Ryan Pyle Blog: The Recession Photographer

Hello,

For a moment I would like to stop and reflect back to last year at this time, spirits were high and I was running like a mad man around China on assignment for various magazines and newspapers. Which is to say that I was kept busy by other people, it was a wonderful time.

Today I am chillin' out in front of my computer in jogging pants and sipping my tea wondering where it all went wrong. So far this year I've had just a handful of assignments, and almost no corporate work to speak of. With budgets being slashed and staff employees being made redunent, the publishing industry is in a real tailspin at the moment.

Surely the situation is not helped by the fact that the advertising industry is also in a bit of a bind, huge spenders like General Motors and Nike have made significant cutbacks to their spending budgets - affecting magazine and newspapers revenues; hence the chopping of employees and reductions in the use of freelancers.

While I pray that this kind of industry gloom doesn't last too much longer, the long term prospects for magazines and newspapers still seem bleak. But without getting too far ahead of myself, how does a freelance photographer make it through a recession?

First off, I don't pretend to be in possession of an expert opinion; but a few observations I have might be of interest. While assignments may be in a bit of a lull at the moment with budget restraints, magazines and newspapers still need to publish; so my guess is they are buying a boat load of stock. In my business my stock sales have increased significantly over last year at this time, partially because I have more images but also perhaps because of these restricted budgets. A magazine can put together a feature for a couple hundred dollars worth of stock pictures, where assigning a photographer for original images might cost thousands. It's true the impact of the stock images might not be as powerful as original images but during a belt tightening time, belts need to be tightened and money needs to be saved.

So what can freelance photographs do to ride out the storm? Well, the same as most companies - use the cash you've saved up to continue doing business. I have a small savings account I keep just for freelancing assignments on my own, which I then turn around and pitch to magazines and newspapers as work I've done on spec. At the end of the day a strong picture is a strong picture is a strong picture, and whether you take that image on an assignment on street shooting on your own time - it'll still have a chance at publication. When it is all said and done we are image makers, and if too many days go by without making images then it'll negatively affect us. Now of course I don't mean just running around with your head cut off and shooting anything you see, but taking the time and organizing a well thought out story or feature on your own can be a incredibly rewarding experience; and if it has a chance at being published than that's all the better. If not then those same images can be used as entries for competitions or part of a larger portfolio of work.

Getting out and shooting is never a waste of time, sitting around and waiting for the phone to ring is. There are a billion stories out there to be told, I say keep shooting no matter what. Well that's my two cents.

If anyone has an interesting story or observation about how the economic slowdown might be affecting their business I would love to hear it, either privately or publicly in the comments of this blog. I just read recently that even some of the photographers winning major awards this year haven't had a 2009 assignment. Difficult times indeed.

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Cheers,

Ryan Pyle
Photographer
ryan@ryanpyle.com
Website: www.ryanpyle.com
Archive: http://archive.ryanpyle.com
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Ryan Pyle Blog: My New Website (www.ryanpyle.com)

Hello,

Every couple of years I like to update my website. Some folks out there might ask which website? I know it can be a bit confusing. I have several websites: one site is my ARCHIVE where all of my images are hosted, that's run by PhotoShelter; I also run this blog and link a lot of work to facebook as well. But the site I've just recently updated is my portfolio sight, or my standard www.ryanpyle.com site.

My reasons for updating are several, it's always good to bring in a fresh look every now and then. I also wanted to update it with recent work, bio and contact information. I feel strongly that when you live in a remote part of the world, far away from London, Paris and New York it's important to have a strong online presence, so that editors and potential clients can get a good feel for who you are and what kinds of work you are doing.

So, if you feel inclined I might be humble enough to suggest that you take a quick peak: www.ryanpyle.com. Comments and suggestions are more than welcome, either personally to my email address or here on the comments section of the blog. I appreciate your time.

www.ryanpyle.com.

As an aside, my www.ryanpyle.com website was designed by Jon at JH Design. His contact details are: Email: jhdesign.sh@gmail.com. Jon is based in Shanghai and he is a very skilled web designer and does a significant amount of corporate web design, graphic design, advertisements and the like. He comes highly recommended.

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Cheers,

Ryan Pyle
Photographer
ryan@ryanpyle.com
Website: www.ryanpyle.com
Archive: http://archive.ryanpyle.com
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Ryan Pyle Blog: What Works and What Doesn't

Hello,

I feel the need to comment on a recently read BLOG. The blog is called Luminous Landscape and it's a site a regularly check in on for gear reviews and such.

The BLOG in question was a review by Photographer Michael Reichmann about a recent trip to Antarctica, and he comments about what worked and what didn't with regards to gear and varying weather conditions.

A few things caught my eye from this blog, first of all I was surprised that of the 77 photographers on this trip some 70% were shooting Canon and half of those had 5D Mark II's. Of the Nikon crowd the D700 was a favorite. The comment I want to make about this blog is not how many photographers there were or to argue about Canon or Nikon; I'm really surprised that so many people brought digital cameras with them to the Antarctic.

Why exactly am I surprised? Well I can't put my finger on it exactly. I suppose it is easiest to say that I don't think I would have gone the digital route due to the sub freezing conditions. Although Michael with his Sony Digital equipment didn't report any problems.

With my documentary work in China I am constantly working outdoors in cold weather. Whether I am documenting Tibetan culture, working on my Black and White project in Xinjiang or even shooting a wind farm just outside of Beijing, I feel like I am constantly shooting in cold weather; and I mean really cold.

Just this past December I was in Baotou, China working on a story about Pollution and it was -26C or worse for four days straight; I was using my Canon EOS 1n film cameras and didn't have a hiccup to mention - only needed faster battery changes. Also, during the first week of February I was out in Xinjiang working on my Black and White project and I was constantly in weather that was -10C or lower, I was even caught in a snow storm in the desert, I had my Leica M6 Range Finders and I was smooth sailing the entire trip.

Getting to the point of the blog, I'm basically saying is I just don't trust the digital equipment in harsh conditions. It's my opinion that they just aren't tough enough to handle the difficult weather, and as Michael points out in his blog the Canon and Nikon digital equipment had a lot of problems (Errors, cracked LCD screens and the like) in weather that didn't seem to get lower than -5C.

There is still a lot of room for analog camera's in this world. Anyone else out there feel similar?

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Cheers,

Ryan Pyle
Photographer
ryan@ryanpyle.com
Website: www.ryanpyle.com
Archive: http://archive.ryanpyle.com
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Ryan Pyle Blog: Iran at 30 years Old

Hello,

Above is a very brief mix mash of my photography from Iran over the last few years. I've made several trips there and had a most incredible time on each journey. My reason for today's blog is because this past week, February 1st actually, marked the 30th anniversary of the Islamic Republic of Iran. That's right, it is been 30 years since the revolution that toppled the "western-backed" Shah and brought Ayatollah Khomeini, and the clerics, to power.

Iran is a country that I hold very close to my heart for several reasons. First and foremost, photography by Gilles Peress ("Telex Iran") and Abbas ("Iran Diary") from Iran are some of my earliest photographic memories; their black and white images from the revolution, and the aftermath, are still vivid in my consciousness and has had a profound influence on me both personally and professionally.

The second reason Iran is dear to me is because in 2003 I traveled from Hong Kong to Istanbul over land, in what was a most exhaustive six month epic journey through Central Asia. After passing through the "stans" my entrance into Iran still, although difficult, still brings a smile to my face. So the story goes I woke up early one morning in Ashgabat and caught a broken down bus headed for the town of Saraghs, a border town with Iran. Exiting Turkmenistan was no problem at all, a breeze in fact. After paying homage to the President Turkmanbashi portrait on the wall I headed out for a 2km walk across the no man's land. When I arrived at the other side I was beaming to finally enter Iran, and I thought that a quick passport check and stamp was all that held me back from exploring this incredible country that I had already read so much about.

To my dismay the border checkpoint folks on the Iranian side spent some 6 hours surfing the Internet trying to figure out if I was a journalist or worse a spy who puts all his details on the Internet. Can you believe I actually waited 6 hours at a border check point? It was painful, I ended up just sitting on the floor reading my book and eating bad Uzbek chocolate I had bought a few days earlier near Bukharra. By the time I got through and was "released" in to Iran it was dark and there was no one around. I managed to scramble to find a taxi that drove me to the town of Mashad, just a few hours away. The remainder of my trip to Iran was a joy, but that border crossing was an experience I'll never forget; that and the shakedown on the Georgian / Azerbaijan border - dodgy.

Changing direction, it is my opinion that Iran is one of the most important countries in the world to watch over the next few years. With their expanding nuclear program, their sponsorship of terrorism and their hardline on Israel; Iran is moulding itself in to a potentially volatile country. While their rhetoric was strong at US$130 oil, less so at US$40, their strength and influence in the Middle East continues to grow. My main question is where is all the photography that should be coming from Iran these days? Perhaps I am not looking in the right places but the fact that this influential, and incredibly complex country, is now thirty years old should be a huge headline, and while BBC and CNN spent some time on the subject very few magazines have dedicated any pages to the issue. Now don't get me wrong, I'm not one who suggests that the 30th anniversary of the Islamic republic should be celebrated, but it deserves to be critiqued and explored, and at a time when my Fortune, Time and Newsweek are knee deep in the financial crisis. And thinking about it, the Islamic Republic of Iran at 30 years old would have made an incredible National Geographic feature, as the country is chalked full of frustration, contradictions, unemployment, government mismanagement as well as an incredible history and culture.

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Cheers,

Ryan Pyle
Photographer
ryan@ryanpyle.com
Website: www.ryanpyle.com
Archive: http://archive.ryanpyle.com
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Ryan Pyle Blog: Tibet is Closed Foreigners

Hello,

Well, it became official just a few hours ago. Tibet is closed. I love this cat and mouse game that the government continues to play. Can you image just closing off a territory the size of western Europe?

I was planning on heading out to western Sichuan in the latter half of February to document the Monlam festival, or the Tibetan New Year festival, until I had my guide and driver basically tell me that he wasn't allowed to take foreign tourists there.

March 10th marks the 50th anniversary of the flight of the Dali Lama from Tibet, and while there will be protests in Katmandu and parts of India my guess is that Lhasa will be calm and quiet; it's hard to stage a protest when everyone is already in jail.

Mental note: Trip to Lhasa at some stage this year. Haven't been since 2005 and I'm keen to see what's become of the place.


ARTICLE BELOW
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BEIJING (AP) — Swaths of western China that have large Tibetan populations have been declared off limits to foreign visitors, local officials confirmed Thursday, ahead of the politically sensitive 50th anniversary of a failed Tibetan uprising.

An official at the tourism office of northwestern Gansu province's Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, which is home to a major monastery and large Tibetan communities, said the region was again closed to foreigners and would not be open until late March. The official, who did not identify himself, as is common in China, did not say when the restrictions were put in place.

March 10 marks the 50th anniversary of a failed rebellion in Tibet against Chinese rule. The Dalai Lama was forced to flee into exile in India after the uprising was crushed.

Last year, protests to mark the anniversary spun out of control, with deadly riots breaking out in the Tibetan capital of Lhasa.

The Chinese government says 22 people died in the riots, but Tibetan advocates say many times that number were killed in the protests and subsequent crackdown.

Sympathy protests quickly spread outside Tibet to neighboring provinces of Gansu, Sichuan, and Qinghai, which all have large ethnic Tibetan communities. However, they were quelled by a huge military presence installed in the area.

Tibet itself has always been off-limits to the international media unless special permits are obtained. China did put on a rare and tightly controlled tour of Tibet this week for some foreign reporters. Several organizations, including The Associated Press, were excluded.

In Sichuan province, many areas open two weeks ago are now closed to foreign tourists until April, according to officials at the Ganzi prefecture tourist bureau. Only three counties in that prefecture will remain open to foreigners. Qinghai province has also closed many areas to foreigners.

On Thursday, Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Jiang Yu described the current situation in Tibet as "stable" but acknowledged that foreign reporters have had difficulty accessing the area.

"Since the March 14 incident, it's true that foreign journalists find it harder to go to Tibet. I think you all know the reasons. The government has taken some measures," she said.

Several journalists have reported being expelled from Tibetan-populated areas in China in the past week.
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Cheers,

Ryan Pyle
Photographer
ryan@ryanpyle.com
Website: www.ryanpyle.com
Archive: http://archive.ryanpyle.com
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Ryan Pyle Blog: My Canon 5D Mark II's

Hello,

Well, I've bought in to the Canon 5D Mark II hype. In fact I picked up two bodies a few weeks back, in Shanghai, and I have already put them through their paces on a few assignments already. It's been a great experience. Sadly, I don't have much to add at all regarding their performance that hasn't already been mentioned.

I shoot in RAW format and haven't had any black spots or any other problems to mention. I also bought a couple of those 16 gigabyte SanDisk cards and those are working out well. The quality of the image is incredible: the light, the color, the sharpness are all improvements over my old 5D. Shooting in low light and at night seem to be where the biggest improvements are, over the previous version of the camera. I am able to focus fast and generate strong colors in very little light, which is exciting for much of my documentary work.

I know I'm a self proclaimed "film man" and don't worry, I don't plan on packing away my two workhorses (ie. My Canon EOS 1n's, or my range finders) but the digital kit is always great to have for covering breaking news or shooting a demanding corporate assignment.

As an additional note, I really am a huge fan of the Canon 5D series. The 10D, 20D, 30D's never did it for me as the lack of a full frame drove me crazy. But the 5D is just a quality improvement over the previous series that one can't help get a little excited about what's next. The 5D Mark II's are small, light and compact. They feel great in your hand and are, in my mind, perfect for documentary / journalism work. I even shot with them last week in Shenzhen and in light rain they performed wonderfully.

I'll confess here that I've never used a Nikon system, and most likely never well. But I'm glad there is a two horse race in the industry, because the competition between the two, and lesser rivals like Sony and Fuji, will keep the prices lower for photographers and hopefully the products will continue to improve in the coming years. Needless to say, I'm very pleased with my purchase.

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Cheers,

Ryan Pyle
Photographer
ryan@ryanpyle.com
Website: www.ryanpyle.com
Archive: http://archive.ryanpyle.com
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Ryan Pyle Blog: The Ziping Dam and The Quake

Hello,

With all the news about China's Ziping Dam potentially causing the massive earthquake that struck Sichuan province on May 12th, I thought I would jump in with a quick comment. Above is a series of photographs I actually shot at the Ziping Dam near Dujiangyang just days after the quake struck.

When the earthquake struck many in Dujiangyang fled the city fearing that the dam would burst and flood the town, in the days that followed the officials in charge significantly reduced the amount of water held in the reservoir as there were aparent cracks. I have shots of some workers actually making repairs to the dam. Scary stuff.

Apparently half of all the dams in the world are in China, and I'm just guessing they are all of varying quality. The epicenter of the May 12th quake, which killed over 80,000 people, is said to be just 3km or so from the site of the of the Ziping Dam Reservoir. I've traveled far and wide in Sichuan and I can tell you that there are dams everywhere and construction is continuing on several projects larger than the Ziping Dam. More difficulties in the future?

It's been my experience that a lot of Chinese officials in small remote areas are big fans of dam construction because they require massive amounts of steel and concrete, business that local officials usually have their fingers in. While it's true that dams offer clean energy, it's apparent that larger projects have serious environmental consequences; not to mention all the people who have to relocate do to the reservoir. Below are links to the articles that have sparked all the chat.

SHARON LaFRANIERE for the New York Times wrote the following article: CLICK HERE

EVAN OSNOS for the New Yorker blogged about an interview he did in 2006 where a geological engineer he met with in Chengdu indicated a growing fear of too many dams on Sichuan's rivers: CLICK HERE for his blog.

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Cheers,

Ryan Pyle
Photographer
ryan@ryanpyle.com
Website: www.ryanpyle.com
Archive: http://archive.ryanpyle.com
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Ryan Pyle Blog: New Work: Chongwu Walled City

Hello,

I had the chance in 2008 to visit Chongwu, an ancient walled city in the southern province of Fujian. The ancient walls date back to 1387 and a time when Japanese pirates were raping and pillaging communities up and down China's coast. In some parts the old walled city still has it's charm, old single story homes still have their lovely tiled rooftops and some people still live a fairly traditional way of life; but signs of development are creeping in and its clear that the residents of the town aren't very keen on preserving their historic architecture, not at least if it gets in the way of indoor plumbing and multi-floor homes.

Above is a little slide show from the short time I spent there, I was just passing through - wish I could have stayed a little longer.

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Cheers,

Ryan Pyle
Photographer
ryan@ryanpyle.com
Website: www.ryanpyle.com
Archive: http://archive.ryanpyle.com
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Ryan Pyle Blog: Guardian Multimedia Push

Hello,

The GUARDIAN NEWSPAPER has spent the last year or so getting in to multimedia. While the VIDEO SECTION of their website is full of content, I haven't had a chance to peak through everything, it is their efforts in Shanghai that have caught my attention.

Dan Chung has published two lovely video dairies from Shanghai, one dealing with an old apartment complex and another dealing with everyday life on the river front near the famous skyline. His work isn't gritty or very remanent of journalism, instead he weaves softly through the crowds catching glimpses wonderful little moments. The video's are set to lovely music and they are very well edited, either by Dan or a crew in London I'm not sure. The two video's are worth a look, and below are the links:

SHANGHAI VIDEO DAIRY 1: LONGCHANG APARTMENTS
SHANGHAI VIDEO DAIRY 2: ON THE BUND

ps. Yes, I am blogging more regularly as I find myself up late on the road in dodgy parts of China. And yes, I've finally learned how to do a proper HTML link.

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Cheers,

Ryan Pyle
Photographer
ryan@ryanpyle.com
Website: www.ryanpyle.com
Archive: http://archive.ryanpyle.com
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Ryan Pyle Blog: NYT: Can You Choose Your Reincarnated Successor?

Hello,

I've blogged a lot about Tibet and China in this space for the last few years and I will continue to do so as relations worsen. But for those who are looking for a clear, well written summary of just some of the problems facing Tibetans in this day and age please see the article below. It's written by Michael Powell for the New York Times.

LINK: CLICK HERE

February 1, 2009

Can You Choose Your Reincarnated Successor?

By MICHAEL POWELL

The search for the present Dalai Lama commenced in earnest in 1935 when the embalmed head of his deceased predecessor is said to have wheeled around and pointed toward northeastern Tibet.

Then, the story goes, a giant, star-shaped fungus grew overnight on the east side of the tomb. An auspicious cloud bank formed and a regent saw a vision of letters floating in a mystical lake, one of which — Ah — he took to refer to the northeast province of Amdo.

High lamas set off at a gallop and found a 2-year-old boy in a distant village. This child, they determined after a series of tests, was the reincarnation of the Dalai Lama.

There is little linear about lama succession in Tibet. And now, as the 14th Dalai Lama journeys into his 74th year, the question of how to pick his successor has come to preoccupy both him and his followers, as Tibet stands at an ever more precarious political pass.

Late last year, the Chinese government again rejected the Dalai Lama’s proposal for a rapprochement that would yield greater autonomy for Tibet. In recent days, Chinese troops have raided thousands of homes and detained at least 81 activists ahead of the 50th anniversary in March of the failed uprising that forced the Dalai Lama into exile in India. China seems inclined to tighten its grip and wait out the aging leader, insisting, a bit improbably for a government that is officially atheist, that it has the legal right to designate the Dalai Lama’s next reincarnation.

When Tibetan representatives met last autumn at their Parliament in Dharamsala, in the Indian Himalayas, their worries about the future echoed down the corridors. A few argued for a militant line, insisting on independence. A majority heeded the Dalai Lama’s counsel to find a pacifist middle way. But the unanswered question remains: How much longer will Tibetans be able to rely on their charismatic and learned spiritual leader, whose persona is so entwined with the destiny of Tibet?

The Dalai Lama has openly speculated about his next life, his reincarnation, musing that he might upend historical and cultural practice and choose his reincarnation before his death, the better to safeguard his exiled people.

But doubts creep in.

Can even so highly evolved a Buddhist as the Dalai Lama select his reincarnation? Will upending the old way of searching for the Dalai Lama’s incarnation, in which priests search for omens, portents and meteorological signs, undermine the legitimacy of his successor?

Since he fled Chinese rule by foot and horseback over the Himalayas in 1959, the Dalai Lama has traveled restlessly and spoken passionately about Tibet. The fruits of his labors are many: The world is spotted with Tibetan centers, and prayer flags flap from Delhi to London to Zurich to Todt Hill in Staten Island. Tibetan culture is celebrated in Hollywood and in popular art. (Exiles number about 130,000; about six million Tibetans live in Tibet and China).

But a darker vision of Tibet’s future is easily divined. This Dalai Lama dies and his successor is young and inexperienced and holds no sway in the chambers of the powerful. Slowly, ineluctably, the Tibetans become just another of the globe’s landless peoples lost in the shadow of a rising superpower.

“Definitely when someone as charismatic and popular as the Dalai Lama passes away, the Tibetans will suffer from less outside attention,” says Tenzin Tethong, a fellow in the Tibetan Studies Initiative at Stanford University. “We will lose a strong unifying symbol.”

The Dalai Lama, a Nobel Peace Prize winner, is no theocratic traditionalist. Should his people ever reclaim Tibet, he says an elected parliament and prime minister should rule; the Dalai Lama would occupy a religious station.

“He is thinking outside the box about Dalai Lama rule,” said Robert Thurman, a professor of Indo-Tibetan Buddhist studies at Columbia University and author of “Why the Dalai Lama Matters.” “He’s trying to get it through the Chinese heads that he’s helpful to them. Their waiting for him to die is completely misplaced.”

Tibetan Buddhists believe in reincarnation, although not in the sense of an irreducible self passing from body to body. They describe a dying candle lighting a new one; one’s essence passes on.

Typically, when the Dalai Lama dies, the royal court appoints a regent who rules until the next reincarnation comes of age. Over the centuries some regents grew fond of their power and some Dalai Lamas expired prematurely, not to mention suspiciously. The sense of the regency as a time of peril persists.

It is within this context that the Dalai Lama speculates about how to pull off his next reincarnation. Perhaps the four sects that constitute Tibetan Buddhism might form a Tibetan version of the Roman Catholic College of Cardinals and pick a successor. Perhaps he will return as a girl, or as a non-Tibetan.

Or perhaps he will pick his future self.

Professor Thurman offers his own speculation. The Dalai Lama, he says, might declare that a younger lama is the reincarnation of his own long-dead regent. Then the Dalai Lama could die and reincarnate as a new baby, which would be identified after the usual study of portents and signs. “Maybe the one he names as the reincarnation of the regent would transfer the Dalai Lama title back to him when his next reincarnation comes of age,” Mr. Thurman said.

Who could gainsay that?

Politics might pose a challenge as great as metaphysics. The Chinese insist that their army freed Tibetans from theocratic slavery and that Tibet is inseparable from China. They are not shy about enforcing their writ. In 1995, the Chinese government rejected the Dalai Lama’s choice of a 6-year-old boy as the reincarnation of the Panchen Lama, a spiritual leader of Tibetan Buddhism’s dominant sect, and then appointed its own. The child chosen by the Dalai Lama vanished into Chinese custody.

“The thinking is a bit odd,” Mr. Thurman said, “as the Chinese Communists don’t believe in former or future lives and it is illegal to propagate religion in China.”

Still, China’s power grows as the Dalai Lama ages. Han Chinese now crowd out ethnic Tibetans in Lhasa, Tibet’s capital, and exiles are uneasy, some taken again to searching for portents of what’s to come. To find themselves without a transcendent leader at this time is, as D. H. Lawrence once wrote of the Brazilian Indians, to risk being consigned “to the dust where we bury the silent races.”


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Cheers,

Ryan Pyle
Photographer
ryan@ryanpyle.com
Website: www.ryanpyle.com
Archive: http://archive.ryanpyle.com
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Ryan Pyle Blog: What the Stimulus Package Means for Green

Image Caption: Who wants a front row seat to an environmental disaster?

Hello

In November 2008 China issued a statement saying that it would release around US$600 to stimulate the economy to help cushion the difficulties brought on by slowing western demand for Chinese products and slower growth at home.

The stimulus package was well received by much of the world, but a few notes should be made:

The money has been earmarked for infrastructure, housing and loans for businesses. So basically the money will funnel down to construction companies, cement companies, steal companies, property developers and some small business; which to me sounds like the government basically wrote itself a big cheque beacause most of the industries I listed above are either controlled by the government or are private companies with government appointed executives. This is to be expected because the government still, for all the media hype about capitalism and free markets, still dominates business in China.

Digging deeper, as the world tries to green itself, what does a massive stimulus package like this mean to environmentalists around the world? Well, the news is not good. For Australia specifically, and any country producing raw materials, the news is great as mining will pick up again. Oil producing countries are surely pleased and this mini boom will further opportunity to mineral exploration both in the sea and below the earth. So basically the world is set to get a whole lot dirtier in the name of short term financial gain.

Sure green technologies are available, but are they ready to step in and fill the big shoes of coal and gas? Not yet. Maybe we can make the transition during the next recession. Until then, the world wide consensus seems to be lets just roll on with our polluting ways.

It's safe to say that over the next few months pollution is at the bottom of the agenda in the minds of Chinese officials, even more so than normal. This is because in the short term, politics could become tense here in China. The government needs to keep migrant workers busy, so that they don't protest, and that means either low paying manufacturing jobs or construction. The construction industry is easier to manage because it's state dominated so that is where the investment will be. More steal and concrete are on the way, two of the most dirty industries in existence; and China will need more coal fired power plants to fuel the archaic (inefficient), old steel and concrete mills. Progress for the greens over the coming years is not looking good. And for all of those who are downwind from China, namely Korea, Japan and even California, beware.

Pollution levels at home in Shanghai for the next years, who knows. For those in the worse affected areas be ready for higher rates of birth defects and lung cancer for air-born pollution and stomach cancel for those drawing water from industry and fertilizer polluted water ways. But for those of us who don't live in rural China next to a coal fire power plant or a chemical company, let's think of all the money we can make if we time the stock market right.

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Cheers,

Ryan Pyle
Photographer
ryan@ryanpyle.com
Website: www.ryanpyle.com
Archive: http://archive.ryanpyle.com
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Ryan Pyle Blog: The Dark Side of China

Hello,

On January 18th I wrote a blog about anniversaries, indicating that it would be great if China could take steps to clean up their legal system and allow some type of division of power between the courts / judges and party officials.

It appears now, in a widely reported story, that a lawyer who was involved in helping parents, who lost children during the earthquake in Sichuan, get fair compensation and perhaps even have the parties involved in building the schools face some form of legal charges. What seems like common sense for us folks ended up getting the lawyer thrown in jail for having "state secrets" - which is a vague term that means basically the government owns you and you're going down for a long time. New York Times article is listed below.

LINK: CLICK HERE

ps. If China just cleaned up it's legal system it could provide a lot of legitimacy to Communist Party rule. For all the talk in Beijing about "cleaning up corruption" sending a lawyer to jail seems like a step in the wrong direction.

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Cheers,

Ryan Pyle
Photographer
ryan@ryanpyle.com
Website: www.ryanpyle.com
Archive: http://archive.ryanpyle.com
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Ryan Pyle Blog: The Bird's Nest to Become a Shopping District

Hello,

I recently read in a widely reported news story that the whole area around the Bird's Nest, or Beijing Olympic Stadium, is set to become a shopping district.

To someone living outside of China this might seem like a decent idea, a place where people can visit a beautiful building and get some shopping out of the way at the same time. But to anyone living in China, and Beijing specifically, will know that the last thing that Beijing needs is another shopping complex.

I was in Beijing in January working and I had a free night to visit a friend who lives next to the British Embassy in the Central Business District. We walked from his place to a restaurant for a meal, and in the 20 minute walk we must have passed no less than 4 shopping malls, all built within the last 5 years, and most were half empty. Signs advertising commercial renting space were everywhere, and walking through the first floors (street level) of these malls was reminiscent of walking through an old western movie set of a town bordered up before a big shoot out.

To me, a man of basic intelligence, that would mean that in Beijing's Central Business District (CBD), home to some of the most expensive real estate and fancy shops, has overbuilt. Too much capacity for too little demand is something the Chinese government is going to start getting very used to as scores of apartment blocks sit finished and empty in some of Shanghai's prime real estate locations. What's the problem exactly?

First is I don't think anyone knows the real situation. Meaning simply that property managers, like most agencies and companies in China, have two sets of books. One set of those books may show full capacity and that rents are increasing, which is what everyone wants to hear. I have no confirmation of this, it's just a hunch based on years of experience.

My second guess for why this over capacity exists is a simple case of limited investment sophistication. It seems that the only way the Chinese government, and local companies close to the government, know how to make money is by building something and getting people to pay you rent. It's a fairly primitive approach to things but it has worked very well for the last 20 years as China's cities have grown and developed. The problem is that now that the city centers of Beijing and Shanghai are well developed, so what should the next step of investment be?

How about a park people can actually use. Beijing, and even Shanghai, are full of parks; it's true. But they aren't very user friendly, meaning that you can't sit or walk on the grass and there are fences all over the place. What I would love to see some property developer do, because the government clearly doesn't have the clarity, is to buy two massive lots of land, put a massive high complex on one lot; because that's there speciality, and on the next lot put in a park...a real park. Get some public tennis courts in there, maybe even a few soccer fields that local amateur teams and youth development leagues can rent out - add lights for us working folks so we can play well in to the night. Put in a few places were people can just lounge around on the grass and read a book. The key to this is that property located near a park, that people actually enjoying being in, will raise the property value of apartments that are close by. For example you pay more for rent if you live 2 blocks away from Central Park then 10 blocks away because people view living close to the park as advantageous. The big bottleneck is that I don't think China's government and business elite are ready for this kind of thinking.

Two of my favorite cities in the world are London and New York, and I travel to them often for work. I love London because of all it's parks and small grassy squares were people can just lounge around and relax on the grass during their lunch break or on the weekends; and I love New York for Central Park alone - a god send for anyone living in the Upper East and West sides.

So clearly what I'm saying is that instead of building a huge shopping complex maybe put in 20 outdoor (with lights) public tennis courts and 10 outdoor (with lights) grass soccer fields so that kids and adults alike can work on their game with friends and family and bask in the glorious shadows caste by the Bird's Nest and Water Cube. Also add in a few places where people can lounge around (on the grass) and spend some time catching some rays or smog.

I'm pretty passionate about this considering I don't even live in Beijing. Are there any Beijing'ers up in arms about this? Oh, that's right we wouldn't know if anyone was against this idea because there aren't any city planners, citizen groups, or neighborhood groups that would risk challenging the government. Oh the freedom!

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Cheers,

Ryan Pyle
Photographer
ryan@ryanpyle.com
Website: www.ryanpyle.com
Archive: http://archive.ryanpyle.com
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Ryan Pyle Blog: Empty Shenzhen

Hello,

Chinese New Year is a strange time of year, for those of us foreigners who are still in China. It's a time when the local population, after working their guts out for eleven and a half months, finally let down their hair and enjoy some quality time with their family or go on vacation.

While cities like Shanghai, my home, and Beijing empty out as migrant workers (making up somewhere between 25%-50% of the city population) head back to the small counties and villages to catch up with family and friends, there are still a lot of local residents who are resting, relaxing and enjoying their downtime in the city. The city is quiet and relaxing. The traffic is light and there is a general feeling of rest and relaxing in the air. There are no honking horns and no one is in a rush - perhaps an indication of what Shanghai could become in the future. With that being said it's a great time to be at home in Shanghai, as shops and most basic services are still open, enjoying my idealistic view of what my adopted home can be.

Yesterday I flew to Shenzhen for an assignment and I was a shocked by the emptiness of: the airport, my hotel and the city in general. Shocked so much by the emptiness as I compared it to Shanghai just a day earlier. Shenzhen is very much a migrant city, meaning that no one is actually from Shenzhen; seeing that it didn't exist until 1979 - it was created out of thin air. So when Chinese new year comes around my guess is that the majority of the staff at the airports, hotels just take off back home; leaving the city with an uncanny silence. Adding to the silence is Shenzhen is no doubt the decrease in global demand for Chinese goods which is wreaking havoc in this part of China, which I've been fortunate to document in towns like Dongguan which lays just outside of Shenzhen.

Traveling in China often one becomes used to the noise, the congestion and the chaos that makes this part of the world romantic and interesting to some, and a massive headache to others. But when a town goes completely quiet, it leaves me with a chill - where are fifteen million people who are supposed to be here? It's almost uncomfortable to look around and see massive infrastructure projects just put on hold, or large eight lane expressways completely empty at mid-day.

My hotel had one person working reception and one person working the door and acting as the concierge, a skeleton staff by Chinese standards. Normally in China you're bombarded with staff and service almost everywhere you go. Bags are collected from the taxi, doors are opened for you, no line ups ever; it is not unusually to have two waitresses or servers focusing just one your own table at a restaurant. The taxi drivers are no where to be found, shops are closed and I feel like I am trapped in some kind of bad movie where everyone disappears and I have an entire city to myself. I wonder how much of this emptiness is because of the holiday and how much is caused by the difficulties in manufacturing that China is facing.

The questions really won't end, will China's manufacturing industry recover as global demand recovers? Will cities like Shenzhen be affected? Will migrant workers flood back to this part of China looking for work, even if there is none to be had? Will factories being to hire again? What about the millions of young men and women that work at hotels and restaurants throughout the region, will they have a job to come back to if the business slows down or dies? Over the next twelve months I'm hoping to be back in Guangdong province several times looking at where China is being hurt this most by this economic atom bomb created by greed in our global financial institutions. I saw today on the news that some fifty million people globally have already lost their jobs, I wonder what China's contribution is to that number, and how many more will be added to the total in 2009. Needless to say, I'll be here watching.

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Cheers,

Ryan Pyle
Photographer
ryan@ryanpyle.com
Website: www.ryanpyle.com
Archive: http://archive.ryanpyle.com
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Ryan Pyle Blog: My Archive is Back Online

Hello,

I remember that frightful morning in October like it was yesterday, waking up to an email that told me that Digital Railroad had just 48hrs left to live, and that anything left on the servers would be erased and gone forever. Now, this was tough to take at the time, and thinking back to the havoc and stressed it caused me, much of my anger still hasn't subsided. While I knew a lot of the DRR managers and editors personally, and I don't blame them for this, I simply can't believe that an entire company servicing so many can vanish so quickly. I know there are a lot of horror stories out there from the DRR collapse and many were much worse than mine, but below is a brief summary of my difficulties.

I became a loyal member of Digital Railroad in the summer of 2005. I thought the service was genius, a chance to manage and display my own images to clients. I bought in to the service, used it and promoted it heavily to other photographers I knew. Life was bliss for years. No service interruptions, no problems, no issues to report at all. Actually I think once there was a service interruption when they were upgrading servers and lost images temporarily, but within a day or two everything was backed up and back online. So, apart from that issue DRR fulfilled all it's promises to customers like me who wanted more control over our own archives.

Then came the Marketplace, DRR's big move to enter the stock photo industry by using images they had stored on their system by members like me. It seemed like a decent natural progression, the problem was that it seemed like DRR had to really expand their sales operation and "ramp up", so to speak.

Now throughout my career I've always backed up everything: digital files, RAW, TIFF and scanned negs. So when DRR went down I didn't actually lose anything per say. So, if I didn't lose anything why has it taken me so long to get my archive back up and running at full capacity?

What I lost was organization. What I lost was some captioning information. What I lost was the hours and hours it took to upload all those images through the Chinese firewall. Now, I had over 7000 images in my archive, a collection of corporate and editorial work, organized in to hundreds of groups and galleries.

Digital Railroad, or I should say management company handling the sale of assets, told everyone that they had only 48hrs to get everything off the site. That wasn't exactly true, they allowed more than a week. My goal when I first got the message about the shut down was, this is no problem. I can just FTP everything to my new archive space at photoshelter, the problem was that all of the 1500 independent photographers and dozens of agencies all thought the same thing at the exact same moment. Needless to say the bandwidth was so jammed during that week I only managed to get about 20% of the images FTP'd across safely, and much of those images were corrupted and had to be "replaced" later.

From mid-October to just last week was the time it took to replace, upload, re-caption (some) and re-organize my entire archive. The reason it took so long was complicated. First I live in China and bandwidth here is severely restricted. The firewall means that anything FTP'd from China has to leave at a snails pace, and even all the hotels I stay in when I am working didn't offer much better internet connections then what I had at my home. I've had to leave my computer on every night uploading and FTP to photoshelter for months now. The second reason was that I was working consistently for that entire stretch and things just never managed to finish it off. The last reason is simply that the task at hand was so large and daunting, I had a lot of starts and stops and even hired a few people to help me out during times.

What did I learn from the whole mess? Nothing really. I back images up and apart from keeping two seperate completely updated archives I don't think there is much I could have done differently. Having a full time assistant would have made my recovery time faster but I don't have one. So there it is, just a huge cluster F*ck that nobody predicted and that almost everyone got caught in. Painful, very painful.

What are my plans going forward? Simply to keep my photoshelter archive (http://archive.ryanpyle.com) as updated and current as possible, and continue to add strong images to it. I hope another DRR meltdown will never happen again, but now that photoshelter picked up all the extra business from DRR they should be sitting pretty for years to come. Fingers crossed.

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Cheers,

Ryan Pyle
Photographer
ryan@ryanpyle.com
Website: www.ryanpyle.com
Archive: http://archive.ryanpyle.com
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Ryan Pyle Blog: The Year of the Anniversary

Hello,

Every year we move forward we end up celebrating an anniversary for something that happened in years past; whether it be as small an act as adopting a baby puppy from a pound or beginning a new career or even getting married.

So as the year of 2009 gets going I've sat back and looked at my calender and I'm utterly speechless. Living in China and being a "China Watcher" I'm blown away by the sheer number of major anniversaries that China will be lining up to celebrate (and pretend never happened) this year. Let's take a quick at a few of these, in no particular order.

1) Of course the big daddy of them all will occur on October 1st 2009, marking the 60th Anniversary of the People's Republic of China. It was 60 years ago that the Communist Army pushed out the Japanese and sent the KMT in to exile in Taiwan. Preparations are already under way in Beijing for a grand military showing, roads are already said to be reinforced. Zhang Yimou, the creative force behind the Olympic Opening Ceremonies, has been commissioned to come up with something for this show of shows. Watch out for another city lock down and potential visa problems. Five star hotels, brace for another season of bleak occupancy rates.

2) Reform and Opening continues on. December 1978 and January 1979 where key dates for China's reform and opening movement initiated under, then President, Deng Xiao Ping. While the 30th anniversary was officially celebrated in the middle of last December expect there to be a lot of continued talk about China's 30 years of capitalism; especially if the current crisis worsens.

3) The year of 2009 will also mark the 50th anniversary of the Dali Lama's exit from Tibet. That's right, in March 1959 the Dali Lama had to flee Lhasa for India, and begin his life in exile. It's generally assumed that there may be activity in various parts of China this year to commemorate that event. All eyes are, no doubt, watching. Just remember that in March it'll have been a full one year since the Tibet riots that left several Chinese shop keepers dead. There could be a lot of mixed emotions on both sides (Tibetan and Chinese) of this and clashes of culture and religion could occur. As an aside I've already had a Tibetan guide tell me that government officials are already suggesting to tour guides to keep foreign tourists out of Western Sichuan, which is a Tibetan region, during that time.

4) It's been 20 years since June 4th 1989. Tiananmen Square demonstrations have left an tough legacy for China to deal with. The idea of pretending it never happened as worked well enough so far, loads of people are still in jail and the rest under house arrest - and China's economy is still the main reason why most governments around the world self censor themselves about this issue. What might occur for the 20th anniversary? Nothing is most likely the correct answer. Expect another city lock down. As an aside, Ma Jian wrote a book published last year titled "Beijing Coma" in which he talks a about the Tiananmen Square days in 1989. His take seems to be that many of the student leaders of that movement may have been much less democratic that originally thought, using democracy in the name of installing another authoritarian regime? We may never know the truth, but it makes an interesting read.

5) August 8th 2008 was the moment when China entered the world stage, and billions around the world tuned in their TV's to watch a spectacle that could have only been duplicated in North Korea. I was blown away by the opening ceremony, and I even have a fake dvd copy of the event. And the date of August the 8th will be celebrated each years as a day to promote sports and physical activity in China.

6) Another new anniversary wins for being the most confusing of the bunch, the Chinese government has just recently announced that March 28 is going to become a yearly holiday in China, and it's going to commemorate the ending of slavery in Tibet. As the government sees things, Tibet was a horrible and cruel civilization dominated by poverty and slavery. The official line is that the Chinese government rescued the Tibetan people from their own government leaders and freed them. Apparently this occurred in March 1959, the same time Tibetan leaders fled to India and around the same time as around one million Tibetans were slaughtered in a one sided defense of their Himalayan kingdom. When asked to comment about the one year anniversary of the riots last year in Lhasa a Tibetan women (held at knife point, maybe?) said "After all these happy years for us, it's a shame that the Dali Lama is still trying to ruin things and reinstall serfdom." Confusing times for ahead for all of us. I needed a machete to just to get through the propaganda in the China Daily this weekend.

7) On May 12th it'll be one year since the Sichuan earthquake that killed 88,000 people. This anniversary is one that sits close to me because I spent about 16 days in the quake zone just after it happened and I was overwhelmed by the destructive force of mother nature. I still to this day believe that the casualty rate is much higher than official numbers suggest, easily topping 100,000. I don't know what a government would gain by artificially keeping the numbers down, but perhaps I'm wrong. Either way some 15,000 to 20,000 of the dead where school children who died when their schools collapsed around them mostly due to poor construction. In some towns other buildings were left standing while schools, right next door, lay in rubble. Expect the parents of the dead school children to continue hassling not only local government officials but by traveling to Beijing in order to make official requests and complaints. It's pretty clear the parents aren't interested in hush money, they want heads to roll and it'll be interesting to see if Beijing feeds any of it's own to the sharks. My guess is more arrested parents.

8) My last point is one of wishful thinking. I hope that sometime this year the Chinese government adjusts it's legal system to allow for less political collusion. If they complete this task this year, then in 2010 I can sit back and write an updated version of this blog and praise the government for taking real steps to reform in 2009. You see, the local county and provincial courts all report to the Party Secretary for the province, not to Beijing. So essentially the Party Secretary for a province is a God-like figure that decides what does and doesn't stand as acceptable behavior. But what's been happening a lot is that local people fed up with government corruption have been caught for crimes like trying to travel to Beijing to tell on them, or even contacting foreign media. These crimes, because of their political nature, tend to stay under the radar and are handled at the local level - never reaching ear shot of Beijing; not that Beijing has a track record of over turning anything or standing for much more than the will of the party.

It's my opinion, based on my frequent travels and conversations, that this country may very well tear itself apart sometime in the next decade, especially if economic hardship hits, and something that might legitimize the Communist rule in the eyes of the people is to free up the legal system and allow provincial courts to report to a central court in Beijing, and to keep the party officials out of the loop. With all the talk that our current Chinese leaders splash out about ending corruption in China; that would be the first big step forwards. And it would quickly differentiate between the honest, hard working government leaders (of which there are many) and the scum. So that is one anniversary that I would like to celebrate in 2010. Let's hope there might be someone out there, high enough up the food chain, who feels like I do. But I'm not holding my breath.

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Cheers,

Ryan Pyle
Photographer
ryan@ryanpyle.com
Website: www.ryanpyle.com
Archive: http://archive.ryanpyle.com
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Ryan Pyle Blog: Attack of the Confusing Credit

Hello,

I've been waiting to write this blog for months, and I finally had my nerve broken by a picture credit in the New York Times over the weekend; more on that below.

So, let me first start off by saying that for years I've been confused by picture credits, and as a photographer I'm concerned. I think the big picture agencies started confusing people a few years back when they stopped adding actual names with image credits. For example, how often do you see an image credit "REUTERS" and not "John Smith/REUTERS". I'm not familiar with the business terms with agency photographers but I've always been someone who thinks that images should always have the photographers names in the credit. Perhaps I'm just old fashioned but I like to know who is shooting what, and where - even if I've never even heard of the photographer before. I take a lot of comfort in knowing that there is an actual human being standing somewhere with a camera trying his or her best to capture the moment, all in the name of journalist integrity; and thereafter getting credit when that image is used. REUTERS was just used as an example, EPA, AP, AFP and Getty are all in on it as well. I know that sometimes agencies do this to protect the identity of the photographer, for example picture credits coming from Myanmar after the cyclone that it in 2008 when the government blocked aid and journalists from the country, and that's understandable. But is there a logical reason for all the other cases? Can anyone shed some light on this issue?

My second point I'd like to talk about is picture credits coming from war zones and regions where natural disasters occur. For example, during the May earthquake in Sichuan province Getty images, AP and a host of other agencies were syndicating images from China Photos and Xinhua News Agency. This is a partnership that has existed for several years where Chinese photographers contribute to local agencies in based in the mainland and through syndication end up having their images used around the world. It makes a lot of business sense, but ethically I think there are some loopholes. For example, who are these Chinese photographers? What are their names? Are they military photographers or journalists? Are the images made in a way that respects the subjects and the surrounding situation? Are the situations staged? China has some incredibly gifted photographers but the country lacks on integrity and any sort of journalism standards. There have been several well documented cases in the past were Chinese photographers have won major international awards only to later confess their documentary images were staged. And furthermore should the sale of images by major American agencies be aiding the Chinese military (if they are behind the syndication)? I believe that the big agencies should have to live up to these questions if they want to syndicate the work.

Lastly, is the photography agency VII. Just in the last week I saw 3 different picture credits from this one agency. The first was from one of the founding members, "John Smith/VII". The second was a photographer from their network of non-members but very gifted photographers, "John Smith/VII Network". And just this past weekend I saw a New York Times credit from the Congo of another photographer who was credited "John Smith/VII Mentor". So, what does it all mean? Is anyone as confused as I am. Obviously it's a great honor to be a part of a prestigious agency, but if you are part of a mentorship program is that really something you can credit in a publication? If I did an internship at Magnum and was shooting on my off days for a magazine could I credit myself as "John Smith/Magnum Intern"? Where is the line drawn?

Now, don't go and misunderstand me. Gifted photography is wide spread amongst the big american agencies, the Chinese agencies and top dogs like VII, but I wish the captioning was more straight forward. While there may well be a clear and simply answer for each of the questions and somewhat confusing situations I've described above, they don't appear obvious to me; and I consider myself to be in the business - or at least on the fringes.

--
Cheers,

Ryan Pyle
Photographer
ryan@ryanpyle.com
Website: www.ryanpyle.com
Archive: http://archive.ryanpyle.com
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Ryan Pyle Blog: Forward to 2009

Hello,

After enjoying a relaxing and festive holiday season, I'm back at my computer today trying to find direction and purpose for 2009. It's a process that's never easy, and given the rapid deterioration of the publishing industry, this year will stretch the limits of photographers as magazines try to do more with less.

So how does a photographer, like me, who relies on editorial assignments manage in this faltering economy? It clearly won't be easy for anyone to maneuver effectively in this environment. I haven't talked much about how I see my photography career developing or my ideas about how to make a living; but I think my mantra can be summed up in just a few words: "Don't sit on your hands; don't wait for the phone to ring".

What that means exactly is that photographers need to take pictures in order to sell pictures, and need to constantly be fine tuning their skill and vision. So sitting around and waiting for the phone to ring means wasting a whole lot of time. I try to stay working all the time whether on assignment or not. That means basically that I keep a long list of photo stories and projects that I have ready to work on for time between assignments. And I feel this could be the year that this list of mine finally gets a good work out.

How can I fund these personal projects if I am not taking assignments? Well, pictures are my business as well as my passion and my full time job, so I am well versed in how to earn a living from my imagery. I earn a stock income from work I've shot previously, I also have started making my way in to producing fine art black and white work for gallery shows. Beyond that I dabble in corporate photography and one time I worked in a studio and was paid for my work - but it was a little daunting.

I think the key in 2009, for me, will be to pursue topics in China of my own particular interest and hope that I can introduce this work to interested magazines and newspapers as features and stock. I'll continue visiting Xinjiang when I can to continue my black and white work; things should continue on without too much change; though I can't see myself getting too many 4 or 5 day assignments for New York, London or Hamburg anytime in the near future.

Let's keep our fingers crossed that magazines stop folding and the market for images and art continues to grow in these difficult times. If things go all wrong I'm sure I'll be quick to blog about it and try to keep people informed. Until then. Best of luck everyone out there.

--
Cheers,

Ryan Pyle
Photographer
ryan@ryanpyle.com
Website: www.ryanpyle.com
Archive: http://archive.ryanpyle.com
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Ryan Pyle Blog: Face Transplant Recipient Confirmed Dead

Hello,

I wanted to make you aware of some breaking news in China. It appears that Li Guoxing, the first recipient of a face transplant surgery in China as been confirmed dead. Li Guoxing received a face transplant surgery in 2006 from surgeon Guo Shuzhong in Xi'an, China. If you can remember Mr. Li, 30 years old when he had the surgery, had is face ripped off by a bear while hunting in rural Yunnan province where he lived in a small village community. Mr. Li's death, it has been said, was due to an infection because he wasn't taking prescribed immune-system drugs properly. Another report says he was favoring herbal medicines instead. No final report on the death will be available because Mr. Li has been buried for several months now, and no autopsy was completed.

Li Guoxing's surgery in 2006 was a ground breaking moment for Chinese surgery and something that I, as a photographer, was interested in covering. Although because I was a foreign journalist in China I was denied access to document Li Guoxing for almost a year after the surgery. In the summer of 2007 I was able to travel to Xi'an and, with Dr. Guo Zhuzhong's permission, follow Li Guoxing for a few days and document his life 1 year after the surgery. I had scheduled a visit to Mr. Li's village for 2009 to see how he was coping with his surgery in his natural environment, but that story won't be possible. Below is a link to the photo essay I shot of Li Guoxing when I visited the hospital in Xi'an in 2007. Above is a slide show of that essay. Also below is the most recent AFP story.

LINK: CLICK HERE TO SEARCH ARCHIVE

STORY: BEIJING (AFP) — A Chinese man who received a rare face transplant in 2006 has died, his doctor and a government official confirmed Saturday, highlighting the risks of a recent groundbreaking US operation.

Li Guoxing, 32, died in July at his rural home in rugged southwestern China after forsaking immune-system drugs in favor of herbal medicine, his surgeon Guo Shuzhong told AFP.

"His death was not caused by the surgery. Our operation was a success. But we cannot rule out a connection with the immune system drugs," said Guo, a surgeon with Xijing Hospital in the northern city of Xian who operated on Li in April 2006.

Qiao Guangliang, chief of Li's village in mountainous Yunnan province, also confirmed the death to AFP.

Both men said the exact cause of death was unknown as no autopsy was performed.

Li's death had been rumoured on Chinese blogs but has received scant attention in the mainstream press.

US doctors in Cleveland said last week they conducted the world's first near-total facial transplant on a disfigured woman.

It was just the fourth known facial transplant.

Doctors in France had performed the first partial transplant in 2005 on a 38-year-old woman disfigured in a dog attack.

The next year, Li, a farmer, underwent an apparently successful operation to replace about half his face after it was ripped off by a wild bear.

A 29-year-old French man then underwent surgery in 2007 for a facial tumor.

Guo said Li defied orders to remain in hospital and went home in late 2007.

Li soon stopped taking prescribed drugs in favour of a local herbal medicine, which Guo said may have caused liver damage.

Guo said the remoteness of Li's home had meant he could not make it to hospital for regular check-ups.

"After his death, I went to Yunnan and suggested an autopsy but his relatives refused" because Li had already been buried, Guo said.

AFP was not immediately able to reach Li's family members.

The US woman, whose identity has been kept secret, has shown no signs of rejecting her transplant, doctors said.

However, facial transplants remain controversial because of the risks and because they are driven by cosmetic, rather than life-saving concerns.


--
Cheers,

Ryan Pyle
Photographer
ryan@ryanpyle.com
Website: www.ryanpyle.com
Archive: http://archive.ryanpyle.com
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Ryan Pyle Blog: "Better Services for Foreign Media" in China

Hello,

I wanted to share some fine fiction I read in the China Daily just last week. The government has held a press conference indicating that the government officially welcomes more journalists from abroad to cover news events in China. The real slap in the face was that they had the nerve to, in the same breath, mention that they are extending better service and freedom to Chinese journalists as well as foreign journalists. I don't know how anyone who follows my blog feels when they read news like this, but for me - it makes my guts turn.

China is, bar none, one of the most difficult countries to work in as a foreign journalist; and for a Chinese journalist you are essentially taking your life, the life of your family and even close friends, in your hands if you want to publish any kind of investigative reporting. While it's true that the life of a foreign journalist is not in danger, as it is in places like Iraq, Afghanistan, Somalia and others, it is painstaking at every turn. And that's one of the reasons why a lot of well known photographers actually refuse to accept jobs in China because the bureaucracy and the difficulty of working freely just wares them down too much. All I can say to that is, yes.........yes it does ware you down. In fact, it's down right exhausting. So how are things supposedly changing?

Well, this is the kicker. They aren't really. In the 1990s, from what I've herd, things were really tough for foreign journalists. The country was closed off and there were few foreigners moving around the country at that time, so anyone who wanted to take a quick trip to a remote province was either a journalist or a spy. After the turn of the century things have opened up a lot more. More travelers, better infrastructure and more access to outsiders have created a countryside in China where towns and villages are accessible to travel to. But that doesn't mean that you are free to report from there, in fact, far from it.

Intimidation, confiscation and detention all still exist. You won't have to read too far into my past blogs to find stories about thugs in cars with tinted windows that pull you over and ask for your cameras, all without showing any ID at all. You don't have to travel too far outside of Beijing, or Shanghai, to find a lawless countryside where local officials intimidate and bend laws to get there ways. In fact, just a few weeks ago a report was published in a Chinese newspaper that indicated that government officials were arresting whistle blows of government corruption and sending them to mental hospitals. Their only crime was trying to travel to Beijing to tell officials there how corrupt their county communist party leaders are. And this highlights where the real problem exists: the central government in Beijing as no control over what happens in the rest of the country. A powerful statement, but true.

China has, for centuries, been a provincial place. Emperors have always sat at the head of government in the Middle Kingdom and their influence has been far reaching, but only by bribing and power sharing deals worked out with local warlords. And after a my years in China, having worked in every province, I can tell you that little has changed. In exchange for a show of solidarity and support, the central government has pretty much given a free hand to the provinces to develop at their own will and pace; which in many cases means shocking human rights abuses and complete disregard for even the most basic law.

So what do I think of the news that things will free up? I think it will happen, but not because of any judgement handed down from Beijing. If it happens it'll happen because provincial officials and business men will see the benefit of having some media savvy, and they'll learn some day that intimidating media, and engaging this cat and mouse game only makes all sides bitter; and can often lead to negative reporting.

A journalist who has the time to freely enter a village and speak with all the voices and understand all sides of the story can write a much more objective piece than the journalist who has to sneak in under the cover of night and speak to one or two people and then get chased out by thugs in a Mitsubishi Land Rover; barely escaping to the main expressway which can ferry them to the neighboring province; and hence safety.

--
Cheers,

Ryan Pyle
Photographer
ryan@ryanpyle.com
Website: www.ryanpyle.com
Archive: http://archive.ryanpyle.com
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Ryan Pyle Blog: Reform and Opening: 30 Years Old

Hello,

Today is a historic day. December 18th 2008 marks the 30th anniversary of Reform and Opening in China. That's right, modern China is exactly 30 years old today. And what an incredible 30 years it's been:

- 10%+ growth almost every year since 1980
- China now accounts for 6% Global GDP, in 1978 it was 1.8%
- A 70% increase in grain production
- 250 million people have lifted themselves out of abject poverty
- 200 million people have moved from the countryside to the city creating some dynamic world class cities like Shanghai and Beijing.

On December 18th 1978 Deng Xiaoping declared, after weeks of meetings and 2 years of internal in-fighting, that China was open for business. Since then the country has developed faster than any other country in history. This economic advancement has led to incredible social changes throughout the country and greatly altered the traditional way of life in China.

The key city to this Reform and Opening policy, and the economic boom that was to follow, was the border city of Shenzhen. Formerly a rice field, the city now boasts a stable population of over 10 million people, as well as one of the most successful, until recently, housing and job markets in the country. The city of Shenzhen has continually re-invented itself from being a border town, to a port and shipping town, to a manufacturing hub of textiles and low quality goods. Today it is home to some of China's most successful "home grown" companies like Huawei, BYD and Hansee.

Although, due to an economic crisis in around much of the world, much of the Shenzhen and Pearl River Delta manufacturing sector is currently struggling with rapidly falling demand in the United States and Europe; but the development of this region can not be overlooked as one of the main engines of Chinese growth for the last three decades.

I've been based in Shanghai, China for several years and I have shot extensively in Shenzhen and Dongguan, through many of the ups and down's. Please follow the link to view a selection of images, some recently shot and some unpublished. Of course a much wider selection of images are available on my archive. I hope you enjoy the images.

LINK: Click Here

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Cheers,

Ryan Pyle
Photographer
ryan@ryanpyle.com
Website: www.ryanpyle.com
Archive: http://archive.ryanpyle.com
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Ryan Pyle Blog: Gongga Work on Travel Photographer Blog

Hello,

Tewfic el-Sawy runs a lovely TRAVEL PHOTOGRAPHY BLOG that covers some of the most interesting travel and documentary photography being created by talented images makers from all corners of the world.

Today I'm pleased to let you know that The Travel Photographer is running a nice little SLIDE SHOW of my work from Gongga Shan, work at was included as an honorable mention in this years Banff Rocky Mountain Culture Awards. It's always nice to see an imbedded slideshow and a wider variety of images, I hope you agree.

Be sure to keep an eye on the Travel Photographer Blog over the coming months. Lots of quality photography sure to come.

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Cheers,

Ryan Pyle
Photographer
ryan@ryanpyle.com
Website: www.ryanpyle.com
Archive: http://archive.ryanpyle.com
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Ryan Pyle Blog: Canon 5D Mark II's everywhere for XMAS!!!!!

Hello,

I recently visited my local camera market in Shanghai, China; and I'm pleased to announced that every store in the market was flush with Canon 5D Mark II's. The first question many of you may have is: are they fake? The answer is no, my buddy bought one and spent the next few days shooting in Shanghai with lovely low-light results.

The second question many of you might have is: did they fall off the back of a truck? Perhaps. It's clear that Canon is suffering to get these things to market fast enough, and part of that might be because so many are available in China. I recently heard that some shooters in NYC have been on a waiting list for several months to get their 5D Mark II, and I can't help but wonder how many of these camera's in China were prepared for the US and European market but never made it there.

Now don't get me wrong, China has a flourishing photography scene with loads of gifted image makers that can afford a US$2600 camera; and I can assure you that they are flying off the shelves. But surely it's horrible PR for Canon that their newest, and most highly anticipated product in years, is more readily available in Shanghai, China then in the New York City or Paris or London.

So, did I pick one up? Not yet. Why am I waiting? I'm not sure really. I'm not a big techie and I'm not very interested in upgrading my equipment very often but these new 5D's seem to really be a massive improvement to digital image making. I'm sure I'll pick one up around Xmas, a small gift for myself after a manic year of running around this ever changing country that has become my adopted home.

To all those of you in North America and Europe you can't get your hands on a new 5D Mark II? If you're thinking of finally taking that trip to China, it might as well be now - we've got all the gear readily available.


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Cheers,

Ryan Pyle
Photographer
ryan@ryanpyle.com
Website: www.ryanpyle.com
Archive: http://archive.ryanpyle.com
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Ryan Pyle Blog: Zeiss Lenses for Canon SLR's

Hello,

I'm not an equipment junkie, in fact I'm far from it. I am pretty unresponsive when friends in the industry email me links to blogs with new gear, new lenses, new software and the like. But a good friend of mine recently forwarded me a link that I got really excited about. It seems that Carl Zeiss is now making EF Mount lenses for Canon SLR's, wow!

I've been a Canon SLR user for my entire (relatively short) career and they carry the weight of much of my color editorial work. I've got 3 Canon EOS 1 film bodies and 1 Canon EOS 5D Digital body; along with a host of Canon lenses. But a few years ago I started dabbling with a Leica M6 and I use it for all of my Black and White work, and I've begun using it more and more in for my editorial assignments. It didn't take long, using the Leica Zeiss lenses, to notice that the image quality was superior in many many ways; but still I leaned towards my Canons because of their versatility and convenience.

Now, well it was announced a few months ago, Zeiss is making lenses for Canon Film and Digital SLR bodies and I'm on board in a big way. I've always been a big believer that the camera lens is far more important than the camera body and that quality lenses are an important element to strong image making. Zeiss has come out with a 50mm f/1.4 and an 85mm f/1.4. I'm keen on the 50mm and waiting for the 28mm to follow in early 2009.

The real kicker is that the Zeiss lenses are only marginally more expensive than their Canon counterparts. It seems like a no brainer to make the switch.

For years I've been reluctant to work in digital fearing image quality, but the induction of Zeiss lenses and the new Canon 5D Mark II may very well change my dinosaur-like old school perceptions of quality image making using digital SLR's.

So to all the folks at Zeiss, I'm excited, and let me tell you - it's a rare thing. So how about a free trial?

LINK TO STORY


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Cheers,

Ryan Pyle
Photographer
ryan@ryanpyle.com
Website: www.ryanpyle.com
Archive: http://archive.ryanpyle.com
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Ryan Pyle Blog: New Work: Fragile China (Newsweek Cover & NYT)

Hello,

I just wanted to share some new and exciting work with you.

Much of China looks like it get caught up in this global financial slowdown. A government stimulus package for infrastructure should get China back in to that airy double digit growth region again. But some parts of China, and in fact some entire regions of China, are bracing themselves for a shock.

One of those regions is China's Pearl River Delta, home to much of the manufacturing that has helped make China the "Workshop of the World". I've done some work in the region the last few weeks and several of the images have been published in the USA. However, this week I am very honored to have the Cover of Newsweek International, in which they devoted their cover story to China's manufacturing slowdown and what that means for global business.

And I just completed another story about China's steel industry under pressure with the New York Times, Click Here.

You can see a scanned copy of the cover if you Click Here

You can find a link to more images from my series on Dongguan if you Click Here

You can read the Newsweek story if you Click Here


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Cheers,

Ryan Pyle
Photographer
ryan@ryanpyle.com
Website: www.ryanpyle.com
Archive: http://archive.ryanpyle.com
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Ryan Pyle Blog: Mountain Culture Award: Honorable Mention

Hello,

I just wanted to write to make you aware of a photo essay I recently completed on Gongga Shan or Gongga Mountain. It was included as an Honorable Mention in the awards at the Banff Mountain Culture Awards earlier this year.

The photo essay was a journey through China's remote Sichuan province; departing from the Chinese town of Kangding my writing partner and I walked 4 days (at an average altitude of 4000m) to reach the remote Tibetan Gongga Mountain Monastery. It was very much a journey from Han China to Tibetan China at a time when relations between the two have been severely strained.

Over the years I've dedicated a lot of time to the documentation of various parts of the Tibetan community and this essay was one of the most rewarding, walking an average of 30km per day we passed through one of the most remote and isolated parts of Sichuan's ethnic Tibetan regions. The monastery was a full days walk from the nearest village, a two days walk form the nearest road and perched on the side of a mountain near the Gongga Mountain (7556m) base camp.

The monastery was visited by Dr. Joseph Rock in the 1920s when he documented and explored much of south west China for National Geographic. It was very much Dr. Rock's footsteps in which we walked and planned our journey.

A tight edit of the photo essay can be found at the Following Link

The Rocky Mountain Culture awards can be found at the Following Link


My Interview with the Mountain Culture center regarding the picture is below:

"I had first learned about Minya Konka, or Gongga Shan, from naturalist Joseph Rock. His work in eastern Tibet, now western Sichuan, was pioneering and when he first laid eyes on Minya Konka he believed he had found the largest mountain in the world. He wasn't far off. Minya Konka stands an impressive 7556m and towers above the rest of the range. It's a sight beyond words. The Minya Konka Tibetan Monastery rests at the base of the mountain. My journey to the monastery began on foot in the town of Laoyulin, just outside of Kangding. From there the four-day, 120-km trek to the monastery had taken its toll, walking at an average altitude of about 4000 m. But this is the way many of the pilgrims make the journey to this remote monastery, and it was important to follow in their footsteps to understand the significance of the temple and its role in the community. Each morning at the monastery one monk prays alone in the main prayer hall. It was a damp and cold morning and there was a lovely light coming in from the single window; my only concern was to do justice to the moment."


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Cheers,

Ryan Pyle
Photographer
ryan@ryanpyle.com
Website: www.ryanpyle.com
Archive: http://archive.ryanpyle.com
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Ryan Pyle Blog: New Work: Taiwan Investing in China's Healthcare System

Hello,

I wanted to write and let you know of some recent work I completed on Taiwanese investment in China's healthcare industry. BenQ, a Taiwanese conglomerate mostly known for consumer electronics, has opened its first hospital in China geared towards China's medium and lower income families. Many Chinese have lost faith in the large state run hospitals where corruption and efficiencies are well documented. Many patients are keen to try something different and are beginning to put their faith in private hospitals like BenQ's new hospital outside of Nanjing, China - some 300km west of Shanghai.

The work was completed as an assignment with the Wall Street Journal. Below is a link to the article and Photo Essay slide show:

Link to Photos

Link to Article

A Larger Edit: http://archive.ryanpyle.com


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Cheers,

Ryan Pyle
Photographer
ryan@ryanpyle.com
Website: www.ryanpyle.com
Archive: http://archive.ryanpyle.com
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Ryan Pyle Blog: 6 Months of Emptiness

Hello,

My efforts to "ramp up" my blog and make it a staple to the way I work has failed miserably.

If you take a look at when my last blog was it was May 23rd, from when I was covering an earthquake in China's Sichuan province. Since then I've added almost nothing to this blog. What's sad is that I've had an incredibly interesting few months of work and I have a lot of unique and interesting stories to share. Which leads me to the central question, why am I not blogging?

The answer has two very clear sides to it. The first is that I don't actually enjoy telling people where I am or what I am doing. Much of this comes from working in a country where the government puts a lot of pressure on foreign journalists. The second reason, and perhaps more importantly, is that I work in a hyper competitive environment being based in China. I'll just take a moment to look at each of these individually.

The government does make life difficult, exceedingly so for freelance journalists who don't have an accredited news company or publication behind their efforts, to access certain places in China for reporting. And I don't feel like letting everyone know where I am and what I am doing all the time. And saying you'll blog about something interesting later once you return to Shanghai never really works. So often I just end up writing nothing. Sad but true.

The second reason is that China is swimming with photographers, up to the brim. And I prefer not to talk too much about my work or what I am up to. Am I too sensitive? Perhaps. Is my work that interesting? Maybe not, but nonetheless that's how I feel about it.

My goals to improve my blog include trying to update my readers with more information about stories that I've completed and avoid discussing about what's in the pipeline. I hope that still makes for an interesting read. I'll also still try to communicate certain frustrations I have working in China and make people aware of certain long term projects, gallery shows and lectures that I'm involved with.

I hope I can stick with that. For those who want more up to date info just add me to your facebook, I tend to use my facebook page as a bit of a working blog so that my friends and family can also see what's going on. And facebook is much more picture and link friendly than this blog space........or at least it's more friendly for people like me who are barely computer literate.

Thanks for listening.


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Cheers,

Ryan Pyle
Photographer
ryan@ryanpyle.com
Website: www.ryanpyle.com
Archive: http://archive.ryanpyle.com
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Ryan Pyle Blog: China's Earthquake Coverage

Hello,

As some of you may know I've been working in China's earthquake ravaged Sichuan province for the last week or so and I've put together a strong selection of images that show the devastation that has hit the region.

I was recently interviewed by Daryl Lang of PDN Magazine on what my experiences covering the earthquake were like. Please follow the link below for article, interview and audio slide show.

Ryan Pyle
LINK: http://www.pdnonline.com/pdn/newswire/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1003807190

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Cheers,

Ryan Pyle
Photographer
ryan@ryanpyle.com
Website: www.ryanpyle.com
Archive: http://archive.ryanpyle.com
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Ryan Pyle Blog: Photo District News Award

Hello,

I just wanted to share some good news with everyone. An image of mine was recently included in the PDN Photo Annual. The PDN Photo Annual is an awards contest run by PDN, a photo industry magazine. The Photo Annual is a collection of the years most compelling images. I am very honored to have my work appear next to mentors of mine like Ed Kashi and Paolo Pellegrin.

The image I had selected is below, it was a story about China's first face transplant patient.

PDN LINK: http://gallery.pdnevents.com/annual2008/

Image LINK: http://archive.ryanpyle.com/my/Common/PhotoDetailPage.aspx?msa=0&pid=9741074&slid=872ff80f-20ed-40a7-903f-d75ee49a771a&slididx=21&lid=9746836&rstid=0eaa01db-e87a-42b9-8b40-568b5672d4b3&aid=1

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Cheers,

Ryan Pyle
Photographer
ryan@ryanpyle.com
Website: www.ryanpyle.com
Archive: http://archive.ryanpyle.com
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