Rowan Sims | Humanitarian & Travel Photographer

São Paulo Favelas, Brazil

Rowan Sims — Tue, 24 Jan 2012 02:50:29 +0000

São Paulo, Brazil’s largest city, and the world’s 7th with almost 20 million people, is also home to some of the largest slums in Latin America. Brazil’s favelas are everything you imagine an urban slum to be: overcrowded, unsanitary, and run by crime. Of course, wherever crime and poverty rule, it is always the vulnerable who suffer the most, and the favelas of Brazil are no exception. The children who are raised in the favelas generally miss out on the basics in every sense of the word. Malnutrition means health problems, lack of income means no education, which of course means these children are extremely vulnerable to being preyed on by the drug traffickers and pimps that rule the favelas. The implications are obvious.

I was lucky enough to be able to visit a couple of the larger favelas in Sao Paulo with my continuing work with Iris Ministries. Access has been granted to the favelas because of the fantastic work Iris are doing to help the children and families that live there. From feeding programs to children’s parties, drop-in centres for youth to helping families find places to live, Iris Ministries are changing one life at a time by loving them in very practical ways.

My time in the favelas was like nothing I have seen before, and meeting the people that call these concrete jungles home was humbling. I was limited as to when and where I could photograph for security reasons, but I still managed to capture the heart of the work being done there, as well as some of the beautiful people that I met.

Children’s Day, Mozambique In Mozambique, one of the world’s five poorest countries, Children’s...
Iris Ministries, Pemba, Mozambique For 16 years, Heidi and Rolland Baker have been rescuing...
September 2011 Desktop Wallpaper In case it isn’t obvious from looking at my last...

Rabari – Encounters With The Nomadic Tribe

Rowan Sims — Mon, 19 Dec 2011 03:53:16 +0000

Mitchell Kanashkevich‘s travel and documentary images have long been a source of inspiration to me. The Sydney-based photographer has an incredible ability to create images of people and cultures that make you feel like you know them personally. Rabari is Mitchell’s latest ebook (and the first of what will hopefully be many ebooks published by Light Stalking), which documents the nomadic Rabari people of rural India. This personal project of his was what he refers to as “the first thing that really put me on the map as a photographer.” Although he produced this work before he was ever really “on the map”, the strength of the photographs, and his approach to his craft, show why he has become a well-known name in the heavily congested world of travel photography.

This ebook is a fantastic combination of beautiful images and very insightful and detailed background information. He starts with some general background information about the project, where the idea came from, and where it has taken him since. He also begins with some invaluable practical considerations with regard to shooting in a foreign country/culture, eg. transportation, guides, translators, etc. Mitchell includes a list of all the gear he used for this project (which, like my own travel setup, was very minimal), his perspectives on gear, and a brief overview of his workflow and backup system.

The main body is comprised of ten full-page images, each with detailed background information about his vision for the image and the process of creating it. The full-page image includes technical data (aperture, shutter-speed, ISO, and focal length) and in the following pages Mitchell details everything from the background and vision for the image to the lighting (including lighting diagrams), posing, and composition. He also discusses the biggest challenge he found in creating the image, and how he overcame that challenge. Finally, you can see before and after versions of his post-processing workflow and a step-by-step breakdown of adjustments made in Adobe Photoshop and Lightroom.

This ebook is an invaluable wealth of knowledge and insight for any photographer, especially those wanting to engage in travel or cultural photography. Mitchell has generously shared so much of not only his skill and knowledge, but also his passion, heart, and vision. This is undoubtedly one of the most valuable educational photography tutorials I have come across so far. I look forward to seeing what Mitchell and Light Stalking come up with in the future.

You can go straight to LightStalking.com and buy Rabari – Encounters With The Nomadic Tribe here. Get $5 off until Christmas Day.

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December 2011 Desktop Wallpaper

Rowan Sims — Wed, 30 Nov 2011 19:12:41 +0000

I had about a week of downtime in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil following my time with Iris Ministries Brazil in Sao Paulo and Nova Friburgo, so I was dragged from one tourist location to another by our local friends there whether I wanted to or not. I was quickly reminded how frustrating it can be to be forced to try and be creative in less than ideal circumstances. Bad light, limited time, and hundreds of tourists aren’t a recipe for great travel photographs. I was taken up to Pao de Queijo (Sugar Loaf Mountain), which I must admit was spectacular, and had to stall as long a humanly possible for the sun to drop down in the sky a little to get this cityscape. Any decent travel photo of Rio wouldn’t be complete without the Cristo Redentor (Christ The Redeemeer). Links for desktop and iPad are below.

Free Desktop Wallpaper
Free iPad Wallpaper

September 2011 Desktop Wallpaper In case it isn’t obvious from looking at my last...
May 2011 Desktop Wallpaper Click on image for the free downloadable version. Today’s the...
April 2011 Desktop Wallpaper I’ve been working on simplifying my images recently. When shooting...

Iris Ministries, Pemba, Mozambique

Rowan Sims — Sun, 13 Nov 2011 22:00:03 +0000

For 16 years, Heidi and Rolland Baker have been rescuing children off the streets of Mozambique and giving them a life they would never have had otherwise. Under Iris Ministries, they house, feed, and love these children in a way I have rarely seen elsewhere. I had the privilege of spending ten weeks with the children in the base in Pemba, and was constantly thrown by the striking contrast between the brutal poverty and stunning beauty of the small city.

Children’s Day, Mozambique In Mozambique, one of the world’s five poorest countries, Children’s...

Children’s Day, Mozambique

Rowan Sims — Thu, 08 Sep 2011 00:26:56 +0000

In Mozambique, one of the world’s five poorest countries, Children’s Day is one of the biggest events of the year. It’s bigger than Christmas. It seems ironic that children would be celebrated this way given the heartbreaking poverty and abuse that they are so often subjected to in this African nation. Decades of poverty, civil war and some of the worst natural disasters the world has ever seen guarantee that many of Mozambique’s children are raised by the streets due to being orphaned or abandoned. Most of them find ways of surviving as only the desperate know how, but a few of the lucky ones are rescued from this cruel existence by an organisation called Iris Ministries. Founded by Heidi and Rolland Baker about 16 years ago, Iris Ministries rescue and care for thousands of children, giving them love and hope and a future.

On Children’s Day, the children of Iris Ministries’ base in Pemba celebrate the only way Mozambicans know how: with chicken! They not only feed all the children that live in the children’s centre, they also feed all the local children from the village surrounding the base. All 4500 of them! This is an undertaking that you can’t even begin to imagine. The chaos is something I have never seen anywhere in my travels. Apart from a few hairy moments while handing out bottles of water to the crowds of children waiting in the sun to be fed, the event was remarkably painless. Fortunately for me, they love the camera, which makes my job a lot easier.

Iris Ministries, Pemba, Mozambique For 16 years, Heidi and Rolland Baker have been rescuing...
São Paulo Favelas, Brazil São Paulo, Brazil’s largest city, and the world’s 7th with...
September 2011 Desktop Wallpaper In case it isn’t obvious from looking at my last...

September 2011 Desktop Wallpaper

Rowan Sims — Tue, 30 Aug 2011 22:58:00 +0000

In case it isn’t obvious from looking at my last post date, I’ve been off the radar for awhile. I’ve been in Mozambique for three months, which I’ll share about soon, and have had virtually no internet access while there. Now that I’m finally back in the world of communication, I can get back into the blogging thing with a free wallpaper just in time for September. This one is a cityscape from Sao Paulo, Brazil, overlooking Heliopolis, which is the largest favela (slum) in Latin America. I’ve been working with Iris Ministries here for the last few weeks since Mozambique. Click on the image for the large wallpaper, or HERE for the small. I hope you enjoy it. There’ll be more on my adventures soon!

December 2011 Desktop Wallpaper I had about a week of downtime in Rio de...

May 2011 Desktop Wallpaper

Rowan Sims — Sun, 01 May 2011 12:49:04 +0000

Click on image for the free downloadable version.

Today’s the first of May. Hence the new desktop wallpaper. Today is also the first day of my last month here in Melbourne, because in 2 weeks we are getting back on a plane and heading to Mozambique and Brazil for 5 months to work with Iris Ministries. I’ll write a little more about that in due course. For now, please just enjoy the new desktop wallpaper from St Kilda, Melbourne. Personally, I prefer the vertical version, but let’s be honest, vertical images look crap on horizontal screens.

April 2011 Desktop Wallpaper I’ve been working on simplifying my images recently. When shooting...
December 2011 Desktop Wallpaper I had about a week of downtime in Rio de...

Below The Horizon

Rowan Sims — Sat, 16 Apr 2011 04:21:14 +0000

For photographers, there is a plethora of resources out there, both digital and physical, from workshops to books, online tutorial videos to ebooks, to help us grow and develop our craft and business. A lot of it is gold, but of course, a lot of it is complete rubbish, or at least repetitive. Craft and Vision, however, have well and truly placed themselves in the former category as a resource of photography ebooks for irresistible prices. I have a growing collection of them, but I’ve only recently got around to reading them and putting my newfound knowledge into practice.

Which brings me to Below The Horizon. This offering from Dave Delnea focuses on shooting during twilight hours (while the sun is below the horizon). I know for myself that in the past I have fallen for the trap of shooting the colourful and dramatic sunset, then packing up and going home. Dave manages to pack a lot of material into this relatively short ebook, from describing the different twilight periods to essential gear to technique to balancing and adding light. There is a lot to think about and put into practice. This is a time of day that opens up a whole new world of unique light and possibilities, and this ebook will give you the knowledge and techniques to get out there and capture it well. I’m sure I will keep coming back to it repeatedly.

After finishing reading through it, I made the most of having the evening to myself and went out with the intention of staying out until well after the sun went down to try this stuff out. I got to St Kilda beach here in Melbourne about half an hour before sunset to scout around for a good location to shoot the disappearing light, and decided on this old pier. With a thousand people around me shooting the sunset on their phones and point-and-shoot cameras, I waited patiently for the sun to go down and the light to really start to fade, all the while making test-shots and playing with various compositions. When the balance of the light in the sky, on the pier, and in the light at the end of the pier was just right, I got the shot I’d been envisioning since I walked onto the pier an hour earlier.

Nikon D3s, 5s, f/11, ISO200, 70mm.
Click on the image to license or buy a print.

All of Craft & Vision’s ebooks are $5, so give up today’s coffee and go buy one. They come in PDF and iPad format. You won’t regret it.

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The International Guild of Visual Peacemakers

Rowan Sims — Fri, 15 Apr 2011 01:34:37 +0000

This post has been a long time coming, as with most things that I finally manage to accomplish. I first discovered the International Guild of Visual Peacemakers (IGVP) about a year ago. I had just made the move to Melbourne from New Zealand, and I was beginning to seriously reconsider the direction I was headed with my photography. I wasn’t really getting the satisfaction I had previously from the wedding and portrait work I had been doing in Wellington, and to be honest, I was struggling to put the effort in that I felt my clients deserved. About the same time, I discovered this thing that has become known as ‘humanitarian’ photography through reading a book by David duChemin, a photographer who has become one of my heroes. As I began to read, research, and learn more about this intriguing specialty, I knew immediately and without a doubt that I had just discovered my calling, if there’s such a thing.

One of my discoveries of that not-so-little investigation was the IGVP, a rapidly-growing community of photographers, videographers, cinematographers, and no doubt many other -graphers. “We are visual communicators devoted to peacemaking and breaking down stereotypes by displaying the beauty and dignity of various cultures around the world.” In a world where the vast majority of the visual media that is fed to us daily is heavily biased and intentionally controversial, the community of IGVP aims to be a growing voice of peace, unity, tolerance, understanding, and inspiration.

In the short time that IGVP has existed, the community has grown dramatically, and I have been lucky enough to meet some incredibly talented and inspirational people who share my passion for using their powers for good. I consider it a privilege to be part of this community, and I look forward to what the future holds for IGVP and the work being done by its members.

A special thanks to co-founder Mario Mattei, the heart and mind behind IGVP, for his dedication and hard work towards this community.

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April 2011 Desktop Wallpaper

Rowan Sims — Sat, 02 Apr 2011 05:35:04 +0000

I’ve been working on simplifying my images recently. When shooting subjects that you don’t have a lot of control over (eg. landscapes), this is particularly difficult, but I’m slowly making progress I think. It seems that removing things from a frame is much harder than adding to it. Click on the image for the small downloadable wallpaper (1200×800), and click HERE for the large one (2400×1600). Hope you like it.

Castle Point, New Zealand.

May 2011 Desktop Wallpaper Click on image for the free downloadable version. Today’s the...
December 2011 Desktop Wallpaper I had about a week of downtime in Rio de...