providing database design and programming services to large corporations and medium size businesses.

He uses a Canon 1Ds Mark II and his favorite lenses for travel are the Canon EF 16-35mm L zoom, a 100mm macro prime, and a 200mm L prime. His photographic interests are wide, and his past and continuing projects include the study of ghost towns, all things old, motion studies and abstracts of the designs of naturally occurring processes.

Jim McKinniss' website is courtesy of Double Exposure (PhotoWorkshops.com), and I recommend you view his two most interesting galleries: Venice and Cuba.

New York Photo Awards Winners

The winners of the 1st New York Photo Awards were announced Friday 16, 2008 in Brooklyn, New York.

According to the PDN article, the awards ceremony had a casual feel, as attendees braved a rainy night to pack into the St. Ann's Warehouse performance space near the Dumbo waterfront.

The winners in the Editorial category - single (tie) were Ibraheen Abu Mustafa and
Adem Hadei. For other winners, visit the link.

Travel Photographer Of The Year

I received an email from the organizers of the Travel Photographer Of The Year announcing its 2008 photo competition.

As a matter of principle, I do not participate in photo competitions of this sort, however I've been told by a reader of this blog (and a past participant -and winner- in TPOTY) that the competition is professionally managed and competently judged.

Nevertheless, caveat emptor or whatever the appropriate Latin expression is, and read the terms and conditions very carefully before you send in your travel masterpieces.

TTP Recap of the Week

For your convenience, here's the past week's (May 12 - May 18, 2008) most popular posts on TTP:

Soundslides Full Screen: Verdict
POV: Hug Your Audience
Canon Rebates

Nevada Wier: Adobe's Showcase

Nevada Wier's Far Corners of The World Revealed is being shown in an Adobe promotional web feature, which is novel and innovative. The episode featuring her imagery is episode #2 and since the web site is Flash-based, I can't give you the direct link to it, but the website's link is Adobe Creative License. You need to click on episode #2.

The feature is graphic-intensive, and requires a fast connection.

(Via Nevada Wiers' blog)

Soundslides Full Screen: Verdict

I've now downloaded the fullscreen playback Soundslides Plus which was just released in beta form, and found it to be a brilliant step forward for this product, which as you can easily guess, I'm a fan of.

I spent a few minutes creating a 'super-sized' slideshow, which allows viewers to the full screen option on their monitors. The slideshow will be shortly uploaded to my website.

The updated Beta version of Soundslides can be downloaded from here

Other competing products such as Fotomagico and Photopresenter may be equally good, but since I've started to use Soundslides I found it to be ideally suited to my requirements. My experience with its customer service has been perfect, prompt and efficient.

Douglas Menuez: The Orphans of Uganda

Douglas Menuez began his career photographing for the Washington Post, then moved to Time, Newsweek, Life, People and Fortune Magazine and many other publications worldwide over the past twenty years.

He’s covered major news stories including the famine in Ethiopia, the destruction of the Amazon, the AIDS crisis, drug wars, presidential campaigns, the Olympics, five SuperBowls and the World Series.

Transcendent Spirit: The Orphans of Uganda follows the journey of 20 orphans who overcame tremendous hardships to form a dance troupe and become cultural ambassadors for their troubled country. They have brought their intense energy and joy to audiences across the US over the past ten years, which have resulted in their support of more than 700 orphans in Uganda. Rising from the extreme poverty and devastation wrought by AIDS and civil war in Uganda to receive standing ovations while touring the best theaters in the US, these exceptional children bring good news from Africa.

For further work from Menuez, go here.

Soundslides Full Screen!

The fullscreen playback Soundslides Plus has just been released in (beta). According to the release notes, the highlights of the new beta release are:

- Full screen playback (Plus only)
- Multiple jpeg image import now available under the Slides tab's "Add image" button
- Re-importing shorter duration audio no longer resets timing points. All timings are preserved now.
- Application now correctly reads the EXIF image rotation data from imported JPEG files and rotates accordingly on import
- Application now creates a .ssproj project file, this file will launch the associated project in Soundslides or Soundslides Plus when double clicked or dragged to the application icon
- Application displays a warning dialog if quit with unsaved changes
- "Clear recent menu" item added to the File menu
- Project folder name now appears in title bar
- Fixed potential compatibility issue with the video plug-in on OS X Leopard
- Improved error handling when importing images and audio

It can be downloaded from here

Thanks!

Photograph © Tewfic El-Sawy -All Rights Reserved
Thank you to the 640pixels blog for including The Travel Photographer in its
5 Websites Every Photographer Should Visit Often listing. It puts my blog in very august company.

I thought the above photograph of an Indian woman at a Varanasi shrine, and offering prasad as a gesture of thanks, is appropriate for this post.

My Show-off: Pankawallah

Photograph © Tewfic El-Sawy-All Rights Reserved
This is my second photograph for the Show-Off feature with an example of my personal photography on The Travel Photographer's blog. Click on the photograph to view it larger size. I used Lightroom 2.0 to accentuate the photograph's saturation. It was photographed with a Canon 28-70mm 2.8L at 28mm 1/60 sec at f 7.1

This is Muhammed Jashem, a pankawallah and one of the more colorful caretakers at the Nizzam Uddin dargah, an ancient and popular Muslim shrine in Delhi. The dargahs (there are a few in Delhi) are my favorite haunts for environmental portraiture.

A pankawallah is someone who works a ‘pankah', a large cloth fan on a frame, and in this specific case, fans the dargah's devotees while they're performing their prayers, or listening to qawwali songs. The dargah pankawallah does not expect tips, but gladly accepts if these are offered. Muhammed is also in charge of lighting wood coal for the burning of incense at the shrine.

Here are more of my photographs of Indian Raga.

PDN Photo Annual 2008

Photograph © Shiho Fukada-All Rights Reserved
PDN has done a gorgeous job with its Photo Annual's website. No one will agree with all of the judges' choices, but most of the awards were certainly well deserved.

I'm gratified that Shiho Fukada was recognized for her work on the brothels of Bangladesh, especially since I've often posted the work of this talented New York City-based photographer on The Travel Photographer blog.

Here's PDN Photo Annual 2008

World Press Photo Interviews

World Press Photo has posted 22 interviews with the 2008 (and 2007) award winning photographers, such as Tim Hetherington, Stanley Greene, Brent Stirton, Balzazs Gardi and Vanessa Winship among others.

A very nicely produced feature with a small flash movie as an inset with each photographer's interview, and a loupe (a la Lightroom and Aperture) to magnify details of the photograph being discussed. Nice touch.

WORLD PRESS PHOTO INTERVIEWS

POV: Hug Your Audience

Photograph © Tewfic El-Sawy-All Rights Reserved
Mike Fox has an excellent article on Black Star Rising titled Building Your Brand Online, in which he outlines recommendations for photographers and photojournalists -established and emerging- to brand themselves. It's a must-read for those who need reaffirmation that the Internet is the most useful medium for self-marketing.

As the article asserts, branding oneself is a multi-pronged effort; it includes setting up a Facebook or MySpace account, putting up a Flickr site, author a blog, and use the myriad of other tools that are readily available.

There's no doubt in my mind that authoring The Travel Photographer blog was one of the wisest decision I've made. It takes time and effort, but it's certainly worth it. The Travel Photographer blog was an excellent (and cheap) way to publicize my name, my photography work and photo expeditions to an infinitely larger audience than the one originally reached through my website. The blog effectively allowed me to hug my audience, and each post I write maintains that hug.

I also compound the reach of my blog by crafting my periodic email newsletters that carry news of my photography projects and photo expeditions. Email newsletters are phenomenal tools to directly reach your contacts. My mailing list went from a handful of names at its outset to currently over 500 registered members....and more join every week. This in itself is a key target audience...and the newsletters allow me to hug that audience.

So my advice to established and (especially) emerging photographers is to create and maintain a blog...it doesn't have to be updated daily, but it must be well crafted and interesting...and weekly posts are perfectly acceptable. Blogging about one's work and describing how a specific photograph was made is always interesting to your audience. If one relies on the passive approach of just having a website, hoping and waiting for eyeballs...the wait will be long.

However, if one starts a blog, it must be updated on a consistent basis. Posting on an erratic or irregular basis defeats the purpose of maintaining a regular line of communications (aka the hug) with your target audience, who should be anticipating your forthcoming blog post...very similar to the arrival of a magazine in one's mailbox.