Journal Entry

This photograph is by James Nachtwey. I think that this image will stay with me for as long as I live. It is sad and depressing, but shows the extreme conditions that these people were living in. It has a dramatic impact on how I see the world because often times I forget how lucky I have it until I see an image like this. The man looks like he is in so much pain that he can't walk, but has to crawl to look for any kind of sustenance. I have seen images of other starving people, but this on in particular has a haunting quality about it.

I think that in today's world photographs can still be considered under the realm of "concerned photographs". The way we look at images and photographs in today's world is completely different from how it was before when social documentary photography started. Now, everyone has a camera and is able to be a photographer. We all have cell phones with cameras or ipods or digital point and shoots. If someone sees something worth documenting they are going to shoot it. Everywhere we turn we see photographs and images. I think that because everyone is able and available to mass quantities of photos is downgrading fine art photography in a way. Now that everyone has a camera the media is able to get their hands on images faster than anyone else. An image of a terrorist shot on a cell phone has a dramatic difference to an image shot by a professional photograph. It is hard to say in today's world whether or not the fact that everyone is a photographer is a good or a bad thing. It is just different.

I think photographers have to take into consideration that they are telling the truth about what they are photographing. A good photographer wants to get their point across in a picture. Documentary photographing is about raising awareness about a situation or place or a person. I think that the images that were in the article made the viewers realize what is going on in other parts of the world and help the viewer empathize with the situation. A photographer should want the image they create to really make the viewer to pause and think. Not to just simply look and move on, but rather feel something when they look at the image. In today's world we are always hit with the information and the image at the same time. Sometimes looking at the image without the information is more interesting. Your emotions and thoughts get blocked by the facts and the impact of the photo changes.