James Nachtwey is an American Photo Journalist that grew up in Massachusetts. During the early 1970's Vietnam was at war and within this time period Nachtwey had just begun his career as a newspaper journalist in New Mexico. However, images captured during the Vietnamese war impacted his inner feelings and raised his ambitiousness to begin a series of war photographs which would seek truth to the world. Therefore, in 1980 he had a change of heart and decided to move to Newyork City and commence his new career as a war photo journalist. He once said, "I have been a witness, and these pictures are my testimony. The events I have recorded should not be forgotten and must not be repeated."
Questions:
- What kind of personality is required to carry out a job of a photo journalist such as James?
Christiane Amanpour, a British-Iranian CNN foreign correspondent stated and described Nachtwey as a "single minded" photographer. This vague yet precise description contributes to analyzing James personality. As shown in the movie, James is a very calm, respectful and quite man which are all characteristics of a photo journalist. In order for one to succeed in life, he/she has to be patient, and this plays a crucial role in photo journalism specifically, because photographers firstly have to patiently wait at times for a certain event to occur and secondly have to be precise and calm in order to take that one perfect shot when it's time.
2. What do you think of his approach to photographing people?
"I try my best to approach people with respect." The moment you gain people's respect, be determined that your goals will be reached. James uses respect as a tool to aid him capture the perfect moments during an event, because once he gains that mutual respect from his interviewee's, he is capable of invading their personal space. This to many might sound problematic, however on the contrary it actually isn't As seen throughout the film, James camera lens was literally centimeters away from his interviewee's face's, however, due to the mutual respect shared at the start, the interviewee's wouldn't even notice James. He might have been invading their own personal space, however they surely felt comfortable with James being very close to them, as at the end, they we're the ones in seek of help; hoping to be heard by the rest of the world. Therefore, this is a very effective approach which made James's photographs unique and more meaningful to the audience.
3. What kind of subject does STERN magazine cover?
STERN magazine is a weekly news magazine that was first founded in 1948 and published in Germany. Unlike many of its European competitors, STERN actually publishes its magazines till this day. There is only one main aspect which makes it different to other magazine's, that is the fact that it focuses solely on covering serious news stories and including journalistic photography. During the film, STERN employees and employers were shown gathered around a white board filled with what seemed to be James's war photographs, discussing which they should publish in their magazine.
4. What conflicts did James cover in his film?
James covered several conflicts in his film, which included:
- The Kosovo Conflict
- The Velika Krusa Massacre
- Rwandan Genocide
- Poverty in Indonesia
- Palestinian/Israeli Conflict
5. What pictures ended up being used?
After years of hard work and travelling the world to witness different conflicts, James finally returned back home and decided it was time to share his photographs to the world. His exhibition included a variety of images from different conflicts, however, as he probably would've taken thousands of pictures, he certainly had to limit the amount of photos he could display of each conflict. Having a reasonable amount of photographs also permitted him to edit some of them, these included basic shadow and light edits.
6. Why did he become a war photographer?
As mentioned earlier, James was greatly influenced by the photographs taken during the Vietnamese war and ever since, he has devoted himself to being a war photographer.
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