Authorities raid Olympus' HQ

I'm guessing that 'Authorities raiding the office' was pretty close to the bottom of Shuichi Takayama's, the President of Olympus', wish-list. But that's just what has happened, as a team of prosecutors attempts to get to the bottom of the accounting irregularities that have pervaded the company for the past two decades.

Japanese TV recorded a train of officials tramping their way into the office. It wasn't just Olympus' Tokyo HQ that was over-run, though. The home of ex-President Tsuyoshi Kikukawa and three offices of businesses that played their part in hiding Olympus' losses amounting to ¥117.7 billion (£960 million) were also raided.

Olympus has stated that intends to co-operate fully with the investigation and has issued an apology to its investors, shareholders, and customers for the 'troubles and worries' it has caused them. Their troubles and worries are far from over, I'd venture. Whatever the investigation might turn up, the raid isn't going to help Olympus' share prices, which have already taken a colossal hit since the scandal broke in late October. Furthermore, Olympus' revised accounts, submitted to the Japanese Stock Exchange a whisker before the 14 December 2011 deadline, have revealed a serious cash-flow problem that could prove even more serious without some rapid restructuring at the company. It's all looking a bit bleak. 

(See also the BBC and The Guardian.)

Portraits that make you go 'Ooh!'

For a little under a year, The Guardian has been running a Sunday feature ‘The 10 Best…’ It has covered everything from fashion blogs to female comedians via mathematicians. Yesterday, it was the turn of photographic portraits. I was thoroughly surprised by the 10 photos selected by Eamonn McCabe. There was a mixture of candid shots, street photography, and posed portraiture. Some were of celebrities, some weren’t. Most, but not all, were black and white. And they weren’t necessarily what I would attribute as the ’10 best’.

But then it occurred to me: what exactly was it that surprised me in his selection, which you can check out here, and why should I be surprised at all?

The point is, of course, that these portraits are his personal opinion of what constitutes the ‘best’. Just because I disagree with, or am surprised by, his selections doesn’t invalidate them. In fact, it’s a bit of an eye-opener. What is it that he sees in a portrait that I don’t? If anything, I’d like a bit more commentary on what it is about these portraits that ‘does’ it for him, rather than the background to photographers who took them. (Don’t get me wrong, I am interested in that, I’d just rather be discussing the photo.)

I took this photo a few years ago. Why do I like it so much? It says something about my subject that, at the time, was important to her.

If I’m going to become a better photographer, knowing how other people interpret pictures is pretty useful. It doesn’t have to mean that I’ll stop taking the kind of photos that I like, more that trying to see a picture through someone else’s eyes shows me something new, a different angle, an alternative perspective. I’m not asking for anyone to justify her or his choices, more try to explain to me what it is that makes it outstanding.

And of course, from time-to-time we put up a ’10 of the best..’ here on Small Aperture. For us, these selections are very much about finding 10 shots that we hope will inspire you to go out and take some pictures. But for now, I’m kinda interested in knowing what are your favourite portraits. You don’t have to offer ten. One, or three, or five, will do. But what is it about that portrait that makes you go ‘Oooh!’?

(Thanks to Catherine for the image of me. Why do I like that one so much? It captures the day that it was taken perfectly. I look relaxed. We had sunshine and showers.)

Who actually invented photography?

Most people think of the Daguerreotype, named after Louis Daguerre, to be the first photographic process. However, Joseph Nicephore Niépce, a French inventor, is actually known by experts to have created the first etched ‘photographs’ on plates made of pewter. And now, scientists from the Getty Conservation Institute in Los Angeles are revealing that Niépce used a previously undiscovered chemical process that consisted of baking lavender oil.

Dusan Stulik of the Getty stated that scientists are now ‘able to create a fuller picture of Niépce, how he worked, and we can really demonstrate that everything related to photography that surrounds us today – digital cameras, film, TV, even 3D and video games, go back to his inventions.’

The new analysis of Niépce’s plates are being announced at a conference in the UK at the National Media Museum this week. Current literature regards Niépce as a key pioneer in the field of photography, however the new studies clearly show that his contributions are far more valuable than previously thought, and Niépce should be regarded as the true inventor of photography.

Headsup to The Guardian