The Press Photographer's Year 2010

The results for the Press Photographer's Year 2010 are out and once again there are some cracking images amongst the winners!

Ah well try again next year.

Click the link below to see the slideshow.....Enjoy......

The Press Photographer's Year Slideshow

Patrol Base

A few photographs taken in a couple of the forward patrol bases that I passed through when out on different jobs whilst I was over in Helmand. The conditions are, as you would probably imagine, very basic and simple but the troops make do with what they have and if they don't have it then you can guarantee that some ingenious member of the unit will make, build or improvise anything they might want. The bases are of course prepared with some defensive positions in case of attack and are made as 'homely' as possible given the conditions as the troops will usually have to live and work from these bases for their six months of deployment.

A bullet marked wall and entrance to one of the 'rooms' used to house troops
 

This poster to support England in the World Cup was stuck up on the wall, however I should imagine it has been removed by now!

A shrine built by Gurkha soldiers at one of their Patrol Bases

An alcove built into the wall provides a storage space for equipment

The officer in charge of one of the units watches over an operation that is taking place from the operations room at a patrol base

A sand-bagged defence position on the roof of a base at one of the locations in Nad' Ali

Clothes dry on a washing line next to a couple of beds brought outside into the cooler evening air

A Gurkha looks out from his defensive position on the roof of a compound that is being used as a base

The bases also provide Mortar support to troops operating around the base when they need it and the mortar crew are able to spring into action very quickly when the call comes for a fire mission

The interior of a Mastiff vehicle is illuminated in the soft glow of the red lights inside the vehicle as it prepares to leave a patrol base 
 

Into the Dark

The images taken below are from a patrol in the Nad' Ali region of Helmand Province as troops prepare to move back towards their Patrol Base after nightfall. Due to the darkness the camera settings were extreme to say the least with the ISO set to 25600! Camera settings were f2.8 at either 1/6 or 1/4. I was shooting with a 24mm prime lens on the D3 which I had resting on my ammunition pouches attached to the front of my body armour to try and keep it as steady as I could as I pressed the shutter.

There was so little light that it was pointless even looking through the viewfinder but knowing the field of view of the 24mm I could make a pretty good guess as to what I was going to get in the shot. Not an exact science I know but it doesn't matter. Sometimes it can produce interesting results. The small white 'squiggle' on the bottom shot is either a flare in the distance or the light from a star low on the horizon, but I fail to remember.

Home Town Features

One of the regular and routine requirements when you work as a photographer for the army is to provide what the military call 'Home Town Stories' but what I prefer to call 'Home Town Features'. The concept is straight forward really.....Individual X from Town Y is photographed, a brief article is written and then both are sent to their local paper.

This type of piece achieves a number of things...

• The Individual(s) and their efforts are highlighted for their friends, family and others to see, which is of course, a good thing.
• The local paper receives a good quality finished article, free of charge, for them to use in their paper and which can, ultimately, assist in the circulation figures of the paper.
• It raises the wider profile of the military and the 'messages' it tries to put out and can also assist with recruitment.

So everyone is a winner really! Although the first point is by far the most important, the other two are of no consequence to me.

The photographs below are recent examples of some of the pictures I took to accompany some of these HTF articles and all of the individuals pictured gave their permission for their pictures to be used and also to then be sent to their particular regional newspapers for publication and in most of the examples below they have already gone out to their local papers.

In the majority of these examples the type of work each individual does comes through in most of the pictures, or at least the environment in which they work and when all are supported by the relevant copy it provides a quality package to their respective local print media. Where the work carried out by the individual is not immediately known these pictures formed part of a more in depth story about an individual and or subject, in other words, a Feature piece, hence - Home Town Feature.

Some brief techy info for those interested in how these results were achieved...

• Two Nikon D3 DSLR cameras
• Either a 24mm f2.8 or an 85mm f1.4 prime lens was used
• One Nikon SB 900 speedlight
• Flash used off camera, either hand held or placed on a small stand
• Speedlight triggered with an SU 800 unit
• 1/4 CTO gel filter for the speedlight - But not used for all pictures. This helps to warm up the image slightly. Use when appropriate.
• All images were shot in 'Manual' mode on the cameras
• A mixture of manual and TTL was used on the speedlight

RSOI

Reception, Staging and Onward Integration or RSOI, is a process that all military personnel and MoD civil servants who arrive in Afghanistan must undergo. Depending on their role once they are here will dictate the duration of the RSOI training package they do. For most, it is four days, and during that time you are bombarded with all manner of briefings, demonstrations and practical opportunities to put into practice many of the drills and procedures that could save your life or the lives of the people your working with.

Below is a small selection of pictures I took during this process, not definitive by any means but hopefully a little different...

Troops arrive on the ranges to check their weapons during a fierce dust storm

A group of soldiers receive a briefing prior to one of the demonstrations starting

On a range next to the one used by British troops an American soldier catches up on some sleep as he waits for his platoon to begin firing

Troops practice the drills that they need to use when they deploy from Camp Bastion and arrive at their own Platoon or Company locations

A soldier returns to a compound at the end of a series of briefings during the day

A soldier covered in dust poses for the camera during the range day

 

 Soldiers march out around 5km to the training area for the start of the days training

Yes Minister

In a show of support for military personnel working in Afghanistan the British Prime Minister, David Cameron, visits troops based at Camp Bastion in Helmand Province, Afghanistan. During his visit he also announced an increase in the 'operational allowance' paid to military personnel on operational deployments - news that was very welcome to troops listening to his address!

Photographing a high profile visit like this is always challenging for a number of reasons. When a high profile visitor comes they are inevitably surrounded by a gaggle of other media, personal assistants, close protection officers and other people hanging on who you need to work around. Time is always tight and the PM's movement between various locations he was visiting is controlled tightly so you need to know exactly where and when he is going so that you can try and get to the next location before he gets there. There is a programme released outlining the visit and this is a good starter but its always worth checking through the day to see if it remains current. One of the things I do is check in with the drivers of the vehicles taking the PM to each of the locations as they will know of any last minute changes in his plans. In this case it paid off as a couple of visits were swapped around and if I had not asked the driver I wouldn't have known.

Finding out the running route the PM was to use on his early morning jog is a requirement for obvious reasons, if possible recce it to try and spot good locations to get to before he runs, in this case he started and finished in the same place so I wanted to find two locations within east reach of the start point from which I could get to easily and quickly in order to photograph him starting and as he ran down the final leg of the run to give me a bit of variation.

After a short break after the run it was onto breakfast with the troops. It's never going to be a great shot of anyone sitting down to eat, doesn't matter who they are! So a couple of quick pictures as he sits and chats with the troops is all that is required and then leave them alone to eat and after grabbing a quick sausage sandwich while they eat it's on to the next location.

The key address to the troops was a busy and hectic affair in the minutes leading up to his arrival - as they always are. His people are trying to orchestrate the best positions for the media to get their message across, the media is trying to get into the better locations for their coverage, the military is trying to organise everything as only the military can - A Sergeant Major shouts a lot and tries to get a crowd of a couple of hundred to do the same thing which is never going to be easy...and in amongst all this with the heat in Bastion and the dust rising up from the shuffling of boots on the dirt your trying to work out your best location, where is the sun? How close can I or should I get? I knew there were other photographers shooting from behind the crowds so I decided to go in close and was able to stand right at the foot of the small platform he was to stand on and shoot it on a 24mm hoping I could get some of his hand gestures as he emphasised his points to the onlookers.

The shot at the top of the post is my favourite as this tells the story of his speech to the troops and his visit best I think. I know he is animated when public speaking and the hand gestures he uses are the same as he uses when speaking in Parliament so I knew he would definitely use them - What lesson from this? Research your VIP to see if they have any traits or characteristics you can keep an eye out for. I positioned myself slightly behind him as I wanted to try and get the animation as he turned and spoke to the crowd.

And so it continues through the visit, leapfrogging from location to location as the temperatures soared trying to get into position to cover the arrivals at each location and the subsequent meet and greet with people. Trying to work on interesting pictures and look for something different that tells the story.

It is hard work, but I enjoy the buzz of having to work fast and keep looking for the pictures in such a fluid and unpredictable situation, followed with the race to edit and get the pictures ready to file to the news agencies.

Job jobbed!

C17 Flight to Afghanistan

Images from the flight deck of a C17 transport aircraft as it flies over Turkey on route to Afghanistan.

Every Day I work for Afghanistan

For the security situation to improve in Afghanistan one of the many requirements the country needs will be for a capable and effective military to be formed and to become effective to help provide a stable platform on which the country can begin to sort itself out. Steps are already being taken towards this and more and more in Afghanistan it is the ANA - Afghan National Army - who take the lead in operations against the Taliban.

The journey for ANA 'Warriors' as they are known, begins at a number of different training locations throughout Afghanistan and with the help of mentoring and instruction from British and US military personnel the trainees are taught many of the skills that they will need when they are conducting operations against the Taliban.

On completion of this training they attend a graduation ceremony at Camp Bastion and formally graduate from their training. At the ceremony a number of certificates are awarded to the best soldiers from within their sections and it is with great pride that they hold aloft their prize on the stage in front of their peers and then shout out over the applause..."Every Day I Work for Afghanistan".

Afghan National Army soldiers wait for their graduation ceremony to begin.

ANA soldiers are briefed by one of their Commanders after graduating from their training course.

British and US Marine instructors help with the training, liaison and planning of the training courses.

A newly graduated trainee holds his certificate aloft and announces, "Every Day I Work for Afghanistan".

ANA soldiers applaud fellow graduates.

ANA soldiers attending the graduation ceremony.

Dunkirk

This weekend marked the seventieth anniversary of the evacuation of British troops from the beaches in Dunkirk, France as they retreated under the onslaught of the German army during World War II. The weekend saw veterans from that time visit the area and culminated in a memorial service and wreath laying ceremony at the war memorial in Dunkirk which was attended by French and British veterans, relatives of soldiers and other dignitaries.

 D-Day veteran Peter Shaw

During the weekend I also photographed various stages of the 'Big Battlefield Bike Ride', organised by and in support of the charity for injured soldiers from more recent conflicts, Help for Heroes. The event involved a three hundred mile bike ride through the countryside of France and Belgium, with the three hundred riders stopping off at battlefields and war memorials from the first and second world wars with each visit been marked with a simple wreath laying ceremony or short service to remember those that had been killed during these wars.

Riders for the charity Help for Heroes arrive on the promenade in Dunkirk at the end of their arduous 300 mile bike ride.

A Bugler stands in front of a wall at the Menin Gate memorial at Ypres in Belgium which lists the 55,000 names of British and Commonwealth soldiers killed and missing during the battle of the Ypres Salient during World War One

A veteran from D-Day chats with an injured soldier from the more recent conflict in Afghanistan

Early morning sun lights the many rows of headstones of British, French and German 
soldiers killed during heavy fighting in this area of Belgium

D-Day veteran Richard 'Dicky' Atkinson

A young boy is held aloft on the shoulders of his father 
at the Menin Gate memorial in Ypres, Belgium

Royal Navy D-Day veteran, George Drewett chats with his grandson, Richard Vanstone, as they walk along the promenade in Dunkirk, France

Having arrived by Navy landing craft on the beach at Dover after completing the 300 mile ride, Mr Jonny Buxton enjoys a pint

For further information on Help for Heroes visit...http://www.helpforheroes.org.uk/