duckrabbit - we produce photofilms » climate change

For your viewing pleasure: The Big Caption

Adam Westbrook — Sat, 26 Jun 2010 12:14:00 +0000

As you’ve probably read over the last week, we’re big fans of photo-blogs like the New York Times’ Lens blog, which showcase some of the best photography from around the world each and every day.

Alongside Lens, there’s also the Big Picture, run by the Boston Globe. Again, it shows big images every day from somewhere on the planet.

It’s now got it’s own spin-off, in the rather hilarious The Big Caption. Each day, someone takes the Globe’s Big Picture, and sticks an off the wall Big Caption all over it, to create a new piece of art altogether. The man behind it, Ian Collins clearly has a good grasp of graphic design and typography, as well as a great sense of humour making this concept a brilliant cheer-me-up to stick in your Google Reader, not to mention being occasionally profound.

MUSTAFA OZER/AFP/Getty Images)

ADAM WESTBROOK

duckrabbit:

These are great, but I think there is a real issue about the copyright of these images. I don’t think it will be very long before the lawyers at Getty send The Big Caption a Big Bill!

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An illuminated view of climate change in Bangladesh

Adam Westbrook — Mon, 18 Jan 2010 08:57:54 +0000

Yesterday in London I decided to get wonderfully lost. I had some hours to kill and so I started walking along the river not really caring where I ended up.

Where I ended up was the small but popular gallery beneath the OXO Tower, only 10 minutes from where I started. The building used to be a cold meat warehouse apparently, and a scene from the new Sherlock Holmes film is set there.

Today it’s the home of an exhibition by Photojournalist Peter Caton.

Peter’s produced a series of startling images from Bangladesh, what is fast becoming the frontline of climate change. His portraits of the people living with rising waters are rich in colour and powerful. What stands out is how Peter takes his pictures.

The British born photographer lugs a mobile lighting kit with him to produce a studio finish to his images. Who does that?

You can see the result of this in the picture above – it almost looks mocked up, but then you realise it isn’t in a studio at all; for me it meant the message of Peter’s images snuck in beneath the radar and made me think differently. A few too many of them follow the hackneyed tradition of having poor people stare like puppies into the camera. But a few – like the one above – remind us these people have dignity despite their terrifying situation.

If you’re in London I recommend you give the exhibition half an hour of your time. And of course Duckrabbit have returned from a reporting trip in Bangladesh too so expect more great photojournalism & multimedia from a story which really, really needs to be told.

ADAMWESTBROOK

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Sometimes it takes just one picture…

Adam Westbrook — Thu, 07 Jan 2010 18:16:35 +0000

…to show you the importance of stepping back, and slowing down.

…and sometimes we don’t even need a human being to take it.

ADAM WESTBROOK

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Proof that we just don’t give a shit about climate change?

duckrabbit — Tue, 15 Dec 2009 12:10:36 +0000

Oxfam have billed it as possibly the most important meeting in history. And it probably is, until the next one.

We are of course talking about the Copehagen Climate talks.

But after a week of, well not a lot, do people care?

Take a look at David’s pictures in the post below. All snapped in a couple of hours. Kids are great aren’t they? Pretty much wherever you go in the world they’ll give you a smile and try and engage you.

As David writes many of these are kids who have been forced to go and live in slums after their homes have been washed away. The truth is that’s something that has been happening in Bangladesh ever since people started to live there because its such a fragile place. No doubt though that storms are getting more frequent. The rate at which land is washed away has to be seen to be believed. Actually I did see it and I’m not really sure I do believe it. It was that mind mashing.

All that is to say I just flicked up GOOGLE NEWS. It’s a site that tracks which stories are making headway on the net; a fairly accurate indication of what people are reading. Guess what? In their headlines not a single mention of Copenhagen.

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“Voices from the edge of climate change” – Guardian

David White, photographer — Sat, 12 Dec 2009 12:50:11 +0000

Have a look at the wonderful images and good use of the interputerweb on the Guardian’s site. It is worth a few minutes of your time.

Great presentation, strong imagery, interesting stories. Just one thing…the title….there are no voices to be heard.

UPDATE Ciara Leeming:

Actually there are some voices. they take a bit of searching, but they exist

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/video/2009/dec/12/climate-change-photography
and
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/dec/12/climate-change-braschler-fischer

you’d have thought they’d link back a bit better to the original images, wouldn’t you.

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Climate change Bangladesh

David White, photographer — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 15:27:38 +0000

Bonjournio mon amigos,

Couple more pics for you fine folk. The first one was taken in a tiny village called Forki. I had been walking through the village to take pics of where the water had taken the land, and had found myself quickly surrounded by the local kids. After distracting the youngsters by pointing them towards Ben ( he is very distracting, it can’t be easy being 6’8″ with long blonde hair) I had scooted off away from everyone. On my little journey towards the old school house (see pics below), I came across this lad. He is proudly sporting the latest fashion accessory for young Bangladeshis, the plastic cobra head clamp. I got one myself, but I chose the wrong size, and now I can’t get it off. As usual, the subject held my gaze…I have never known anywhere like Bangladesh for that, it is wonderful. If I put a camera in a strangers face here in the UK it would be embedded in mine quicker than you can say cheese. The lad is standing in front of an upturned, recently tarred fishing boat.

Climate change, Bangladesh, 9.2009. A young boy in Forki village proudly displays his plastic cobra 'hat', his back against the tarred bottom of a fishing boat.

The next one is a lot more sombre, but no less odd methinks. Taken at Alimoddi village, Bhola, this picture just doesn’t make sense. The day previously the cow would have been in a field. The river had burst into the village, destroying the mud dam protecting the village and it’s crops. When you see a flood, you imagine it to be deep…I do at least. Often in Bangladesh the water was no more than a few inches or so deep, but so full of sediment (about a third of the waters that reach the Ganges delta are sediment by the time they get there) that you could not see where the land was, whether it was a foot below the water or 20. It’s quite pretty this picture, in a terribly wrong way.

Climate change Bangladesh 11/2009 Water levels around Alimoddi village on the island of Bhola create the wrong landscape. Image © David White ------------------NO UNAUTHORISED USE------------------------- 07866 361695 0044 (0) 117 9710423 www.nospin.co.uk dave@nospin.co.uk

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