The Power of the Camera...

Darn sickness to hell. I'm quite over it. I've had 8 large vials of blood taken today so my head is floating ten feet above my body. Not the best day to blog but the results might be interesting.

The sickness is compounded by the fact that I'm letting people down. I've had two great offers to take photographs for people I really respect lately but I haven't had the energy to go. I'm letting them down and I'm letting myself down. But another date with nurse Helen and her needle will hopefully sort this shit out.

The photo above illustrates the exact opposite of how I'm feeling.

A big thanks to all that checked out my updated Spiked Punch website. The colour images are kinda average I'll be the first to say but I'm finding my feet after so many years away. The reaction to my buying a digital camera though has been interesting to say the least. Did I make that big a deal about not wanting to go digital? Anyway, scroll down the page to see the moment of illumination when I finally realised that I could get something out of it. I stand by my convictions...

Two thoughts for this blog. One is that cable television is bad. Yes, yes, you all know this. It's bad on many levels however the worst crime is that it steers me away from great channels such as SBS and I end up missing out on so much. Thankfully, I managed to switch on SBS at the right time last night to watch a 2004 documentary called Born Into Brothels.

Which leads me to my second thought. And I could possibly be settled in for a rant here so get comfortable, have a bathroom break or get a drink...

This documentary was funded by a project called Kids with Cameras - a New York non-profit organisation formed to teach photography and the passion behind it to marginalised children around the world. They've got programs going in Calcutta, Cairo, Haiti and Jerusalem but the documentary last night was on Calcutta and specifically the children of prostitutes. It won the Oscar for best documentary a few years ago so I'm way behind the times, however given a few years have passed it could be good to bring a tiny bit of attention back its way.

It was quite overwhelming to be truthful, and no words I can say will do it justice. These kids are obviously from a background of great hardship, they face challenges every day that you or I could possibly never imagine, they hardly know what beauty is given the dirt and the deceit around them. But the images they took - no matter how painful the subject matter - were some of the most beautiful images I've seen. Take a step back and not know the background of the photographer and they are some of the most beautiful images I have seen.

The ultimate message of the camera as a tool for hope and change was the driving force of this documentary. I mean, it was and it wasn't. The KWC representative was trying so hard to get them in to a proper school (which was impossible for most and the parents of the remainder would not let them) and trying so hard to make grand changes which could reshape their lives, however this small change of bringing a camera into their lives was a larger change than displacing them from their way of life (however terrible we might view it, this was all they knew and all their families were). The camera gave them hope, allowed them to show their lives as it was (to promote change) and ultimately gave them validity.

My background is obviously nothing like the kids from Calcutta however the importance of the camera is clearly universal.

Visit Kids With Cameras

From the Kids Gallery... Please visit the website and view all the images.