From the Quake to the Cup
By Mariana Bazo
Nearly 300 Haitians are stuck in Inapari, a tiny Peruvian village on the border with Brazil. They are victims of the 2010 earthquake in their country and traveled weeks chasing their dream of simply getting a job. They believe that in Brazil the upcoming World Cup is creating great opportunities.
Some 3,000 kilometers after leaving home, they reached the Brazilian border only to find it shut to them, closed to stop the wave of their compatriots that began to arrive after the disaster.
They wait in the middle of the jungle and understand little. They’ve bet everything on this chance, selling or just abandoning all their belongings back home to make it this far. They now have nothing in Haiti and can’t reach their destination, nor can they return. They even asked me why they’re not allowed to cross the border, assuring that they are good workers and are willing to work hard to live better.
Inapari is a lowland village of immigrants from the Andean highlands. A few years back it was opened up to the world with the construction of the Interoceanic Highway uniting the Pacific with the Atlantic across Peru and Brazil. With that road came many things good and bad. First came illegal logging. Then came illegal mining and smuggling. But at the same time Brazil and Peru are now united, commerce is more fluid and Machu Picchu is now only 12 hours away by road.
Shooting the Rugby World Cup
In the third installment, Sydney-based photographer Tim Wimborne describes what is necessary to keep the file fresh throughout the tournament and to satisfy different client needs.
In the second of a series of multimedia pieces, Bucharest-based photographer Bogdan Cristel talks about the focus required to cover the Rugby World Cup.
In the first of a series of multimedia pieces, London-based photographer Stefan Wermuth talks about the challenges he anticipates at the Rugby World Cup in New Zealand.
Editing thousands of cricket pictures a day
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.
Great images, pretty much my dream job – the photography rather than the editing 
Any pointers for my portfolio would be very welcome.
Clash of two cricketing titans
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
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.
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For Cricket World CUP 2011 details and schedule please visit
http://havyas90.blogspot.com/2011/02/icc -cricket-world-cup.html
2011 Cricket World Cup: Let’s play
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
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.
Vivek, really nice piece. also love your Singapore wealth on Vimeo.
No turning back as Africa’s hour arrives
The 2010 World Cup has been a memorable and momentous occasion not only for me, but for South Africa, the African continent and the rest of the world.
It has indeed been incredible. It has been a unifying factor, with people beginning to appreciate the importance of their national symbols such as flags.
As a photographer for an institution such as Reuters, one can say that I have been privileged to be a part of this historic occasion. It was indeed a privilege to be among hordes of international media covering the event. I was here during the Confederations Cup, but the feeling of covering the World Cup is enormous – it is part of history.
This has changed the perception of those who doubted that South Africa, or Africa as a whole, could stage such a magnificent tournament. Everywhere, people have been consumed by the World Cup. Cars have been decorated with flags, houses and shops – many with the South African flag.
All I can say is I was so excited for world cup to be played in Africa soil, but mostly I big up the Ghana’s for showing off what Africa are made of. I had faith in them and they did made us proud and hope on next world cup, the trophy will be coming to Africa.
How a simple tentacle became a media star
Sometimes I hold seminars about journalism – photo journalism in particular of course. Most of the time I start talking about the journalistic rule number one.
What is rule number one? Journalism works very simply. When a dog bites a man – this is not a story. Dogs bite men. Unless the man is Prince Charles or the President of the United States, nobody is interested. But the opposite case – when a man bites a dog – that’s a story. The story will be even bigger if the man who bites the dog is the U.S. President and the dog belongs to Prince Charles.
However, in the future I must change my seminars and change the picture from the dog to the octopus “Paul” — better known as the “octopus oracle” at the Sea Life Aquarium of Oberhausen, a former coal mining and steel producing city in western Germany.
The two-and-a-half year-old octopus has become a star all over the world by predicting all six of Germany’s 2010 World Cup games correctly – two defeats and four victories.
With his nine brains it takes him only a few moments to choose between two glass boxes – each filled with a delicious mussel. Each box is decorated with the flags of the respective teams that are scheduled to clash in South Africa. The keepers of the Sea Life Aquarium strictly follow the FIFA regulation: the home team gets the left box and the guest team receives the right box. Then hungry Paul reaches with one of his eight tentacles into one of the boxes to steel the little mussel. When the mussel quickly disappears into his mouth a whole nation is plunged into disbelief or jubilation.
The first time I covered Paul’s prediction for Reuters was before the classic clash between England and Germany. Only a handful of TV cameras – most of them local or domestic TV – were there. Then there were, including myself, four photographers from Germany’s biggest daily and three wire agencies. After Paul predicted the Germany-England match and the following game (Germany vs. Argentina) correctly – the media coverage got completely out of hand.
If Paul likes yellow more why did he anticipated Serbia’s victory over Germany correct ? Here is a link to the Serbian flag – which contains definitly less yellow as Germany
http://de.wikiversity.org/wiki/Datei:Fla g_of_Serbia.svg
Unfortunatly I did not shoot this match oracle. By the time Paul picked his second oracle – the Serbia/Germany match – he was not yet a story. And: pulpo’s first pick (Germany’s victory over Australia) was done without the media. I think Paul needed a practice run first to regain and train his skills.
Pulpo Paul is absolutely impartial – or colour blind.
from UK News:
Best of Britain: Fakes and spills
This week's Best of Britain brings us everything from highs and lows to fakes and spills.
Prince Harry falls off his horse as he plays polo in the Veuve Clicquot Manhattan Polo Classic on Governor's Island in New York, June 27, 2010. REUTERS/Stephen Lovekin/Pool
Samantha Cameron poses with waxwork of her husband, Prime Minister David Cameron, at Madame Tussauds in London, July 1, 2010. REUTERS/Luke MacGregor
A pair of England chairs are abandoned after the World Cup match between England and Germany at the Glastonbury Festival, June 27, 2010. REUTERS/Luke MacGregor
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It’s so sad and heartbreaking to see a human being in this condition… I understand that the level of employment in Brazil is growing, good news! Let’s have these mens get in, what could we do to accelerate the process of legalization?