The Big Picture.

Det här är ganska off-topic på vår blog, men ni måste kolla in Boston Globe´s bildblog The Big Picture som sedan drygt två år tillbaka postar tunga bildreportage där ofta bilderna talar för sig själv. Inspirerade av gamla klassiska magasin som Life Magazine och National Geographic postar de flera reportage varje månad; politiska konflikter, djurliv, events, folkgrupper, naturkatastrofer, urban utveckling, rymden, sport, u name it. Det är oftast mycket bra foton, men fokus ligger ändå inte på digital fototeknik eller foto som konst, utan på vad bilden verkligen visar. Tips på highlights är 100 år gamla foton i färg från centrala Ryssland, den vita fattigdomen i Sydafrika, Rio´s knarkkrig, Dagen D 1944 och Scenes fron the recession. Amerikanska tidningars bloggar av denna typ brukar vara ganska vinklade och politiska, men The Big Picture låter oftast fotografierna säga sitt, i kombination med de ganska neutrala kortfattade bildtexterna. Allting är relativt, men det här är en jävligt intressant och fascinerande bildblog. Om ni surfar in på deras blog så var beredd på ibland ganska jobbiga intryck. Här kommer lite random pics från deras hundratals reportage, där jag har utelämnat de magstarka bilderna så här i juletider, på gott och ont…

Texterna under bilderna är rippade direkt från The Big Picture.

Alleged drug traffickers who did not want to identify themselves, pose for a photo as they stand on a street at a slum in western Rio de Janeiro, Brazil on Nov. 7, 2010

On February 13, 2010 NASA’s Cassini spacecraft approached close to Saturn’s moon Mimas, approximately 70,000 km away, and created this image of the icy satellite. Saturn’s limb and upper atmosphere are visible in the background.

A soldier evacuating residents carries a flood victim to a helicopter in Sanawa, Pakistan’s on August 5, 2010. 

Praying Mantis – Pseudocreobotra wahlbergii. This beautiful whalbergii evolved through two of its nymph-stages on the Barberton Daisy at left, surviving because of its bright color which blended so well with the flower. Towards the end of its growth into an adult, it became a little more adventurous (but not much more) as pictured here. Once it had shed the layer in this picture, it became a fully-fledged adult, and departed after about two weeks. Total stay in this tiny ecosystem was approximately six weeks.

Dressed as Santa Claus, Einar Sveinsson of Iceland comforts patient Hasel Sanchez at the emergency room of the Benjamin Bloom Children’s Hospital in San Salvador, El Salvador on Saturday, Dec. 25, 2010.

Oasis. (Photo and caption by Nam In Geun)

Frost clings to spiderwebs and the statue of Lord Alfred Tennyson as freezing fog surrounds the tower of Lincoln Cathedral as plummeting temperatures continue to grip the UK on December 20, 2010 in Lincoln, United Kingdom.

A tourist in a Mrs. Claus t-shirt poses for a photo in front of a Christmas tree which she decorated on Waikiki Beach in Honolulu, Hawaii on December 25, 2010.

View of the airfield at Naval Air Station (NAS) Ford Island and flames from burning ships in the background taken during the Japanese attack, 7 December 1941

Afghan children with sheep walk through a path covered with fallen leaves in Panjwai district, Afghanistan’s Kandahar province, on Friday, Nov. 26, 2010.

A Mexican soldier arranges blocks of marijuana, weighing a total of 46 tons, before they are incinerated at a military base in the border city of Tijuana May 11, 2010

WBC boxing champion Vitali Klitschko (right) of Ukraine lands a punch on Shannon Briggs of the U.S. during their WBC Heavyweight Championship boxing bout in Hamburg October 16, 2010. Klitschko won the fight by points after twelve rounds.

Homeless people attend a Christmas mass celebrated in a bus in Nice, southeastern France on December 25 2010.

A tremendous sinkhole caused by the heavy rains of Tropical Storm Agatha in Guatemala City was estimated to be 30 meters wide and over 60 meters deep. As the sinkhole formed, it swallowed a clothing factory about three miles from the site of a similar sinkhole three years earlier. The clothing factory had closed only an hour before it plunged into the Earth.

A gold miner smiles as he climbs down into a mine shaft in Manica Province, near the Zimbabwe border, September 18, 2010. Hundreds of miners work in individual claims rented from local landowners. 

A Christmas tree floats along the Yenisei River as members of a local winter swimmers’ club take part in a fancy-dress bathing performance to celebrate the upcoming New Year, with the air temperature at around -21 degrees Celsius (- 5.8 degrees Fahrenheit), in the Siberian city of Krasnoyarsk on December 26, 2010. 

Andre Coetzee, 57, drinks a mug of coffee at a squatter camp for poor white South Africans at Coronation Park in Krugersdorp, South Africa on March 6, 2010. A shift in racial hiring practices and the recent global economic crisis means many white South Africans have fallen on hard times.

Catholic worshipers leave the St. Esprit Church after a midnight Christmas Mass in Harbiye, downtown Istanbul, Turkey, on December 25, 2010.

Cars lie overturned after the highway they were travelling on was destroyed in an earthquake in Santiago February 27, 2010.