Afghanistan // Outtakes

The Tourist

 Anthony will be guest blogging for me for a few days. Enjoy the eccentric meanderings of Lisa V Lupo Photography’s most valued employee.

I may have just finished my most interesting roll of film to date. In the span of 15 frames, I captured a convoy (from the inside), a death celebration (almost like a post-funeral charity-event), and some assorted Afghan street scenes. [Expect to wait another month for the film to get sent, developed, and scanned.] For those that are queasy, be prepared for a few pictures of locals tearing strips of meat from a severed bull’s head. One elder waived an uncooked cow ankle at me, hoof included. Not really sure if that’s an invitation or warning.

At any rate, thank goodness for the latitude of Portra 400. I should get away with a few hasty draws.

Yes, I will sing the praises of film until my dying days, but only a fool brings a 37-year-old MF film camera on mission out-and-about in Afghanistan. There are easier ways to get the results you want. Which leads me to a simple and obvious revelation: film is for controlled situations, digital is for everything else.

Allow me to describe what I look for in a picture taken in Afghanistan. [I wish I had more pictures to show you, but Lisa hasn’t received my second batch of film yet. Film will teach you patience.]

1. Old or ‘Afghanned’ infrastructure. To ‘Afghan’ something is to find a creative and undoubtedly dangerous solution to an engineering problem. This is a term of endearment. If I had a super-telephoto lens, I’d capture a few shots of children climbing on burned out Toyota shells in the junkyard behind our compound. Tetanus anyone? I never pass up an opportunity snap a shot of decaying infrastructure— a bit of a cliché I admit. But Afghanistan serves these up on a desiccated platter.
   
   
   
    What you can't see in this picture: the broken glass littered all over the floor.
   
   
2. Soldier Portraits. I take the same approach to soldier portraits as portraits of American civilians. I want the soldier to look at his picture years from now and fail to force back a smirk. Most of the pictures I take are facetious or tie into an inside joke that has come to characterize the soldier’s personality. Then there are classic portraits (those that are simply aesthetically appealing), and those that incorporate some narrative or editorial aspect. Certain soldiers are better suited for these latter portraits than others. I should be doing a wounded-warrior-type editorial shoot in the next few days. These photos are the most difficult. I’ve found you have to walk a fine line between melodrama and interesting. I’ve found that reality can be frustratingly melodramatic at times.
   
   

   
   
   
3. Afghans, especially Elders. Tight, close portraits of older Afghans are especially telling. The turbulence of the last 50 years of Afghanistan is, to borrow a phrase, ‘etched in the scars and deep wrinkles of their faces.’ They are a fascinating portrait subject. Most Afghans love having their pictures taken, so these shots are common and fairly easy. Explaining to them that I’m using a film camera that doesn’t display the picture on an LCD screen, however, is much more difficult.
   
   
   
    Notice the little flower in his hand. These portraits are teeming with interesting subtleties. Hopefully Lisa gets my others soon.
   
   
4. War Icons. I love taking pictures of items that have come to symbolize this era of warfare: HESCO barriers, concertina wire, bullet-holes, ‘ECM-off’ signs, military working dogs, etc. Many of these items will soon fade into obscurity, like the C-rations or Lucky Strikes of old.
   
   
   
    The whole 'concrete barrier over gravel' design concept probably won't catch on stateside, fortunately.
   
   
5. Anything else of interest. I am an amateur photographer. My approach is not results-driven (here at least). I experiment for the sake of it. So I like to try different lighting situations, films, etc.

 

 I love film color.

The NVG bag tied to my kit contains an outmoded and ungainly photographic relic. While I might look like a tourist, I’m without a doubt more intellectually engaged with my surroundings than those around me. The world is fundamentally different through a waist-level finder, which is why photography in Afghanistan is as much a performance art as anything else.

Epilogue

It takes roughly a month to develop a roll of film shot in Afghanistan, which is why all the pictures above (with the exception of one, guess which?) have been recycled from previous shoots. Allow me to explain: no one (reputable) develops film in Afghanistan. This means that my film has to travel from Afghanistan to the US by mail. This can take up to three-weeks. (Side note: Mail sent to Afghanistan arrives in roughly one week, or three times as fast by comparison.) When Lisa receives my film, she has to send it to a professional photo lab, in our case, Richard's Photo Labs in SoCal (another 2-3 days). There's roughly a 5-business day turnaround from RPL before the scans are available for download. All told, this process takes about a month. On the horizon, however, should be a series of Portra 160 and 400 portraits and some experimental shots taken with Ilford 3200 black & white pushed to 6400. I'm very excited for the Ilford to come out: should be pretty grainy and edgy.

Afghanistan Series // Mamiya M645

And now a word from my dear husband in our segment: The Afghanistan Series.

A deployed soldier dedicates at least 15 mins of every hour to serial escapism. Everyone has their thing-- usually an item that be bought or built, like a motorcycle or house, but occasionally an activity, like rock climbing or bow hunting. These tokens are an extension-- sometimes even a caricature-- of the soldier's personality. These are the things we think about to pass the time, and the things that come to symbolize our hope for a safe return and renewed (this time successful) quest for self-actualization. I chose medium format film photography. 


Medium format film is easily twice as large as 35mm film, which means, typically, that an old medium format camera can capture more detail than even the best Nikon or Canon digital cameras. Most manufacturers stopped making new medium format film cameras in the 90s, and the cameras themselves are technologically primitive (almost all are manual focus!). But even though my original Mamiya M645 was made sometime in the 1970s, it should still produce amazing high-quality prints. 


I am not one to wake up early. The early bird can get the worm for all I care. Yet now I wake up, consistently, at 0500hrs for early sunrise photography-- when the light coming over the city paints the compound in striking orange hues. No one is around to demand that I take their picture (Afghans are very insistent on having their pictures taken).

It could be said that the object of photography is to create beautiful images, or, in my case, to capture this deployment for posterity. No; this is nothing more than a way to pass the time and remain engaged. I will continue to look for the perfect exposure, but that is meaningful only insofar as I feel closer to what Lisa is doing back home. 


When laying in the grass to take this picture of my Mamiya, I was startled by an earth-shaking explosion. The Taliban detonated a vehicle borne IED near a bus carrying locals that work on a nearby FOB, killing several. That is the thing about escapism; eventually, you are called back to reality.