COM 343: HISTORY OF COM 343: HISTORY OF PHOTOGRAPHYPHOTOGRAPHYLesson 5: History of War Photos

Metin ErsoyFaculty of Communication and Media Studies

Lesson 5: History of War Photos

WAR PHOTOS◦Photos are more effective than words.◦War is an international relations dispute,

characterized by organized violence between national military units.

◦Photography has marched arm-in-arm with war since its invention.

◦Hippolyte Bayard made a daguerrotype of the barricades of Paris after the 1848 revolution, but daguerrotypes required several minutes to make and were useless for action shots.

LessonLesson 55:: History of War History of War PhotosPhotosA technological improvement came with

the invention of the wet collodion process, which spread light-sensitive silver iodide crystals on glass plates. Images could be easily multiplied, even though they still took a long time to make.

Using the wet collodion process, Felice Beato shot pictures of the Crimean War in the mid-1850s, and Matthew Brady and his staff photographed the battlefields of the Civil War, often within a few hours of the actual battle.

LessonLesson 55:: History of War History of War PhotosPhotos

ANTIETAM, Maryland — On Sept. 17, 1862, at least 3,650 Confederate and Union soldiers died at the Battle of Antietam.

LessonLesson 55:: History of War History of War Photos (The Cyprus Conflict Photos (The Cyprus Conflict is an example)is an example)"Mr. Brady has done something

to bring us the terrible reality and earnestness of the war," wrote a reporter for The New York Times.

LessonLesson 55:: History of War History of War PhotosPhotosWet plates were replaced by gelatin-

coated dry plates around 1880 and the invention of halftone printing enabled photographs to be reprinted in newspapers in the 1890s.

Hand-held cameras with spooled film arrived by the turn of the last century, enabling photographs of the Spanish-American War, the Mexican Revolution and the second Anglo-Boer War.

LessonLesson 55:: History of War History of War PhotosPhotosBy 1913, smaller, lighter cameras such as

the 35mm Leica, the 120mm Rolleiflex and the single-lens-reflex Contax enabled photographs to be taken at eye level, without exposing the photographer to prolonged enemy fire.

They also opened photography to amateurs, even to soldiers themselves. German soldiers took their Leicas with them when they marched into Russia in World War II and took thousands of shocking photographs of massacres and murdered Jews.

LessonLesson 55:: History of War History of War PhotosPhotosRobert Capa (Budapest, October 22,

1913 – May 25, 1954) was born Endre Friedmann. He was a 20th century combat photographer who covered five different wars: the

Spanish Civil War, the Second Sino-Japanese War, World War II across Europe, the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, and the First Indochina War.

LessonLesson 55:: History of War History of War Photos (The Cyprus Conflict Photos (The Cyprus Conflict is an example)is an example)

From 1936 to 1939, Capa was in Spain, photographing the horrors of the Spanish Civil War. In 1936 he became known across the globe for a photo he took in Cerro Muriano on the Cordoba Front of a Loyalist Militiaman who had just been shot and was in the act of falling to his death.

LessonLesson 55:: History of War History of War Photos (The Cyprus Conflict Photos (The Cyprus Conflict is an example)is an example)"If your pictures aren't good

enough, you aren't close enough," war photographer Robert Capa used to say.

In 1954, Capa got too close. He stepped on a land mine in Indochina

and died in the explosion, aged 40.

LessonLesson 55:: History of War History of War PhotosPhotosWilliam Eugene Smith (1918-

1978) was an American photojournalist known for his refusal to compromise professional standards and his brutally vivid World War II photographs.

LessonLesson 55:: History of War History of War PhotosPhotos

W. Eugene Smith, Marine Mop-upFollowing Japanese Suicide Charge, Saipan, 1944

LessonLesson 55:: History of War History of War PhotosPhotosDavid Douglas Duncan (born

January 23, 1916) is an American photojournalist and among the most influential photographers of the 20th century. He is best known for his dramatic combat photographs.

LessonLesson 55:: History of War History of War PhotosPhotos

A picture from the war in North Korea by David Douglas Duncan. 9 December 1950

LessonLesson 55:: History of War History of War PhotosPhotosCarl Mydans (May 20, 1907 –

August 16, 2004) was an American photographer who worked for the Farm Security Administration and Life magazine.

LessonLesson 55:: History of War History of War PhotosPhotos

The mother in a family of nine holds her baby. The family lives in a field on U.S. Route 70 in Tennessee, near the Tennessee River. Photograph by Carl Mydans, 1936

LessonLesson 55:: History of War History of War PhotosPhotosEliot ELIS1942- 19451942, Joins U.S. Army as

photographer; serves in North African.

LessonLesson 55:: History of War History of War PhotosPhotos

Songye power figure, protector of the village. Nsapo region, Congo (Democratic Republic), 1947Eliot Elisofon

LessonLesson 55:: History of War History of War PhotosPhotosEdward Steichen (March 27,

1879 – March 25, 1973) was an American photographer, painter, and

art gallery and museumcurator, born inBivange, Luxembourg.

LessonLesson 55:: History of War History of War PhotosPhotos

This photo by Al Chang from the Korean War was included in the book "Family of Man" by Edward Steichen, published in 1955.

LessonLesson 55:: History of War History of War PhotosPhotosWar Photos – World War 1, World War

2, Iraq War, Cyprus War, Kosovo War, Vietnam War, etc…

Civil War PhotosAtom Bomb PhotosNature PhotosEnvironment PhotosAtatürk PhotosPeace PhotosSeptember 11

LessonLesson 55:: History of War History of War PhotosPhotosCONCLUSIONWhat is ethics?

◦ Ethics is a major branch of philosophy, encompassing right conduct and good life.

◦ It is significantly broader than the common conception of analyzing right and wrong.

◦ A central aspect of ethics is "the good life", the life worth living or life that is satisfying, which is held by many philosophers to be more important than moral conduct.

LessonLesson 55:: History of War History of War PhotosPhotosMembers of the Society of

Professional Journalists believe that public enlightenment is the forerunner of justice and the foundation of democracy.

The duty of the journalist is to further those ends by seeking truth and providing a fair and comprehensive account of events and issues.

LessonLesson 55:: History of War History of War PhotosPhotos

◦Photojournalism ethics during war Peter Howe, who covered civil wars in

Northern Ireland and El Salvador as a photojournalist and who wrote Shooting Under Fire: The World of the War Photographer, has an op-ed article in USA Today about the editorial choices involved in deciding which photos to publish in a newspaper to tell the story of the war.

LessonLesson 55:: History of War History of War PhotosPhotosPeter Howe says, “The decision

to show dead bodies has always been a lightning rod for public opinion, often polarizing it between those who believe we should see war's reality and those who feel such images are inappropriate on the pages of items that enter the home. ... “

LessonLesson 55:: History of War History of War PhotosPhotos1. History of your subject (general

information)2. General evaluation of

technology of photos in that time

3. Famous photographer in your subject

4. Photos from that period5. Conclusion