First Images from African Students

One of the first things I was told before I went to Africa was that things would most likely not go as you have planned and I would need to be flexible.  Well that was so true.  The goal of the project was to find young adults that had never used a camera before to shoot photos of their society to give us a look into their culture.  The goal was to find a village that had no exposure to any media, electricity, TV, Movies, or that had never even seen a camera before.  In order to train the students we would need interpretors. 

Here is what happened.  We had contacted some local leaders in each of the communities we were going to so they could line up the interpretors and students for me to try out the project.  Well due to a lot of circumstances the interpretors and students turned out to be the same people for this first trip.  All the kids who go to secondary school (equivalent to High School) learns English.  So the students that were chosen for me turned out to be the interpretors I will use when we go and do the project next year.  I call them Junior Mentors. When I met them they told me that some of them did know what a camera was but never used one before.  The others did not know what a camera was at all.  They understood English and could speak it fairly well.  They also knew Borana so they will be a valuable part of our project.

I spent about 4 hours with them the first day I met them and we talked about what photography was and how to tell stories with pictures.  We went over the camera controls and I wanted to make sure they did not get hung up on the magic of seeing images for the first time but first thought of how to take meaningful pictures.  I wanted them to go beyond the basics right away since I had so little time with them.  We did not take any pictures the first day.  We only had a photo lecture and hands on camera control learning.  We loaded batteries, media cards and just talked about taking pictures.  I showed them a few images on my laptop to get them excited.

The next morning we had a short briefing and while the rest of the medical team I was traveling with went to do the medical clinic I turned my new photography students loose with the cameras.  This was the first time they ever used a camera before. They were so excited and I was amazed at the images they came up with.

I gave them each an assignment.  They were to go and shoot the pictures that represented their assignment and then shoot anything else they wanted as long as they came back with a good shot of their assignment.  The assignments were to shoot:
Joyful Children
Mother and Child
Doctors at Work
Someone in Need

I had two students that really stood out although I got great images from each of the kids.  The thing I could not believe is that two of the students had a shooting style from the first images they took.  Most of us shoot for years trying to develop a style and these students had a style from the first time they picked up a camera.  So here are the first images from two of my star students.

Guyo is great at Environmental Portraits. I could tell which images were his every time.  He had an eye to  capture the emotion of his subject while capturing backgrounds that really helped to tell the story about the subject. Take a look at Guyo's first day images.  Remember that Guyo had never touched a camera in his life before he took these images.  Guyo's assignment was a Mother and Child and here is my favorite image he took for this assignment.

 
You can click here to see Guyo's Showit Slide show of his first images.

Hakana was my other stand out.  He had a way of capturing the emotion of his subjects and to draw you into the pictures.  You just want to look at each image and the eyes of his subject are just trying to tell you their story.  Hakana's assignment was Joyful children.  Here is one of my favorite images for this assignment. Again you need to remember that these are images he took the first time he ever touched a camera. You can Click here to see Hakana's Showit Slide Show if his first images.  I think these guys did an amazing job.                                                               

Comments

[Sarah Q]

Those are GREAT!! I'm so jealous ... I wish I could go to Africa, too! You're doing such a great thing, David. If only more people were like you, the world would be such a nicer place. KUDOS!
XOXO, Sarah / Roxy and Kai Photography

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