How photography connects us David Griffin

[Music]

[Applause]

let’s just start by looking at some

great photographs this is an icon of

National Geographic an Afghan refugee

taken by Steve McCurry but the Harvard

Lampoon is about to come out with a

parody of National Geographic and I

shudder to think what they are going to

do to this photograph oh the wrath of

Photoshop this is a jet landing at San

Francisco by Bruce Dale oh he mounted

the camera on the tail poetic image for

a story on Tolstoy by Sam Abel pygmies

in the DRC by Randy Olson I love this

photograph because it reminds me of

Degas bronze sculptures the little

dancer a polar bear swimming in the

Arctic by Paul Nicklin polar bears need

ice to be able to move back and forth

they’re not very good swimmers and we

know what’s happening into the ice

these are camels moving across the Rift

Valley in Africa photographed by Chris

John’s

shot straight down so these are the

shadows of the camels this is a rancher

in Texas by William Albert Allard a

great portraitist

and Jane Goodall making her own special

connection photographed by Nick Nichols

this is a soap disco in Spain

photographed by David Alan Harvey and

David said that there was a lot of weird

stuff happening on the dance floor but

hey it’s at least it’s hygienic

these are sea lions in Australia doing

their own dance by David Doubilet

and this is a comet captured by dr. you

and Mason and finally the bow of the

Titanic without movie stars photographed

by Emory Kristof photography carries a

power that holds up under the relentless

swirl today’s saturated media world

because photographs emulate the way that

our mind freezes a significant moment

here’s an example four years ago I was

at the beach with my son and he was

learning how to swim in this relatively

soft surf of the Delaware Beaches but I

turned away for a moment and he got

caught into a Riptide and started to be

pulled out towards a jetty I went I can

stand here right now and see as I go

tearing into the water after him the

moment slowing down and freezing into

this arrangement I can see the rocks are

over here there’s a wave about to crash

onto him I can see his hands reaching

out and I can see his face in terror

looking at me saying help me dad I got

him the wave break Oh broke over us we

got back on shore he was fine we were a

little bit rattled but this flashbulb

memory as it’s called is when all the

elements came together to define not

just the event but my emotional

connection to it and this is what a

photograph taps into when it makes its

own powerful connection to a viewer now

I have to tell you I was talking to Kyle

last week about this that I was going to

tell this story he said oh yeah I

remember that too I remember my image of

you was that you were up on the shore

yelling at me

I thought I was a hero so this

represents this is a across sample of

some remarkable images taken by some of

the world’s greatest photo journalists

working at the very top of their craft

except one this photograph was taken by

dr. Ewen Mason in New Zealand last year

and it was submitted and published in

National Geographic last year we added a

section to our website called your shot

where anyone can submit photographs for

possible publication and it has become a

wild success tapping into the enthusiast

photography community the quality of

these amateur photographs can at times

be amazing and seeing this reinforces

for me that every one of us has at least

one or two great photographs in them but

to be a great photojournalist you have

to have more than just one or two great

photographs in you you’ve got to be able

to make them all the time but even more

importantly you need to know how to

create a visual narrative you need to

know how to tell a story so I’m going to

share with you some coverages that I

feel demonstrate the storytelling power

of photography photographer Nick Nichols

went to document a very small and

relatively unknown Wildlife Sanctuary in

Chad called zoo coma the original intent

was to travel there and bring back a

classic story of diverse species of an

exotic locale and that is what Nick did

up to a point this is a serval cat he’s

actually taking his own picture shot

with what’s called a camera trap there’s

an infrared beam that’s cutting across

and he stepped into the beam and taken

his photograph these are baboons at a

watering hole Nick or the camera again

an automatic camera took thousands of

pictures of this and Nick ended up with

a lot of pictures of the rear ends of

a lion having a late night snack notice

he’s got a broken tooth and a crocodile

walks up a riverbank towards its den I

love this little bit of water that comes

off the back of his tail but the

centerpiece species of zoo coma are the

elephants it’s one of the largest intact

herds in this part of Africa here’s a

photograph shot in moonlight something

that digital photography has made a big

difference for that was with the

elephants this story pivoted Nick along

with researcher dr. Michael Fay collared

the matriarch of the herd they named her

Annie and they began tracking her

movements the herd was safe within the

confines of the park because of this

dedicated group of Park Rangers but once

the annual rains began the herd would

begin migrating to feeding grounds

outside the park and that’s when they

ran into trouble for outside the safety

of the park were poachers who would hunt

them down only for the value of their

ivory tusks the matriarch that they were

radio tracking after weeks of moving

back and forth in and out of the park

came to a halt outside the park Annie

had been killed along with 20 members of

her herd and they only came for the

ivory

and this is actually one of the Rangers

they were able to chase off one of the

poachers and recover this ivory because

they couldn’t leave it there that it was

still valuable but what Nick did was he

brought back with it was a story that

went beyond the old-school method of

just straight isn’t this an amazing

world and instead created a story that

touched our audiences deeply instead of

just knowledge of this park he created

an understanding and an empathy for the

elephants the Rangers and the many

issues surrounding human wildlife

conflict now let’s go over to India

sometimes you can tell a broad story in

a focused way we were looking at the

same issue that Richard Wurman touches

upon in his new world population project

for the first time in history more

people live in urban rather than rural

environs and most of that growth is not

in the cities but in the slums that

surround them

Jonas bendixson a very energetic

photographer came to me and said we need

to document this and here’s my here’s my

proposal let’s go all over the world and

photograph every single slum around the

world and I said well you know that

might be a bit ambitious for our budget

so instead what we did was we decided to

instead of going out and doing what

would result in what we consider sort of

a survey story where you just go in and

see just a little bit of everything we

put Jonas into Dharavi

which is part of Mumbai India and let

him stay there and really get into the

heart and soul of this really you know

major part of the city what Jonas did

was not just go and do a surface look at

the awful conditions that exists in such

places he saw that this was a living and

breathing and vital part of how the

entire urban area functioned by staying

tightly focused in one place Jonah’s

tapped in to the soul and the enduring

human spirit that underlies this

community and he did it in a beautiful

way sometimes though the only way to

tell a story is with the sweeping

picture we teamed up underwater

photographer Brian scary and

photojournalist Randy Olson to document

the depletion of the world’s fisheries

we weren’t the only ones to tackle this

subject but the photographs that Bryan

and Randy created are among the best

capture both the human and natural

devastation of overfishing here in a

photo by Brian a seemingly crucified

shark is caught up in a gill net off of

Baja I’ve seen sort of okay pictures of

by catch the animals accidentally

scooped up while fishing for a specific

species but here Brian captured a unique

view by positioning himself underneath

the boat when they threw the waste

overboard and Brian then went on to even

greater risk to get this never before

made photograph of a trawl net scraping

the ocean bottom back on land Randy

Olson photographed a makeshift fish

market in Africa where the remains of

filleted fish were sold to the locals

the main parts having already been sent

to Europe and here in China

Randy shot a jellyfish market as prime

food sources are depleted the harvest

goes deeper into the oceans and brings

in more such sources of protein this is

called fishing down the food chain but

there are also glimmers of hope and I

think anytime we’re doing a big big

story on this we’re not only going we’re

not we don’t really want to go and just

look at all the problems we also want to

look for solutions and Brian

photographed a Marine Sanctuary in New

Zealand where commercial fishing had

been banned the result being that the

overfished species have been restored

and with them a possible solution for

sustainable fisheries photography can

also compel us to confront issues that

are potentially distressing and

controversial James Nachtwey who was

honored last year at last year’s Ted

took a look at the sweep of the medical

system that is utilized to handle the

American wounded coming out of Iraq it

is like a tube where a wounded soldier

enters on one end and exits back home on

the other Jim started in the battlefield

here a medical technician tends to a

wounded soldier on the helicopter ride

back to the field hospital

here is in the field hospital the

soldier on the right has the name of his

daughter tattooed across his chest as a

reminder of home from here the more

severely wounded are transported back to

Germany where they meet up with their

families for the first time

and then back to the states to

recuperate at Veterans Hospitals such as

here in Walter Reed and finally often

fitted with high-tech prothesis they

exit the medical system and attempt to

regain their pre-war lives Jim took what

could have been a straight-up medical

science story and gave it a human

dimension that touched our readers

deeply now these stories are great

examples of how photography can be used

to address some of our most important

topics but there are also times when

photographers simply encounter things

that are when it comes down to it just

plain fun photographer Paul Nicklin

traveled to Antarctica to shoot a story

on leopard seals they have been rarely

photographed partly because they are

considered one of the most dangerous

predators in the ocean in fact a year

earlier a researcher had been grabbed by

one and pulled down to depth and killed

so you could imagine Paul was maybe a

little bit hesitant about getting into

the water now what leopard seals do

mostly is they eat penguins

you know of the march of the Penguins

this is sort of the munch of the

Penguins here a penguin goes up to the

edge and looks out to see if the coast

is clear and then everybody kind of runs

out and goes out but then Paul got in

the water and he he said he was never

really afraid of this well this this one

female came up to him she’s probably

it’s a shame you can’t see it in the

photograph but she’s 12 feet long so she

is pretty significant in size and Paul

said he was never really afraid because

she was more curious about him than

threatened this mouthing behavior on the

right was really her way of saying to

him hey look how look how big I am or

you know my what big teeth you have

then Paul thinks that she simply took

pity on him to her here was this big

goofy creature in the water that for

some reason didn’t seem to be interested

in chasing penguins so what she did was

she started to bring penguins to him

alive and put them in front of him she

dropped them off and then they would

swim away she kind of look at him go

what are you doing go back and get them

and then bring them back and drop them

in front of him

she did this for over the course of a

couple of days until the point where she

got so frustrated with him that she

started putting them directly on top of

his head it’s just resulted in a

fantastic photograph eventually though

Paul thinks that she just figured that

he was never going to survive this is

her kind of just puffing out you know

snorting out and sort of disgust and

lost interest with him and went back to

what she does best Paul set out to

photograph a relatively mysterious and

unknown creature and came back with not

just a collection of photographs but an

amazing experience and a great story it

is these kinds of stories ones that go

beyond the immediate or just the

superficial that demonstrate the power

of photojournalism I believe that

photography can make a real connection

to people and can be employed as a

positive agent for understanding the

challenges and opportunities facing our

world today thank you