World Press Photo 2016 Exhibition in Santiago

The yearly World Press Photo exhibition is back here in Santiago, Chile with this year's winners. The exhibit is held again at Espacio Fundación Telefónica right in front of Plaza Italia which will last from July 29 until August 28.

Every year there are some photos that really grabs my attention, and this year is Sergey Ponomarev's "Refugees arrive by boat on the Greek island of Lesbos." (http://www.worldpressphoto.org/collection/photo/2016/general-news/sergey-ponomarev) and Kevin Frayer's entry under Daily Life, Singles (http://www.worldpressphoto.org/collection/photo/2016/daily-life/kevin-frayer/101).

Exhibit Address:

Espacio Fundación Telefónica

Providencia 127. Metro Baquedano

Read more about this year's exhibit:

World Press Photo 2016 Photo Contest in context

World Press Photo Contest gallery

Exposición 2016 World Press Photo at Espacio Fundación Telefónica

August 9, 2014 (Part 4)

A couple of rounds and I decided to move on and I went ahead to La Vega (until now I'm not sure of the right word/name of [the] place). We had been to this place before. It's a 2 story market that's a bit more organized that I'd like. Crossing the bridge to the place I saw that gat most of the gates were to the building were still closed. It's past 8 now, and a market was just waking up. Weird.

I thought walked passed it and went to a street where I saw a hint of business(?). I've never been to this area and at this point I was getting frustrated. Most shots I've taken and the sun is now above the mountains. The light is now too strong, and would be hard to balance the exposure between the shadows. I still pressed on just to survey the place so that I didn't need to go back if there was nothing there.

Then the people and cars and carriages started to pickup more and more as I walked. Trucks and stalls full of fruits and laborers. I was getting giddy inside.

I wasn't shooting though. My hands were in my pockets for some reason. Then all of a sudden the place opened up. The market I was looking for. A whole plaza bustling. And I was late. I tried to shoot at this point which proved futile. Lighting was harsh. I was uncomfortable with the looks I'm getting from my camera. The unfamiliar camera I'm using. I thought I might may have lost the confidence I had back then, and this almost feels like a restart. I need to get used to this again, thicken my skin and make the camera the extension of my hand.

In less than an hour I'm back to the place where I started, reflecting and writing this.

Disappointed. Yes. Very It's a start though. I've flexed my muscles and hopefully it won't take too long for it to remember how to do this.

-

I thought it would be proper to have a reflection of myself after this entry so I took a selfie self-portrait of myself when I got back home.

Fin.

Yel

(This entry was copied from my travel log 2014)

August 9, 2014 (Part 3)

[See scan below]

Someone handed me this calling card upon entering Mercado Central. I was too lazy to use my travel log to  log the times so I used this card instead.

-

The omnipresent Andes is so long and so big that it blocks the sun for a good amount of time, giving the morning glow more time to linger. The plaza was empty. Too early for the hustle and bustle but [has] just [have] the right lighting. I decided to walk around to have some opportunity to shoot and survey the place.

By 7:50 I decided to go to Mercado Central, and maybe La Vega after that. The market has been my bread and butter and I thought my luck would be better there.

By past 8 I was there, diss almost disappointed. People [had] just started on setting up their stalls, which is weird. I used to tend to my lola's market stall when I was in college, and back then we open the stall around 3:30 to 4 in the [morning], an the market was already busy buzzing. I guess it's all about I guess people here go to the market late, hence they don't need to open early. Mercado Central is a closed-roof market with most stalls selling seafood with some restaurants. The good thing about closed-roof markets [are] that most stalls are well illuminated by bulbs, a lot of bulbs, coming from all sides that gives interesting and tricky lighting.

[to be continued]

[Click here for Part 4]

August 9, 2014 (Part 2)

I can't decide if I will be writing on this side of the notebook.

So I'll skip for now.

- my coffee has gone cold -

I've been doing a lot of things recently, more on personal growth and improvement. I'm currently studying learning the Spanish language and I just started on learning journalistic writing (unfortunately this entry does not benefit from that). I have also started getting back in shape. It has been more than 10 ten years since I last went to a gym.

But during the last 14 months my photography [endeavors] has been on a rut, to say the least. No dedicated shoots, 10 photos posted, no blogs, [nada]. My backlogs have reached the 200 GB mark which stretches back from our trip to Japan, maybe [farther].

- I ordered another coffee -

This morning's photowalk and this writing is a __________ to jumpstart my comatosed hobby. It's been too long.

-

I woke up around 6:45 [in the] morning with a sunrise shoot in mind. Before sleeping last night I checked  what time the time when the sun would rise and Google said 7:05. The plan was [to] walk around the vicinity of Plaza de Armas and sit down at this very cafe and write something - this. By 7:15 I was in the subway and 15 minutes later I was in the station beside this cafe. Funny (or is it tragic?) thing about catching the golden hour here in Santiago is the hour seems to really an hour.

[to be continued]

[Click here for Part 3]

August 9, 2014 (Part 1)

I'm currently sitting at a cafe in Santiago's Plaza de Armas. It's 9 in the morning and two señoras just sat across my table. I think they're having a breakfast. It's almost 9:15, back home my lola would already have clocked in about 6 to 7 hours of work and about 5 cups of coffee.

I just finished a photo walk around this area and I'm having a break I planned to sit and reflect on what has been going on recently in my life on some things, but maybe for this entry, [I'll] try to focus on my photography.

It's been a while since I had my last "shoot". By "shoot" I mean a dedicated, planned and focused time for just shooting. To my recollection it has been over a year - 14 months to be exact is a good approximation. The last one was around Kathmandu and since then a lot has happened.

My now fiancé (I'm engaged) and I has moved to South America, here in Chile, for work and we've been here for the past 5 months. I had been going back and forth to the US but mostly for work of those trips were dedicated for work. I have sold most of my gear the gears I was using a year ago - my DSLR, lenses, bags, filters - the whole lot, and now I'm using a segunda mano Leica M9 with a prime 35mm Summi rangefinder.

[to be continued]

[Click here for Part 2]