Romanians protest in Trafalgar Square against cyanide mining that would destroy heritage site Rosia Montana and threaten massive cyanide pollution of the Danube and Black Sea.
I seem to be getting further and further behind in posting my work on My London Diary, and further still in posting about it here. There are various reasons, for this, some personal which I won’t bore you with, but mainly because there have simply been so many events for me to cover in the last couple of months. The pace of protest seems too have ratcheted up and I’ve had many more messages inviting me to cover events. Of course I can’t be everywhere, but I do my best to cover the things I have a particular interest in, and the 30 or so events listed here for September kept me busy.
I work differently from the typical press photographer, as readers of some of my posts will know. Often when I’m covering an protest I’ll be there as the protesters arrive and set up, and will stay as long as I can while things are still happening, telling the story of the event through a series of images – which you can see in my edited version (sometimes too loosely edited) on My London Diary. Eventually.
Of course a newspaper or magazine generally only wants a single image, seldom the text about the story and never the story in a set of pictures. At an event where I spend several hours taking pictures, it isn’t unusual for a press photographer to arrive, spend five minutes arranging a group picture, and leave, or sit down in a corner, get out a notebook and file his or her pictures. I try to get my pictures to the agency – selected and properly adjusted where necessary, captioned and key-worded – along with the story, by the end of the day. Though sometimes the day ends around 1 or 2am, and the story follows the pictures the following morning.
Their way of working reflects a different kind of interest, and one that is far more closely geared to the market. I don’t mean it as a criticism when I talk about the difference, and in some respects I admire their professionalism, but we have different motives. At times they take pictures that I look and and think that I wish I had thought to approach the subject in that way, though more often I find them rather formulaic. Some of my pictures are like that too, and I often find that the images in a set that to me are least interesting are those that my editors at Demotix like to promote, and which are used by the press.
I like to write here more about the photography of many of the events, which delays me more. Some events go entirely smoothly, with no photographic or other issues and unless I have something particular to say about them I don’t write about them on >Re:PHOTO, but quite often there is a story to tell – if only about how I messed things up.
There are other photographic items of photographic news and opinion that I like to share with my friends – around 3000 visitors a day – on this site; the occasional review, links to photography in the press, in galleries and on the web and my own thoughts and prejudices. Thanks for your interest.
September 2013
Save Rosia Montana – No Cyanide Mining
Sudanese Call for Regime Change
10,000 Cuts – Deaths After Atos Tests
Express Stop Sponging Off Migrants
Hizb ut-Tahrir Women March for Syria
Paddington Basin
Druids Celebrate Autumn Equinox
World Peace Day
Save Whipps Cross Hospital
National Gallery Human Chain over Arts Cuts
Iran ‘Release Sunnis, Don’t Hang Them’
Aurora tells Shell – Stop Arctic Drilling
Malta Day Procession
Secular Europe Protest
Lewisham Hospital Victory Parade
Arms Trade Die-In at Parliament
9/11 Protest at US Embassy
Occupation at DSEi Arms Fair Continues
Wreath for Victims of London Arms Fair
Occupy vs the Arms Fair
Silvertown
Musical Protest against Arms Fair
Tower Hamlets United Against the EDL
Anti-Fascists Oppose EDL
EDL March returns to Tower Hamlets
DPAC take Pants to IDS
End UK Caste Discrimination Now
DPAC Picket Ministries
Hands off Syria
Love Russia, Hate Homophobia
DPAC at BBC – Tell The Truth
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My London Diary : Buildings of London : River Lea/Lee Valley : London’s Industrial Heritage
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