Photographers Blog

from Russell Boyce:

Asia – A week in pictures 14 August 2011

Russell Boyce

Aug 15, 2011 14:20 UTC

This week Pakistan marked its day of independence from British rule with parades, parties, face painting and bombs.  Two pictures of faces covered in colour, one paint, the other blood, seems to sum up all there needs to be said about the national pride Pakistan feels while facing so many challenges. Visually the complementary colours of green and red (colours on opposite sides of the colour spectrum) make the pictures jump out of the page especially when put side by side. The angry eye staring out of the face of green in Mohsin Raza's picture engages the viewer full on while in Amir Hussain's picture the man seems oblivious of his wound as blood covers his face, again more opposites, this time not in colour but mood. India too is preparing to celebrate its independence and Dehli-based photographer Parivartan Sharma's picture of festival preparations came to mind after I put together the red-and-green combination picture from Pakistan.  

(top left) A man, with his face painted depicting the colours of the Pakistan national flag, attends a ceremony to mark the country's Independence Day at the Wagah border crossing with India on the outskirts of Lahore August 14, 2011. Pakistan gained independence from British rule in 1947. REUTERS/Mohsin Raza

A man, his face bloodied by a head injury, is held by a resident as he waits to be evacuated from the site of a bomb blast in Dara Allah Yar, located in the Jaffarabad district of Pakistan's Balochistan province, August 14, 2011. A bomb ripped through the two-story building in Pakistan's restive southwest on Sunday, killing at least 11 people and wounding nearly 20, police said. REUTERS/Amir Hussain 

A worker installs decorations to a tent to be used for independence day celebrations in Noida, in the outskirts of New Delhi August 14, 2011. India commemorates its independence day on August 15. REUTERS/Parivartan Sharma

A roller-coaster week in global markets kept many of the team in Asia busy illustrating one of the hardest stories to shoot pictures for, the fall and rise of stocks, currencies and markets. On news of the United States losing its triple-A rating the markets fell only to be later buoyed by good news on employment. Gold prices rose and currencies fell on more bad news from the euro-zone, the Asia market always being one of the first to react. The question in every photographers' mind was "what to take pictures of?". One minute the markets are up and the  next down, currency changes are good for one part of the country's economy but bad for another. From Pakistan and India across to China, Japan, South Korea and down to Australia, the pictures the team produced are a visual feast of the turmoil.

Editing thousands of cricket pictures a day

Altaf Bhat

Apr 4, 2011 15:57 UTC

Sports and Action photography is all about timing. It’s about reacting. It’s about being in the right place at the right time and it’s about execution.

These are all qualities of the athlete and those of the photographer covering them as well. Each sport has predictable and unpredictable moments. For instance, in cricket, photographers will have opportunities to capture jump shots, players diving to make the crease, diving to take a catch, diving to field the ball, a bowler leaping in the air as he bowls, a batsman screaming in joy on reaching his century, etc. Understanding the timing of these predictable actions allows a photographer to capture the peak moment; when the action is most dramatic.

Before I start editing I always have a brief chat with the photographers about what could be the day’s great picture. The staff never fail to deliver and meet expectations. I briefed two photographers covering matches from the quarter-finals onwards not to forget to look for emotion in the players and the fans. A good number of the best shots come from the crowd. I received a bunch of nice pictures of the crowd from the final.

While editing pictures from the semi-final match between arch rivals India and Pakistan, I thought I should leave the confines of our New Delhi desk and photograph the match in Mohali. The Mohali semi-final match had a few news angles attached to it. Firstly, India and Pakistan were playing each other after a long time; secondly the Indian Prime Minister and his Pakistan counterpart Yusuf Raza Gilani were watching the match in the stands after the latter accepted an invite from Manmohan Singh to watch the match. It was a historic moment where one could see the prime ministers of two nuclear-armed countries sitting side-by-side enjoying the game. But in the end, I am glad I edited their pictures.

from Russell Boyce:

Asia – A Week in Pictures, March 27, 2011

Russell Boyce

Mar 28, 2011 03:06 UTC

Japan continues to dominate the file from Asia with new photograhers rotating in to cover the twists and turns of this complex and tragic  story.  In a country were the nation rarely buries its dead, the site of mass graves is quite a shocking scene to behold. Holes the length of football pitches are dug in the ground with mechanical digggers and divided into individual plots by the military and are then filled with the coffins of the victims of the tsunami. Family members come to weep and pray over the graves. Some are namless and marked only with DNA details, others bear the names of the victims. There is not enough power or fuel to cremate the thousands of bodies that are being recovered from the disaster zone. 

Members of the Japan Ground Self-Defense Force carry a coffin of a victim of the earthquake and tsunami to be buried at a temporary mass grave site in Higashi-Matsushima, in Miyagi prefecture, northern Japan March 24, 2011. REUTERS/Yuriko Nakao

People who have either been made homeless by the tsunami or have fled the 30km exclusion zone around the stricken nuclear plant live out their lives in evacuation centres, not sure what the future will hold. There is a backdrop of growing concern over the radiation that is continuing to leak out into the atmosphere from the nuclear plants in Fukushima.  Thousands of people are still unaccounted for, international help has arrived to help with the massive task of clearing up, industry is still crippled and the weather is poor.  Next week, a school will reopen at a temporary site, 80% of the classes are either dead or missing. It is under these conditions our team of photographers continue to work. Again I wil let the pictures speak for themslves.

Members of the Japan Ground Self-Defense Force salute after placing coffins of earthquake and tsunami victims at a temporary mass grave site in Higashi-Matsushima, in Miyagi prefecture, northern Japan March 24, 2011. REUTERS/Yuriko Nakao

Clash of two cricketing titans

Vivek Prakash

Mar 25, 2011 21:42 UTC

The second quarter-final of the cricket world cup was a clash between two huge teams. India, the world’s no. 1 team with its power batting lineup. Australia, three-time world champions who have reigned supreme over the game for 12 years. Whoever won, it would be a huge story. Whoever lost, it would be a huge story.

We headed to the stadium at around 10am, well before the 2.30pm start. Traffic was backed up a long way. There was only one road leading to it and we weren’t sure if it was fans waving flags and blowing horns, buses and four wheel drives, scooters or the cops that were in charge. Fellow photographer Andrew Caballero-Reynolds got nervous because on his last 3 trips to stadiums, the vehicle he’s been in has blown a tire. Lucky we made it in one piece. There were thousands of fans queuing in the searing heat to get into the ground, watched over by the usual stick-wielding police in khaki suits.

I installed a remote camera high on a TV tower above the stands, hooked up by usb cable to a laptop, both powered by a 25m extension cord we rented for 150 rupees (about 4 dollars) from a local shop that usually rents them out for weddings. The remote would capture the action from a different angle and would fire whenever I wanted it to from my field side position. I had the laptop running on a data card so the pictures would automatically be downloaded and transmitted to our editing system live, so that we didn’t have to wait for the break inbetween innings to get the disk and edit pictures. It was going to provide some great pictures from the match.

As it got closer to the start of the match, fans packed the stadium and the familiar chants began – “Jeeta bhai jeetega!! Indiaaaaa jeetega!!!” (We’ll win brother, we’ll win, India will win!!!) I was torn, as someone who was born in India but has an Australian passport, I wasn’t sure who to support. I decided to support New Zealand, my other nationality, to evade having to choose.

Australia had a fairly tame start to the match. Captain Ricky Ponting scored a century as Australia posted a total of 260. Amit Dave, Andrew and myself were burnt to a crisp in the unforgiving Gujarat heat as we covered the innings. At least I had water on my side; they forgot to bring any for the photographers at Andrew and Amit’s positions.

Cricket snippets

Vivek Prakash

Mar 2, 2011 22:12 UTC

We’re into March, and the ICC Cricket World Cup is well under way. Just 32 more days to go (yes, thirty-two!) until the tournament comes to a close with a final showdown in Mumbai on April 2.

Reuters’ lean mean team of photographers have fanned out across three countries in the subcontinent – India, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka – as we get stuck into covering the first round of the tournament. Photographers Adnan Abidi, Andrew Biraj, Amit Dave, Andrew Caballero-Reynolds, Dinuka Liyanawatte, Rupak De Chowdhury, Danish Siddiqui and myself have started crisscrossing our territories. Philip Brown, who is on an “embed” with the English cricket team, has already covered two cities. Altaf Bhat in New Delhi is anchoring the operation as the main editor for the tournament with me lending a hand on days when I’m not on the move, shooting training or covering a match.

Covering cricket in the subcontinent is not as straightforward as one might think – for one thing, we’re worried about tight travel schedules and the possibility of flight delays – which thankfully haven’t happened yet.

A range of problems beset every one of us in this first week of matches.

At the opening ceremony in Dhaka, the stadium wireless went down, as did the phone network, leaving everyone stranded with no way to file anything, and it didn’t recover until well into the ceremony. Andrew Biraj had pictures of a lavish ceremony featuring traditional hand-pulled rickshaws and performers playing a cricket suspended from wires, on a giant vertical backdrop.

2011 Cricket World Cup: Let’s play

Altaf Bhat

Feb 17, 2011 20:25 UTC

As the cricket World Cup draws closer, the pulse rate of the players and their fans from the 14 participating nations is surely rising.

The build up to the quadrennial event, the equivalent of the FIFA soccer world cup, has been nothing short of spectacular. Despite the game grappling with a spot-fixing saga and an under-prepared Eden Gardens stadium in Kolkata losing the hosts a marquee match against England, the enthusiasm of having a “good game” seems to have taken over. Like the previous editions, the 10th ICC world cup will also see some of the great cricketers saying “Goodbye” to the gentleman’s game and all of them would want to lay their hands on the coveted trophy.

Fans will be seeing Ricky Ponting, Muthaiah Muralitharan, Sachin Tendulkar and probably Jacques Kallis for the last time at a world cup but it will be Sachin, who will want to etch his name on the winners’ trophy more than anyone else. The master blaster has achieved almost everything that is there to achieve in the game of cricket but the world cup has remained elusive.

There will surely be new heroes found for their respective nations and new stars will appear on the horizon. But there are already some who I will be keenly watching during the 45 day event. From India, the most exciting youngster to emerge since the master blaster has been Virat Kohli. In the limited opportunities he has got, Kohli has proved that he is the man for the future.

Colin Ingram from South Africa will be another young lad to watch alongside Ahmad Shehzad, Umar Akmal (from Pakistan), Darren Bravo from the West Indies and Angelo Mathews from Sri Lanka.

In the bowling department, spinners will hold the key on the slower and turning tracks of the subcontinent. It might not be the run feast that is anticipated on the pitches in this part of the world but batting should be easier if the batsmen are willing to grind.

Before a ball is bowled

Vivek Prakash

Feb 8, 2011 17:10 UTC

Reuters Photographer Parivartan Sharma takes us to the town of Meerut, north of Delhi, where cricket balls are still being made the old-fashioned way – by hand. India, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh will co-host the 2011 Cricket World Cup starting on February 19.

The Making Of A Cricket Ball – Cricket World Cup Preview from Vivek Prakash on Vimeo.

Sachin Tendulkar in all his cricket glory

Altaf Bhat

Nov 11, 2010 14:41 UTC

I have always followed ‘cricket’ and ‘news’ but ‘cricket news’ has fascinated me like nothing else.

I was in school when news broke that a young boy was going to be part of the Indian cricket team to tour Pakistan under a new captain — Krishnamachari Srikkant. No one in the world had any doubts about the talented young boy from Mumbai but to throw him in the deep end to face the pace battery of Pakistan, led by Wasim Akram and the spin wizardry of Abdul Qadir, who had earned himself a sobriquet of “Googly” for foxing the batsmen world over, had many questioning the wisdom of his selection.

But Sachin Ramesh Tendulkar — who would prove to be the real baby-faced assassin of all bowling attacks and a nightmare for bowlers of legendary stature like Shane Warne — had other ideas.

It was in November 1989, when Sachin was packing his bags for the Pakistan tour, that my school sports coach was giving batting tips to us ahead of a game against a school rival.

Although I doubt my coach had ever watched Sachin play, he was full of praise for the then 16-year-old. I am sure he must have gone through the interviews and column spaces dedicated to him to find a replacement for the aging middle order of the Indian cricket team in late 1980s. Most of the talking and writing revolved around two young schoolmates from Mumbai who had shared a world record partnership of over 600 runs — Sachin and Vinod Kambli.

The duo would play many games — Test matches as well as One Day Internationals — but Sachin has since outlived many careers. He is not the oldest person on the circuit but he has played more years and more games than all the current active cricket players.

from Russell Boyce:

Asia – A week in Pictures 7 November 2010

Russell Boyce

Nov 8, 2010 00:47 UTC

A continual struggle with writing this blog is trying to keep it picture led and not wander off into the top stories from the week that may not have produced the best pictures. This week in Asia we have seen the arrival of U.S President Obama in India, U.S Secretary of State Hilary Clinton doing the rounds, the first election in Myanmar for 20 years (no prizes as to who will win though) not one, but two Qantas jets getting into engine difficulty, the continuing tensions between Japan and China, the failed bid by BHP Billiton to take over of Potash, currency woes as we prepare for G20 in Seoul later this week and let's not forget Afghanistan and bombs in Pakistan. So where to start?  Mick Tsikas produced my favourite picture of the week, a fan at the Melbourne Cup; one can only admire the oral control it takes to shout in celebration while holding firmly onto a lit cigarette.  I thought this was a skill that died out with the passing of Humphrey Bogart.

A race-goer cheers as jockey Gerald Mosse of France rides Americain to victory in the Melbourne Cup at the Flemington Racecourse in Melbourne November 2, 2010. REUTERS/Mick Tsikas

In Indonesia the stark realities of living in the shadow of an erupting volcano continue to be brought home by Beawiharta. Try as I might I could not edit out any of these four pictures.  So with cries of "overfile ovefile" ringing in my ears I will shamelessly re-publish.  Wearing a hat to protect yourself from the hundreds of tonnes of hot ash raining down, you've been made homeless and the air is filled with dust and smoke - what do you do? Light up - a perfect moment caught as life stoically goes on. The strong diagonal lines and planes of tone in perfect monochromatic harmony.

A man smokes a cigarette in front of temporary shelter in Jumoyo village in the city of Magelang as Mount Merapi volcano erupts November 4, 2010. Mount Merapi has killed at least 39 people since it began erupting on October 26. Over 74 have been injured and more than 70,000 people have been evacuated, according to Indonesia's National Disaster Management Board on Wednesday.  REUTERS/Beawiharta

Aditia Surya's brutal image of the twisted ash covered bodies of the victims brings home the speed and destructive power that the eruption of Mount Merapi has brought to Indonesia. To counter this brutality are two images of the beauty by Beawiharta; the angelic figure walking through a camp set up for those made homeless by the eruption and the sheer might of natures forces as Merapi erupts surrounded by lightening strikes.

from Russell Boyce:

Asia – A week in Pictures 17 October 2010

Russell Boyce

Oct 18, 2010 05:57 UTC

Only days after the world watched the 33 Chilean miners emerge from the bowels of the earth, triumphant, an explosion at another mine, half a world away, is making headlines, but on a much smaller scale. The blast in China is reported to have killed 26 miners and trapped 11, with rescue attempts hampered by coal dust. Last year over 2,600 miners died in industrial accidents in China, whose mining industry is considered the deadliest in the world. The access given to the photographer is quite amazing in the circumstances.

A rescuer is seen in a tunnel of the Pingyu No.4 Coal mine in Yuzhou, Henan province October 16, 2010. An explosion in the Chinese coal mine killed at least 20 miners in central Henan Province on Saturday, state media reported. REUTERS/Stringer

Looking at the file from last week I got the sense that Asia seemed strangely calm - maybe the calm before the storm of Super Typhoon Megi that is bearing down on the Philippines.  Winds of over 250 kph are expected along with flooding, landslides and possible injury and damage.  Our team are waiting, poised and ready to jump into action; one of the hardest things to do for photographers is to wait and watch until the danger has passed knowing that safety must come first - no point becoming the story yourself by being injured or worse killed, but always in their minds are the pictures they are missing.

This NASA satellite image, taken and released on October 17, 2010, shows Typhoon Megi, locally known as Juan, approaching the Philippines at 0500 GMT. The super typhoon bore down on the northeastern Philippines on Sunday packing winds of more than 250 kph (155mph), and evacuations began before it makes landfall on Monday morning. REUTERS/NASA/Handout

In India, the Commonwealth Games ended, and no doubt the organisers would like it to be remembered for the athletes competing infront of stunning landmarks and not the images of flooded accommodation, collapsed bridges and dirty pool water.  Tim's picture of diver Grace Reid is a highlight for me: a mixture of beauty, grace (no pun intended), movement and the feeling of controlled panic of a human trying to fly or at least control their fall, unaided by wing or motor.