Service

Kesha Brown, photographed at the United States Military Academy at West Point during graduation week.

"This summer, the photographer Platon took pictures of hundreds of men and women who volunteered to serve in the military and were sent to Iraq or Afghanistan. He followed them on their journey through training and deployment, after demobilization and in hospitals, to compile a portrait of the dedication of the armed services today...."

READ ON at newyorker.com

___________________

Mike  (Thanks to Dave Sailer)

Comments

[David]

Those are beautiful. I'd love to see all of them.

[David Bennett]

First class.

[Mike]

The subject matter is important. The compositions are sometimes interesting. The images feel like over-processed digital-to-bw. Too much contrast, too much sharpening.

[yunfat]

Alas, another photographer who has fallen for the trap of irrational digital exuberance. So sad to see HDR enter the mainstream. All the dark areas and skintones have halos and all the blacks (shadow detail) have different values despite uniform lighting (look at the outdoor scenes). What I thought was a flickr gimmick seems to have gained a foothold with more mainstream media... what a pity. This photographers film stuff is miles better, check out his site:

http://www.platonphoto.com/

Seems the transition to digital has claimed the soul of one more artist whose skill is clearly with analog media. Some people just shouldn't switch.

[Mike Hess]

As with all great artists, Platon has taken what could be called images of loss, grief, and tragedy and made them beautiful images. These are images that don't just remain silent, they grab you and make you look deeper. They each tell a story that will make you question your beliefs. It is photojournalists like Platon, Steve McCurry, James Nachtwey, and many others that truly elevate the medium to new heights.

Mike

[Paul Amyes]

Good work, I think the post processing suited the subject matter.

[Dave Kee]

Made me think of the work of Ivan Albright:

http://www.tfaoi.com/newsmu/nmus40b.htm

[Chuck Albertson]

The audio interview on the New Yorker site reveals that Platon has just been made staff photographer, so we'll see more of his work in the magazine.

[Dan K.]

Once again Platon amazes me!

While I am not a fan of the "Dave Hill" over-processed look, I feel that the post-processing in the images are well suited for the subject. The results seem to show every bit of fine detail in regard to the exterior appearance of the subject, and it also seems to be an attempt to show a contrast between the fine and detailed structure of the exterior to the hectic emotions within the subjects portrayed.

Bravo Platon! You never cease to amaze me!

[David]

I think the processing is well within the boundaries of tasteful. He's managed to do what he wanted to do. Just because you know he used some sort of technique to accomplish the look of his images doesn't mean it's bad. Sometimes that awareness gets in the way.

Yunfat, on your website, you use a few techniques in a few images that are common and perhaps, in the same way you write off HDR, overused and make the images overly process driven. I guess I just don't see how you can dismiss this guys use of this process in such a cut and dried way. I only really notice the HDR artifacts in an objectionable way in one or two of those images, even then it's a fairly minor flaw as those images carry themselves in content.

As photographers, we tend to look at images in a number of different ways..technique always looms as one aspect. I do it with every image i look at...if it's done well, that technical aspect of my evaluation of an image is ditched and I move on to enjoying the picture, if the content has merit. The look of these images is just fine and dandy in my book. I consider me, to be, very sensitive to the HDR thing. This guy puts it together well.

[Stan B.]

I'd love to see original prints- and as for the "digital over processing," I really don't think there's anything there that couldn't have been done via the analog darkroom.

[erlik]

Ah, I never knew he was the author of the Putin portrait that received World Press Photo Award this year.

Anyway, as to the soldiers... the approach works for some of the photos and doesn't work for others. And I think it crosses the line over to photo illustration quite a lot. Very stylized. Like that soldier with a rocket launcher. Almost like a drawing.

[Michael Carrithers]

Thank you very much for posting this. As more of us are drawn into the military, we need to see more different takes on what that means. Is this good journalism? Yes. Is this art? Yes. Good stuff!

[Harry Lime]

I feel these images are framed and over processed to the point where they look like adverting art. It takes away from the real story behind these images.
We're talking about war here, not a Nike ad.

[Michael W]

The photos left me completely unmoved. It felt like the photographer was just going through the motions. The over processing was also a distraction from what content there was. Of course my reaction is probably largely due to the fact I borrowed a library copy of In Flagrante by Chris Killip yesterday & have hardly been able to put it down. There is a photographer who was truly engaged with his subject. The compositions are exquisite but the photos are always about the content - the lives being recorded.

[Bob Wong]

I like the pictures and the way they have been processed to push through emotional content. I can't help but admire the determination of service, military capability and great sacrifice that they also depict.

I must say though that it scares the bejabbers out of me not to also see the moral will to question the reasons why and weigh the costs of such sacrifice.

[Diego]

I don't care much about the technical details of the photos (halos and oversharpening). They're still awesome photos.