Picture Stories by Stephen Alvarez

stuck

I bet that right now someone is reading this stuck in an airport. You are stuck now because some jackass tried to blow up a Detroit bound flight last week. Security is tighter, traffic is heavy, weather is bad, a perfect storm of travel delays. 

It sucks, and I feel for you. While it might not help, maybe this photo can put things into perspective. This is the main road through Kajo Keji, South Sudan, the truck stuck on the single lane bridge belongs to the company in charge of maintaining the roads. Double Stuck.

Remember things could always be worse.

-Stephen Alvarez

 

The New Canon G11 review by Ira Block

UPDATE the G11 is 50 bucks off at Amazon see it here Canon PowerShot G11  

Photographers take pictures, but if you aren’t carrying your camera, you’re going to miss a lot of great 
shots. That is why I make an effort to always carry a point and shoot with me – a habit that goes back to the days when I shot film. I’ve worked my way up through all the Canon G series  digital cameras starting with the G6, and now the new Canon PowerShot G11 . The big news for me on the G11 is the flip out screen – the last G series that shot raw with a flip out screen was the G6, and I’m glad it’s back. The new G11 screen is a little smaller than the G10 , but it’s hardly noticeable.

Mobile Food Pantry Sewanee, Tennessee

Last Saturday Otey Parish's Community Action Committee and Second Harvest Food Bank distributed 18,000 pounds of food to families from across the Southern Cumberland Plateau in a mobile food pantry.

Organizer Laura Willis was expecting 200 families, 450 ended up receiving food. People waited in line 4, 5, 6 hours to receive a grocery cart of donated food. They are largely working poor families, people the economic stimulus plan has left behind. 

-Stephen Alvarez

You can veiw a hi def version of the video here

Happy Thanksgiving Viva La France

From the New York Times this morning, they should be celebrating Thanksgiving in Paris.

Journalism 2.0 rises from the ashes

I write about the death of journalism here. The NY times has an interesting article on an organization (voice of san diego.org) that is doing non profit journalism much like I advocate. Call it journalism 2.0

-Stephen Alvarez

Kansuk, South Sudan

This cycle of violence happens many places in the world but no more so than along the border of Uganda and Sudan. Soldiers kill parents, orphans join armies, become soldiers who kill parents. The wheel constantly turns...

What choice does this kid in the picture have but to become the soldier that he is staring at? That is why I shot the picture as part of a long series I've been working on about the border. It is really about that cycle, people caught in it, perpetuating it, trying to break it.

This image is on my mind today. It is one of two wall sized banner prints hanging in the chapel at my old high school SAS. They were made for a gallery show about the project and then hung in the church afterward by the school's chaplain Buddy Van Dyke. I've been asked to come back to the school tomorrow morning and talk to the students about the pictures during morning chapel. I've done this once before and I have to say that speaking to 200 high school students at 8am is one of the more intimidating experiences of my life. 400 bored eyeballs who's bullshit sensors are highly tuned. Don't yet know what I am going to say but I do know it better be true.

-Stephen Alvarez

Sewanee, TN

Death of Journalism

Jeff Jarvis mocks the death of journalism here. Ron Rosenbaum takes him to task here. Rosenbaum's article resonates today as Time Inc has announced it would like to cut 600 jobs and there are rumors that NG will do something nearly as drastic this morning. 

Jarvis (founder of Entertainment Weekly)  faults journalists for not giving consumers what they want. Rosenbaum counters with Gershams Law 

"trash drives out value."

I think that Jarvis confuses journalism with media. Journalism is not about giving people what they want but information that they need. Over the past 7 years journalism has broken down in this country. Major publications have given consumers too much information that they want and little of what they need. The pressing question for me is how do we have a free society without good information?

Do we need to go down the list of recent journalism failures?

Weapons of Mass Destruction in Iraq
Link between Iraq and Al-Queda
politicization of the justice department
relaxation of capitalization rules leading to the current financial crisis
global warming (ok maybe we get a break on global warming)

There are many more feel free to ad to them...

What to do about it? This is the tough part. Journalism -as viewed by the people who run media companies- is a commodity. As good capitalists the people in charge want to see how cheaply they can make their commodity (call it product or the dreaded "content") and still sell it. We shouldn't fault them for this, it is their job. The CEO, CFO etc of Time Warner is responsible to the shareholders and the CEOs of other media giants are responsible to their investors whether they be shareholders or individuals.

Maximizing profit is their job. 

Journalism, good journalism on the other hand is expensive. Do you have any idea what it costs to keep a writer or photographer in the field? How about filing freedom of information requests? Or compiling financial data? Or spending years cultivating sources in government. It costs money and time. Spending that money runs counter to maximizing profits. 

So what is to be done? Well we could ask the shareholders of Time Warner to accept lower dividends. I think that is doomed to failure. There should be a way to remove news gathering, true journalism from the profit driven cycle. Some of the best journalism done is publicly funded, Frontline, Nova, NPR. I think that there has to be a way to treat journalism as a public necessity rather than as entertainment and business.

Sort of a not for profit, endowment funded institute for journalism. There are several small scale grants and endowments, Aftermath,  Alexia and the Pew come to mind, but I am thinking large scale. When my ideas get more sorted out I'll post about it. Tomorrow I promise to get back to photography.

-Stephen Alvarez

Voting

It seems like more than my grandfather abandoned the Republican party yesterday. Now the real work begins. Congratulations to President Elect Obama and to us all.

Obama's acceptance speech

Voting

I love my grandfather Charles Speidel. He was a successful business man and then in retirement a dedicated amatuer photographer. Our family vacations are better documented than either Bush presidency. I think that much of my obsession with photography grows from his influence on me. Charlie has been the light of many parties, is always a pleasure to talk to but he and I never, ever talked about politics. 

For his entire life my grandfather  has voted a straight Republican ticket. He says that he "occasionally" would throw a democrat into the mix, but for most of the 60 plus years he's been voting Republican. That is an amazing record.

This morning when Charlie went into the voting booth he voted a straight Democratic ticket for the first time, EVER. I asked him why and his answer came down to McCain's choice of running mate. It seems that he is concerned with the people John McCain is surrounding himself with. 

I think it is a measure of how far to the extreme right the Republican party has swung that a reasonable conservative like my grandfather votes for a democratic president for the first time. But I still doubt that we will talk about politics much.

Barack and Roll!

-Stephen Alvarez

Politics

 There are two extensive photo essays on the Digital Journalist this month. John McCain is covered by Stephen Crowley from the New York TImes. It is the coverage that you would expect to see from a conventional, heavily orchestrated campaign. Crowley is a great photographer but there is no penetration beyond the photo op. He was simply not given the chance to see beyond the veil. In fact Crowley calls the McCain tour the "No Talk Express."

Contrast that with Callie Shell's coverage of Obama. Callie too is a great photographer -perhaps the best political photographer this generation- and she is able to give us a glimpse inside the campaign. That speaks to her skill as a photographer. Callie spent 8 years developing a style a technique to photograph behind the scenes as Al Gore's photographer. She is able to get to what is going on in politics, but only because the politicians are willing to let her.

The coverages make clear the differences in the campaigns. Do those difference translate into how the men would govern? Well we will never know because come the first Tuesday of November only one of them will become president.

I hope it is the man who is not scared to have his picture taken.

-Stephen Alvarez, Sewanee Tennessee