Photographer kills himself because of a photograph

This is a photograph taken by a South African photojournalist, Kevin Carter. It was taken in 1993 and is of a little girl starving to death as she tried to crawl towards the food center less than a mile away. The vulture was waiting for her to die.
Carter took this photograph and left to continue on his work assignment.

He later won the Pulitzer Price in 1994 and two months later, committed suicide due to depression.
This is one of these things that make me think. After taking a photograph such as this one, would you want to intervene? If taking photographs of the harsh truth is your way to make a better world, then why not help the people you are photographing?

Owen vs. Brooke

So we had two guest speakers coming in to talk to our class these couple weeks, Brooke and Owen, and I definitely prefer one over another. Janelle Brooke. She's young, and her photographs show it. She's different and gave herself a signature style that most couples nowadays would love, which is great because all she does is wedding photography. She was very inspiring, seemed very happy with her job, and really gave the entire class hope. Whereas Owen sort of... did the opposite. He kept mentioning the past and how much better photography used to be because of the amount of amateur photographers there are today. He was almost irritable and annoyed that he had to be talking to our class. Didn't seem to have much to say to us.
Anyway that's what I picked up. I'm still glad I got to hear what both of them had to say though.

Research project

Fact-sheet

a. Travel photography is the field I have chosen

b. Self-employment is the most commonly used way for travel photographers to start their own business

c. The buyers/customers are those who work for books, magazines, newpapers, travel company brochures, calendars, greeting cards, posters, advertising agencies, fine art print collectors, and websites.

d. Formal education is not necessary and this field can be self-taught

e. Assisting and internships are important steps to becoming more successful and better experienced

f. A typical work day/week differs with photographers but for Tewfic El-Sawy, the travel photographer I interviewed, his days are long and he usually starts early in the day for best lighting conditions.

g. Pricing, again, depends on the way the photographer chooses to sell their work, but stock photography is commonly used with travel photography and can range from very little money like 10 dollars to thousands of dollars, depending on the demand of the photograph.

h. As a travel photographer, one can make from 21,000 to 229,000 (or above if you're lucky) a year.

i. Professional organizations such as the ASMP help create connections, and leads to workshops, internships, and jobs.

j. I had asked El-Sawy how to approach strangers when photographing them, and he told me to be honest and to spend some time with them prior to the shoot.

k. This research paper helped me understand this field more and taught me that it is not an easy field to be in but I believe I have the will to make it happen.

Photoshop fun

I had some time today and decided to put together some crazy layers of people and nature... one is of my little brother, and one is of myself :)

Daydreamin'

photomanip I just finished. I've been listening to this song, I love it
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SaUeiCaAejA

Purr

My little life companion died this Halloween. His name was Bichon and he was a fat, purring fuzzy red thing that did nothing but love on people. He has traveled the world with our family and lived until he was 13. I was looking through a folder of my self portraits just now and realized that more than half of my self portraits have him in them. This goes to prove that he was such a big part of me... I really do feel like I lost a part of myself.
This is a photograph I took of us about a year ago. He loved to tackle me with his head :3

Diversity

I have always embraced diversities and seeing this poster and the quote made me realize that not only should I embrace everyone's differences, but that without it, there would be no inspiration for my photography.

My favorite model

Kieran, again

Time Management...

So I filled out Keener's schedule and did realize that even though I have a pretty busy schedule (working full time, going to school full time) I still have a lot of time I could be using for homework. I am making good grades, etc but I always complain on how much time I need to get everything done but really the time is there and I just need to see it to know it. So thanks prof. Keener for making me do this, it really helped...
Cora

10/18/10 sunset

This was taken tonight during sunset right next to the road

multiple exposure feature

I just started using the "multiple exposure" feature in my camera (so much fun) and this is what I came up with. No photoshop except for color/sharpness. Multiple exposures were done in-camera. For the first picture, I focused on Sam for one of the exposures and focused on what was behind him for the second. For the second picture, I had to turn the camera completely so that the 2nd exposure would be exactly the opposite as the 1st.

Poison Ivy

This is a picture I took in the woods today. I like the colors and the wide angle/vignette look to it :]

Inspirational Movie

I just wanted to recommend a movie you guys should watch. It's french with subtitles, and it's one of those movies that has inspired the way I see and photograph the world. There's just something about it. The movie is called "Le Fameux Destin D'amélie Poulain" and you can rent it easily from Blockbuster. Just lettin' ya know!


Here's the link to the trailer if you're interested:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8G7CkdZoEK4&feature=related

Stranger

I thought this was a cute picture of my cat...haha

feathers n leaves

Random, a closeup picture of dunes at the beach. Kind of inspired by Radiohead's Kid A album.

Summer is over...but fall is back!

Fall is back, and I'm excited to take pictures of all the autumn colors... but I am going to miss summer. This picture was taken in the middle of summer. I love to take pictures with shallow depth of fields. It's really what I love the most when I take pictures, in fact most of my photos are taken with a wide aperture. Oh, and this is my little brother, he loves plants and flowers :]

About me

My name is Cora and my dream is to travel the world and photograph it and its people. I have already traveled and lived in different corners of the world and intend to keep moving for the rest of my life. I was born in Geneva, Switzerland and lived in France for 11 years. I lived in Austin, Texas for 8 years and am now new to Long Island, NY. I am going to community college here and hope to transfer to a specialized school in art/photography. I'm very excited to learn more about this passion of mine and can't wait to meet people with the same interests :]