Foundry Photojournalism Workshops 2012

[Greenside]

The highly regarded Foundry Workshops are coming to Chiang Mai this year. At the invitation of the Documentary Arts Asia (more about that and their festival in another thread), and by arrangement with Chiang Mai University, the week long course will start on July 29th. This is a rare opportunity to learn from some experienced photojournalists.

More details on their website and also the Chiang Mai Documentary Arts Festival.

[harrry]

I see no reason for dual pricing for this,

[TheWalkingMan]

I see no reason for dual pricing for this,

USD $975 for the mugs

or

USD $475 for local photographers from India, Pakistan, Nepal, Sri Lanka, Tibet, Thailand, Burma, Vietnam, Philippines, Bhutan, Laos, Cambodia,Indonesia, and Malaysia.

Dual pricing rears its ugly head again.

[Greenside]

As far as I know, these workshops are held in different locations around the world and they want to encourage people from the region to take part rather than have, in this case, attendees fly in from Europe or the US. There's an FAQ on their website which addresses the question although it relates to last year's event in Brazil.

The kind of dual pricing you disparage is presumably the practice of charging different rates at national parks and other "attractions" in Thailand, although it is rife in China, Vietnam and plently of other places too. The rights and wrongs of using the higher spending power of tourists to subsidise the entry costs of those who might otherwise be unable to appreciate their own heritage, has been debated a hundred times on TV and my impression is that many of us object to the way the rules are applied (ie if you are white and western looking you pay more while people from Korea, Japan and Vietnam are seldom if ever challenged) as much, or more than, the underlying principle. It's also poorly explained and has huge differences where there needn't be but TIT.

I have no links with this other than helping the Documentary Arts Asia project spread the word. It seems to me that we are fortunate to have this coming to our backyard as it were, and for people planning to make or further a career in photojournalism the fees don't seem unreasonable although they're out of my reach at the moment.

Edited February 9, 2012 by Greenside

[Genericnic]

I'm with @TheWalkingMan on this one. It is one thing to have the dual pricing issue internal to Thailand (I disagree with it but I'm ok with it since I have been around tourist areas throughout the world and they pretty much all do it ... even in the US), but to have international organization come in and do the same thing just doesn't cut it. They noted "they want to encourage people from the region to take part rather than have, in this case, attendees fly in from Europe or the US." In my case, I am not an attendee that would be flying in from the US. I live here in Chiang Mai. So, how does the dual (double) pricing apply to me?

I did find it interesting on the registration information that they limit the number of participants to 96 for the "locals" at $475 but for all of the "others" there is unlimited registration at $975. One would think that would be reversed if they truly wanted to encourage the "local" photographers to attend.

Overall, As we would say in the US, <deleted>.

For now, I would recommend anyone in the higher cost category refrain (boycott, if you will) from attending this workshop. There is no need to encourage international organizations to adopt the bad habits of other countries.

Just my thoughts on it.

David

[RAZZELL]

Daniel Berehulak's a good bloke, Guttenfelder has won more awards than you can shake a stick at (not surprising as World Press and Pulitzer judges love agency boys and he works for AP)...not too sure about Haviv and VII - the ethos of which seem's to be all about promoting them as "photojournalistic superstars".

The workshop is quite good value really if you think about it.

RAZZ