Each year, the non-profit Aftermath Project awards two $20,000 grants to photographers exploring the lasting effects of conflicts on civilian populations, in order to encourage conversation about the value of journalism that goes beyond the headlines to study the aftermath of war and strife. Grant winners and two finalists are published in a book. Applications for the 2011 grants are now available online on the web site of the Aftermath Project. Applications must be received by November 1, 2010.
The Aftermath Project is funded by donations from institutions and individuals, and does not charge an application fee for entry.
The 2010 winners were Polish-born, Italy-based photographer Monika Bulaj, who won for her project “Afghanistan: Not Only The War,” which explores Sufism and other minority religions in the country; and American photographer Danny Wilcox Frazier, who is working on “Wounded Knee: Generations Endure a Massacre,” a project examining the effects of both the 1890 Wounded Knee Massacre and the 1973 uprising, during which armed Native Americans reclaimed the Wounded Knee land and held it during a 71-day standoff with Federal authorities.
Several agencies that supply celebrity photographs taken by
paparazzi to People magazine have banded together to demand additional compensation for the use of photographs in People’s forthcoming
iPad app, according to Hollywood Reporter.
The entertainment trade publication says the negotiations
are delaying the release of People’s iPad app, an assertion Time, Inc., owners
of People, deny.
“Photo agencies are taking a keen interest in the iPad
because while online usage of their snapshots commands a fraction of what their
fees earn from print usage, they recognize the potential for the tablet market
to be a game-changer,” the article says.
If a recent study commissioned by a consortium of publishers
that includes Time, Inc. is to be believed, the tablet market could drive $3
billion in revenues by 2014. According to a report published yesterday by Folio,
digital consortium Next Issue Media, which includes Condé Nast, Hearst,
Meredith, News Corp. and Time Inc., hired a consulting firm to evaluate the
demand for tablet subscriptions. The firm found that the tablet market for
newspapers and magazines could create $3 billion in revenue.
If the market for tablet editions of publications does realize this potential, photographers and their agents are likely to press publishers to negotiate additional compensation for tablet usage over the next few years.
Herman Leonard, who shot iconic images of jazz greats including Duke Ellington, Billie Holiday, Miles Davis and others, died August 14 in Los Angeles. The cause of death was leukemia. He was 87.
Leonard attended Ohio University to study photography in the 1940s, and served in the medical corps during World War II. After finishing college in 1947, he drove to Ottawa and knocked on the door of Yousuf Karsh. The famous portrait photographer told Leonard he didn't need an assistant, but they hit it off over lunch, and Leonard ended up apprenticing under Karsh for a year.
Today is the last day to submit work to the PDN Pix Digital Imaging Contest. Now in its 16th year the Pix Digital awards have highlighted the best in digital imagery each year.
2009 saw the introduction of the popular multimedia category, which honored a film by the Wade Brothers for British fashion house FLY53.
This year’s entry categories include: ADVERTISING, PORTRAITS/CELEBS/MUSIC, TRAVEL/LIFESTYLE, FASHION/BEAUTY, NEW TALENT, PERSONAL PROJECTS and MULTIMEDIA PROJECTS.
Judges for this year’s contest are: Anna Goldwater Alexander, Deputy Photo Editor, Wired Magazine; Brian Storm of Media Storm; Saatchi & Saatchi Art Buyer Katie Johnson; Aaron Padin, Head of Art at JWT; and Jennifer Santiago, Associate Director, Art Buying, G2 USA, Grey Advertising.
We're a fan of the classic 24 Hours of Le Mans car race and classic Leica cameras, so add the two together and you should have a winner, right? Um…no.
Leica's special limited edition Le Mans version of its X1 digital camera — reviewed here last February — is underwhelming to say the least. Basically it's a Leica X1 with what looks like a sticker placed on top.
The Le Mans X1 was released back in June to commemorate the race and has a limited edition run of 50.
Not clear if all 50 have sold out yet but it's still up for sale at the Leica Store Paris.
On the bright side, the mark-up for the Le Mans version of the X1 is pretty slight. It's selling for 1590 Euros which converts to about $2035. So, in other words, that Le Mans sticker adds about $35 to the list price. Oh, there's also a version sold with a leather case for 1690 Euros or approximately $2163.
We say skip it and save up your pennies for something more extravagant like this gold-plated Leica MP.
Life magazine may have folded for good three years ago, but its parent company, Time Inc., has continued to crank out photo books and themed issues using its photo archive as material. And now a Life publication is available to readers via the latest publishing technology: the iPad.
Life Wonders of the World is the digital version of the new photo book in the Life series. It includes over 100 photos, most of them scenics and landscapes. It sells for $5 on the Apple iTunes store (while the book costs $30 in bookstores).
A review posted of the iPad app, posted on iLounge, complains that the photos only appear in horizontal mode: Turning the iPad does not reorient the image. Instead a big black screen with the words, “Turn to Read Wonders of the World” appear.
That problem aside, Min, the trade magazine for publishing and PR, notes that “the sharp and luminous nature of the iPad display” makes it a natural fit for photo-heavy publications and “Life’s trove of images.”
Lens Culture has announced its 2010 International Exposure Awards Competition of the best in global photography. The competition is designed to find, nurture, and promote emerging as well as established talent from all over the world. It is open to all photographers working in genres ranging from documentary to fine art and fashion photography. Two categories are open for submission: Portfolio Awards and Single Image Awards. An international jury of photography experts will review each entry and choose six grand-prize winners as well as 25 Honorable Mention Awards. Some of the judges are creative and marketing consultant Mary Virginia Swanson, photographer and gallerist Christopher Rauschenberg, and National Geographic’s Kathy Moran.
Six photographers will win top honors and cash grants of up to $2,500. In addition to grants and prizes, the winning photographs will be featured in Lens Culture and exhibited in the International Exposure Awards traveling exhibitions at galleries in Paris, New York and San Francisco.
The deadline for application and image submissions is September 18th, 2010!
Business is apparently grim for NB Pictures, the agency that represent Sebastiao Salgado, Simon Norfolk, and 8 other photographers. Owner Neil Burgess, who was previously head of Network Photographers in London and the New York and London offices of Magnum Photos, has jumped onto the "photojournalism is dead" bandwagon in a dispatch to the EPUK blog. "I’m stepping forward and calling it," he wrote. “Photojournalism: time of death 11.12. GMT 1st August 2010. Amen."
The gist of his argument is that (news flash!) print publishers don't support photojournalism anymore. Burgess allows how "there are some things which look very like photojournalism," and then goes on to say, "but scratch the surface and you’ll find they were produced with the aid of a grant, were commissioned by an NGO, or that they were a self-financed project, a book extract, or a preview of an exhibition."
And what, pray tell, is wrong with that? At best, it's an argument for calling photojournalism by a different name (suggestions, anyone?). In the meantime, photojournalists are simply facing reality, and finding new ways to make it work. Witness the efforts of Magnum, VII, Noor, and other NB Pictures competitors, not to mention the explosion of documentary stories all over the web. (See also our story about alternative funding for photo-j in the August issue of PDN.) Burgess is correct that photojournalism is a terrible way by itself to make a living, and we owe it to every aspiring photojournalist to make that clear. But photojournalism isn't static, and until the passion for it dies, it certainly isn't dead. By the looks of things, that passion is as robust as ever.
The explosion of the Deepwater Horizon oil rig and the subsequent oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico killed 11 workers, destroyed wildlife, did untold harm to the Gulf coast ecosystem and brought economic hardship to communities dependant on the fishing and tourism industries.
And as Steven Meisel points out in a new fashion story in Vogue Italia, the oil spill is also super-duper yucky.
Photojournalist Lee Lockwood, who gained exclusive access to regimes in Cuba, North Vietnam and other communist countries during the 1960s, died July 31 near his home in Weston, Florida, The New York Times has reported. The cause of death was complications from diabetes. He was 78.
Lockwood is best known for a week-long interview he conducted with former Cuban leader Fidel Castro in 1965. From that interview he published Castro’s Cuba, Cuba’s Fidel: An American Journalist’s Inside Look at Today’s Cuba in Text and Pictures in 1967. He also spent 28 days documenting life in North Vietnam in 1967, as the Vietnam war intensified. His story appeared on the cover of the April 7, 1967 edition of Life magazine.
Lockwood was represented for many years by the Black Star photo agency.
