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Reuters blog archive
from Photographers Blog:
A day at the gun range
Los Angeles, California
By Jill Kitchener
If a guy wanted to take me to a gun club for a date, I don’t know how I’d react. Growing up near Toronto, Canada, guns have never played a role in my life - most certainly not my dating life. Shooting guns as a recreational activity has never caught on in my social circle.
Yet I found myself at the Los Angeles Gun Club with photographer Lucy Nicholson while on vacation.
After a nice lunch at a neighborhood cafe we thought we’d try our luck in getting permission to shoot at the gun club – with our cameras. To my surprise, the manager was more than happy to have us document the action. She kindly provided us with headphones to save our eardrums.
We met a family with a young girl learning to shoot (the minimum age to shoot at a gun range is 10, as long as they have parental supervision). We met couples on dates, and groups of male and female friends out for some fun. Some were there to shoot the guns they owned, and some were there to try new guns before buying their own. There were tourists looking to shoot, and a swell of frat boys from a local university. Whether young or old, male or female, it seemed everyone was eager to have their shot on the range.
from Photographers Blog:
A witness to Sandy’s wrath
Superstorm Sandy slammed the U.S. East Coast on October 29, causing widespread destruction in coastal New York and New Jersey. One month later, Reuters photographers describe their working conditions during the storm and the aftermath they witnessed – including tragic stories and the resilience of people in their community.
Multimedia production by Jillian Kitchener
from Photographers Blog:
Choreographing our China congress coverage
Beijing, China
By Petar Kujundzic
Is there anyone against? – “Meiyou” (There is no one)
The last time I covered an important Communist Party congress was in my own country almost 23 years ago. I was the only photographer for Reuters there, shooting black and white and sending a few pictures to the wire using a drum analog transmitter. The last congress of the Yugoslav Communist Party, which ruled the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia from 1945 until 1991, ended with a split within the League of Communists and ushered in years of violence and civil conflict... but that is a totally different story.
Last week’s 18th Chinese Communist Party Congress, by contrast, was a highly choreographed affair — no drama. In fact, during the preparation, the question arose: How do you cover one of the world’s top stories when it’s considered visually “boring.” At the same time, how do you deal with the difficulties of restricted access, especially if you are a foreign journalist in China?
from Photographers Blog:
Photographing the Olympic best
Reuters photographers and editors discuss their strategy for covering Olympics track and field events from every angle, such as the highly anticipated men’s 100m final. Videography by Lucy Nicholson. Production by Jillian Kitchener.
from Photographers Blog:
“Bosso Fataka” turn trash into sculpture
By Tom Peter
Some call it street art; Bosso Fataka call it “joy in shaping our environment." The environment that surrounds the four young men of this art group is the streets of Berlin, a city that some say has become Europe's unofficial capital of unsanctioned art in the public space.
Over twenty years after the reunification, there is an abundance of derelict houses, whole swathes of industrial wasteland and railway arches that afford artists with square kilometers worth of brickwork that's just asking to be covered in graffiti.
from Photographers Blog:
Addicted to the needle
By Jason Reed and Larry Downing
The tattoo is as ancient as time itself.
Born out of man’s desire to draw more than straight, simple lines, today’s tattoos have evolved into beautiful interpretations by savvy artists that bend those old lines into colorful masterpieces etched onto a virgin canvas of skin with sharp needles and bright inks. Lifetimes of stories of hard love, or high adventures archived onto an arm, a leg, or for that matter, anywhere skin lives for curious eyes to enjoy forever.
The hobby of collecting tattoos has exploded into the mainstream. Look around and you’ll find them worn by anyone…. and anywhere. Annual conventions and competitions are held freely inside luxury hotels instead of hidden from view. Tattoos are even stars of their own reality television shows.
from Photographers Blog:
Window to North Korea
By Bobby Yip
A ten-day media tour to North Korea is a challenge for the authorities, as well as a challenge for the press. As one side tries to highly control what should be seen and who should be interviewed, the other side tries to show the world what the reality is.
Except visits to scheduled events, in most cases photographers are not allowed to walk on the street to take photos. Many of my images were shot through the window of a media bus or on one occasion through the window of a train. Watching the street scenes and the village scenes along the way, I felt an isolation between the people and me. I also sensed the isolation between the people themselves. It is the ideology behind the surface which distinguishes North Korea from many other countries, and it shows on the streets.
from Photographers Blog:
72 hours in Shanghai
By Carlos Barria
Occasionally, along with covering the news stories like the economy, politics, sports and social trends, we (Reuters photographers) have time to do something really fun.
Weeks ago, over a couple of beers, a friend from the BBC had the idea of putting a camera on the hood of a car and shooting a time-lapse sequence for a story he was working on. I’d never done a time-lapse project myself, so when I was asked to come up with an idea for Earth Hour on March 31— when cities across the world switch off their lights at 8:30 pm— my colleague Aly Song and I thought we’d give it a try. We decided to shoot sequences during the three days leading up to Earth Hour, ending with the dimming of the lights in Shanghai’s city center.
from Photographers Blog:
Obamacare under siege
By Jason Reed
President Obama's healthcare overhaul, signed into law two years ago, is his signature domestic policy achievement. It remains a divisive issue among Americans and is likely to be a key issue ahead of the November 6 election in which he seeks a second term.
For three days this week, the nine Justices heard arguments from both sides on whether the healthcare overhaul is lawful. A ruling is expected in June.
from Photographers Blog:
Two worlds of Purim
By Nir Elias
As an Israeli and a resident of “ultra” secular Tel Aviv for most of my adult life, Purim -- the celebration of the Jews' salvation from genocide in ancient Persia, as recounted in the Book of Esther -- has always been a time of partying and dressing up, for me.
Images of Orthodox Jews celebrating Purim were always very familiar. But being present at one of these celebrations was a different experience altogether.
