photo essay examples in the philippines

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Photo Essay: Indigenous Transitions, by Hannah Reyes

IPA 15/07/2014 Photography , PROJECTS Leave a Comment

The Philippines is home to a large number of indigenous groups. Through the years, succeeding waves of migration and colonisation have pushed them into the interior highlands of the islands where physical isolation helped them retain their customs and traditions.

However, improving access to roads, mainstream education, and media is changing their culture as the younger generations slowly assimilate into mainstream culture. This transition is not well documented. This project follows the transition of three indigenous communities in Luzon–the Aytas of Pampanga, the Butbuts of Kalinga, and the Ivatans of Batanes. I focused on the transitions to modernity–how old traditions are surviving, what remains under broader social pressure, and what new forms are emerging through the fusion of cultures. What happens to people when both preservation and progress are necessary?

This story is not one of abandonment, but of change. It is a story of passage.

More on the project on National Geographic: http://newswatch.nationalgeographic.com/author/hreyes/

Photographs by Hannah Maria Carmina Reyes | Website:  http://hannah.ph

Hannah Reyes is an IPA Alumni and 2013 Workshop Grant Recipient . More features from other IPA Alumni filed under IPA Alumni Journeys .

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A photo essay of beautiful Bohol, Philippines

We explored Bohol Island for four days after our fill of beach time on Panglao Island. Here’s a little photo essay to show off the beauty of the area.

Our days consisted of traipsing along the Loboc River to the little town of Loboc, zipping around the countryside on a motorbike, checking out the Chocolate Hills and Mag Aso Falls as well as a visit to the Tarsier Sanctuary.

We stayed at Fox and Firefly , a lovely little resort with groups of cottages and a second floor open-air restaurant and lounge.  They also offer SUP tours of the island.  Todd and I got our first ever SUP lesson from them and were thrilled to SUP down the Loboc River.  It was one of the most peaceful nature activities I have ever done and we wish we had sprung for the longer tour.  I would highly recommend them if you are on Bohol.  The guides were great and this is ecotourism at it’s best.

Our first day we wandered around Loboc.

It’s a cute little town located right on the Loboc River.  They are known for river cruises, which go up and down the river serving meals (lunch or dinner), with live bands to accompany all of your karaoke dreams. It was a little touristy for us so we chose to skip them and instead ate at some smaller local restaurants.

Renting a motorbike is definitely the way to see the island from a local’s viewpoint.

From Loboc to the Chocolate Hills you wind up, down and around hills, through a man-made forest with its cool shade and past a lot of rice paddy scenery.

After braving some treacherous downpours on our motorbike, we finally made it to the Chocolate Hills.

There are somewhere between 1250 and 1775 of these conical and symmetrical hills, which turn brown in the dry season hence the name.  You pass them here and there on the roadside before winding up to a stellar viewpoint.  As a reward for trekking through the crazy weather, a double rainbow popped out just as we arrived at the viewpoint.  The viewpoint was up a long set of stairs, but totally worth it as you got complete 360 degree views of the hills.

A trip to Bohol wouldn’t be complete without visiting Baclayon church.

The town of Baclayon was founded by the Jesuits in 1596 and became a parish in 1717.  The church itself was built in 1727 and is still standing, although it sustained a lot of damage in the earthquake of 2013.  It was still under renovation while we were there.  We could tour part of it including the main altar and a very interesting museum filled with old church vestments, prayer books and statues of saints.

Our last day we rented a motorbike again and drove across the island to see Mag Aso Falls.

It was off the tourist path a little and well worth the drive.  We just loved seeing more of the countryside, waving to locals who always gave us a smile and an enthusiastic hello.

When we got to the falls, it was a short trek down some very slippery stairs, and what awaited us was magical.  The color of the water was an incredible blue that I have seen in oceans before, but never in fresh water.  We were in a jungle cavern and besides the main pool to swim in there were small pools created by rocks where you could relax and let the river wash away any stress.

There was only one other couple there when we arrived and they left shortly, allowing Todd and I to take it all in privately.  It was definitely an afternoon I will not soon forget!

At the end of the day, we checked out the Philippine Tarsier Foundation’s   Tarsier Sanctuary  in the town of Corella.

Tarsiers are the smallest primates and sadly are endangered.  They have been losing their natural habitat as the jungle is cut down and also are used as pets and to be viewed in small cages by tourists.  The animals are the size of a man’s fist (approximately) and are very shy and nocturnal.  They are sensitive to light and sounds and have been known to kill themselves in captivity.

We went to the conservation center that encompasses many acres and lets them roam in their natural habitat.  We were very lucky the day we visited because we got to see a few that were visible along a path in the jungle behind the museum.  You cannot talk or use flashes while in the viewing area.  They are interesting looking, cute with huge eyes which appear open even though they are asleep during the day.  There are only about 700 of these species left in the Philippines, although new efforts to conserve and repopulate are under way.

For an entertaining dinner, stop in Baclayon at Don’s Ocean View Restaurant and Bar.

The owner was a feisty German expat and super friendly and welcoming.  He loved Americans and showered us with shots of rum (which under normal circumstances I never drink – but this guy was easily 6’5″ and an ex-Navy Seal).  The food was delicious – he offers mostly German fare with a few other international dishes.  And he hand-cut his own fries.  They were wonderful!  The views couldn’t be beat either, watching the fisherman ready their boats for some twilight fishing.

And that in a nutshell is how to spend four days on Bohol!

We really felt we got to see a lot of this island in such a little time since it was so easy to get around.  Even though we did do activities every day, we also left plenty of time for relaxing on the couches up in the lounge at Fox and Firefly where we met a lot of other travelers and swapped stories.  We also had some good hammock time overlooking the river.  Bohol is a wonderful place to visit in the Philippines if you want a little beach, a little jungle and a little relaxation.

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Fabulous story/pix love see.ing all this trip since I can’t go thanks so much a great travelogue went to school with a few phllipinoes wonderful kind loving they were through the war lost slot of their families. One friend saw her whole family murdered very sad her name was Lourdes Cohuangco. And her cousins also Cohuansgcos

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Scenes from the Philippines Rice Fields, a Photo Essay

Almost every year for the past decade I have put together a calendar of photos that reflects our life on board over the last 12 months. Usually I have more than enough images of bucolic anchorages, dramatic landscapes, exotic local scenes and a few usable pictures of us. This year when I looked back over the images that chronicled our year all I saw were the troubles and tribulations we had in the yard. Those were not experiences I wanted to re-live, or share.

That’s not to say that I didn’t take many photos in 2018. On the contrary. Instead I turned my camera to the landscape that surrounded us, and more often than not the business of growing rice, a subject that I find as fascinating as it is beautiful. So, I decided to put together a calendar of “Scenes from the Philippine Rice Fields,” and then I wrote a short essay to accompany it. Instead of just sharing this annual project with family this year I decided to share it here as well. I hope you enjoy the images and your next bowl rice.

Scenes from the Philippines Rice Fields

In the Philippines rice is eaten with every meal of the day. In many poorer communities it is eaten AS every meal of the day. In big cities restaurants advertise “ unli ” (unlimited) rice to entice customers. In small communities it is sold by the kilo at almost every local sari sari (corner) store. It is estimated that each person in the Philippines consumes on average 125 kg of milled rice per year, 90% of which is grown in the country. With a population that is set to exceed 109 million that is a lot of rice. ( source )

Luzon, the largest of the over 7000 islands in the archipelago and home to the capital Manila, was also where we spent most of 2018. The boatyard where we hauled Kate was located just south of Manila in a region where towering rugged hills protect fertile, flat valleys. Our weekly trips to the nearest city of Nasugbu for provisions took us through some of the prettiest landscapes on the island. I felt compelled to document what we saw, even from the back of a speeding motorcycle taxi. I didn’t know then that we were travelling through what is know as the “Rice Bowl” of the Philippines, a region that produces almost 20% of all the rice in the country. ( source )

Throughout the seasons we witnessed the cycle of tilling, planting, tending and harvesting the rice fields. Then we watched as many of the streets were diverted so that the rice could be sundried on the hot pavement. Traffic in these areas would be slowed to one lane but hardly ever would you see a vehicle purposely drive over the rice. Instead there was a patient and understood system of stopping to allow oncoming traffic to pass. The rice had the right of way.

The work of growing rice is hard.

Buffalo are still used to till the fields in most places, although you do see gas powered tillers rusting on the side of the road, the farmer probably unable to afford the petrol to run it or parts to fix it. Planting is done by hand; men and women bend at the waist and up to there knees in mud for hours. Tending and harvesting are also done using manual labourers. Mobile threshing machine make the rounds when the rice is ready to be separated from the chaff, but it is often buffalo that are used to drag the machines from paddy to paddy.

After harvest the rice is then either dried in small batches on the road or sold to a community mill. Here it is dried on large concrete slabs that often double as the local basketball court in the late afternoons after the rice is piled up and covered in plastic to protect it from the evening dew. Although modern fertilizers and herbicides are used to help rice crops it is common to see large flocks of big, brown ducks in a flooded rice paddy. The ducks are used as a natural means of controlling bugs that damage the rice, and they have the added benefit of fertilizing the plants as they go.

Rice is a thirsty crop.

70% of the rice fields in the Philippines are irrigated and many of these fields are located in Central Luzon. It is also a country heavily affected by typhoons, which can wreck havoc on the rice production; successive heavy rains causing drainage problems and high winds blowing blossoms off flowering plants rendering them unable to produce. During a typhoon advisory the national weather organization PAGASA (Philippines Atmospheric, Geophysical and Astronomical Services Administration) not only publishes potential damage to buildings but what damage may occur to the rice crop. Rice crop losses due to typhoon Ompong in September were estimated at more than P4.97 billion pesos ($96 million USD). This was one of only 20 typhoons the country suffered in 2018, albeit a big one.  ( source )

In the later part of the year we sailed to the small island of Busuanga, just north of Palawan. While travelling around the island by rented motorcycle we rode through the same, familiar scenes; rice being harvested and dried on the road, boys and men guiding and riding buffalo. Yet I couldn’t resist raising my camera to capture a few more photos. Like each grain of rice, each moment was unique and beautiful.

Bread is often referred to as the “staff of life” but it is rice that feeds much of the people across the globe. Rice is not expensive, even in the western world where it is imported, yet how often do we stop to consider where it comes from, how it is grown, and the human cost required to put it on the shelf? Rice may be one of the most basic foods available, but very little about it is simple.

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Good day to you! I enjoyed reading your essays about rice fields. I am writing a research paper about this. I would like to ask your permission if you could please allow me to mention you/your essay and pictures in the journal. I am the Director of the Bocaue Center for Research, Arts and Culture in Dr. Yanga’s Colleges, Inc. located in Bocaue, Bulacan.

I hope for your positive response. Thank you and God bless you more!

Fe F. Faundo, Ph. D.

Hello, thank you for your comment. Could you please send a little more information about your project, your organization and what you would like to use my photos for to our email: [email protected] . Salamat Po

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Photo Essay: Batad Rice Terraces in the Philippines

Rice is life in batad, philippines..

It’s what you look at, it’s what you think about, it’s what you eat.

And it’s not just the rice grown on terraces that reach the heavens that produces an omnipotent amazement, it’s the entire atmosphere, the trickle of the gravity fed irrigation system, the peace of being surrounded by mountain walls, the chirping of the birds and the warm hospitality of local Batadians.

My initial viewing of the amphitheater of Batad rice terraces gave me that jelly weakness, a feeling only possible to obtain from a true natural miracle or a man-made masterpiece. The Batad rice terraces were both.

It gave me that same adrenalized feeling of being a millionaire on the island of Palawan , dreamy emotions that can make anyone feel like royalty.

I’m not the only one, the authorities in the Philippines also felt the natural power of the rice terrace region in the Cordillera’s – as depicted on the backside of the 1000 Philippine Peso note.

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The hardest thing about hiking down the trail to Batad was remembering to look at your feet; a moment of staring at your surroundings and it could turn into a far out gaze, a dream – and then a twisted ankle.

This particular view of the Batad rice terraces put me into a mesmerize silent state of trance, a soothing rhythm of harmony. It was like a magic eye staring into the fingerprint of the earth.

Whatever angle I looked at the rice terraces produced another stunning view of the same thing, with a different perspective.

I felt like a gladiator on the fighting floor of the coliseum, looking up at the mighty Batad rice terraces with an energized feeling of triumph.

For the next couple of nights I camped out in a local Batad style hut (middle hut). I slept next to the rice, derived beauty from the fields, and learned to truly appreciate rice.

It’s a routine, there’s no example that can bang the point home harder; You don’t work, you don’t eat.

The process begins by husking the dry grains of rice off the splintery grass. I tried this a few times, believe me, your hands need to build up a series of callus’s to protect from the sharp bits of the dry grass.

After the rice is plucked from the grass, it’s placed into the pounding stone. We pounded back and forth, alternating thrusts of the 15 kilo mallet into the stone, attempting to get the hard wrapper off each grain.

The final step of rice preparation was sifting the rice to get ride of the outer shell that we pounded off.

I won’t lie and say we ate luxuriously, we didn’t. But those plates of rice mixed with green beans and flavored with a splash of soy sauce were the brute force of century’s old techniques of rice cultivation and sustenance.

Though our meals were plain, they were truly special.

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What is a Photo Essay? 9 Photo Essay Examples You Can Recreate

A photo essay is a series of photographs that tell a story. Unlike a written essay, a photo essay focuses on visuals instead of words. With a photo essay, you can stretch your creative limits and explore new ways to connect with your audience. Whatever your photography skill level, you can recreate your own fun and creative photo essay.

9 Photo Essay Examples You Can Recreate

• Photowalk Photo Essay
• Transformation Photo Essay
• Day in the Life Photo Essay
• Event Photo Essay
• Building Photo Essay
• Historic Site or Landmark Photo Essay
• Behind the Scenes Photo Essay
• Family Photo Essay
• Education Photo Essay

Stories are important to all of us. While some people gravitate to written stories, others are much more attuned to visual imagery. With a photo essay, you can tell a story without writing a word. Your use of composition, contrast, color, and perspective in photography will convey ideas and evoke emotions.

To explore narrative photography, you can use basic photographic equipment. You can buy a camera or even use your smartphone to get started. While lighting, lenses, and post-processing software can enhance your photos, they aren’t necessary to achieve good results.

Whether you need to complete a photo essay assignment or want to pursue one for fun or professional purposes, you can use these photo essay ideas for your photography inspiration . Once you know the answer to “what is a photo essay?” and find out how fun it is to create one, you’ll likely be motivated to continue your forays into photographic storytelling.

1 . Photowalk Photo Essay

One popular photo essay example is a photowalk. Simply put, a photowalk is time you set aside to walk around a city, town, or a natural site and take photos. Some cities even have photowalk tours led by professional photographers. On these tours, you can learn the basics about how to operate your camera, practice photography composition techniques, and understand how to look for unique shots that help tell your story.

Set aside at least two to three hours for your photowalk. Even if you’re photographing a familiar place—like your own home town—try to look at it through new eyes. Imagine yourself as a first-time visitor or pretend you’re trying to educate a tourist about the area.

Walk around slowly and look for different ways to capture the mood and energy of your location. If you’re in a city, capture wide shots of streets, close-ups of interesting features on buildings, street signs, and candid shots of people. Look for small details that give the city character and life. And try some new concepts—like reflection picture ideas—by looking for opportunities to photographs reflections in mirrored buildings, puddles, fountains, or bodies of water.

2 . Transformation Photo Essay

With a transformation photography essay, you can tell the story about change over time. One of the most popular photostory examples, a transformation essay can document a mom-to-be’s pregnancy or a child’s growth from infancy into the toddler years. But people don’t need to be the focus of a transformation essay. You can take photos of a house that is being built or an urban area undergoing revitalization.

You can also create a photo narrative to document a short-term change. Maybe you want to capture images of your growing garden or your move from one home to another. These examples of photo essays are powerful ways of telling the story of life’s changes—both large and small.

3 . Day in the Life Photo Essay

Want a unique way to tell a person’s story? Or, perhaps you want to introduce people to a career or activity. You may want to consider a day in the life essay.

With this photostory example, your narrative focuses on a specific subject for an entire day. For example, if you are photographing a farmer, you’ll want to arrive early in the morning and shadow the farmer as he or she performs daily tasks. Capture a mix of candid shots of the farmer at work and add landscapes and still life of equipment for added context. And if you are at a farm, don’t forget to get a few shots of the animals for added character, charm, or even a dose of humor. These types of photography essay examples are great practice if you are considering pursuing photojournalism. They also help you learn and improve your candid portrait skills.

4 . Event Photo Essay

Events are happening in your local area all the time, and they can make great photo essays. With a little research, you can quickly find many events that you could photograph. There may be bake sales, fundraisers, concerts, art shows, farm markets, block parties, and other non profit event ideas . You could also focus on a personal event, such as a birthday or graduation.

At most events, your primary emphasis will be on capturing candid photos of people in action. You can also capture backgrounds or objects to set the scene. For example, at a birthday party, you’ll want to take photos of the cake and presents.

For a local or community event, you can share your photos with the event organizer. Or, you may be able to post them on social media and tag the event sponsor. This is a great way to gain recognition and build your reputation as a talented photographer.

5. Building Photo Essay

Many buildings can be a compelling subject for a photographic essay. Always make sure that you have permission to enter and photograph the building. Once you do, look for interesting shots and angles that convey the personality, purpose, and history of the building. You may also be able to photograph the comings and goings of people that visit or work in the building during the day.

Some photographers love to explore and photograph abandoned buildings. With these types of photos, you can provide a window into the past. Definitely make sure you gain permission before entering an abandoned building and take caution since some can have unsafe elements and structures.

6. Historic Site or Landmark Photo Essay

Taking a series of photos of a historic site or landmark can be a great experience. You can learn to capture the same site from different angles to help portray its character and tell its story. And you can also photograph how people visit and engage with the site or landmark. Take photos at different times of day and in varied lighting to capture all its nuances and moods.

You can also use your photographic essay to help your audience understand the history of your chosen location. For example, if you want to provide perspective on the Civil War, a visit to a battleground can be meaningful. You can also visit a site when reenactors are present to share insight on how life used to be in days gone by.

7 . Behind the Scenes Photo Essay

Another fun essay idea is taking photos “behind the scenes” at an event. Maybe you can chronicle all the work that goes into a holiday festival from the early morning set-up to the late-night teardown. Think of the lead event planner as the main character of your story and build the story about him or her.

Or, you can go backstage at a drama production. Capture photos of actors and actresses as they transform their looks with costuming and makeup. Show the lead nervously pacing in the wings before taking center stage. Focus the work of stagehands, lighting designers, and makeup artists who never see the spotlight but bring a vital role in bringing the play to life.

8. Family Photo Essay

If you enjoy photographing people, why not explore photo story ideas about families and relationships? You can focus on interactions between two family members—such as a father and a daughter—or convey a message about a family as a whole.

Sometimes these type of photo essays can be all about the fun and joy of living in a close-knit family. But sometimes they can be powerful portraits of challenging social topics. Images of a family from another country can be a meaningful photo essay on immigration. You could also create a photo essay on depression by capturing families who are coping with one member’s illness.

For these projects on difficult topics, you may want to compose a photo essay with captions. These captions can feature quotes from family members or document your own observations. Although approaching hard topics isn’t easy, these types of photos can have lasting impact and value.

9. Education Photo Essay

Opportunities for education photo essays are everywhere—from small preschools to community colleges and universities. You can seek permission to take photos at public or private schools or even focus on alternative educational paths, like homeschooling.

Your education photo essay can take many forms. For example, you can design a photo essay of an experienced teacher at a high school. Take photos of him or her in action in the classroom, show quiet moments grading papers, and capture a shared laugh between colleagues in the teacher’s lounge.

Alternatively, you can focus on a specific subject—such as science and technology. Or aim to portray a specific grade level, document activities club or sport, or portray the social environment. A photo essay on food choices in the cafeteria can be thought-provoking or even funny. There are many potential directions to pursue and many great essay examples.

While education is an excellent topic for a photo essay for students, education can be a great source of inspiration for any photographer.

Why Should You Create a Photo Essay?

Ultimately, photographers are storytellers. Think of what a photographer does during a typical photo shoot. He or she will take a series of photos that helps convey the essence of the subject—whether that is a person, location, or inanimate object. For example, a family portrait session tells the story of a family—who they are, their personalities, and the closeness of their relationship.

Learning how to make a photo essay can help you become a better storyteller—and a better photographer. You’ll cultivate key photography skills that you can carry with you no matter where your photography journey leads.

If you simply want to document life’s moments on social media, you may find that a single picture doesn’t always tell the full story. Reviewing photo essay examples and experimenting with your own essay ideas can help you choose meaningful collections of photos to share with friends and family online.

Learning how to create photo essays can also help you work towards professional photography ambitions. You’ll often find that bloggers tell photographic stories. For example, think of cooking blogs that show you each step in making a recipe. Photo essays are also a mainstay of journalism. You’ll often find photo essays examples in many media outlets—everywhere from national magazines to local community newspapers. And the best travel photographers on Instagram tell great stories with their photos, too.

With a photo essay, you can explore many moods and emotions. Some of the best photo essays tell serious stories, but some are humorous, and others aim to evoke action.

You can raise awareness with a photo essay on racism or a photo essay on poverty. A photo essay on bullying can help change the social climate for students at a school. Or, you can document a fun day at the beach or an amusement park. You have control of the themes, photographic elements, and the story you want to tell.

5 Steps to Create a Photo Essay

Every photo essay will be different, but you can use a standard process. Following these five steps will guide you through every phase of your photo essay project—from brainstorming creative essay topics to creating a photo essay to share with others.

Step 1: Choose Your Photo Essay Topics

Just about any topic you can imagine can form the foundation for a photo essay. You may choose to focus on a specific event, such as a wedding, performance, or festival. Or you may want to cover a topic over a set span of time, such as documenting a child’s first year. You could also focus on a city or natural area across the seasons to tell a story of changing activities or landscapes.

Since the best photo essays convey meaning and emotion, choose a topic of interest. Your passion for the subject matter will shine through each photograph and touch your viewer’s hearts and minds.

Step 2: Conduct Upfront Research

Much of the work in a good-quality photo essay begins before you take your first photo. It’s always a good idea to do some research on your planned topic.

Imagine you’re going to take photos of a downtown area throughout the year. You should spend some time learning the history of the area. Talk with local residents and business owners and find out about planned events. With these insights, you’ll be able to plan ahead and be prepared to take photos that reflect the area’s unique personality and lifestyles.

For any topic you choose, gather information first. This may involve internet searches, library research, interviews, or spending time observing your subject.

Step 3: Storyboard Your Ideas

After you have done some research and have a good sense of the story you want to tell, you can create a storyboard. With a storyboard, you can write or sketch out the ideal pictures you want to capture to convey your message.

You can turn your storyboard into a “shot list” that you can bring with you on site. A shot list can be especially helpful when you are at a one-time event and want to capture specific shots for your photo essay. If you’ve never created a photo essay before, start with ten shot ideas. Think of each shot as a sentence in your story. And aim to make each shot evoke specific ideas or emotions.

Step 4: Capture Images

Your storyboard and shot list will be important guides to help you make the most of each shoot. Be sure to set aside enough time to capture all the shots you need—especially if you are photographing a one-time event. And allow yourself to explore your ideas using different photography composition, perspective, and color contrast techniques.

You may need to take a hundred images or more to get ten perfect ones for your photographic essay. Or, you may find that you want to add more photos to your story and expand your picture essay concept.

Also, remember to look for special unplanned, moments that help tell your story. Sometimes, spontaneous photos that aren’t on your shot list can be full of meaning. A mix of planning and flexibility almost always yields the best results.

Step 5: Edit and Organize Photos to Tell Your Story

After capturing your images, you can work on compiling your photo story. To create your photo essay, you will need to make decisions about which images portray your themes and messages. At times, this can mean setting aside beautiful images that aren’t a perfect fit. You can use your shot list and storyboard as a guide but be open to including photos that weren’t in your original plans.

You may want to use photo editing software—such as Adobe Lightroom or Photoshop— to enhance and change photographs. With these tools, you can adjust lighting and white balance, perform color corrections, crop, or perform other edits. If you have a signature photo editing style, you may want to use Photoshop Actions or Lightroom Presets to give all your photos a consistent look and feel.

You order a photo book from one of the best photo printing websites to publish your photo story. You can add them to an album on a photo sharing site, such as Flickr or Google Photos. Also, you could focus on building a website dedicated to documenting your concepts through visual photo essays. If so, you may want to use SEO for photographers to improve your website’s ranking in search engine results. You could even publish your photo essay on social media. Another thing to consider is whether you want to include text captures or simply tell your story through photographs.

Choose the medium that feels like the best space to share your photo essay ideas and vision with your audiences. You should think of your photo essay as your own personal form of art and expression when deciding where and how to publish it.

Photo Essays Can Help You Become a Better Photographer

Whatever your photography ambitions may be, learning to take a photo essay can help you grow. Even simple essay topics can help you gain skills and stretch your photographic limits. With a photo essay, you start to think about how a series of photographs work together to tell a complete story. You’ll consider how different shots work together, explore options for perspective and composition, and change the way you look at the world.

Before you start taking photos, you should review photo essay examples. You can find interesting pictures to analyze and photo story examples online, in books, or in classic publications, like Life Magazine . Don’t forget to look at news websites for photojournalism examples to broaden your perspective. This review process will help you in brainstorming simple essay topics for your first photo story and give you ideas for the future as well.

Ideas and inspiration for photo essay topics are everywhere. You can visit a park or go out into your own backyard to pursue a photo essay on nature. Or, you can focus on the day in the life of someone you admire with a photo essay of a teacher, fireman, or community leader. Buildings, events, families, and landmarks are all great subjects for concept essay topics. If you are feeling stuck coming up with ideas for essays, just set aside a few hours to walk around your city or town and take photos. This type of photowalk can be a great source of material.

You’ll soon find that advanced planning is critical to your success. Brainstorming topics, conducting research, creating a storyboard, and outlining a shot list can help ensure you capture the photos you need to tell your story. After you’ve finished shooting, you’ll need to decide where to house your photo essay. You may need to come up with photo album title ideas, write captions, and choose the best medium and layout.

Without question, creating a photo essay can be a valuable experience for any photographer. That’s true whether you’re an amateur completing a high school assignment or a pro looking to hone new skills. You can start small with an essay on a subject you know well and then move into conquering difficult ideas. Maybe you’ll want to create a photo essay on mental illness or a photo essay on climate change. Or maybe there’s another cause that is close to your heart.

Whatever your passion, you can bring it to life with a photo essay.

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Photo Essay: Makeshift Basketball Courts Across the Philippines

Basketball was invented in 1890 in America. By 1900, it was already in the Philippines where the locals had embraced the sport with open arms. Over a century later, one photographer is on a quest to capture just how important this sport is to the Filipino people.

Based in Cebu, Philippines, documentary photographer and videographer Richard Daniels has travelled all over the country to chronicle the Basketball Courts of the Philippines. More specifically, “the grassroots hoops and courts of the local, mostly impoverished villages in the Southern Philippines.”

“My intention was to document the environment and local culture, using the basketball court or hoop as the unifying theme,” explains Daniels. “The project is still ongoing with over 200 courts and hoops documented, together with sub sets of the series including a focus on makeshift backboards.”

Here’s a look at a small sample of those 200 courts and hoops he’s captured so far during this long-term project:

To see the whole project, click here . And if you’d like to check out more of Richard’s work—surprisingly he’s found time to create several other projects while working on Basketball Courts—head over to his website or give him a follow on Facebook and Instagram .

Image credits : All photographs by Richard Daniels and used with permission.

Farmers have died waiting: Malacañang reviews DAR’s flip flop on conversion of irrigated farmland

Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism

Filipinos face the mental toll of the Covid-19 pandemic — a photo essay

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BY ORANGE OMENGAN

Depression, anxiety, and other mental health-related illnesses are on the rise among millennials as they face the pressure to be functional amidst pandemic fatigue. Omengan’s photo essay shows three of the many stories of mental health battles, of struggling to stay afloat despite the inaccessibility of proper mental health services, which worsened due to the series of lockdowns in the Philippines.

“I was just starting with my new job, but the pandemic triggered much anxiety causing me to abandon my apartment in Pasig and move back to our family home in Mabalacat, Pampanga.” 

This was Mano Dela Cruz’s quick response to the initial round of lockdowns that swept the nation in March 2020. 

Anxiety crept up on Mano, who was diagnosed with Bipolar Disorder Type II with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder and Obsessive-Compulsive Personality Disorder traits. The 30-year-old writer is just one of many Filipinos experiencing the mental health fallout of the pandemic. 

Covid-19 infections in the Philippines have reached 1,149,925 cases as of May 17. The pandemic is unfolding simultaneously with the growing number of Filipinos suffering from mental health issues. At least 3.6 million Filipinos suffer from mental, neurological, and substance use disorders, according to Frances Prescila Cuevas, head of the National Mental Health Program under the Department of Health.

As the situation overwhelmed him, Mano had to let go of his full-time job. “At the start of the year, I thought I had my life all together, but this pandemic caused great mental stress on me, disrupting my routine and cutting my source of income,” he said. 

Mano has also found it difficult to stay on track with his medications. “I don’t have insurance, and I do not save much due to my medical expenses and psychiatric consultations. On a monthly average, my meds cost about P2,800. With my PWD (person with disability) card, I get to avail myself of the 20% discount, but it’s still expensive. On top of this, I pay for psychiatric consultations costing P1,500 per session. During the pandemic, the rate increased to P2,500 per session lasting only 30 minutes due to health and safety protocols.”

The pandemic has resulted in substantial job losses as some businesses shut down, while the rest of the workforce adjusted to the new norm of working from home. 

Ryan Baldonado, 30, works as an assistant human resource manager in a business process outsourcing company. The pressure from work, coupled with stress and anxiety amid the community quarantine, took a toll on his mental health. 

Before the pandemic, Ryan said he usually slept for 30 hours straight, often felt under the weather, and at times subjected himself to self-harm. “Although the symptoms of depression have been manifesting in me through the years, due to financial concerns, I haven’t been clinically diagnosed. I’ve been trying my best to be functional since I’m the eldest, and a lot is expected from me,” he said.

As extended lockdowns put further strain on his mental health, Ryan mustered the courage to try his company’s online employee counseling service. “The free online therapy with a psychologist lasted for six months, and it helped me address those issues interfering with my productivity at work,” he said.

He was often told by family or friends: “Ano ka ba? Dapat mas alam mo na ‘yan. Psych graduate ka pa man din!” (As a psych graduate, you should know better!)

Ryan said such comments pressured him to act normally. But having a degree in psychology did not make one mentally bulletproof, and he was reminded of this every time he engaged in self-harming behavior and suicidal thoughts, he said.

“Having a degree in psychology doesn’t save you from depression,” he said. 

Depression and anxiety are on the rise among millennials as they face the pressure to perform and be functional amid pandemic fatigue. 

Karla Longjas, 27, is a freelance artist who was initially diagnosed with major depression in 2017. She could go a long time without eating, but not without smoking or drinking. At times, she would cut herself as a way to release suppressed emotions. Karla’s mental health condition caused her to get hospitalized twice, and she was diagnosed with Borderline Personality Disorder in 2019. 

“One of the essentials I had to secure during the onset of the lockdown was my medication, for fear of running out,” Karla shared. 

With her family’s support, Karla can afford mental health care. 

She has been spending an average of P10,000 a month on medication and professional fees for a psychologist and a psychiatrist. “The frequency of therapy depends on one’s needs, and, at times, it involves two to three sessions a month,” she added. 

Amid the restrictions of the pandemic, Karla said her mental health was getting out of hand. “I feel like things are getting even crazier, and I still resort to online therapy with my psychiatrist,” she said.

“I’ve been under medication for almost four years now with various psychologists and psychiatrists. I’m already tired of constantly searching and learning about my condition. Knowing that this mental health illness doesn’t get cured but only gets manageable is wearing me out,” she added.    In the face of renewed lockdowns, rising cases of anxiety, depression, and suicide, among others, are only bound to spark increased demand for mental health services.  

MANO DELA CRUZ

Writer Mano Dela Cruz, 30, is shown sharing stories of his manic episodes, describing the experience as being on ‘top of the world.’ Individuals diagnosed with Bipolar Disorder Type II suffer more often from episodes of depression than hypomania. Depressive periods, ‘the lows,’ translate to feelings of guilt, loss of pleasure, low energy, and thoughts of suicide. 

Mano says the mess in his room indicates his disposition, whether he’s in a manic or depressive state. “I know that I’m not stable when I look at my room and it’s too cluttered. There are days when I don’t have the energy to clean up and even take a bath,” he says. 

Mano was diagnosed with Bipolar Disorder Type II in 2016, when he was in his mid-20s. His condition comes with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder and Obsessive-Compulsive Personality Disorder traits, requiring lifelong treatment with antipsychotics and mood stabilizers such as antidepressants.

Mano resorts to biking as a form of exercise and to release feel-good endorphins, which helps combat depression, according to his psychiatrist.

Mano waits for his psychiatric consultation at a hospital in Angeles, Pampanga.

Mano shares a laugh with his sister inside their home. “It took a while for my family to understand my mental health illness,” he says. It took the same time for him to accept his condition.

RYAN BALDONADO

Ryan Baldonado, 30, shares his mental health condition in an online interview. Ryan is in quarantine after experiencing symptoms of Covid-19.

KARLA LONGJAS

Karla Longjas, 27, does a headstand during meditative yoga inside her room, which is filled with bottles of alcohol. Apart from her medications, she practices yoga to have mental clarity, calmness, and stress relief. 

Karla shares that in some days, she has hallucinations and tries to sketch them. 

In April 2019, Karla was inflicting harm on herself, leading to her two-week hospitalization as advised by her psychiatrist. In the same year, she was diagnosed with Borderline Personality Disorder.  The stigma around her mental illness made her feel so uncomfortable that she had to use a fake name to hide her identity. 

Karla buys her prescriptive medications in a drug store. Individuals clinically diagnosed with a psychosocial disability can avail themselves of the 20% discount for persons with disabilities.

Karla Longjas is photographed at her apartment in Makati. Individuals diagnosed with Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD) exhibit symptoms such as self-harm, unstable relationships, intense anger, and impulsive or self-destructive behavior. BPD is a dissociative disorder that is not commonly diagnosed in the Philippines.

This story is one of the twelve photo essays produced under the Capturing Human Rights fellowship program, a seminar and mentoring project

organized by the Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism and the Photojournalists’ Center of the Philippines. 

Check the other photo essays here.

Larry Monserate Piojo – “Terminal: The constant agony of commuting amid the pandemic”

Orange Omengan – “Filipinos face the mental toll of the Covid-19 pandemic”

Lauren Alimondo – “In loving memory”

Gerimara Manuel – “Pinagtatagpi-tagpi: Mother, daughter struggle between making a living and modular learning”

Pau Villanueva – “Hinubog ng panata: The vanishing spiritual traditions of Aetas of Capas, Tarlac”

Bernice Beltran – “Women’s ‘invisible work'”

Dada Grifon – “From the cause”

Bernadette Uy – “Enduring the current”

Mark Saludes – “Mission in peril”

EC Toledo – “From sea to shelf: The story before a can is sealed”

Ria Torrente – “HIV positive mother struggles through the Covid-19 pandemic”

Sharlene Festin – “Paradise lost”

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Filipino Photojournalists on Working in a Post-Truth World

They're the unseen men behind some of the most memorable, the most haunting, the most controversial photos in media today. We talk to the country's top photojournalists about life and work in the post-truth world.

FRANCISCO GUERRERO: Introductions first. Who are you, what do you do?

CARLO GABUCO: I’m Carlo Gabuco, I’m a visual artist.

CARSTEN STORMER: But you’re not a visual artist anymore.

GABUCO: I know! I still can’t consider myself a photojournalist, but I’m doing this to document the ongoing war on drugs. I want to see the effects, what it’s doing to the society, the community, the families of those who have been affected by it. That’s what I’m trying to explore as of the moment.

EDWIN TUYAY: My name is Edwin Tuyay. I’m an old man already. I used to be a pornographer (laughs). I did a lot of shoots for FHM, 13 years at AsiaWeek magazine of course, as a staff photographer. Then I retired. Freelance—I still shoot freelance. I shoot everything.

VEEJAY VILLAFRANCA: I’m Veejay Villafranca, photographer. Freelance now for about eight years. Staff photographer before for the Philippines Graphic, covering news. And then I focused on different issues, personal projects that I started, [which I do] until today.

STORMER: Carsten Stormer; I’m a German journalist, a senior correspondent for a German news agency. I’m a writer and a filmmaker, and I’ve been living in the Philippines for nine years and been extremely busy for the last seven.

GUERRERO: Okay, I’m going to go back to what Carlo said: ‘I’m a visual artist, and I don’t call myself a photojournalist.’ Why do you define yourself as not a photojournalist, even though your work could be considered photojournalism?

GABUCO: Because I’m not trained as a photojournalist. I love photography. I’ve been doing photography since I was in college. My paintings are inspired by photography. I just want to be out there. I cannot be in my studio, working on paintings, I’d be stuck there for weeks. I don’t see everything happening outside; I want to see everything move forward in front of my eyes. For me, it’s curiosity, I guess.

GUERRERO: Does it go back to that idea of witnessing? Or is that too much of a clichéd idea?

STORMER: I think that’s what journalism is about. It doesn’t matter if it’s photojournalism—I think [the mission of] journalism in general is to be accurate and truthful. You can be biased to a certain extent, as long as you’re truthful and not faking anything.

GUERRERO: What’s the difference, though? What’s the difference between biased and truthful? Because I think a lot of people can’t make that distinction. If you’re biased, it can’t be the truth.

STORMER: Look at the situation of the Philippines at the moment. I think everyone covers the drug war. I think everyone agrees that no one is against fighting drugs. But a lot of people disagree on how it’s executed. And you can be against killing, but still be journalistically unbiased at the same time—personally have a clear stance that killing is the wrong answer.

VILLAFRANCA: Photojournalism in the Philippines is fairly young compared to other countries. It was in the last maybe ten, 15 years that it’s started to shape up, and it started to have its own identity, if I may say. What also I think is not discussed much nowadays is how photographs—especially news photographs—tell stories. It’s supposed to give the viewers a hint of, or the basic facts of what’s happening on the ground. And it’s usually up to the viewers to decide on what they want to believe. It depends on [the viewer’s] personal biases as well. But also, [the work is] supposed to spark debate or a discussion. That’s the role of photography in this kind of setting. Especially when the drug war pictures started to be published, everyone was saying [the photographs were] biased, that they were staged, [that the photographer] has political inclinations. Yes and no, but generally, a photograph is supposed to tell you what’s happening on the ground, no matter how it is framed, published, or printed.

Carsten Stormer

GUERRERO: Whether the reader likes it or not, this happened last night.

VILLAFRANCA: And also that’s one part of photojournalism that’s still strong now—I mean, that’s supposed to be strengthened: it’s two disciplines fused together: journalism and photography.

STORMER: I don’t think there’s a difference. You have to have the same principles and standards whether you’re a photographer or a writer.

GUERRERO: Maybe Veejay is speaking to the skill set—knowing how to use the tools, the camera instead of the pen.

TUYAY: The setting now is very different from ten years ago. We are very— ano ba tawag d’un —polarized.

VILLAFRANCA: Super polarized.

STORMER: Not only in the Philippines. Globally.

TUYAY: Globally. Even Europe, right? So three days ago, I shared this photo by Linus Escandor [who photographed a story on extrajudicial killings for CNN International]. I know the photographer, I know the writer. Then one Duterte supporter told me, lectured me, that ‘you should distinguish which is fake or not.’ You know what I did? I didn’t make any fuss. I just blocked him and removed his comment.

GUERRERO: I mean, it must be hard for someone who’s been practicing photojournalism for so long, for someone to come around and say…

TUYAY: Oo, lelecturan mo ako ? (laughs)

VILLAFRANCA: But I guess there didn’t use to be discussion. There’s no platform for people to react to the images, and to question their integrity.

TUYAY: There was no social networking then.

GUERRERO: Carlo, you’ve been very active recently with the extrajudicial killing coverage. As a photographer, have you been accused of faking a photograph?

GABUCO: Not yet. But I’m curious and bothered at the same time—every night you show pictures of killings and this and this… and still they say it’s fake news, it’s biased.

GUERRERO: Well, to play devil’s advocate, the World Press Photo competition, which is the mecca of photojournalism, has found [fake photographs] within prize categories. How does one defend photojournalism?

GABUCO: What I’m saying kasi sa EJK, it’s not just me on the scene. Carsten’s there. Linus is there. Dondi [Tawatao] is there. A lot of photographers are there, to see the same subject, but just different angles. So how can you fake that? How is that not true? So that still bothers me.

STORMER: I wish we were paid so much that we would actually be able to stage a fake! (laughs)

GABUCO: It’s frustrating, [but I think] it’s our responsibility. If people don’t believe you, it’s still your responsibility as the image-maker. Maybe you didn’t present it right, or maybe you did something…I cannot speak for everyone, because I’m not trained to do this—I’m just there. I just see it.

I think we’re living in a time, globally, where the importance of journalism can’t be underestimated. It shows how important it is for journalists to be there and report.

STORMER: I think we’re living in a time, globally, where the importance of journalism can’t be underestimated. It shows how important it is for journalists to be there and report, and despite all the opposition of these people claiming that they are fake news, that photographers stage [photos]. Unfortunately, it does happen to a very, very minor extent. But I’ve hardly seen more integrity in journalism than here. It’s quite incredible.

GUERRERO: So you’re saying that the general Philippine press—media, photographers, writers, TV journalists— has stepped up.

STORMER: I don’t know so much about TV journalism. But I know writers here, and I know photographers. It’s very hard to fake news. Like what Carlo said, we’re not the only ones there. There are dozens of people there, local and international. So if someone comes up with a fake story, there would be a lot of opposition from other people who would be at the same spot and can say “it’s not true, this is what happened.”

GUERRERO: If I could speak, for example, again to the fake awarded stories: people do raise their hands and say no. He got caught.

STORMER: It comes from the industry—it comes from photographers saying this guy has fake news.

GUERRERO: We’re policing ourselves. I don’t think people realize how much of an accusation it is to come up to a photojournalist and say “Oh, you faked that, that’s fake news.” That really hits the core.

STORMER: Oh absolutely. It hurts my integrity. If someone is faking a story, it falls back on my reputation as well. I would be the first one to say that, if I knew about someone faking a story, I would be the first one to speak up.

GUERRERO: Which, I guess is hard for people to believe, they think we’re all protecting each other. Which isn’t the case.

STORMER: No, why would I protect someone who’s hurting my livelihood?

Edwin Tuyay

TUYAY: You remember that picture of Raffy Lerma? The “Pieta”? No less than the president accused Lerma of staging it.

STORMER: With hundreds of witnesses? Using drones and everything.

TUYAY: You know this advertising guy Dennis Garcia? He was a composer—a member of Hotdog, top advertising guy. He’s the one who told the public that the photographers staged it. You know, sanay siya sa advertising, eh . So he thought that, because of the lights, that it was staged. He didn’t know that the lights there were coming from the TV crew, from the vehicles.

VILLAFRANCA: Maybe if that happened predigital, it might be harder to come up with the same image, because of technology. But now all the digital cameras—you can shoot 10,000 ISO. It will blow out the same. Siguro ’yung idea of misrepresentation or fakery, d’un nanggagaling , because of the technical aspect.

TUYAY: That’s why I answered Dennis. [I said] Bullshit, this is not advertising.

GABUCO: Actually that’s the danger nga every night, when we go out. There’s this seductive light, this seductive feeling—I know it’s wrong to say this, but everything is just… the lights, the corpse...

GUERRERO: It’s dramatic.

STORMER: Very dramatic.

GUERRERO: That’s the strength of the work. It’s a dramatic situation with dramatic light.

TUYAY: With your high-end camera nowadays, even the mirrorless camera...

VILLAFRANCA: Even just a hint of light.

GABUCO: Even with your iPhone, you can capture that.

GUERRERO: But I think the questioning of, let’s take a photograph, who’s taking the photograph is also because of that phrase, “everybody’s a photographer.” Everybody has taken their selfies, everyone has taken a picture of something and then Instagram-filtered it or warped their wide waist. Everybody feels capable of faking an image. So they also think, well, why not these professionals with all the tools in the world? Now, how do we fight against it? How do we keep the integrity and say, this is what we do, this is the reality—you might not like the reality that we’re photographing, but this is what’s happening.

VILLAFRANCA: There are several ways, I think. Engaging them would be one, but that takes a lot of time. I mean we hardly have any time already for ourselves. You go to the comments section and, damn! That’s a black hole right there!

STORMER: You can’t discuss with those people. They are resistant to facts and arguments. You can’t.

GUERRERO: Maybe we want to bring it to the day-to-day too: I mean I read a lot of these comments on Raffy’s photographs. I think people believe that you just show up, get out of the cab, go click-click and get back in the car, and you’re done. But what’s the day like?

VILLAFRANCA: It depends. Like me, I work on long-term projects. For example, my project on the gangs of Baseco. This was pre-EJK, and they were already in that scenario. They were trying to get out of drugs, poverty, all that. I committed to it, at first as a personal project and as a school project. But then afterwards it snowballed into something like a real-world project.

GUERRERO: Again, I’m trying to stress the fact that you don’t just show up take a picture and you’re gone.

VILLAFRANCA: Ah, no. [In the beginning] I hardly took any pictures. I took pictures of Baseco. Baseco is like our photographer’s go-to place for several issues—poverty, environment, organ-selling and all that. And then I met these people. But it took me four, five months before I could talk to them. When I was able to actually talk to the guys, then that started my dialogue with them. I would go there just to hang out with them. And yeah, it took me around two years before I could come up with the edit that I felt comfortable with.

GUERRERO: Wait, this is something again that I think that people aren’t aware of: that you actually build a relationship with your subjects in the course of your work. You interview, you talk to people, you’re taking photographs of someone’s home. There’s a relationship there—or a rapport, more than a relationship.

TUYAY: That’s one of the requirements of photojournalism. You have to engage your subjects.

STORMER: And it takes time, I mean, you’re entering people’s lives. They are opening up to you.

TUYAY: It’s hard to penetrate.

VILLAFRANCA: Basically you’re uninvited, eh.

TUYAY: Yeah, especially when a family is mourning and then you barge in? ‘How do you feel, ma’am?’

STORMER: I think that was the main difference between sincere journalism and for example, TV. And you see it here a lot when someone gets killed and they’re still at the crime scene, they’re horrified that they lost their relatives, and suddenly they have bright lights in their face and someone goes, ‘How do you feel?’

GUERRERO: But this is the negative perception of the mainstream media: microphone shoved in your face.

STORMER: I really disagree with this kind of behavior, because I think it’s wrong. We take pictures from behind or stay in the back. Or I would go back the next day or several days after, introduce myself, maybe come back again, and then sit down with them, when they’re not like in the worst moment of their lives to ask silly random questions like, ‘How do you feel? I’m Carsten, by the way.’

Villafranca: How do we engage these people about fakery—they don’t understand the responsibility that comes along with the job. Everyone will leave, all the news crew will fade out, but then [there are some photojournalists who stay with the story]

VILLAFRANCA: That’s actually the part of the job that hardly gets [attention]…you know, nobody notices that. Because you bear the brunt of this responsibility. And I think—going back to your question, how do we engage these people about fakery—they don’t understand the responsibility that comes along with the job. Everyone will leave, all the news crew will fade out, but then [there are some photojournalists who stay with the story]. Recently, one of the main guys that I photographed messaged me, ‘Hey, I’m in Baseco, you might want to meet.’ I went there, you know, just to keep in touch with them. [I’d been keeping in touch with them] for the longest time—it’s been ten years since I did that project, in 2007—so there is constant communication. The people that I’ve photographed, say, after Yolanda or after several other typhoons, it’s the same: Sometimes they’d text, like, ‘Sir, wala kaming pang gatas ,’ or ‘ Nasira ‘yung bahay ko ,’ or ‘My daughter or my son is in the hospital.’ How do you respond? You can only do so much.

TUYAY: You know, I envy these three guys, because they have these long-term projects. All my pictures were from assignments.

GUERRERO: But still, that sense of responsibility— nand’un rin , regardless of the duration.

TUYAY: Yeah, it’s part of the training. You have to engage, start a relationship, just like what Veejay was saying: you have to come back.

GUERRERO: But you know the engagement can happen over months, years, or minutes. It’s about intensity of engagement rather than duration. Would that be a fair statement?

Francisco Guerrero

STORMER: Sometimes you’re lucky and you have weeks or even months to uncover something. That really depends on you. You have to be able to empathize quickly and establish the trust very quickly and be able to enter people’s lives. You’re breaking in someone’s life, and you have to make them understand that you are not exploiting them but you actually want to tell what happened to them.

GUERRERO: I’m sure some of you worked in the Yolanda area. I was doing a workshop about what’s it like on the field, and I asked: Imagine that your house just got flooded, four of your family members have just died, and all of a sudden four photographers show up to your house. What do you do? Do you speak? It sort of brings it back home, because their bravery and their courage to share these stories is also something, I think, that’s overlooked. A lot of people think that, oh, it’s in their self-interest. Is it really, or is that part of the relationship now? [These people are] probably at the worst days of their lives and they’re trying to tell this story of what happened to them.

GABUCO: I think for me—I’ve realized this recently—there’s this moment, like what Carsten was trying to say, this moment, you’re in front of a grieving wife or a mother, you have to give them a moment to process everything and settle in. And you have to give yourself that moment to [process] how you’re going to present it, how you’re going to treat it, how you talk to them, everything. If you’re building that relationship, it’s not just them that needs to settle in. It’s you as well—as the start, as the voice, as the conduit. Again, it comes down to responsibility.

STORMER: You’re giving them a voice. And they are willing to take that opportunity. And that comes with enormous responsibility. You’re responsible to the people you’re covering, but also to your readers and viewers, to do the best of your abilities, to report accurately.

GUERRERO: How have these past months affected you professionally or personally? Like it or not, as journalists, we’re used to photographing something that’s happening to somebody else. But this, this is our home. We live here. This is our backyard. How has it affected you on a day-to-day basis? How has it affected your work?

VILLAFRANCA: I skipped the whole drug war thing, but generally covering news or issues is quite taxing at some point. Whether you have a family or not, professionally, since the jobs or assignments [are] also getting scarce, add that to the fact that foreign journalists and photographers are coming in. I take it day by day, as long as I find ways to continue my work.

Veejay Villafranca is a recipient of the 2008 Ian Parry Grant for his work in Baseco.

STORMER: I just don’t like people ending up dead at my doorstep. I really find it offensive. I find it rather scary that there is a huge consent in the population that it’s all right that so many people get killed. I think everyone can agree that fighting drugs is a good thing; it’s a necessary thing. Drugs are an evil menace to society [but] I find it very worrying that due process is abhorred.

GUERRERO: Especially for Carsten: You fly around the world. I mean, is there a bit more importanceor urgency to your work when you work locally?

STORMER: It’s not really a factor. It becomes more important because it is your home, yes. But the importance—I work a lot in the Middle East, I find it as important when this is happening at home. So yeah, I find it frightening.

Everything will sink in. The trauma, you will experience  during the shoot, but you’re blind, you don’t hear anything, you do your job. But when you come home to your family, that’s when everything will sink in.

TUYAY: Well, everything will sink in. The trauma, you will experience, of course, during the shoot. [But] you’re blind, you don’t hear anything, you just keep on doing your job. But when you come home to your family, that’s the time when everything will sink in. And you’ll be worried, what if somebody, one of my friends next door will end up dead tomorrow morning? That’s scary.

STORMER: I’m very careful because I’m not a local. I live here, I’m very happy to live here, but I’ve been living here for nine years, and there’s a reason. I’ve never experienced that level of fear within people. I think this is a shocking development within the society. If someone had told me a year ago that Filipinos are capable of accepting many people ending up dead, I would’ve said no way.

Veejay Villafranca

VILLAFRANCA: I was sitting with Carlo two days ago—we were having coffee, then he got a call from his network of the nightcrawlers—the guys that cover EJKs—that there was a raid right across my house. Well, my house is in a compound, but opposite it is a marginalized community, a settlement. And the PDEA guys did a raid there, 20 people got arrested. And that area’s been on my radar. I want to do something in that area, but I cannot, because it’s too close. The proximity is very close to my house. If I go inside and ask around, and I go back, they see me enter my compound, they would be like, ‘That guy is an intel.’

STORMER: I think this is one of the reasons why there is so much indifference at the moment: Because it doesn’t hit home for most people. Killings happen at night—not even that far away—but they happen at night, and when people wake up, the body is gone. It’s cleared. And it mostly happens in poor areas. It doesn’t happen in Dasmariñas Village. It doesn’t happen in Forbes Park. So people who could make a difference, they are not affected.

GUERRERO: But isn’t that the job of the photograph? Isn’t that its job to say look, it’s right here. This is it. This happened last night while you were asleep.

TUYAY: It doesn’t affect people anymore.

STORMER: I disagree. I think what the local journalists have achieved here with the drug war, I think without the photographers, the local photographers, this story would not have been that big, would not reach international news. Because of the quality and dedication of local journalists, the story has become so big. Now foreign journalists know about what’s going on. It’s like, why do people go to places like Payatas, Caloocan, Navotas? You don’t go to have fun.

GABUCO: I try to avoid working in Mandaluyong [where I live], but something’s always going on in Mandaluyong. Like there was this one time, I was doing a follow-up interview with this family near my house. It was a Monday, and Mondays are usually busy—usually a lot of killings happen on a Monday. I was doing an interview, then after that, I was planning to go to Manila Police District. I was doing an interview, I was wrapping up, then there’s this woman who approached me. She just said she saw a riding-in-tandem, wearing masks. They were all sure [that they] were the killers. Minutes after, a boy approached us, said someone got shot. I ran there. And yeah, there’s this guy, tricycle driver, his brain was splattered on the street. So many people there. There were witnesses. There are things that you cannot really avoid, but it’s scary whenever you go home at night. It scared the shit out of me. Like, Veejay—I was with Veejay the other day, I was telling him, always check your six.

GUERRERO: We don’t live in the safest country for journalists. A radio talk show journalist was killed in the province, and nobody really cares. It definitely speaks to the efficacy of the medium that so many people are against [our work]; so many people are calling out, ‘No, it’s fake, it’s fake.’ It definitely is hitting home. If it didn’t, people wouldn’t even care.

STORMER: Thing is, I understand where it comes from. People are fed up with the status quo in the Philippines. People don’t want to live in poverty, in corruption, in chaos anymore. So I think that’s what marched Duterte to power. So I understand where it comes from.

GABUCO: Basically, fear corrupts everything.

Photographs of Aleppo, Syria

STORMER: And, you know I’m not a Duterte supporter, I wouldn’t be if I was Filipino. But I think this guy actually genuinely wants to change your country. I think he’s very much mistaken about how he wants to achieve it. But when it comes to threats to journalists—I don’t think this administration would threaten journalists or have journalists killed. But who knows? There are people within the administration, within the police, or within drug syndicates who are certainly not happy with the amount of attention this is getting. And that’s scary.

TUYAY: That’s quite scary, yeah… from the syndicates. Mahirap ‘yun pag ikaw na -target. Just like what happened in Colombia, and Mexico.

STORMER: By these so-called vigilantes. There are no vigilantes here. But there are assassins.

VILLAFRANCA: There’s one photojournalist who was killed in the line of duty [in 2004]. His name is Gene Boyd Lumawag. He was actually the son of the president’s photographer. He was based in Davao, and had been covering Mindanao a lot. They went to Jolo with MindaNews—one of the biggest, most credible news outlets in Mindanao. And he was just shooting a sunset on the Jolo pier and he was shot at the back of his head.

TUYAY: Very young, at the age of 26.

GUERRERO: What are you working on now? What’s the next story that you’re working on that needs to be told?

STORMER: I think the challenge for Filipino journalists is to keep the story in the news. I find it already very much incredible that it has been breaking news for so long, internationally and locally. I think the biggest challenge is to keep it in the news.

GABUCO: During Martial Law, we didn’t have any solid photo books. That’s why now there are so many revisionists, apologists. This didn’t happen, where are the photographs?

VILLAFRANCA: There are, actually. Pero they hardly circulated.

Carlo Gabuco

GABUCO: You need to have solid publication, books, to prove that it did happen, that we went through this.

TUYAY: Next week I’ll embark [on] a project for the Japan International Cooperation Agency, all over Philippines. To pay the rent (laughs). I’m just waiting for an assignment. [It’s] funny that you mentioned Yolanda, I didn’t get any assignment from that incident. All they want is, ‘Can you do video?’ I realize I need to learn multimedia.

VILLAFRANCA: I’m working on the climate refugee book. It’s supposed to be out this year. So I’ve been at that issue, that story for like six, seven years now. There’s so many stories after. One reason why I kept going at it is just the science of it actually [drives away] the people…That became a challenge for me. That and also I’ve been trying to work with other photographers on trying to establish baseline information about Philippine photography in general. This is, I think, my way of—not naman combating fake news—but to establish what photojournalism really is in the Philippines. Because from the time of Sir Edwin and even the guys before that, [photojournalists] kept working, through the ’70s, ’80s, ’90s. And then a lot of them, their archives have been on the shelf. Sonny Yabao, Alex Baluyut, Derek Soriano…

GUERRERO: Photography is a very popular thing to pick up as a hobby. I think the younger generation needs to realize that, if you want to do this professionally, you have to make a living—but with ethics. You can’t be a practitioner and not have any ethics. The next step is, are people going to pay for your photos?

VILLAFRANCA: I kind of changed track with how I run my own personal workfl ow. I hardly rely on the waiting assignments. So I pitch, and since I work on long-term projects, because I want this project to be envisioned, to come into fruition. So I approach possible funders, grants. I pitched consistently after I went freelance in 2006 or 2007. Every day ‘yan , pre-social media.

TUYAY: What was the result?

VILLAFRANCA: Ah, wala —99 percent [of the time], hardly anyone answers.

STORMER: But that one percent pays the bills.

VILLAFRANCA: Sometimes it did!

STORMER: As long as you don’t compromise your work ethics. Like, I would never take an assignment for advertising. I wouldn’t compromise my integrity for money. But then again, I’m very, very lucky. I’m a trained writer, but I do mostly films now, because it funds my writing. I don’t rely on the payments anymore for the stories.

VILLAFRANCA: I think with photographers now, the business model should be questioned—or not questioned, but challenged.

Carlo Gabuco recently won a Magnum Foundation grant for his project "Less Than Human" which chronicles President Duterte's drug war through the eyes of affected children .

STORMER: And I think that’s where fake news comes from. You’re kind of staging stories. If you get paid 500 euros for a story where you work on a month or two months, it doesn’t make sense. You have to come up with something. Some people might think ‘Oh, I’m going to come up with something just to pay the bills.’ Quality does require funding. That’s as simple as it gets. You want to have quality journalism, you have to pay for that. And that goes for the editors, that goes as well for the readers—you can’t expect free news, and…well, we don’t work for free. It’s our livelihood. My kid wants to eat, my kid wants to go to school. This is my job. I have to get paid.

GUERRERO: Edwin, you’ve gone from staff to freelance.

TUYAY: It’s hard being a freelancer. But I do a lot of stuff, corporate, wedding, (laughs), the works. So right now, I hardly work on any hard news.

GUERRERO: And yet your portrait of Duterte was a cover.

TUYAY: Yeah, Time magazine bought it for one time use.

GUERRERO: But that was stock, you shot it before, you weren’t on assignment.

TUYAY: Yeah, I told them that it was an old photo. Still, they asked me to view. Then they liked that particular shot. They asked me to convert it to black and white. The rate was $1,500. I asked the editor, “Why that low?” Because they used to pay me $2,000 for a cover. Even Newsweek, they pay $2,000. They told me because subscriptions are going down.

GUERRERO: You said quality costs money, but my question then is: Who’s asking for quality anymore?

STORMER: By ‘quality,’ I mean truthful journalism. Not only getting the truth out; it’s really the truth in a journalistic kind of way. It has to be well-written, it has to be well-photographed. It takes a lot of time to get the access. You have to pay a lot of people, you have to pay the fixers, the driver, the car, whatever. I just did a film in [Iran] and just to do the film cost the company 20,000 euros.

GUERRERO: I might overstep my boundaries over here, but I’ve heard of stories of journalists selling out: writing politically biased news reports, because they have to pay for the bills. You know, people are handed envelopes, saying hey look, you’re getting paid five pesos per word—I have no idea what their rate is—but if you write it this way, here’s an envelope, just write it.

TUYAY: Worldwide naman ’yan, eh .

GUERRERO: I mean if you pay your journalists well, they might end up being uncorrupt.

VILLAFRANCA: I think there are political biases also, and their lineages, and personal biases would make them switch—of course the money.

STORMER: Well, why do you become a journalist in the first place? It’s like, you’re an idealist. You certainly don’t go into journalism to get rich. It’s a privilege to see history unfold in front of your eyes. It’s a real privilege. But you don’t choose to for the money.

GUERRERO: I think with privilege comes responsibility. I think we’ve all been in situations where—I have been in situations where I don’t take a photograph, because I know that that’s not ethically correct to do that.

Edwin Tuyay's most well-known recent work is a portrait of President Duterte for Asian Dragon magazine, which was also used by Time .

STORMER: I have an example. I was working in Mindanao, in 2008, I think. And there were five kids who had been killed by the Philippine Army. It was an accident, but I had the pictures. I decided not to show it in the Philippines, because I knew either side, whether it’s MILF or the Philippine Army, would use it for...

VILLAFRANCA: Propaganda.

STORMER: So I decided not show them.

VILLAFRANCA: I think it’s still personal. It’s the choice of the author. Either you’re a print journalist or a photographer. There goes integrity. Going back to your earlier question: how do you keep these things, how do we combat these fake news and all that? Keep your integrity intact, keep doing what you do, cover either the drug war, climate change, keep doing editorial assignments, it’s your work that will define it.

STORMER: And with that comes success.

VILLAFRANCA: Hopefully, success.

GUERRERO: With luck.

TUYAY: It’s a long journey, but...

STORMER: With a little bit of luck, if you produce quality work with integrity, you will be successful.

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