Which Camera?

Its perhaps interesting to see which cameras were used to take the winning pictures in World Press Photo, though the sample is so small (I think 38) it isn’t possible to draw any really strong conclusions from them. They continue to be dominated by Canon and Nikon DSLRs, but I doubt if the one can really draw any conclusions about the relative popularity of the two marques from the different proportions from year to year. There are articles in various places on the web about this, including Fstoppers and PetaPixel, all relying on an article in a Spanish magazine. But I’ll try to give my own perspective.

The DSLR remains the camera of choice for most working professional news photographers for good reasons, and they are likely to use the more expensive models designed for professional use. The actual models change over the years, rather more rapidly than they would have done years ago, both because the manufacturers bring out new models with at least minor improvements, but also because they simply do not last as long as cameras used to, with major repairs usually being uneconomic. So while the SLR I bought back in 1973 is still actually capable of taking pictures (though in terrible condition after I used it for almost 30 years), I’ve written off two DSLRs bought in the last ten years.

DSLRs are flexible and relatively reliable, usable with lenses of every focal length – and a huge range of them available. Professional models at least can be used in all kinds of conditions (or almost all) and are reasonably weather-proof, important to many of us. They can do almost any photographic job, even if there are better tools for some. Since I went seriously digital I’ve used Nikon DSLRs for almost all of my work. When I went into digital, Nikon had the best camera at an affordable price with the D100 and I’ve upgraded though a whole series of new models to the D810, though never moving to the top of the range models such as the D5, which have always seemed just too large and too heavy for any advantages they might have. When the D810 comes to the end of its life I’ll probably replace it with another Nikon DSLR.

I’ve never worked with a Canon DSLR. I’m sure once I got used to it I’d find it as good as the Nikon, but over the years I’ve built up a collection of Nikon lenses, most of which have their uses, though I only regularly use three of them, and a system change would be expensive.

But I have for some years wanted to move to a smaller, lighter system, and for some years I’ve also been using Fuji cameras too. They feature in the winners list too, though I think the interpretation I’ve seen of this in various articles is rather lacking. Fuji-X cameras split into three very distinct groups – the fixed lens X100 series – used by three of the winners, the rangefinder style X-Pros with one winner, and mirrorless interchangeable lens cameras which fail to feature. All of the four Fuji images in the list were taken with cameras which have – like the DSLR – an optical viewfinder.

I’m increasingly working with cameras without an optical viewfinder, including the Fuji XT1 and an Olympus OMD E-M5II (I remain convinced Olympus would double their sales if they came up with a sensible naming system) and although their digital viewfinders are good, they are still lacking compared to the directness of an optical finder. The Fuji is frustrating in not always being ready to take a picture – sometimes the quickest way seems to be to switch it off and on, and while the Olympus is better in this respect, I find its menu system and function buttons etc confusing, and sometimes the camera seems to have a mind of its own, refusing to stay on auto WB or some other setting I’ve made. Nikons just seem easier to keep control of (though they have their quirks.)

Of course if you are going to use Nikon or Canon’s top of the range DSLRs you will be probably be using full-frame (though perversely I often use the D810 at 1.2x or even APS-C) though few of us ever need the full size files. I didn’t consider Micro 4/3 cameras for years, but using the Olympus has rather changed my mind.

Although the name Leica still comes up with one entry, this is the Leica Q, a fixed lens camera rather than a traditional M-series camera. The nearest to that in the list is perhaps the Fuji X-Pro2, and that, along with four relatively compact fixed lens cameras (three from Fuji and the Leica) making the winners does seem to me to be a very high proportion. There are still situations where a relatively small and less obtrusive camera is the best for the job.

Defend Rojava

One of the few positive outcomes of the civil war in Syria has been the Rojava revolution, the establishment in the northeast of the country sinvce 2011 of a de facto autonomous region widely known as Rojava.

Many see Rojava as a model for the future of Syria at the end of the civil conflict, though it is perhaps increasingly unlikely that President Assad and his Russian backers will see things that way rather than continuing until they establish total control over the whole of the country.

Rojava, which has a considerable Kurdish population is also seen by Kurds as Wstern Kurdistan, but the region is multi-ethnic, with considerable Arab and Assyrians as well as smaller numbers of Turkmen, Armenians and Chechens.

Turkey sees Rojava as a threat, largely because of the strong presence there of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, PKK, which they regard as a terrorist group and as being behind the struggles inside Turkey which have resulted from their attempts to eliminate the Kurds and their culture. Turkey has already invaded and conquered Afrin, the closest area of the Democratic Federation of Northern Syria which was founded in 2016.

The DFNS was founded with a constitution that was designed to overcome the problems of a multi-ethnic society, and – as Wikipedia puts it, to:

“constitute a social revolution with a prominent role played by women both on the battlefield and within the newly formed political system, as well as the implementation of democratic confederalism, a form of libertarian socialism that emphasizes decentralization, gender equality and the need for local governance through semi-direct democracy.”

Despite its socialist nature, the USA has shown some support for Rojava as its armed groups, the YPG and the YPJ,  relatively lightly armed men and women fighters, have been the decisive force – with the help of US air power – in the military defeat of ISIS.  However since that end has been acheived they seem unlikely to stand in the way of their NATO ally Turkey and the future of Rojava is at best uncertain.

The event was organised by Kurdish groups and a number of UK left-wing groups came along to speak in support at the rally before the march. Unfortunately the rain started to pour down, and taking pictures became difficult. It got even heavier as the march started, but the marchers were not deterred, though this photographer was struggling a little.

As well as contending with the weather, the marchers also had to contend with the police. The UK followed the lead of its NATO ally in proscribing the  PKK, and showing their flag – as some marchers did – is an offence under out terrorism laws. Under the latest of these I may be committing an offence by publishing the pictures that show these flags on the web, though I’m sure my union would fight the case as the ridiculous attack on freedom of speech this represents.

A police snatch squad made an attempt to grab one of those carrying the PKK flag as they marched down Regent St, but the person was instantly surrounded by a crowd of other marchers and the police had to retreat back onto the pavement empty-handed.  From then on their were large squads of police looking at the march poised to pounce, until the march,  which halted for some time, went on slowly to stop again at Piccadilly Circus.

Mark Campbell spoke there at length condemning the police for attacking Kurds who were fighting, telling them they should be ashamed of themselves for attacking people who were supporting forces who had dedicated themselves to fighting ISIS, and, as some of the banners reminded us,  that included many who had lost their lives in the fight.

Despite the power of his arguments, I rather doubt if it was that speech which persuaded the police to abandon their close surveillance of the protest. More likely that they realised that the few individuals they were trying to arrest were no longer on the march, having slipped away in the crowds around Piccadilly Circus.

More about the protest and more pictures: Defend Rojava from Turkish invasion

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Do Not Bend

The film Do Not Bend: The Photographic Life of Bill Jay produced by Grant Scott’s The United Nations of Photography casts an interesting light on photography in the UK in the 1970s at a time when I was just coming into the medium, though so far I’ve only taken a brief look at a few sections of it. The full film is over an hour and a half long, and I hope to have time to watch it all before long – when I may have more to say about it. If you don’t already know something about Bill Jay it would be worth reading the web site above before watching it.

It does contain insights from a number of photographers and others I’ve come across over the years, including a few I got to know fairly well at various times and one who is a good friend I visit regularly, and whose view on it I will be interested to hear.

It has already been shown at a number of screenings here and in the US, but Grant Scott and Tim Pellatt who were the team behind the documentary have now made the film available to view for free on Youtube.

Whaling or a woman?

I’m not sure why a protest against Japan’s plans to resume commercial whaling should be such a Conservative occasion as this clearly was, with a strong presence from the Conservative Animal Welfare Foundation as well as Boris’s father Stanley Johnson and Tory MEP for the East of England John Flack as speakers.

Animal rights is an issue that cuts across party divides, but the more radical side of the movement including most of those I’ve photographed at protests against the annual slaughter of dolphins at Taiji cove outside the Japanese Embassy seemed to be missing.

I’m clearly not sufficiently aware of the political nature of conservation and animal welfare, and this does appear to have been organised by Conservatives for Conservative conservationists, with no speakers from Labour, Lib-Dem, Green or other parties in Cavendish Square.

But we did see some disgraceful behaviour by some photographers, pushing protesters and other photographers out of their way as they rushed to photograph conservationist and former Tory spin doctor Carrie Symonds, not for anything she had to say, but because she was Boris Johnson’s girlfriend. I try to avoid occasions where the paparazzi are at work, as on this occasion butressing their reputation as the scum of photography.

And unfortunately their rudeness and assaults were rewarded at least by the popular press, whose accounts of the event hardly mentioned whales and were almost entirely illustrated by pictures (some rather poor) of Symonds and gossip about her and Boris. For the media it was about the woman rather than whaling.

Of course I did photograph her too, and did file four of her in the 44 pictures to the agency from the event, rather more than of the others who spoke, and you can see those pictures along with many others at ‘No Whaling’ rally and march.

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Marzieh Hashemi arrest protest

The USA decided to move its London embassy a few years ago, and probably a major factor in the decision to go to Nine Elms was that Grosvenor Square was such a convenient location for demonstrations. The most notable of these was back on on 17 March 1968, when police horses ran amok in a relatively peaceful crowd that was filling the square. I can’t see myself in the videos but I’m fairly sure (it was the sixties, and if you can remember …) I was there and certainly remember the panic as out of control horses rushed towards me. I don’t think horses were used at the other protests I was at then, though I’ve seen them used at other London protests in recent years.


Not the embassy

It seemed an example of cruelty to animals (which the nation might be expected to violently object to) and also of cruelty to protesters, about which many would care little. Quite clearly those horses were frightened and out of control of their riders, who rode them into peaceful crowds heedless of the injuries that might be caused. The BBC and much of the other media described it as a riot, but the only rioters where the horses were deployed, well away from the embassy, were the police.


A part of the embassy

In recent years at Grosvenor Square there were probably several protests most weeks, mostly small but some sizeable, though virtually none reported in the media, where only protests abroad against regimes we don’t favour or those involving so-called celebrities seem normally to qualify as news.


This is the embassy

Things are certainly much quieter for the us at Nine Elms, which for many Londoners seems almost on the edge of the known universe. though actually it is only a short walk from one of London’s major transport interchanges at Vauxhall. But it isn’t just getting there that is the problem; the embassy is on a relatively minor road and its entrances hidden away some distance from that road. While people and cars move through Grosvenor Square, virtually nothing goes past the new Embassy which is still in the middle of one of the largest building sites in the country.

Back on the main road in front of the embassy, there is nothing to tell you that this is the US Embassy, though the building itself, on the other side of a garden and lake, is made distinctive by some odd wrapping on three sides (but not that actually facing the road.) Unlike in Grosvenor Square, there is no giant eagle on its roof, and the US flag, rather than being on the roof, is hidden away behind the embassy.

It’s hard from the pavement in front of the pedestrian entrance to the embassy site to get a convincing view of the building, as it is too close for the widest rectilinear lens. Bits of it – as the top two images show – are not that distinctive or convincing, and to get the third image I had to use a fisheye lens. As usual I’ve converted the image using Fisheye-Hemi to make the side walls straight, but the top of the building does retain a curve. The latest version of this utility is now available as a Lightroom export plugin, making it no longer necessary to use Photoshop for the conversion.

I had two main reasons to attend the protest, first that it was about the mistreatment by the FBI of a fellow journalist, but also because it seemed a clear case of Islamophobia, FBI harassment of the Muslim community.  America never really was the ‘land of the free’ so far as many of its inhabitants were concerned, or for the rest of the world, but things have got even worse since 9/11 and such shameful US activities such as the illegal rendition and detention of detainees in Guantanamo.

More about the event at Marzieh Hashemi arrest protest.

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My London Diary : London Photos : Hull : River Lea/Lee Valley : London’s Industrial Heritage

All photographs on this and my other sites, unless otherwise stated, are taken by and copyright of Peter Marshall, and are available for reproduction or can be bought as prints.

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Arms Dealers feast while Yemen starves

I didn’t much enjoy taking pictures outside the Grosvenor House Hotel on Park Lane in London’s Mayfair on a cold January night. The pavement is fairly narrow and fairly dark, and it was very crowded, with a lot of pushing and shoving, with some police getting rather more physical than the situation demanded.  And police took no notice when some of those attending the dinner assaulted the protesters. At least they hadn’t brought their weapons with them.

Of course we shouldn’t be selling arms to be used in Yemen. I’d be happier if we didn’t have one of the larger arms industries in the world, which despite claims about strong export controls is still happy to sell arms to countries where we have serious human rights concerns. We still sell them to over two thirds of the countries on that list – including Saudi Arabia, which is using them in Yemen.

Although it makes big money, the arms industry employs relatively few people – around 140,000 according to the industry body. There surely must be better ways to employ these workers, many who are highly skilled, than in making arms to kill people.

And it is obscene of the Aerospace, Defence and Security industry to hold a luxury dinner celebrating their activities causing death, starvation and devastation across the world. Since Saudi Arabia began its bombing of Yemen in 2015, the UK have continued to supply weapons costing almost £5 billion putting 14m Yemeni people – mainly uninvolved civilians – at risk of famine and starvation.

I arrived after the protest had started, a little earlier than advertised, and it seems that neither the hotel or the police had really prepared for the inevitable and widely advertised protest. Traffic was still flowing on the lane next to the pavement, putting protesters and passers-by at risk, and the barriers were perhaps poorly placed.

Police began handling demonstrators rather roughly, and at least one or two officers were clearly enjoying themselves doing so, while others were clearly trying to treat people carefully. There does need to be some system for officers to report rogue fellow officers and clean up the police. Policing is a difficult job and needs the support of those being policed and this is clearly eroded by the behaviour of some.

I wasn’t too badly treated by police, though as often one or two deliberately moved in front of me to prevent me getting a clear view of their colleagues and I did at times get pushed a little more roughly than necessary. But at one point I was knocked into the road by a protester who had been bodily thrown in my direction by police, but fortunately there was no traffic in the nearside lane at this point.

For obvious reasons I don’t have a picture of that incident, and others were blurred as I was pushed or people were rather rapidly moved. The pictures I took with flash were as expected rather better with subject movement, but even some of those were blurred.

More at Stop Arming Saudi while Yemen starves
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There are no adverts on this site and it receives no sponsorship, and I like to keep it that way. But it does take a considerable amount of my time and thought, and if you enjoy reading it, a small donation – perhaps the cost of a beer – would be appreciated.

My London Diary : London Photos : Hull : River Lea/Lee Valley : London’s Industrial Heritage

All photographs on this and my other sites, unless otherwise stated, are taken by and copyright of Peter Marshall, and are available for reproduction or can be bought as prints.

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London solidarity with Russian anti-fascists

While some of my anarchist friends are always happy to be photographed, others fear being identified in pictures, and have very negative feelings towards photographers. I sometimes am told that I should blur all the faces in pictures that I publish showing anarchists and aniti-fascists, something that in general I am not prepared to do. Generally I reply that if people are in public and wish to hide their faces they should ‘mask up’. It usually makes my pictures more dramatic too.

We do have some control over our appearance in public, and many hide all or part of the time behind masks or other face coverings, make-up or even beards. But if we are in public we will be seen by others, and also photographed, if only by the many security cameras that litter our streets and public  and private buildings.

Many are particularly suspicious of being photographed by the press, feeling that any pictures will  be used in a way that discredits them. Clearly there are photographers working for some publications who have these as an aim, but I’m not one of them, and those who know me generally know they can trust me, although once a picture goes to an agency I will have little or no control over how it is used.   It’s certainly important to think carefully about what you do and don’t file.

Although I don’t believe their fears of being photographed have any real foundation (or sense), unless there seems to me a good public interest  reason to do so I will try to avoid taking pictures of people who clearly do not wish to be photographed.

Quite clearly at the rally in front of the Cable St mural to oppose racism, xenophobia, fascism and the upsurge of far-right populism and to show solidarity with Russian anti-fascists there were people who did not want to be photographed,  and both I and the videographer who was recording the event for the organisers were careful to avoid upsetting them. It did make for a slightly edgy situation, and there were a few times I would have liked to take a picture but did not. Except for the images of those speaking at the event, I think for all of the pictures which are dominated by a single person or small group I asked permission before making the picture. There were very few who said no, though one did hold the placard I was interested in up in front of his face.

There were half a dozen other freelance photographers who had come to photograph the event, but I think I was the only one who took pictures during the rally, with others waiting in the street outside the public park until people came out for the march – and all those who were camera-shy were appropriately masked up.It ws during the march, and particularly as it passed under the railway bridge that it became most dramatic. But although I like to make dramatic pictures when I can, the most important thing is to tell the story, and I wanted to include the pictures of the speakers and banners underneath the mural, as well as some of the rather short rally in Altab Ali park at the end of the march.

More pictures, text and captions: Solidarity with Russian anti-fascists

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There are no adverts on this site and it receives no sponsorship, and I like to keep it that way. But it does take a considerable amount of my time and thought, and if you enjoy reading it, a small donation – perhaps the cost of a beer – would be appreciated.

My London Diary : London Photos : Hull : River Lea/Lee Valley : London’s Industrial Heritage

All photographs on this and my other sites, unless otherwise stated, are taken by and copyright of Peter Marshall, and are available for reproduction or can be bought as prints.

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Bread & Roses

Back in 1910, a Chicago factory inspector Helen Todd, speaking at an event launching a new campaign for votes for women picked up on a comment made to her by a young woman worker that votes for women would mean “everybody would have bread and flowers too”, elaborating it in her speech, quoted in part in Wikipedia:

“… life’s Bread, which is home, shelter and security, and the Roses of life, music, education, nature and books, shall be the heritage of every child that is born in the country …”

Later that year, Todd was involved in the Chicago garment workers’ strike led by The Women’s Trade Union League, making a number of speeches, and “We want bread – and roses, too” was one of the slogans used by the strikers. It was soon picked up by others, including James Oppenheim who published a poem, ‘Bread and ROses’ in 2011, and by a number of leading suffragettes and women trade unionists including the Polish-born American socialist and feminist Rose Schneiderman of the Women’s Trade Union League of New York, with whom the phrase became associated.

It was the 1912  Lawrence textile strike, often known as the Bread and Roses strike, that made the phrase well-known.  Most of the unskilled work in the mills was carried out by immigrant women, and at the start of the year they found without warning that their wages had been cut because of a new Massachusetts labour law which cut the working week for women and children fromf 56 to 54 hours.

The established unions were not concerned with the loss of pay as they mainly represented the skilled white male workers who were unaffected. The IWW came in to organise the immigrant workers, who had come to the USA mainly from countries in southern and eastern Europe and the Middle East – and spoke around a couple of dozen different languages.  They set up relief commitees and organised large and noisy protests where some women carried a banner “We want bread and roses too.”

The employers and the authorities hit back with force and dirty tricks, including arresting the union leaders on clearly false murder charges and getting the firemen to turn their hoses on the marchers in freezing weather, but newspaper coverage of this made the strike a national outrage, eventually forcing the employers to agree to almost all of the strikers demands, including a  a 15% pay raise, double pay for overtime, and an amnesty for strikers.

‘Bread & Roses’ was the inspiration for the Women’s March in London (and similar events elsewhere around the world) on January against economic oppression, violence against women, gender pay gap, racism, fascism, institutional sexual harassment and hostile environment in the UK, and called for a government dedicated to equality and working for all of us rather than the few. Many of those organising the event and taking part, like those who struck in 1912, were from our migrant communities, and there are certainly similarities between the IWW’s tactics in the 1912 strike and the activities of some of the smaller independent unions that are now active with low-paid workers.


Speakers with scripts in orange folders and directed by a BBC camera crew

The march began outside of the BBC, with a few speeches on the steps of the BBC church, All Souls in Langham Place, in a rather curious short rally that appeared to be both scripted and stage-managed by a small camera team from the BBC, who were directing the women who spoke, and generally barging their way through some of the protesters and photographers. I was told they were making a documentary about a group of the women, but if so they clearly have a very different idea of documentary to me, and it seemed more like a play. Other than that of course the BBC as usual ignored both this march and any other protests taking place in London on the day.

More at Women’s Bread & Roses protest

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My London Diary : London Photos : Hull : River Lea/Lee Valley : London’s Industrial Heritage

All photographs on this and my other sites, unless otherwise stated, are taken by and copyright of Peter Marshall, and are available for reproduction or can be bought as prints.

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Brexit Warms Up

Although inside Parliament Brexit seemed to be in the same rut as it had been since the ridiculous decision to invoke Article 50 without any real plan or consensus as to what Brexit actually meant – enshrined in Mays mantra ‘Brexit means Brexit’ – things outside seemed to be hotting up. The Tories had the strange notion that entering negotiations was like were playing a poker hand rather than trying serious discussions with our European partners over how the difficult process might be best arranged, and there were so many legal arguments about how the referendum was carried out that should have been played out before the decision was taken. So many things called the result into question that it seems clear that had it actually been a binding referendum it would have been declared null and void.

Obviously I voted to remain largely because I felt the country would have much greater control over its trade negotiations as a part of a much larger entity than as a single smaller body and because I value some of the associations and benefits we have built up in cooperation with our European neighbours. And some of our deprived areas – and we have some of the worst in Europe – have benefitted greatly from money from Europe financing projects in a country where our national governments have so clearly favoured London and the surrounding area.

The referendum did not show a decisive majority in favour of leaving Europe, but a nation roughly split down the middle, and was the kind of result that another vote a few months earlier of later could well have reversed. And had we used other versions of eligibilty to vote it might well have been different. Hugely important constitutional change like leaving Europe should only have been triggered by a much more significant vote than a simple majority.

But we are where we are, even if nobody quite knows where that is at the moment. I went to Parliament to photogrpah on the morning when May’s deal was coming up for a vote – and the only sure thing seemed to be that virtually nobody though it was acceptable – and when the vote came there was a huge majority against it. I’m not sure if Brexit will come to a sensible conclusion, or exactly what that might be. Perhaps to revoke Article 50 and schedule another referendum, perhaps with the stipulation that it would only be binding on the government under similar conditions to those that have been imposed on trade union strike ballots!

The pavement opposite Parliament and beside College Green was pretty crowded in parts on this morning, and the group one of my colleagues calls the ‘yellow pests’ was out and very vocal along with the more reasonable protesters on both sides, harassing Steven Bray and his SODEM supporters and apparently any MP they could find, though I wasn’t a witness to that today.

More at Brexit protest against May’s Deal.

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My London Diary : London Photos : Hull : River Lea/Lee Valley : London’s Industrial Heritage

All photographs on this and my other sites, unless otherwise stated, are taken by and copyright of Peter Marshall, and are available for reproduction or can be bought as prints.

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Pride Not Profit

My fourth volume in the Café Royal Books series of publications came out a few days ago, with the title ‘‘Pride Not Profit London 1993–2000‘‘. You can page through it on the web site.

The cover picture, taken in 1997 and shown above, has Sisters Dominatrix and Ophelia Balls of the Order of Perpetual Indulgence and is printed across both front and rear, with the title filling the rather empty space at top right. I was pleased to find this image which I think makes a good cover; images I’ve taken with a suitable space at top right are remarkable rare.

I began photographing Pride in 1993, rather late in the day but at a time when my interests in photography were moving from the urban fabric towards a more direct approach to people and social issues. Pride then was very much still a protest rather than the corporate funded spectacle it has now become, but the times were clearly changing, and seven years later, in 2000 some of those on the march were carrying signs reading ‘Pride Not Profit‘, providing the title for this small collection of photographs, most of which appeared in a larger selection shown as a part of a Museum of London travelling show, ‘Queer Is Here‘ in 2006. You can see that larger group of images on-line.

Designing a book like this always means making compromises, and it was impossible to include all of my favourite images, but I was pleased with the rhythm and flow I think I managed in this small sequence of 19 images. As usual you can page through the book on the Café Royal site, thopugh the images I think look rather better on the page. It isn’t perfect printing but I think it serves the subject matter well.

Pride has changed very much since I took these pictures, so much so that last year I couldn’t motivate myself sufficiently to photograph the actual parade, and in 2017 I only photographed the alternative parade that preceded the main event when protesters were refused permission to join it – in Anti-Racist & Migrant Rights reclaim Pride.

If you are quick you can take advantage of the current sale offer on Café Royal Books, £27 for ten books, though as it says “Books selected at random from currently in-print titles” I’m not sure you will get this one. But there are many on the current list that are worth having.

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There are no adverts on this site and it receives no sponsorship, and I like to keep it that way. But it does take a considerable amount of my time and thought, and if you enjoy reading it, a small donation – perhaps the cost of a beer – would be appreciated.

My London Diary : London Photos : Hull : River Lea/Lee Valley : London’s Industrial Heritage

All photographs on this and my other sites, unless otherwise stated, are taken by and copyright of Peter Marshall, and are available for reproduction or can be bought as prints.

To order prints or reproduce images

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