War Photographer (919 characters)

I had the opportunity to attend a lecture by war photographer Yoichi Watanabe.

Before that, I didn't know much about him; although I had heard his name, I only had a vague image of him as someone doing a somewhat dangerous job based on the word 'battlefield'.

From the very beginning, I was taken by surprise by his soft-spoken tone, which was the complete opposite of the impression I had of a battlefield. As I listened to stories about how he ended up in the profession of a war photographer and what kind of people he encountered on the battlefield, my imagination began to drift in a direction different from the image I had arbitrarily held of a war photographer.

It is a dangerous job where you never know when a bomb might hit. That is certainly true, but it seems he is very cautious about risk management because of that. He said that the work of a war photographer is 80% risk management and preparation for shooting, and 20% camera technique and interviewing. When you think about it, it is a life-threatening job, so it is natural to proceed with caution, but I was a little surprised that camera technique was positioned as secondary.

I had thought that the battlefield was a survival world completely different from the peaceful Japan of today. However, listening to his story, I realized that this perception was wrong. The forms of happiness, daily life, and customs are the same on the battlefield as they are in Japan. Families eat breakfast together, work hard, and children go to school. Even in countries at war, the basic life of a human being and the way they feel happiness are the same.

What does he value as a war photographer? Of course, since he goes abroad, language skills are essential. If you don't understand the language, you can't do the job. But that's not all. The most important thing is respect. Interacting with the local people, building trust, and respecting their culture, customs, and way of thinking. Without that, he says, you cannot go to the battlefield to talk to people or take pictures. Therefore, he spends a long time building a relationship of trust with the local people even before entering the country. He says he can only go to the battlefield after becoming like family, like precious friends.

In Japan, thankfully, the battlefield is an extraordinary occurrence. I was taught the significance of going to that battlefield, interacting with the people there, listening to their stories, and taking pictures. It was about conveying what must be valued most as a human being.