Today in Photography

kbg32

kbg32

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The photo of the flag raising on Iwo Jima was taken on this day in 1945 by Joe Rosenthal.
 
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That is an iconic photo despite the ongoing discussion about whether it was a moment in time, or whether it was enacted for the camera.

Thank you for the reminder.
 
This photograph is a staged reproduction of the first which was also photographed. The original was with a much smaller flag which was given to some Admiral as a keepsake. It is descirbed in "First Sight: Photography and the Smithsonian," a Smithsonian publication.
 
Steve Bellayr said:
This photograph is a staged reproduction of the first which was also photographed. The original was with a much smaller flag which was given to some Admiral as a keepsake. It is descirbed in "First Sight: Photography and the Smithsonian," a Smithsonian publication.
Click to expand...

472px-First_Iwo_Jima_Flag_Raising.jpg
 
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Yeah, I know the stories.

It's not really real, but it's not a fake either.

It's an honest recreation of a real event, all mixed up with a misunderstood phone conversation.

But it is iconic.

Even if it is not 'true' it embodies a 'truth'. And that's what makes it a great photo.
 
A re-raising of the flag with a larger one, might have been a re-creation of a previous event, but it was in the same day, and still, a real event that was recorded. Iwo Jima was not officially taken during the flag raisings. Officers wanted to replace the flag that was raised with a larger one that could be easily seen from anywhere on the island.
 
For those of you who like the archival qualities of film, when Joe Rosenthal died recently the Bergen Record ran a photo of the negative. It is kept in a vault at AP (I think), and handled only with cotton gloved hands. It was neat to see the negative. Now that's a REAL photo.

/T
 
That's right.

As I understand it they put up a flag, and were photographed.

Then they replaced the flag several hours later, and were photographed again.

Joe Rosenthal sent the photos to his newspaper and they asked him if it was staged or for real. He said 'for real' because he thought they were talking about the first version.

Later hew saw they had published, the better, second version.

In my opinion it is still for real, and still iconic.
 
The staged one definitely looks better. Would we be having this post if the only shot was the real one? Probably the real one would be tossed away if it were not for the "fake" version.
 
It wasn't staged, it's simply a shot of the second (bigger) flag being raised.

The fist flag was too small to be seen properly, so they replaced it with a bigger one.
 
There's an article in the Bergen Record from a few years back of an interview with Joe Rosenthal about the taking of the photo. He talks about trudging up the mountain with a 4x5 Speedgraphic, how heavy it was, the extra plates he had to carry, etc. He also talks about how he had to keep moving back to get the scene framed right and his concerns about how it came out. A very interesting piece, but it now hides behind a for-fee newspaper firewall.

/T
 
The flag raising that Rosenthal shot was not a staged event. When the hill was taken a flag was raised....an admiral in the commanding ship wanted a larger flag raised and sent a larger flag up the hill. That was when Rosenthal took the photo.
 
Here it is in Rosenthal's own words:

The photo was so dramatic and perfectly composed that some believed Rosenthal must have posed the figures.

"No," Rosenthal told a friend in recent years. "It was not posed. I gave no signal and didn't set it up. I just got every break a photographer could have wished for. If I set it up I probably would have ruined the shot. I was lucky."

But it was the luck of a fearless photographer who went into the thick of battle "to get where the action is, where pictures happen themselves, and all I had to do is point the camera," as he said, with typical modesty.
Click to expand...

/T
 
Staging a photo

Staging a photo

The famous photo of MacArthur wading ashore in the Phillipines was staged, in that MacArthur and company did the same walk through the surf 2 or 3 times in succession, to make sure that both the still cameras and the movie cameras got the shot. If as he said, Rosenthal followed the action to the second larger, taller flag raising, without saying "hey guys, do it again so I can shoot with fill flash" - to me that wasn't staged. It's a great shot that encapsulates the entire Pacific war, and that's why we remember it.
 
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