POV: Analog Efex Pro

I'm perennially looking for short cuts when I post process my photographs. I use minimal processing whether using Photo shop or Lightroom (with the exception of sharpening, and adjusting levels and curves, I rarely use the other tools), and sitting at a computer fiddling for hours on end for the optimal look is really not my kind of thing...I just don't enjoy it.

Coming up with my own presets is above my intellectual pay grade, so I am always thrilled to find software that provide "one-click" solutions.

I'm particularly fond of Alien Skin Software and of the Nik Collection, and use them whenever necessary. These alternatives often preclude me from having to use Photoshop, and I'm delighted.

The Nik Collection from Google has received a new free update which is named Analog Efex Pro – a series of filters that replicate the look of classic cameras, wet plate cameras, toy and vintage...all 'funky' presets that alter the character of ones' photographs at the click of a button.

For the portrait of the young Balinese student dancers, I chose a colored wet plate look which replicates the look of ancient color photographs of the Italian photographer Felice Beato (1832-1909).

Viviana Peretti | Camargue Gypsy Pilgrimage

Photo © Viviana Peretti-All Rights Reserved

I sometimes discover a photographer's work that is so interesting that I hurry to post about it as soon as possible, upending the predetermined order of future posts on my blog.

The work of Viviana Peretti is one of those.

So I'm glad to feature Viviana's Gypsy Pilgrimage in La Camargue which she covered so well using her iPhone and the Hispstamatic's Tintype Tinto 1884 lens and the D-Type film pack...which is by far my favorite.

The Gypsy Pilgrimage celebrate the saints Mary-Jacobé and Mary-Salomé, and it is held in Saintes Maries de la Mer, a small village in the heart of the Camargue, South of France. The legend is that a boat landed near the village's site from Palestine, carrying Mary Magdalene, Marie-Jacobé, and Salomé, as well as Lazarus. With them was Sara, whose identity is unclear. There are some who believe that she was the daughter of Mary Magdalene and Jesus Christ...while others believe she was the personal maid of Marie-Jacobé. As the only dark-skinned woman on the boat, she was embraced by the Romani as their patron saint.

Romani (aka gypsies) from the region carry the the saints' effigies in a long procession to the beach to be blessed in the sea. The procession is not only made of Romani, but of the region's Arlesiennes in their distinctive costume, as well are the Gardians (Camargue's cowboys) and pilgrims.

This ritual's concept reminds me of the Hindu Durga Puja and the Balinese odalan, where effigies are carried to the river or sea to be blessed.

Viviana Peretti is an Italian freelance photographer currently based in Europe. After earning a BA in Anthropology from the University of Rome, she moved to Colombia where she specialized in photojournalism and worked as a freelance photographer for 9 years. In 2010, she graduated in Documentary Photography and Photojournalism from the International Center of Photography, and worked in NYC as a freelance photographer until her recent move to Europe.

She received fellowships and awards from the International Center of Photography, the Joannie M. Chen Fund in New York, the University of Salamanca, the Spanish Embassy in Colombia, the Photo Museum in Bogotá, and the Colombian Ministry of Culture. In 2010, she was selected for the Eddie Adams Workshop (Barnstorm XXIII), and has been published in a number of international newspapers and magazines including The New York Times, the New York Magazine, BBC, CNN, Le Journal de la Photographie and L'Espresso.

Jimmy Nelson | Dying Tribal Life

Photo © Jimmy Nelson-All Rights Reserved

"I found a Dutch billionaire, Marcel Boekhoorn, a philanthropist who is in a position to reinvest his wealth, and he took this project on. The initial amount he committed was 400,000 euros." - Jimmy Nelson

I featured the work of Jimmy Nelson on my blog a few months ago, and it appears that a number of wide circulation newspapers such as The New York Times and the UK's Daily Mail have recently devoted intensive articles about the photographer and his book Before They Pass Away.

My initial post elicited a number of email comments as well as on my Facebook page; some very positive and complimentary as mine were, but others thought he had exploited the tribes he visited and photographed, and was making money by selling his book.

By the way, the price for the special exclusive collectors' book is around $8000. A more modest version exists and is priced at $142.

My personal viewpoint is that Mr Nelson has devoted a significant portion of his life traveling in difficult conditions, schlepping an archaic (and heavy) studio camera, to visit 35 of the world’s least known and most imperiled tribal peoples...and returned with magnificent photographs for us to enjoy and wonder at. can't judge how Mr Nelson worked in the field, and whether he was respectful or not...although from his images and the articles, it does appear he achieved a relationship with his subjects. In my view therefore, there's no question that he's deserving of the tangible and intangible rewards he may receive from his work. 

I've read both newspapers' articles, and my jaw dropped when I read that a Dutch philanthropist had funded the Before They Pass Away project to the tune of over $500,000. I was also amazed at the number of press and blog reviews...even my own post on The Travel Photographer blog is listed.

Most assuredly, this is the work of a powerful PR machinery. I don't think I've ever known such a large amount of press coverage for a book of that kind. Naturally, I've also never heard of a photographer being able to have such enormous funding from a private individual...philanthropist or not.

Contrary to naysayers, I'm thrilled that Jimmy Nelson's work has found such an enthusiastic support. It's probably too early to say if the book sales are taking off...but I hope they do.

Perhaps a little Pollyanna-ish, but Mr Nelson's view that his book is primarily a commercial project and not a political statement, and that he hopes it creates a greater awareness of the beauty and individuality of the tribes and foment a positive dialogue between them and the modern world is one that should be applauded.

POV: Sadhus, Charlatans or Not?

Photos © Tewfic El-Sawy-All Rights Reserved

Yesterday's post prompts me to elaborate a bit more on the question whether the sadhus in India (and Nepal) are charlatans or a genuine aesthetics.

From my numerous travels in India over the past 10+ years, and from having met innumerable sadhus during my assignments and photographic expeditions, I'm reasonably comfortable in asserting that most of them are a cross between homeless charlatans and spiritual ascetics. The more difficult question is whether they became ascetics because of poverty or because of some form of inherent spirituality. Charlatanism is an integral part of many of them, but they may have resorted to this activity because of need.

With their tilak markings, and their orange cloths, they are certainly photogenic and some of them exploit their appearance to coax money from gullible (and sometimes, not-so-gullible) tourists. Others are more imaginative, and develop an aura of spirituality to generate religious respect and alms from lay people.

Naturally, there are a large number of sadhus who are authentic. For instance, the Naga Babas, whose ceremonial bathing at the Kumbh Melas is a sought after ceremony, belong to the Shaiva sect and are known as 'warrior ascetics'.

In 2006, I've come across authentic sadhus during an assignment in Varanasi. My fixer was from this ancient city, and knew it inside out. Upon learning that I was interested in sadhus, and seeing my disinterest in photographing the "tourist" sadhus basking in the sun on the ghats of Varanasi, he took me to a number of out-of-the-way ashrams for sadhus.

It's there that I met elderly sadhus, living in nothing more than cubicle-like tiny rooms and subsisting on small bowls of dahl and rice. These were true ascetics, who spent their days reading Hindu sacred scriptures, meditating and avoiding contact with lay people as much as possible.

I recall one of them had come to Varanasi because it was where he'd be eventually cremated and cast in the Ganges, thus achieving moksha. That in itself is not unusual, but what was unusual was his background.

He had spent his whole career with the Indian Railways (the largest employer in India), and upon his retirement he chose to become an ascetic, and left his family with their full consent, leaving all his worldly possession and his pension. He came to his ashram, and started to study herbal medicinal plants. Eventually, patients came to seek his advice, and the word spread amongst the poor in Varanasi that he was a healer. He dispensed his advice for free, and occasionally accepted some food as payment for his services.

During my visits to these ashrams, I was never asked for money...no one offered me ganja...and no one asked to pose for my cameras...and certainly no one spoke English. One of the sadhus (the one reading a scripture) never even looked up to acknowledge me as I was photographing him.

Alexis Pazoumian | Sadhu Hundred

©Alexis Pazoumian-All Rights Reserved

Sadhus...depending on your point of view or experience, they can be spiritual ascetics, devout mystics, philosophic vagabonds, or homeless charlatans. I can say that many of the sadhus I've encountered (and I have met a lot during my countless travels in India) are a bit of all these descriptions, but most are charlatans, preying on the generosity, spirituality and superstition of lay people...many of whom are equally poor. That said, they are photogenic and they know it.

It is estimated there are 4 to 5 million sadhus in India, and these belong to two main sects: the Shaiva sadhus, who are ascetics devoted to Shiva, and Vaishnava sadhus, who are renouncers devoted to Vishnu (including Rama and Krishna). Although some sub sects have properties that generate revenue to sustain members, most sadhus rely on donations, and poverty and hunger are realities for many sadhus.

Alexis Pazoumian's Sadhu Hundred is a photo gallery of sadhu portraits; some of which were photographed at the Pashupatinath Temple located on the banks of the Bagmati River in Kathmandu. It's one of the most significant Hindu temples of Shiva in the world.

You'll note the sadhus following Shiva wear a tilak of three horizontal lines across the forehead, while the tilak of Vaishnava sadhus usually include two or more vertical lines resembling the letter U, which symbolizes Vishnu's foot.

Alexis Pazoumaian is a photographer in France who, after completing a two-year course in a graphics school, turned to photography. He spent six months documenting and living in one of Rio de Janeiro’s favelas,  and was finalist in a contest by “Paris Match” for photojournalism students.

His clients include Agence Elan, Premicefilms, Elie Saab, Maje, Hilldale production, Toshiba, Caviar Agency, We love Art, Monsieur White, Société Général, Maison Sauvage, Grand Palais, Groupe Vendôme, and Agence moderne. 

Javad Tizmaghz | Tajen

Photo © Javad Tizmaghz-All Rights Reserved

It's been a while I haven't featured the work of a photojournalist, and here's the work of Javad Tizmaghz, an Iranian photographer specializing in documentary photography, and currently based in Malaysia. His work was published in a number of publications, including the Guardian. He is also an alum of the Foundry Photojournalism Workshop 2011 which was held in Chiang Mai.

I was attracted to Javad's photo story on the cock fighting in Indonesia, and chose the above photograph for this post because of the similarity in man's eyes and that of his rooster...and to me, this made the picture.

Javad's Tajen documents the Balinese tradition of cockfighting (which is known locally as Tajen) is mixed with religious rituals. Cockfights, while technically illegal, are required at temple and purification ceremonies. The local police is loath to prevent such bouts since the prevailing belief is that these are protected by the deities of the temples. There are ancient texts proving that the cockfighting ritual has existed for centuries, so Balinese police can legitimately look the other way.

 I have featured a number of cockfighting photo essays on my blog, including my own. It's usually a male-only spectator/participant kind of venue, and when I walked in the site during one of the fights, followed by a number of female photographers who were in my photo workshop group, there was a noticeable silence amongst the crowd.  However, the excitement of the bouts soon seduced the onlookers back to the action, and away from us.

Cockfighting is common in South and South East Asia; and is a gambling event in countries such as The Philippines, Thailand, Indonesia (Bali), Southern India and even Japan. 

Mustafa Dedeoğlu | Istanbul

Photo © Mustafa Dedeoğlu-All Rights Reserved

In 1807, Napoleon would exclaim "Constantinople, Constantinople! C'est I'empire du monde!"

When I started photography in earnest some 12 years ago,  my first solo destination was Istanbul. I was attracted to its traditional architecture, its people, its food, its culture and above all its history. After all, my country of birth was part of the Ottoman Empire and there are many similarities between them.

Since that first trip, I went back twice...and the latest was during the 2010 Foundry Photojournalism Workshop where I taught a class on Multimedia. It was like seeing an old friend after a few years of absence. I ate hamsi (whenever I could find them), sardines, kunefe, then drank Efes, rode the ferry and the tram, and dropped by the Grand Bazaar. I could go on and on....

With the memories of Istanbul in mind, I feature the photographic work of Mustafa Dedeoğlu, who photographed his wonderful city, mostly in monochrome.

I also liked Mustafa's work on Anatolia, with many strong portraits, also in monochrome.

Mustafa started taking photos a few years ago ago, and is largely self-taught.  He uses the Nikons d700 and d800 cameras, and prefers wide angle lenses such as the Nikon 14-24 mm. He also used Nix Software's Silver Efex for black and white conversions. In common with many street photographers, Henri Cartier-Bresson is his insipiration.

POV: DxO Film Pack 3 & Color Efex Pro 4

All Photos © Tewfic El-Sawy-All Rights Reserved

I admit it...sheepishly perhaps, but I really do.

I've mellowed and moved away from my earlier resistance to experiment with what I call funky experimentation on my photographs. I was an unwavering believer in "purity" insofar as my photography was concerned, preferring to keep my photographs as untouched as possible.

As recently as a year ago, I would use Photoshop or Lightroom as minimally as possible, barely using their capabilities except for some sharpening and color enhancements. But the availability of specialized post processing software such as DxO Film Pack, Alien Skin Software, and Color Efex Pro 4 encouraged my explorative forays into different creative avenues, and I developed an affinity for the wet plate look (quite obviously influenced by the Hipstamatic Tintype filter)...which in turn led me to try fiddling with some of my photographs using the previously mentioned software, either singly of together. Importantly, these software products are really no-brainers to use, and produce good results.

I'm still a conflicted purist at heart. For example, I'm unwilling to crop my travel photographs but I'm perfectly happy to crop the heck out of a photograph which I shot from the hip during my street photography jaunts in New York City. The fact that I shot an image from the hip gives me the "excuse" to crop it...but not for those I made using a viewfinder. So yes, a conflicted purist...or perhaps a purist who follows his own rules which he makes up as he goes along. Whatever.

This morning, I experimented with using the DxO Film Pack converting the lower photograph to monochrome (using the Kodak T-Max100 preset) and then applying a Sepia Gold toning filter to it. I then added some Structure and Vignetting using Color Efex Pro 4. I showed if off on my Facebook page...some friends liked it, so I used the same "soup" on the top two.

It took me no more than 3 minutes to process each photograph...and I quite like the results. Will it become one of my "signature" looks? I don't think so...I'm just having fun. That's the whole idea.

Subrata Biswas | Chhau, Behind The Mask

Photo © Subrata Biswas-All Rights Reserved

India, black and white* photography, storytelling, cultural-religious tradition....what's not to make my pulse race?

This is about the ancient traditional dance form named Chhau. It's a type of Indian tribal martial dance which is popular in the Indian states of Orissa (now called Odisha), Jharkhand and West Bengal. There are three subgenres of the dance, based on its places of origin and development, and these are Seraikella Chhau, Mayurbhanj Chhau and Purulia Chhau.

The Chhau blends dance and martial practices employing mock combat techniques, stylized gaits of birds and animals and movements based on the chores of village housewives. The dance is performed by male dancers from families of traditional artists or from local communities and is performed at night in an open space.

As is often the case with such traditional dance forms, the future doesn't look bright for the Chhau despite it being inscribed in the UNESCO's Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity. Fewer young people are interested in joining the art form due to the uncertainty of its financial future.

Behind The Mask is a photo essay by Subrata Biswas, a talented visual storyteller and painter from Kolkata. Despite being an IT software engineer by training, he decided to embrace a life as a self-taught painter/artist and photographer/photojournalist. His paintings have been exhibited in various venues India, while his photographs were published in a number of print and online media.

*I don't know why pure black & white images now automatically appear as sepia on Blogger. 

Arthur "Fuse" Osmanov | Hanoi

© Arthur Osmanov-All Rights Reserved

Ah, Hanoi! A city made for street photographers, as New York City and Old Havana (and many others) are. The Old Quarter especially replete with natural and impromptu life scenes that make street photographers' hearts jump out of their throats...I could lose myself in that city for days, just ambling about, and take pictures of daily life as it goes on. No one minds your camera...they're far too busy living and making a living to care. All one has to be careful of is the lava stream of whizzing scooters and motorcycles.

Arthur Osmanov Dreams of Vietnam is a collection of monochrome street photographs of Hanoi, which he describes as being a city where everything happens in public, and human interactions are not hidden behind closed doors of privacy.

Arthur is a web designer and a travel photographer who's living on the road for a second year after leaving NYC. He spent half a year in Hanoi working and living around Tay Ho area photographed with my Leica m9 and Fuji X100s.

He also has a gallery of color photographs made in the area of Tay Ho or West Lake.

John Horniblow | Imilchil Wedding Festival

The Imilchil moussem (festival) is held in Morocco's High Atlas, and is all about livestock and finding a partner. It's also known as Souk Aamor Agdoud N’Oulmghenni, which is a tongue-twister for most of non Berber speakers. It represents the annual meeting of the large and important tribal Berber families of Aït Haddidou, Aït Morghad, Aït Izdeg and Aït Yahia.

There are two versions of stories explaining the birth of the festival. The Berber version tells the legend of two young people from different feuding tribes who fell in love but akin to Romeo and Juliet, they were forbidden to see each other by their families. The grief of unrequited love led them to their deaths. The legend tells that they cried themselves to death, creating the neighboring deep alpine lakes of Isli (his) and Tislit (hers), near Imilchil.

Another version is that the lovers drowned themselves in the separate lakes. The Imilchil Marriage Festival was founded as a commemoration of the lovers' death, and provides the opportunity to unmarried Berbers, particularly women trapped at altitude for most of the year, to look over and mingle with prospective spouses. They sing, dance and flirt, and available men must wear white turbans and their female opposites wear the family silver.

Another version, but much less romantic explanation, is that Morocco's French past colonial administrators assembled the transitory Berbers to register their births, deaths and marriages.

John Horniblow tells us "small groups of young Berber women dressed in traditional finery and roughly, woven woollen robes distinctive to each family tribe, some with berber fibules (amulets), eyes rimmed with heavy black kohl, and intricately hennaed hands, amble through the commerce of the souk talking, flirting with or being approached by the potential bachelors trying to strike up meaningful conversation. The wary eyes of elder relatives, looking on, following them protectively at a furtive distance."

John Horniblow is the founder and editor of Photojournale and publisher of Photojournale Connections Across A Human Planet. John is both photographer and film maker with his photographic work featuring in Geo Mundo, Penguin books and People ( Time Inc.) . He also has worked on production managing and assisting Frans Lanting on assignment with National Geographic and has also produced directed and shot documentary and short films featuring on SBSTV , Channel Seven and at International Film Festivals.

Jason Florio | The Vodun Trail

Photo © Jason Florio-All Rights Reserved

I had a hard time choosing a photo essay out of Jason Florio's interesting and compelling work, but thought that his Benin: The Vodun Trail would suit this blog the best due to my own interest in featuring and documenting religious rituals.

The other photo essays that competed for my attention are The Ring (a photo essay on Muay Thai boxing in Chiang Mai) and Blackout Portraits-Mogadishu.

Benin is considered the cradle of vodun (one of its adaptations is voodoo) which is one of the ancient belief system essentially based on animism. Despite concerted efforts of Christian missionaries, this ancient belief system still has millions of adherents along West Africa’s former Slave Coast, from Ghana to parts of Nigeria, and especially in Benin. In 1996, Benin’s democratic government officially decreed vodun a religion, and ever since, thousands have openly practiced it. A significant percentage of Benin practice pure vodun. For more information, an article from the New York Times (with Jason's photographs) can be viewed here.

Jason Florio is a New York City based photographer and writer from London. He worked as a freelance photojournalist around the globe for publications including The New Yorker, New York Times, Outside, Liberation and The Times of London, working on stories that attempt to reveal the unseen and to provide an alternative point of view on people and places.

He spent the last 3 months of 2009 making a 930 km expedition by foot of The Gambia, West Africa to produce a series of portraits of African chiefs for which in part he was given fellowship of the Royal Geographical Society in London. His work on Afghanistan is in the permanent collection of the Brooklyn Museum of Art in New York, as well as a number of private collections.

The Girls of Tết Trung Thu

A year ago, I was walking the streets of Hanoi's Old Quarter during my Vietnam North of the 16th Parallel Photo Expedition-Workshop, carrying my street photography gear: a Leica m9 and a Fuji X Pro-1. Hanoi's streets are replete with extraordinary life moments, ready for the taking by anyone with an interest to do so.

My group and I were there in late September just before the Mid Autumn Festival, which is known in Vietnam as Tết Trung Thu festival. Traditionally, this festival celebrates harvest and is held on the 15th day of the eighth month in the Chinese calendar. In recent years, it’s an occasion for young women (and men) to walk the streets of Hanoi’s Old Quarter to show off new clothes, and to wear over-sized fake eyeglasses, and Minnie Mouse ears or antlers on their heads.

I thought it would be timely to feature a gallery of photographs showing the youthful, fun and innocent exuberance that envelops this time of year in Hanoi. The Girls of Tết Trung Thu was just added to my The Leica File (& X Pro-1) website, and is one of many featuring my work out of Vietnam.

The adorable young women parading the street were very keen to be photographed, and seeing my cameras, asked to be photographed, making the well known Asian ‘V’ sign and tilting their heads in a sweet way. 

Ninth Angkor Photo Festival 2013

The 9th Angkor Photo Festival is scheduled for November 23-30, in Siem Reap, Cambodia.It's longest-running international photography festival in Southeast Asia, will showcase the work of over 130 photographers, half of which are from Asia.

The week-long event will feature daily evening outdoor slideshow projections as well as 8 indoor and outdoor print exhibitions.

The 2013 Program is curated by the festival's program coordinator, Françoise Callier. In addition, Shahidul Alam (Director of Chobi Mela - Bangladesh) and Jean François Leroy (Director of Visa pour l’Image – France) will be its guest curators.

Some of the photographers who will showcase their work are Edwin Koo, Marylise Vigneau, John Vink, Patrick Aventurier, Kumi Takahashi, Gali Tibbon, Sankar Sarkar, Dina Oganova, Binh Dang, Abir Abdulla, Subrata Biswas, Antoine Raab and many others.

I was privileged to attend the Angkor Photo Festival in November 2011 and one of my photo essays The Possessed of Mira Datar was featured at the festival. It was an absolute delightful experience to be part of such an event, and the gracious hospitality of Francoise Callier and Jean-Yves Navel (the Festival Director) was instrumental in making it such success. I have no doubt that the festival in November 2013 will equally be as wonderful.

Tom Parker | Departures Magazine

Photo © Tom Parker-Courtesy Departures Magazine

I occasionally leaf through Departures; a luxury magazine for American Express card members, and enjoy seeing the photographs by various travel-commercial/editorial photographers, whose work is clearly aimed at high-end magazine publishing. It's somewhat different from mine, since many of the photographs are carefully staged, involve styling, set up, reflectors, etc.

The latest Departures issue features a spread of photographs by Tom Parker, and it showcases the beauty of Ethiopia. The issue is only in print for the time being, but take my word for it, the photographs are beautiful. In fact, most of the issue deals with Africa and the photographs that are featured were well worth my taking the time to enjoy and learn from them.

I constantly learn not only from the work of travel-commercial/editorial photographers, but (as I previously wrote on this blog) from fashion photographers as well. If you browse through Tom's work, you'll note a preponderance of vertical (aka portrait) photographs, which are favored by magazine publishers. Landscape (or horizontal) formats are more suited to story telling photo journalism (whether travel photojournalism or otherwise.

Tom Parker is an English photographer who relocated to Nepal to write for an independent newspaper. Working as a reporter for BBC Radio 4, he photographed for London newspapers. In 2004 he based himself in Sri Lanka for 3 years and covered the tsunami as a photographer, BBC radio journalist and writer.

He then moved to Mumbai and travelled worldwide as a photographer, and later was appointed photo editor of Condé Nast Traveller India, launching Asia’s first edition of the magazine. He recently returning to the UK and is currently a contributing photographer for Condé Nast Traveller India and Architectural Digest India.

His work appears regularly in international publications including Condé Nast Traveller, Condé Nast Traveler, Departures Magazine, Vogue, GQ, GEO, House and Garden, Sunday Times Travel Magazine, WIRED, Guardian, Independent, Marie Claire and others.

Jessica Antola | Ethiopia

Photo © Jessica Antola-All Rights Reserved

"...what consumed me were the people - strong 

and loud in dazzling technicolor..." -Jessica Antola

Ah, Ethiopia! The country which added so much to many travel photographers' portfolios with its myriad photo opportunities, its handsome people with varying physiognomies and ways of life.

Here's the Ethiopian portfolio of Jessica Antola. Born in Los Angeles, she currently lives in New York City after living and working in Paris, Portland and Rome. In her decade long photography career, she has photographed advertising campaigns for globally recognized brands, features for international magazines and three books. She also produced images portraying people, cultures and landscapes from locations including: West Papua, Antarctica, Tibet, and Myanmar.

She was featured in AFAR magazine, and if you drop by her interesting Tumblr blog, you'll see a delightful photograph of a Yali man in his traditional koteka or penis gourd in West Papua, Indonesia.

Constantine Manos | Leica & Magnum

Here's a Leica Camera documentary on Constantine ("Costa") Manos, the Magnum photographer known for his photographs of Boston and Greece.

Let me share a story about Costa Manos.

In 2000, I joined a street photography workshop in Old Havana with Costa Manos as instructor. It was one of the foreign destination workshops by the Maine Photographic Workshops, and probably the only workshop I ever attended. It was just after the Elian Gonzales custodial battle, which made authorized travel to the island more difficult than usual...but the workshop went ahead, and a small group of hard-core photographers made it (somewhat circuitously because of our US passports) to Havana.

It was still pre-digital world at the time, and for Costa to edit our photographs, we had to use color film and have it processed at local photo processing stores. Naturally, the quality left much to be desired, but the processing was fast and cheap. I had just returned from Nepal and India, and was quite full of myself...and super proud of the portraits of sadhus and Nepali women that I displayed to the group and for Costa's critique.

He took his time looking at my photographs, and probably seeing I was getting a little anxious, he told me something I have never forgotten:

"Your pictures are technically fine, but they're too simple...I want you to bring me complicated pictures; pictures that tell stories; pictures that I can look at for a long time..."

If there's only one piece of advice that guided my photographs since 2000, it was this. And it was then I began trying to complicate my photographs, to complicate my compositions. and to try to insert and build layers upon layers in them. Sometimes I succeed...and sometimes I fail. Most of the time, it falls somewhere in the middle....but I never forgot Costa's advice.

Photo © Constantine Manos-All Rights Reserved

The above photograph is hanging in my office, and I bought it from Costa during the Havana workshop.

Street Photography | NYC's San Gennaro's Feast

Photo © Tewfic El-Sawy-All Rights Reserved

I chanced on Little Italy's San Gennaro Feast last weekend, and despite the incredibly packed crowds, I managed to make a few photographs here and there. It was lunchtime which explained the crowds moving at a snail's pace, ogling the menus of the full to capacity Italian restaurants with tables overflowing on Mulberry Street in Little Italy/Chinatown. The whole of Little Italy was blocked to traffic, so pedestrians were packed like sardines with little room to compose interesting frames.

I felt I had been transported to a filming shoot for The Sopranos, hearing exaggerated Italian American accents all around me; some inviting tourists into restaurants and others hawking mozzarella (pronounced something like 'muzarel') and cannoli, the famous Sicilian dessert. Many of those were actually waiters and restaurant staff from Mexico who occasionally whispered in Spanish to each other.

Absolutely no one cares about these details. It's here in the heart of what is left of Little Italy that the feast of San Gennaro is held every year, and which was expected to attract more than one million people from all over the world to participate in the annual Salute to the Patron Saint of Naples. Perhaps hyperbole, perhaps an overly optimistic forecast...but who knows?

A little away from the main bustle, on Mott Street, a restaurant singer was pleasing the crowd with old favorites, ranging from Domenico Modugno's Nel Blu Dipinto Di Blu (aka Volare) to Dean Martin's Everybody Loves Somebody. I waited for a song by the one and only Louis Prima...Just A Gigolo would've been just perfect...but I waited in vain, and anyway a woman singing anything by Louis would sound weird.

Photo © Tewfic El-Sawy-All Rights Reserved

On Hester Street, there was a crowd gathering in front of a stall, listening to the patter of a man dressed as a boxing or wrestling referee. From what I gathered, the attraction was the presence of Bruno Sammartino, who would be performing mock matches with anyone who dared. It appears that Mr Sammartino is an Italian-born American retired professional wrestler, best known for being the longest-running champion of the World Wide Wrestling Federation. I saw no one volunteering.

Unfortunately, I won't be in NYC this weekend for the grand finale of San Gennaro's Feast. It'll be packed if last week end is any guide...I'll have to wait for next year.

For more of my New York City street photography and more, drop by The Leica File.

Foundry Photojournalism Workshop 2014 | Guatemala!

Mexico City, Manali (India), Istanbul, Buenos Aires, Chang Mai, Sarajevo and now...Guatemala!!! So if your dream is to be coached by some of the best photographers and photojournalists available, act now!

Eric Beecroft of the Foundry Photojournalism Workshop just announced the pre-registration for the Guatemala workshop. A non refundable pre-registration fee of $100 must be paid before January 15, 2014, and it guarantees a spot on the workshop, and the higher on the list you become to choose your instructor. It’s on a first come first served basis, from past experience some popular instructors classes fill up quickly.

The pre-registration deposit of $100 is applied to the full price/general tuition of the workshop which is $1000, or is applied towards the regional tuition ($500) for students from Latin America and the Caribbean.

Regional students must be from and currently living in the following countries: Antigua and Barbuda, Argentina, Bahamas, Barbados, Belize, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Cuba, Dominica, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Grenada, Guatemala, Guyana, Haiti, Honduras, Jamaica, Mexico, Netherlands Antilles, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Puerto Rico, Saint Lucia, St. Kitts and Nevis, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, Suriname, Trinidad and Tobago, Uruguay, and Venezuela. It also includes students of the Foundry 2013 regional country list: Croatia, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Serbia, Albania, Bulgaria, Slovenia, Moldavia, Romania, Macedonia, Turkey, Syria, Egypt, Lebanon, Palestine, Cyprus, and Greece.

The workshops consist of unique classes, extensive fieldwork shooting stories, one on one portfolio reviews, nightly slideshows by our instructors, panel discussions, working dinners, and a final night’s projection of the best student and instructor work from the workshop.  However, the tuition does not include travel, lodging, food, gear, etc.  

The instructors for the Guatemala workshop are Kael Alford, Andrea Bruce, Tewfic El-Sawy, Ron Haviv, Neal Jackson, Robert King, Claire Rosen, Maggie Steber, Dave Storey, Adriana Zehbrauskas, and many more, especially Latin American photographers, to be announced soon.

So pre-register now on the Foundry Photojournalism Workshop!

Shuchi Kapoor | The Unreasonables

"Why would someone inflict pain on themselves?"

On the white eight-foot walls of a private building on the corner of Goubert Avenue, close to the statue of Dupleix, in the city of Chennai (India), Shuchi Kapoor is currently exhibiting a collection of super-sized photographs, titled ‘The Unreasonables’. These photographs question the sin cleansing rituals by those who are often labelled as ‘possessed’’ in various parts of India.

The initiative was taken by Pondy A.RT. and intends to fill a section of the sea-facing walls with insightful art which will focus on a theme or issue every month through the medium of photography. It follows the model of movie posters, which are often displayed to the public on walls.

Photo © Gayatri Nair-All Rights Reserved

Shuchi is a photographer currently based in Chennai; quite a distance from her native Gujarat, and who describes herself as a storyteller minus the frills. She worked for a decade in advertising until she found her calling in photography as well as in writing. Some of her stories have been published by Femina, The Sunday Guardian, Marie Claire, The Lonely Planet, Spiceroute, and TAXI.

She also assisted me in Ajmer last May during my Sufi Saints of Rajasthan & Kashmir Photo Expedition-Workshop, which aimed at documenting the Urs of the Sufi saint Moin'Uddin Chisti.

Rasha Yousif | Heaven's Gate

Rasha Yousif was on my Sufi Saints of Rajasthan & Kashmir Photo Expedition-Workshop, and documented the Urs of the Sufi saint Moin'Uddin Chisti which attracts thousands of devotees and pilgrims from the four corners of South Asia, including Pakistan and Bangladesh. She produced an audio-slideshow of the event, and titled it Jannati Darwaza; Urdu for Heaven's Gate.

There's the story, perhaps apocryphal, that whoever crosses the threshold of Jannati Darwaza seven times to circumambulate the saint's tomb, will secure a place in heaven...hence its name.

While most attending the event are of the Muslim faith, there are significant numbers of Hindus, Sikhs, Jains and members of other religious traditions who visit the shrine during this annual observance. 

Moinuddin Chishti is the more famous and revered Sufi saint of the Chisti order of the Indian Subcontinent. He was born in 1141 and died in 1230 CE, and is believed to be a descendant of the Prophet Muhammed. He interpreted religion in terms of human service and exhorted his disciples "to develop river-like generosity, sun-like affection and earth-like hospitality."

Rasha is from Bahrain, where she works in the finance industry. She graduated from the University of Bahrain, and obtained her Masters in Finance from DePaul University.

She's a passionate and prolific photographer, and her work can viewed on her website, and on her Vimeo page.

Heidi Laughton | Spirit Hawk Eye

Photo © Heidi Laughton-All Rights Reserved

Just a few days after returning to New York from Los Angeles, I got an email from Heidi Laughton announcing the opening of her "Spirit Hawk Eye" exhibition at the Talisman gallery...in Los Angeles! I had originally met Heidi a few years ago in London where we attended a travel photography show in Earl's Court.

So it's with pleasure that I feature Heidi's Ways of the World photographic galleries, which include images from her “Spirit Hawk Eye: A Tribute to American Native Culture” photographs. These celebrate American Indian culture andreveal aspects of present-day cultural practices and lifestyles, remarkable individual stories and colorful, spiritual and artistic elements of Native American communities.

For this particular series of photographs, Heidi embedded herself within the Native American culture, and photographed a "mix of modern and traditional regalia, with the traditional regalia not necessarily being a true representation of the wearer’s tribe, but often an amalgamation of different tribal influences as is often the case today".

Originally from London, Heidi is now a Los Angeles-based fine art, portrait photographer who always had a fascination for world cultures and has worked on projects that took her as far as Kenya and China.

The photographs now exhibited at the Talisman Gallery were made usingmedium and large format film and are available as archival pigment prints on fine art paper. Alongside each portrait, a text panel further explains facets of Native life and anecdotal information relating to the portrait.

I missed it by a few days, but my readers who are in Los Angeles can view the exhibition at Talisman Fine Art Gallery, Bergamot Arts Center, Unit A6, 2535 Michigan Avenue in Santa Monica.

The Nihon-Jin of Rodeo Drive

Having some time off on Los Angeles' Rodeo Drive, I decided to test whether the city of angels's legendary shopping mecca was as conducive to street photography as is New York City. I only had a brief window of opportunity and it opened between 2-3 pm; a period of time not surprisingly accompanied by a dazzling sunshine...but with hordes of Japanese tourists.
Rodeo Drive of Beverly Hills, California is a 4 block stretch of road north of Wilshire Boulevard and south of S. Santa Monica Boulevard, known for its luxury-goods stores. The street is home to some of the most sought-after stores including Louis Vuitton, Chanel, Hermès, Burberry, and Coach....and others that I don't know. These stores must spend serious money for rent, and their air conditioning bills must be astronomical.

The Nihon-Jin of Rodeo Drive is a gallery of photographs all made with the Fuji X Pro-1 and a Fujinon 18mm, and all were shot from the hip (except one). I wanted to be as unobtrusive as possible, and shooting from the hip allowed me to capture candid expressions I may not have been able to otherwise. As women engaged in shopping for luxury goods are normally extraordinarily focused, I could've photographed them at point-blank range, and they wouldn't have noticed me. 

However, as I learned many years ago not to interfere with, or distract, a woman on a shopping spree, I thought the shooting from the hip option to be the safest for my well-being.

A Japanese guide told me that these buses carrying these shoppers are a daily occurrence, who are greeted by the Rodeo Drive merchants with open arms. I was also told that 92% of the shoppers on these buses were women, and the rest were men...presumably the very patient kind.

The photographs are not listed in any particular order, but most of them show the intensity of this activity reflected in the expressions of these women. The Japanese shoppers must've a specific window of time to do their shopping and to enter as many luxury stores as possible...and it's serious business.

Chris Sorensen | Sri Lanka

Photo © Chris Sorensen-All Rights Reserved

I've seldom featured work of Sri Lanka on The Travel Photographer Blog, and I wonder whether it's because professional travel photographers are not interested/active in this magnificent country, or if it's eclipsed by India.

So I'm glad to have found the work of Chris Sorensen whose website has a nice gallery of Sri Lanka. I've traveled more or less through all its western coast for about 2 weeks, and the gallery reminded my of its beauty. It also reminded me of photo shoot with the traditional stilt fishermen in the southern tip of the island. This is an ancient method of catching fish, quite primitive and one which give poor results, but it's a virtual icon of Sri Lanka...and the fishermen, although probably unable to make a living from it, do earn money from tourists and photographers.

A long pole is stuck in the seabed, not too far from the shore, and another shorter pole is tied to it in order to create a perch for the fisherman, who can stay there for hours catching fish during the incoming surf. I recall wading in the surf, waiting for the sunset to provide the right background to these fishermen.

Chris Sorensen is a portrait & travel photographer based in Hong Kong (another escapee from the corporate world!), and took up photography full time. He was the Grand Prize winner of the 2013 PDN Faces photo competition and a Finalist in the 2013 Kuala Lumpur International Photo Awards. His work was also awarded Honorable Mentions in the Portraiture and Fine Art categories of the 2011 International Photography Awards, as well as Honorable Mentions in the Portraiture, Lifestyle, and Fine Art categories of the 2010 International Photography Awards. His photographs appeared in

Condé Nast Traveller (UK), Monocle, AFAR, Hemispheres, Hong Kong Tatler, The Financial Times, Australian Art Collector, SILKROAD, Belle,PDN, Die Weltwoche, Veckans Aff ärer, The Phoenix, Hospitality Design, Philips, Eurosport Asia, and Gansevoort Hotels.

Sivan Askayo | Viet Nam & Other Travels

Photos © Sivan Askayo- All Rights Reserved

There is a variety of talented travel photographers; some describe themselves as storytellers and documentarians (like I do, for example) and there are others who are more attracted to editorial travel photography which involves photographing for magazines.

Sivan Askayo's lovely work, whether of Viet Nam or Florence, is more of the latter type. She's a New York based freelance travel photographer and writer, whose work was featured in Travel +Leisure, Hemisphere, AFAR, Marie Claire Italia, and Resource Magazine. I particulalry liked her work from Viet Nam and Buenos Aires; places that I recently photographed.

Sivan earned a Master degree in Advertising and Marketing and was involved with the ICP, International Center of Photography, both as a student and a teacher assistant. She photographs what she loves; children, food, travel, street art and she seeks to capture the dynamics of the places she is in. Her work has been exhibited nationally and internationally and she has been involved with emerging artists groups both in New York and in Tel Aviv.

Dede Pickering | Cuba

Photo © Dede Pickering-All Rights Reserved

Dede Pickering has been super busy for the past six months, having traveled to India, Cuba, Colombia, and Iceland. Having retired from the corporate world, she became a photographer, and traveled to Antarctica, Mongolia, Tibet, Nepal, Bhutan, Burma, China, Cambodia, Peru, Patagonia, Kosovo, Albania, Rwanda, New Zealand, Guatemala, Cuba, South East Asia and has made multiple trips to Africa and India.

She recently updated her website with galleries of these travels, and I chose to feature one of Cuba 2013. Influenced by the work by travel photographer Nevada Weir and others, she is a member of the Explorers Club in New York

In 1998 Dede took on a full-time volunteer position with CARE, a global private humanitarian organization, to start the Women's Initiative, aimed at connecting American women professionals with women in the developing world. She served as chair of the Women's Initiative until 2004. Under her leadership the small group of volunteers raised awareness and a minimum of $150,000 annually to benefit poor women and their families. Dede was also a CARE Trustee and a member of the advisory committee for CARE's Campaign for Education.

Kris Bailey | Threads For Prayers

"The highest form of devotion is to redress the misery of those in distress – to fulfill the needs of the helpless and to feed the hungry.” - Moin'Uddin Chisti

Here's a well made audio-slideshow of the annual Urs Festival commemorating the death of the Sufi Saint Khwaja Moin Uddin Hasan Chishti produced by Kris Bailey, a member in my Sufi Saints of Rajasthan & Kashmir Photo Expedition-Workshop. It's the third time Kris traveled with me...the first being on Kolkata's Durga Puja, and the second being The Oracles of Kerala Photo Expedition & Workshop.

The Sufi Saints Photo Expedition/Workshop's principal objective was to document the death anniversary held in Ajmer (Rajasthan) of Hazrat Shaikh Khwaja Syed Muhammad Moin'Uddin Chisti (1141- 1230 CE), the most famous Sufi saint of the Chishti Order of the Indian Subcontinent. He introduced and established the order in South Asia. He is also known as Gharib Nawaz or ‘Benefactor of the Poor'.

Kris chose to produce the audio slideshow (converted to video) in monochrome to avoid the divergence in colors arising from the harsh sunlight and the shadows created by the canopies in the shrine.

Threads for Prayers is an apt title for this Sufi religious observance, and underscores the syncretic commonality between Hinduism and Islam in South Asia. A Hindu practices is to tie red threads known as kalava or mauli in temples for their wishes to be fulfilled, and it's one of the practices also observed in Sufi shrines.

Apart from being an attorney in Northern California, Kris is a photographer who's keenly interested in South and South East Asia, and is particularly attracted to unusual rituals and religious festivals. She's already been on two of my most intense photo expeditions workshops, and that doesn't seem to deter her in the least.

A number of her projects can be viewed on her Vimeo page.

Nevada Wier | Insights

"...all of us should have art in our lives...."

There is a small number of leading household names in the world of travel photography and visual ethnography, and one of the top world-wide recognized names is that of Nevada Wier.

As many of my readers know well, Nevada Wier is a multiple award-winning photographer specializing in documenting the remote corners and cultures of the world. She has been published in numerous national and international publications, such as the National Geographic, Geo, National Geographic Adventure, Islands, Outdoor Photographer, Outside, and Smithsonian. She is a Fellow of The Explorer’s Club and a member of the Women’s Geographic Society.

She also is a speaker for workshops, seminars, professional panels, and conferences, and has been featured in video promotions for Adobe Lightroom.

This an interesting insight in Ms Wier's craft and thought process that's behind it. She's currently involved in personal projects, and you'll see towards the end of the video that's she's keen on working with infrared imaging. Well worth your time to appreciate the vision of an experienced and wise professional travel photographer

The video can also be viewed on Vimeo.

Charles Meacham | Calcutta's Taxi

Photo © Charles Meacham-All Rights Reserved

I just read in the India Times that the color of the iconic taxis in Kolkata is to be shortly changed from yellow to blue and white.

Imagine! Although there are new models in the taxi business, most of Kolkata's taxis are antiquated yellow painted Hindustan Ambassadors and I wager their owners and drivers are raising hue and cry at the government's decision. To add further insult to injury, the West Bengal government is reported to be planning to introduce a new fleet of 2,000 cabs in the city which could never refuse passengers, citing late hours, inclement weather or whatever pretext.

So perhaps as a swan's song to these venerable workhorses and for the 'fiddled-with' meters, here's Charles Meacham's Calcutta's Taxi, a photo essay on the yellow taxis that crawl around this teeming metropolis.

I often used these yellow taxis to travel from one end of Kolkata to the other during my Durga Puja Photo Expedition-Workshop in October 2011, and I recall an occasion when seated in the front seat alongside the driver, I almost passed out from the heat spewed out by the motor's heat of the old and ill-maintained Ambassador. Obviously there was no air conditioning, nor were the open windows any help whatsoever in Kolkata's heat and humidity.

Charles Meacham was born outside of Philadelphia, and started traveling immediately after high school. Having spent the last ten years photographing, he has received over 30 international photography awards, and attended the 25th annual Eddie Adams workshop. He co-founded the Walk With Pride project which aimed to bring social awareness to LGBT Rights by photographing pride marches around the world.  After 10 years of living in Asia, Charles calls Brooklyn his home. 

Supranav Dash | Trades Portraits

Photo © Supranav Dash-All Rights Reserved

I very much like this type of project. 

Everybody who's been to India knows that many occupations, trades and services are to a large extent linked to the prevailing caste system. For a few hundred of years, members of specific castes were rigidly tied to occupations, and could rarely deviate from them. These occupations, crafts and trade know-how were passed from generation to generation; from father to son...but how long will this continue with the globalization and the erosion of the caste system.

The photographs were made in Kolkata by Supranav Dash between 2011-2013. Kolkata was, of course, the capital of British Colonial India and also the commercial hub of the Indian sub-continent. I came across this work on TIME's Lightbox blog, and learned from the accompanying article by that Ms Jyoti Thottam that Supranav was influenced by Eugène Atget and Irving Penn who documented the trades and professions of London, Paris and New York.

The first photograph on the Lightbox blog is that of a Brahmin with a deformed cow, and those of you who have visited Pushkar will certainly recall such itinerant individuals with similar cows, trying to make meagre earnings by parading these unfortunate animals. 

I seldom read the comments that accompany such projects, but this time I did...piqued by curiosity at how viewers will react to the monochromatic photographs of India. True enough, a commentator didn't like it and described the choice as strange. She proceeded to insult another commentator who disagreed with her. Well, I think these monochromes perfectly fit the subject matter.

Supranav Dash was born and brought up in Kolkata, India. He has a BFA in Photography (Honors) from the School of Visual Arts, NYC. He currently lives and works in Brooklyn. His areas of interest are Fine Art and Social Documentary.

If you're interested in viewing the portraiys along with ambient sound (presumably of Kolkata's streets), drop by Supranav's Vimeo page.

Ruben Vicente & João Maia | Hidden Gion

Here's a lovely multimedia piece (in video form) of photographs by Ruben Vicente and João Maia of the famous Gion neighborhood.

Gion is a district of Kyoto, Japan, originally developed in the Middle Ages, and built to accommodate the needs of travelers. It eventually evolved to become one of the most exclusive and well-known geisha districts in all of Japan. The geisha in the Gion district (and Kyoto generally) do not refer to themselves as geisha; instead, Gion geisha use the local term geiko. While the term geisha means "artist" or "person of the arts", the more direct term geiko means essentially "a child of the arts" or "a woman of art".

I read that Gion's structures boast wooden lattice windows made of thin wooden beams in a grid pattern to create a lace effect, and its streets are lined with stores selling traditional Kyoto crafts, such as 'kanzashi' (ornamental hairpins), incense and kimono accessories.

Ruben Vicente is travel photographer based in Lisbon who, apart from loving photography, is a senior programmer in the telecom industry. João Maia is a part-time freelance photographer in Lisbon specializing in landscape, nature and travel. He is also a software architect with a major Japanese company.

Kares Le Roy | Asia In 6 Minutes

I frequently find wonderful work by photographers on my ZITE, and this remarkable video by Kares Le Roy managed to temporarily distract me a little from following the horrific events in Egypt. I hope it will have the same effect if you feel the same way.

Kares is a French photographer and graphic designer. More of his background can be found on his blog (scroll down for the English version). He traveled and photographed in Tibet, Nepal, India, Bali, Cuba, Cambodia and Morocco. He traveled through 56 000 km of land and humans: faces, smiles, eyes, monuments, cultures, events and this 6 minutes video masterfully provides a bird's eye view of the Asian continent.

I have featured the work of Kares on The Travel Photographer blog already, but Beware Magazine also has an interesting interview with him.

POV: Monochrome...A Phase In Life?

Photo © Tewfic El-Sawy-All Rights Reserved

A Facebook "conversation" touching on the merits (or lack thereof) of the Leica Monochrom with my friend Pierre Claquin triggered many thoughts in my mind. First off, the ephemeral thought of selling some or all of our photo gear to acquire the $8000 Monochrom crossed our minds...but after pushing away the temptation, I reflected on the reasons behind my recent interest in making monochrome photographs.

It started off during my Kolkata's Cult of Durga Photo~Expedition & Workshop™ in October 2011 during which I asked all its participants to produce their projects in black and white in order to bast capture the grittiness of Kolkata's Durga Puja.

I started to dabble with the various techniques in Photoshop or Lightroom; sometimes using presets in some cases. I also tried shooting in black and white with my M9 and the X Pro-1. The latter was used quite a lot in that mode in Sa Pa and Hanoi during my North of the 16th Parallel Photo-Expedition/Workshop, resulting in The Indigo People, and Hanoi Streets among others.

Photo © Tewfic El-Sawy-All Rights Reserved

More recently, I caught myself converting some of my most colorful photographs (such as the one of the Rajasthani shepherd and the Kathakali performer) to black and white, and was glad in seeing that these were equally powerful and pleasing to my eyes. I continued this trend over the past weeks, and started sending some of my conversions to be printed at Adorama.

In my office, I have about two dozen of some of my Cibachrome photographs made about a decade ago, already framed and mounted, and I've now decided to replace them with more recent photographs in monochrome. I already have switched 3 or 4 and these adorn one of my walls.

So is this infatuation with monochrome a function of a maturing phase in my photography timeline...or is it just an aesthetic phase that will subside? I don't know, but I wager that I'm not the only one who's passing (or has passed) through it.

It might also be a partial consequence of having downloaded the Nik Collection with its Silver Efex 2 software. The ease to use this software, and its results are really worth its $150 price tag.

In fact, its suggested workflow is what I use...not necessarily on all my conversions, but with a little tweaking, I found it works for me:

1. Apply Raw Presharpener using Sharpener Pro 3.0.
2. Apply noise reduction using Dfine 2.0.
3. Control color and light using Viveza 2.
4. Apply filter enhancements using Color Efex Pro 4.
5. Convert to black and white using Silver Efex Pro 2.
6. Apply output sharpening using Sharpener Pro 3.0.

Finally, will I desert color photography for monochrome? No...how can I when there are many instances where color photography is just perfect for the scene?

Photo © Tewfic El-Sawy- All Rights Reserved