The Big Picture - Boston.com: “Earthquake in Chile” Feb. 27th, 2010. Phptp by Marco Fredes for Reuters

“At 3:34 am local time, today, February 27th, a devastating magnitude 8.8 earthquake struck Chile, one of the strongest earthquakes ever recorded. According to Chilean President-elect Sebastian Pinera, at least 120 people are known to have been killed so far. The earthquake also triggered a Tsunami which is right now propagating across the Pacific Ocean, due to arrive in Hawaii in hours (around 11:00 am local time). The severity of the Tsunami is still not known, but alerts are being issued across the Pacific.” (more)

Artist statement:

“These photographs of albatross chicks were made on Midway Atoll, a tiny stretch of sand and coral near the middle of the North Pacific. The nesting babies are fed bellies-full of plastic by their parents, who soar out over the vast polluted ocean collecting what looks to them like food to bring back to their young. On this diet of human trash, every year tens of thousands of albatross chicks die on Midway from starvation, toxicity, and choking.

To document this phenomenon as faithfully as possible, none of the plastic in any of these photographs was moved, placed, manipulated, arranged, or altered in any way. These images depict the untouched stomach contents of baby birds in one of the world’s most remote marine sanctuaries, more than 2000 miles from the nearest continent.”

To learn more, visit Chris Jordan official website.

About this photograph:

“At dawn, on a chill April 17 in 1927, my fiancée, Virginia, two friends (Charlie Michael and Arnold Williams), and I drove from our home to HAppy Isles and began an eventful day of climbing and photographing. I had my 6½ × 8½ Korona View camera, with two lenses, two filters, a rather heavy wooden tripod, and twelve Wratten Panchromatic glass plates. Those were the days when I could climb thousands of feet with a heavy pack and think nothing of it; I was twenty-five and weighed about 125 pounds. Virginia and friends were fine climbers in those pre-roping times, and nothing daunted us.

[…] This photograph represents my first conscious visualization; in my mind’s eye I saw (with reasonable completeness) the final image as made with the red filter. I knew little of “controls.” My exposures were based on experience, and I followed the usual basic information on lenses, filter factors, and development times. The red filter did what I expected it to do. […] I can still recall the excitement of seeing the visualization “come true” when I removed the plate from the fixing bath for examination. The desired values were all there in their beautiful negative interpretation. This was one of the most exciting moments of my photographic career.”

Quoted from the book Examples. The Making of 40 Photographs, Boston: Little Brown and Company, 1983, p. 3-5

About the year 1927 in Adams’ life:

“Nineteen twenty seven was the pivotal year of Adams’s life. He made his first fully visualized photograph, Monolith, the Face of Half Dome, and took his first High Trip. More important, he came under the influence of Albert M. Bender, a San Francisco insurance magnate and patron of arts and artists. Literally the day after they met, Bender set in motion the preparation and publication of Adams’ first portfolio, Parmelian Prints of the High Sierras [sic]. Bender’s friendship, encouragement, and tactful financial support changed Adams’s life dramatically. His creative energies and abilities as a photographer blossomed, and he began to have the confidence and wherewithal to pursue his dreams.” (more)

Learn more about the Half Dome and Ansel Adams (Wikipedia).

Original caption: “Mounting Timber Wolf-Burlap, saturated in liquid plaster of paris is used to cover skeleton to form a base or armature on which to model in clay.”

“Wilson Alwyn “Snowflake” Bentley (February 9, 1865 – December 23, 1931), born in Jericho, Vermont, is the first known photographer of snowflakes. He perfected a process of catching flakes on black velvet in such a way that their images could be captured before they either melted or sublimated.” (Wikipedia)

“Though produced in considerably primitive conditions, the photographs are masterpieces of the intricate, infinite patterns in nature, never before imaginable. Wilson A. Bentley captured the astonishing beauty of what he called “gems, wrought by blizzards.” Today, the knowledge we have, in large part, about the complexity and the beauty of the snowflake is due to the scholarly efforts of this remarkable pioneer. Bentley’s prodigious body of work, SNOW CRYSTALS, was published in 1931 in New York, N.Y., by the McGraw-Hill book publishers. That same year, less than a month after the book’s release, Wilson A. Bentley walked home in a raging snow blizzard to make yet more photos of his beloved form of precipitation, and, contracting pneumonia from that walk, died two weeks later.” (Hammer Gallery)

“Every snowflake has an infinite beauty which is enhanced by knowledge that the investigator will, in all probability, never find another exactly like it. Consequently, photographing these transient forms of Nature gives to the worker something of the spirit of a discoverer. Besides combining her greatest skill and artistry in the production of snowflakes, Nature generously fashions the most beautiful specimens on a very thin plane so that they are specially adapted for photomicrographical study.” Read the full essay by Wilson Bentley at his official website.

American Museum of Natural History Library / Picturing the Museum: “Display case showing detail of The Skeleton from Fish to Man (III)”, photo by Allen, 1932, New York, NY.

American Museum of Natural History Library / Picturing the Museum: “Museum staff with fossil shark jaws under restoration”, photo by H.S. Rice, January 1927, New York, NY.

American Museum of Natural History Library / Picturing the Museum: “DNA model, Hall of Invertebrates”, photo by Alex J. Rota, 1965, New York, NY.

“David Zaitz is an advertising, corporate and travel photographer known for his quirky style of people/location imagery. An eternal wise-cracker with a buttoned-down approach, Zaitz enjoys the diverse range of clientele he has built. He’s based in Los Angeles, but travels extensively on assignment which makes driving the 405 freeway much more bearable. Zaitz’s clients include Doubletree Hotels, Esquire magazine, POM Wonderful, Wells Fargo Bank, Pedigree, Bank of America, Bridgestone Tires, Coca-Cola and Toyota.” (Altpick.com).

American Museum of Natural History Library / Picturing the Museum: “Large Male Gorilla, Gorilla Group”, photo by Charles H. Coles, November 1936, New York, NY.