View from my room, Boston.
Picture Stories
February 05, 2010
Boston
View from my room, Boston.
January 30, 2010
Neither rain nor snow nor dark of night...
We are in the middle of a massive winter storm in the Southeast. There is snow and rain and sleet. Crazy winter weather. I'm trying to shoot a story in the middle of this, and weather doesn't make things easier. The drive from one site that I am shooting to another should have taken 4 hours yesterday. Instead it took 12 through rain sleet and snow. I have to shoot today operating on 4 hours of sleep.
On the upside 1/2 a foot of snow makes everything pretty.
-Stephen Alvarez
Rogersville, TN
January 28, 2010
Bishop's office Juba, South Sudan
Bishop's office, Juba South Sudan October 2009
Last week Human Rights Watch released a report saying that abuses by both the Northern and the Southern security forces threaten to undermine the upcoming elections. That corroborates what I found in my informal survey in October. As one man told me, "at least during the war I knew who my enemies were."
-Stephen Alvarez
January 21, 2010
Robert Frank, Life for a photographer
"Life for a photographer cannot be a matter of indifference. Opinion often consists of a kind of critisicm, But criticism can come out of love."
-Robert Frank
In response to criticism of The Americans
January 18, 2010
National Geographic Freelance Room
Photography is a singular occupation. We tend to work alone. It is unusual for me to see another photographer in the field ever. The only place I ever run into my fellow photographers is the NG freelance room. Every time I go in, there is someone I admire sitting at one of the cubicles talking about something interesting. It offers a rare sense of camaraderie in an otherwise solitary profession.
Here is the scene on Friday in the NG freelance room: left to right, David Alan Harvey, William Albert Allard, and Ira Block. What are they talking about? A camera bag...
-Stephen Alvarez
January 13, 2010
Salt River, Tennessee
Some days I feel like this, like I am just barely keeping my head above water. Too much to do.
This is the long swim in Salt River cave. It is about 6 inches of airspace over many feet of water. You can't touch the bottom and as you swim the trick is not to make waves because they come up to the ceiling. So that is what I do these days when there is too much work. Just swim through it calmly and try not to make waves.
-Stephen Alvarez
January 12, 2010
7D in Argentina
Ok this is one of the more unique dslr filmmaking techniques I have seen. Most of the commercial we were doing was shot on the Red One. But as anyone who has ever seen one knows they are monsters. So the director and dp attached a Canon 7D 
-Stephen Alvarez
January 05, 2010
Buenos Aires
My friend Daniel Villar directing a Sony/Ericsson commercial in Buenos Aires, Argentina
I'm headed to Buenos Aires to shoot a Sony-Ericsson Satio phone commercial today. Its a lot of work in just a few days and I'll try to post something from the camera phone. It is shocking, this new phone has a 12 megapixel camera in it. My first double truck photo in National Geographic was shot with a 6 megapixel camera.
-Stephen Alvarez
buy the satio here
Hunting Crocodiles, Madagascar
Like I said yesterday, contest time is here. And this is a great time to go through a year's images and pull out things I'd forgotten about. The image above had completely slipped my mind. I shot it as part of a story, it didn't make the final cut so off to the dust bin.
Except that I don't ever throw pictures out, so here is Luke Padgett searching for crocodiles on the Manambolo. Not sure if it goes into a contest ...
-Stephen Alvarez
December 29, 2009
Ezrum, Turkey
Ezrum Turkey
