Aug 2: Week in Photography
Your lens to the internet's most powerful photographs. 📸 MOST POWERFUL PHOTO OF THE WEEK 📸  Michael M. Santiago / Getty Images This week, the world saw the burial of the body of John Lewis, a legend of the civil rights movement and a longtime member of the US House of Representatives who was known as the conscience of Congress. His funeral procession began by crossing the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama, where Lewis was beaten during a civil rights march known as Bloody Sunday in 1965. Lewis returned repeatedly to the bridge in later years to commemorate the struggle for racial justice. This frame showing his final crossing of the bridge by Michael M. Santiago for Getty is a poignant reminder of history and his legacy at a time of reckoning about equality.
 📸For Your 👀 Only: BEHIND THE CINEMATIC SCENES OF @KODAKLOSERS Feeding your brain with creative things is a good antidote to tough times. To find some inspiration, we frequently turn to Instagram, and one account that struck our eye is the dreamy, cinematic feed of @kodaklosers. Ryan Razon started the account a few years back as part of a class, and it's a gem to follow. We spoke with Razon about his process and what to do with Instagram virality.
HOW DID THIS GET STARTED? I just graduated college, so it started, I believe, sophomore year as a project for one of the classes. We had to look at how to grow your Instagram and I wanted to create something where I could share my friends’ work. I didn’t know that it was curating, or how to go about that. @leicalosers was the first one, and I made @kodaklosers a month or two later, and it took off from there. Now, I’m thinking of new ways to develop it to make it stand out and to try to help the community more — that’s the goal.  @nurcaglapolat / @kodaklosers HOW DID YOU GET INTO PHOTOGRAPHY? In high school, I studied TV production, which got me into the cinematic themes. When college came, being a Filipino, my mom wanted me to be a nurse, and for three years I was actually in nursing school. In the last year, I wasn’t happy. I didn’t see myself doing it for the rest of my life, and I decided to take a year off and apply to FIT. If I got in, I would pursue my dream, and if not, I would go back to nursing school. My dad said, "If you really want to do something, pursue it, and prove to your mom that you can do it."
A lot of people submit hashtags of their accounts, and a lot of it is friends that I know from being a photographer myself, and I just love their stuff. It comes from a lot of different places. I think the number one thing is hashtags.
Recently I’ve been asking myself that — it's always about what’s the story behind it that makes a good photo. We could all take pretty photos, but at the end of the day, the best photos are the ones with a story behind it.
 @johnnyhomemovies / @kodaklosers HOW DOES IT FEEL TO HAVE THIS PLATFORM? It’s pretty insane. I was happy at a thousand followers and then it kept growing and growing. I think the first moment I felt the 150K was when someone told me to shut up about something dear to my heart, and I was told, you know, you shouldn’t be political, you’re just a photo page, and like, no. There’s a lot of people who follow this account and generally like this. I have such a big voice now. I need to let it be heard. You can actually make a difference out of that; it’s not just a photo account page.
The future would ideally be something I can publish. I want to make an actual website and eventually start publishing. Whether or not Instagram survives, books will always be there. Publishing will always be there. That’s the main goal. I am working with a few friends to make it something more concrete, and not just an Instagram page. If Instagram dies, @kodaklosers dies with it, so we’re trying to make ways like a user channel where we can feature more artists
DO YOU STILL WANT TO BE A PHOTOGRAPHER? At the end of the day, yes. I’d really like to figure out how to take pictures. I don’t really see myself curating. I would love to curate a show in a space with @kodaklosers, but not beyond that.
 @anojon / @kodaklosers FAVORITE PHOTO IN THIS PROJECT? One who I’ve featured a lot is this kid @johnnyhomemovies, which is mostly his home life with his girlfriend. He finds these really good scenes. Anojan Satha, he's actually one of the first people I started reposting at an early stage of his photography. He also has that cinematic - Todd Hido vibes that I always talk about but clearly with his own take, it has always inspired me.
For me in the beginning, I want people to be inspired to go out and do something, to create something.  📸THE WEEK'S PHOTO STORIES FROM BUZZFEED NEWS 📸 This week, we're looking at ways to be inspired — from the lifelong civil rights work of Congressman John Lewis to an inside look at how legendary street photographer Joel Meyerowitz approaches pictures.
Find more of the week's best photo stories here.
HOW PHOTOGRAPHERS ARE GETTING CREATIVE USING THEIR PHONES AS CAMERAS  Mical Valusek
BEHIND THE SCENES OF ICONIC STREET PHOTOGRAPHS  Joel Meyerowitz
EMOTIONAL PHOTOS SHOW HOW PEOPLE SAID GOODBYE TO CIVIL RIGHTS ICON JOHN LEWIS  Jonathan Ernst / AP
📸SOME HOPE 📸  Ethan Miller / Getty Images "That's it from us this time — see you next week!" —Gabriel and Kate “We are making photographs to understand what our lives mean to us.”— Ralph Hattersley
📝 This letter was edited and brought to you by the News Photo team. Gabriel Sanchez is the photo essay editor based in New York and loves cats. Kate Bubacz is the photo director based in New York and loves dogs. You can always reach us here.
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