FREELANCERS AND “BEYOND WAR”

By Bill Gentile

WASHINGTON, DC, 2 June 2018 – Jon Sawyer, Founder and Executive Director of the Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting, addresses dinner guests at the Center’s “Beyond War Conference” at the National Press Club in the nation’s capital.

During his address, Sawyer emphasized the increasingly important role that freelance journalists play in today’s media landscape.

The Pulitzer event features two days of panels and workshops dealing with the issues of violence and conflict around the world – along with some of the most talented and accomplished journalists covering those issues. Most are freelancers. Among the panelists was Jason Motlagh, a multiple Pulitzer Center grantee who screened some clips from his upcoming documentary about the Rohingya crisis in Myanmar.

Just a few years ago I helped engineer a partnership between American University’s (AU) School of Communication and the Pulitzer Center. That relationship has helped co-sponsor international reporting fellowships for AU students traveling to Mexico, Thailand, Colombia, Borneo, Laos, Peru and, this fall, El Salvador. Some of those students attended the event last night.

The argument about freelancers is the core of my upcoming documentary series, FREELANCERS with Bill Gentile. My graduate teaching assistant, Matt Cipollone, and I traveled to Mexico in March 2017 to shoot the pilot episode. Matt has graduated from AU and now works as a freelancer.

Jason Motlagh is on the far right, with beard.

Guests view Motlagh’s Rohingya video.

Matt Cipollone documents the event.

(Photos by Bill Gentile)

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Fire and Ice on the Mountain

WASHINGTON, DC, 21 December 2017 — I produced this film, Fire and Ice on the Mountain, on my most recent assignment for American University’s Center for Latin American and Latino Studies (CLALS). I traveled to Peru in June to make the film, following a Swedish anthropologist investigating the link between religion and climate change.

Fire and Ice explores how the melting glacier of Peru’s Huaytapallana mountain impacts Peruvians’ cosmovision or, their spiritual relationship with nature and their understanding of their place in it.

I’ve worked as a freelance foreign correspondent on similar stories in other parts of the world. And that is no coincidence. As the impact of climate change becomes more apparent, and as humankind invades deeper and deeper into the dwindling undeveloped regions of the world, the inhabitants of these regions are squeezed tighter and tighter in the vise of “modernity.” And they are forced to either fight back, adapt — or both.

It was fascinating for me to witness, first-hand, how Peruvian pilgrims celebrating the Andean New Year, adapt to the changes imposed on them by the disappearing glacier atop the mountain of Huaytapallana, just outside the bustling city of Huancayo, some 120 miles east of Lima.

As I do on the vast majority of assignments these days, I employed the methodology that I refer to as “backpack journalism,” to make this film. Backpack journalism means, “one story, one camera, one properly trained video journalist.” This is the methodology that I brought to American University’s School of Communication in the early 2000s, when I founded the Backpack Journalism Project. With the exception of the drone footage shot by colleague and friend Carolina Quinteros, I shot, wrote, and narrated the entire film. My wife, Esther, edited the story.

We hope you enjoy the film.

(Photo by Bill Gentile)

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THANKS for Supporting FREELANCERS

WASHINGTON, DC, 15 December 2017 — YOU are THE BEST!!! Thank you ALL so much for your generosity and your grace! What a great campaign it was, with the contributions coming in right up to the very last minute. Forty days of mostly direct and some indirect contributions add up to a total of over $25K. We believe ours is an important story, and your support of our FREELANCERS with Bill Gentile Indiegogo campaign takes us one step closer to telling it.

Your contributions support more than a campaign or a project. By sharing and contributing to FREELANCERS you are supporting the dedicated men and women who toil overseas to ascertain the truths that we need every day to make crucial decisions about our lives and the life of the countries where we live.

We are thrilled. We are humbled. We are invigorated by your solidarity and your support.

THANK YOU!!!

We have some EXTRA good news to share. American University’s School of Communication, where I teach, this week unveiled a Graduate Assistantship dedicated specifically to my Foreign Correspondence class and to related activities. According to the announcement, “The selected student will work closely with Professor Gentile on a variety of projects and tasks related to his Foreign Correspondence class, his FREELANCERS with Bill Gentile documentary series, and AU’s membership in the Pulitzer Center Campus Consortium, all of which are designed to promote awareness surrounding, and the practice of, foreign correspondence.”

For more information, see  http://www.american.edu/soc/admissions/graduate-financing.cfm?utm_source=print&utm_medium=vanity%5Furl&utm_campaign=gradfunding#collapse-4778110

NONE of this could have been done without you, your awareness, your trust in us, your sharing, your contributions. We, the craft of foreign correspondence, and truth itself, are indebted to you.

Our team returns now to the delivery of the perks which you all so richly deserve, to the finishing touches on our documentary, to mapping out the remaining episodes of the series, to our search for distributors.

Please continue to spread the word about FREELANCERS. And never hesitate to contact us with questions.

We’ll keep you posted about the release of our documentary. Until then, thanks once again for your support. We are deeply grateful to EVERY ONE OF YOU!

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Daniella Zalcman on Identity and Inclusion

WASHINGTON, DC, 9 October 2017 — We are delighted to announce that we are hosting award-winning photojournalist Daniella Zalcman on Sunday 22 October 2017 from 4 pm through 5:30 pm for a presentation and discussion of her work. Daniella is hosted by the American University and the Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting. The event is free and open to the public. Please RSVP.

 

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“Freelancers,” Technology Revolution

MEXICO CITY, 8 March 2017 — Associated Press (AP) video journalist Gerardo Carrillo edits material he shot of a women’s march in the Mexican capital. I spent time with Gerardo while filming a pilot for the series, “Freelancers,” about the young, tech-savvy freelance foreign correspondents stepping into the void left by mainstream media retreating from overseas news coverage. Gerardo and I worked together in Central America during the 1980s. He founded the AP video unit in Mexico City, and still works there.

Journalists like Gerardo often provide critical support to freelancers like myself. I began my own career in Mexico in 1977 but have not worked there in many years. He’s using a laptop computer to edit his material before transmitting to the AP bureau in Washington, DC. This technology is part of what makes freelancing so viable today. The cost of global communication has plummeted since the days that Gerardo and I worked in Nicaragua and El Salvador. It’s truly a technology revolution. I’ve entered the post-production stage of the “Freelancers” project, and will be posting images and text as I move along. Please feel free to contact me with questions.

American University graduate student Matt Cipollone and I spent Spring Break shooting and producing the film. In addition to Gerardo, we spent time with a freelance foreign correspondent working with The New York Times and Time magazine; with a freelancer who works with USA Today and The Guardian; with a freelance documentary filmmaker; and with three still photographers.

This project is supported by American University’s School  of Communication, where I work in Washington, DC. I decided to produce the pilot for “Freelancers” in Mexico mostly because that’s where I landed as a freelancer right after graduate school at Ohio University, but also because it’s close to home and logistics would be less costly than some of the other countries and regions where I want to take this project. More on that later.

(Photo by Matt Cipollone)

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Women In Conflict @ American University

WASHINGTON, DC, 26 March 2017 — American University’s School of Communication and the Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting co-hosted an exciting, informative and much-needed presentation and panel discussion titled, “Women In Conflict.” From left to right, Cassandra Vinograd, Natalie Keyssar and Hannah Allam, held the attention of a full-house crowd — in awe of their knowledge, their poise and their presentations — for more than an hour and a half. They told students, colleagues, working professionals, and the general public how to stay safe while covering conflict abroad — and at home.
(Photos by Danielle Criss.)

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Cuban Armed Forces Honored

HAVANA, Cuba, 2 January 2017 – Members of Cuba’s Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias (FAR), or Revolutionary Armed Forces, participate in a march honoring their institution. In the background is the Monumento a José Martí, Cuba’s national hero.

Cuba’s armed forces are considered to be the most steadfast supporters of the system installed decades ago by the now-deceased Fidel Castro.

(Photo by Bill Gentile)

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Getty Images and VCG Partner in Exclusive Global Distribution Partnership

(Bettmann / Corbis)

Getty Images, the world leader in visual content and communications, and Visual China Group (“VCG”), a leading Chinese visual communications and new media business, today announced an exclusive distribution partnership that will enable Getty Images customers to access the extensive visual library from Corbis Images. As a result, the existing Getty Images collection of almost 200 million images will expand to include Corbis Images content, creating an unprecedented collection of images, videos and historic archival content for creative and editorial use worldwide.

Read the full article here: http://press.gettyimages.com/getty-and-corbis/

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Photography Contests: It’s That Time Of Year, But Do They Matter?

Once again we are upon the photography contest season. And every year Jim Colton says that he hears photographers ask, “Do photo contests matter?”

“In the opinion of this photo editor, they do!” Colton says. But just don’t take his word for it. Here, in four installments by Colton, are what some prominent industry professionals think about the value of contests and what you can do to assure that your entries are seen in the best light.

Visit Website:  https://www.nppa.org/news/26571

By NPPA The Voice of Visual Journalist, Dec 13, 2012

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‘Witness’ HBO’s documentary series features Eros Hoagland

Photojournalist Eros Hoagland is one of the stars of HBO’s documentary series ‘Witness,’ premiering Nov. 5. He writes about providing perspective in conflict-ridden areas—and what he’s witnessed over the years.

Read full article: http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2012/11/05/conflict-photographer-eros-hoagland-on-his-dangerous-craft.html

by Eros Hoagland publish by The daily beast on Nov 5, 2012

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