war

Using Drones to Shoot War Zones

Photographer and director Joey L has been using camera drones to capture aerial photos and videos in conflict zones. Here's a 21-minute talk he recently gave on his work at Hardwired NYC.

Army Photographer Captured the Blast That Killed Her

The late US Army combat photographer Spc. Hilda Clayton is being hailed as a hero this week after the Army released photos Clayton captured of the blast that killed her in Afghanistan. The photos were published with the approval of both Clayton's family and her Army unit.

Rare Color Photos from World War II

Due to costs and scarcity, the vast majority of photos captured during World War II were shot on black-and-white film. Some images were captured in color, however, and those rare shots reveal what scenes from the Second World War looked like to people in them.

Provocative Photos of Camera Gear Arranged to Look Like Weaponry

Arranging camera equipment to look like a gun is not a novel idea, but photographer Jason Siegel's art project Shoot Portraits, Not People takes this provocative idea to a new level by building all sorts of weaponry and combat materials using hand-picked pieces chosen from over 200 pounds of camera parts.

How a Combat Photographer Named a Phenomenon to Honor Soldiers

While embedded with troops in Afghanistan in the late 2000s, war photographer and writer Michael Yon captured numerous photos of the sparkling halo that can appear when a helicopter's rotors hit sand and dust. Upon finding that the particular phenomenon didn't have a name, Yon gave it one that honors two fallen soldiers: the Kopp-Etchells Effect.

26 Before-and-After Pics Reveal What War Has Done to Syria

Once Syria's largest city, Aleppo has been the worst-hit city in the country since the Battle of Aleppo began in 2012 as part of the ongoing Syrian Civil War. Now a series of before-and-after photos reveals just how much the once-vibrant historical city has been marred by war.

Ansel Adams’ Pictures of an American Relocation Camp During WWII

Ansel Adams is best known for his breathtaking landscape photos, but he photographed much more than nature during his decades-long career. In 1943, already the best-known American photographer, Adams visited the Manzanar War Relocation Center in California, one of the relocation camps the US gathered Japanese-Americans into during World War II.

D-Day Photos Recreated Through a War Reenactment

If you want to experience what it's like to shoot as a combat photographer, but don't want to actually risk getting shot at, you can look into photographing war reenactments. Lucas Ryan is a photographer who shoots reenactments, and last year he covered D-Day Conneaut, one of the world's premier D-Day reenactment events.

Photographer Giles Penfound on Storytelling with the Art of Photography

Giles Penfound is a photographer with an engrossing past and a story to tell. Penfound began his journey as a professional photographer over 25 years ago and spent most of his time documenting military operations from within the British Army. Documentary photographer Neale James approached Penfound to produce a short film about his life and work, and the result is the inspirational 30-minute video above. (Note: the video contains some strong language.)

Photographer Captures the Isolated Lives of People in Unrecognized Countries

For his ongoing project "Lands in Limbo," photographer Narayan Mahon has been visiting de-facto countries that aren't recognized as countries by most of the world. Unless you're into geography and/or politics, you may never have heard of any of the places before: Abkhazia, Nagorno Karabakh, Northern Cyprus, Somaliland, and Transnistria.

These World War II Photos Were Actually Captured During a Modern Reenactment

Conflict photography is typically a dangerous, traumatizing and, at least in part, heroic profession that puts you in the line of fire with only a camera as a weapon.

But as Penn State grad and former Onward State photographer Mitchell Wilston recently demonstrated to great effect, you don't need to put yourself in harm's way to capture the kinds of gritty, black-and-white conflict photography that has become iconic through the ages.

Terrifying GoPro Footage Captures Syrian Tanks Wreaking Destruction

Editor's Note: Although there is no direct footage of men dying, fighters on both sides lose their lives during this footage. It is not for the faint of heart.

Iconic conflict photographers are thought of as such because they do something that your standard news coverage just can't do: they show the realities of war. Statistics enumerating the number of people killed or displaced by conflict are just numbers on a page until someone captures the reality of these numbers on film... or sensor.

The video above was not shot by a conflict photographer, but it too captures that reality of war in a profound and shocking way. For an hour, you can spend time looking through the eyes of a Syrian tank column as it wreaks unimaginable havoc.

Shocking ‘Second a Day’ Video Delivers a Powerful Anti-War Message

"Just because it isn't happening here, doesn't mean it isn't happening." That's the tagline of one of the most powerful, shocking ad campaign we have ever run across.

Put together by Save the Children UK, this campaign uses the popular 'second per day video' lifelogging concept to drive home an anti-war message in the most stark and unsettling way, focusing on how war affects children.

Photog Using the Power of Photography to Help Stop Exploitation & War in Congo

We hope you never get sick of hearing about stories that show the true power of photography to affect change, because I doubt we'll ever get sick of finding and sharing them. The most recent such story we've stumbled across is told by photojournalist Marcus Bleasdale, whose work has already helped curtail the efforts of warlords in Africa who are exploiting children in their attempt to rule Congo.

Hidden World of South Sudan: An Interview with Photojournalist Camille Lepage

Camille Lepage, 25, is an independent French photographer living in South Sudan. She works on long term projects about topics that do not make to the mainstream media and looks at the consequences of the politics on the populations.

For over a year now, documentary photographer Camille Lepage has been photographing the struggles of South Sudan. As a new country, sovereign since 2011, South Sudan can be considered a hotbed for social, political, and religious conflicts. These conflicts are laid bare by Lepage through a strong, intuitive eye and a determination to get her shot.

Her two on-going bodies of work, You Will Forget Me and Vanishing Youth (which are on display below) contain stirring imagery that speak of the violence, and the religious and cultural dissonance that permeates this young country and its people.

My Experience Photographing on the Front Lines of the Syrian Civil War

It’s cold. The air is stinging my ears and my hands are numb. I pull back on my gloves and resume huddling in the conner of the courtyard. It’s December in Aleppo and the air is bitter, but the overwhelming sense of dread comes not from the cold, but from overhead. Early morning, midday, through the night; the aerial bombardment doesn’t stop. The sound of a jet buzzing overhead and those terrible trails of white streaming from the underbelly as missiles launch. Distant blasts and then closer ones. Mortar strikes as well. Silence and then an explosion.