Veteran's Day 2009

I went to Arlington National Cemetery yesterday after class. The weather perfectly matched the mood of the place - quiet, cold, rainy and starkly beautiful.

The headstone above Staff Sgt. Leroy Alexander's grave at Section 60. Alexander was a Special Forces engineer sergeant died in Afghanistan nine days before his redeployment home. He left behind a wife pregnant with twins.

Dan Sanchez at the grave of his friend 1st Lt. Forrest P. Ewens at Section 60. Ewens died in Afghanistan.

A tin of tobacco left on a headstone.

Stop-Motion video

Check these video clips shot with a Nikon D2X or D3 DSLR. Video with a D3 you say? Its not traditional video but stop-motion video. They were shot by Andrew Kornylak, an Atlanta-based photographer.

Nikki Blue from Andrew Kornylak on Vimeo.

The Beta - Six Feet Under from Andrew Kornylak on Vimeo.

More Leica M8 pics

Here are more pics shot this week with the Leica M8.

Leica M8 pics

A very gracious friend of mine lent me his Leica M8 earlier this week and these pics are some of the results. This camera has gone nearly every where with me ever since. To class. In the car while I drive. To the scanning lab at school. Suffice to say I like it.

The M8 was met with a lot of fan fare and eventurally derision by photographers for a variety of issues to include: a cropped sensor, bad IR issues, bad high ISO noise and a loud (for Leica) shutter. I panned it too. After a few cursory looks and shots I was turned off in particular by the said IR issues. Leica did come up with a solution - special and expensive IR filters for the lenses - and it seems to work. The shutter is "loud" because Leica changed from a clothe shutter to a metal one to accomodate faster shutter speeds. The fastest on my M6 is 1/1,000 of a second. It's 1/8,000 of a second on the M8. As for the ISO noise, its not bad. I made a few shots at ISO 1250 and like shooting with film you need to really nail the exposure but its workable and nice looking.

The good thing about this camera was people could use their Leica bayonet mount glass on it. These shots here were made with my Summicron 50 f2. And, again, I like it. The look is exactly what I wanted it to be - Vivid. The high ISO pics remind me of pushed ISO 320 or 400 Tri-X and 400 VC film. Sure it has white balance issues. Two continuous shots in the same light can be look different which is correctable in post production though. I also noticed a hot pixel in a few of the images but thats because of exposure or light type (dark and tungsten on a Metro platform). That hot pixel is the first I've seen since using the camera. The notorious black/gray fabric turning magenta due to lack of IR alias filter in front of the CCD (and no IR filter on my lens to correct it) happened to me today for the first time too. After fiddling around in post i just gray scaled it. That option might work for now but I would need the IR filter if I did a professional gig with it.

After this week, though, I like the camera. A lot. I would definitely buy one if the cash were on hand.

Dignified Transfer time lapse

I shot this time lapse of the Dignified Transfer at Dover Air Force Base on Tuesday. Coincidentally, Jay Westcott had the same idea.

Dignified Transfer even at Dover Air Force Base, Del. from Bill Putnam on Vimeo.

Dignified Transfer

Eight transfer cases. Secured in a C-17 transport plane sitting on a tarmac. Barely a cloud in the mid-morning sky. Eight cases covered with American Flags. Men were inside them soon to be positively identified and then back to their families. Two blue buses pull up next to a collection of journalists and photographers. People de-board. Through the tinted windows I see some women wearing shrouds. I hear the scampering of children's feet. An honor guard from the 3rd Infantry Regiment slowly walks into view toward the plane and the eight cases. The flurry of shutter clicks. A chaplain makes a blessing. A dignified transfer party of an Army lieutenant general, major general, sergeant major and Air Force colonel march up the plane's ramp, then back into the sun light. They face the families. A call to render honors is bellowed from the plane's belly. Six men carry the casket down the ramp and to a transfer vehicle.

I photographed the Dignified Transfer event this morning at Dover Air Force Base, Del., of six American soldiers killed Saturday in Afghanistan's Nursitan Province. Eight soldiers were killed in the attack on the two combat outposts but six families granted media coverage of the event. It goes without saying that these truly are tough times over there.

One by one the six are carried to the transfer vehicle. One by one the transfer party renders a slow salute. The men quietly heave as the cases are loaded into the vehicle.

These events - and this was my first - have a very understated elegance to them. Nearly a decade in to the war, the teams that organize and carry out this detail are good. Smooth and flawless in a way that doesn't show routine. Because that's what they have become - routine. As of today 5218 US troops have died in Afghanistan and Iraq. All the same, the honor guards and transfer parties carry out the event like it was their first, public affairs officers said.

The last case is loaded. The honor guard marches back, stops, does an about face then renders their own slow salute. An Air Force airman, who stood the entire ceremony at the vehicle's rear, deliberately secures the doors. The vehicle slowly drives away. The airman walks behind the van. The honor guard follows the airman. The transfer party follows them. All of them walk toward the Air Force mortuary where the men will be positively identified. The ceremony is concluded. The journalists board their bus.

Kidney stones in the water?

This article in Stars and Stripes about troops getting kidney stones in Iraq and Afghanistan made me think of my own bout with them in March 2006. Mine hit while embedded with 2nd of the 9th Cavalry at FOB Wilson. They woke me up from a dead sleep in a dripping sweat. Thankfully the squadron surgeon administered drugs and I passed them pretty quick.

Here's the money quote: "'Some women say (the pain is) more severe than labor pains," McDonald said."

That's saying something. I am definitely not a woman but the pain I felt was almost undescribable.

Apparently I wasn't alone in getting them. There are so many cases the military has installed a special stone cutting laser in the Combat Support Hospital for lesser cases. Some people are also being evacuated to Landstuhl for treatment.

While there is no definitive medical proof that the bottled water we slugged back is causing them, I suspected it was the water, and as the article points out, the food we ate. Minerals in the water and high-sodium food might have added up to bad times for some. I drank a lot of water while in Iraq, at least eight bottles a day, but that wasn't enough often times. The good thing about the food was the sodium was good for water retention, which can be good in a place like Iraq. Add up the water and food and that might be the cause.

Either way, it is an interesting phenomenon.