A Beautiful Photographer: Jason P. Howe

The images that Howe took that day led to him winning 
best photo essay and photographer of the year 
from the Picture Editors’ Guild. 
It was a professional high, 
but after the incident and the events that followed 
(the MoD first asked the Telegraph not to print the photograph, then agreed publication if it were censored, so the worst injuries were not shown; ‘I was told there wouldn’t be any repercussions, but then several months later, when the next Telegraph embed came up, I was told the MoD had refused my application,’ Howe said), 
his mental health started to decline. 
Unable to work, after months of hard partying he realised he ‘would probably end up dead’ 
 and he changed track, 
moving to a rented isolated finca in northern Spain 
in an attempt 
to 
‘escape from the world’.

  But he suffered from horrific nightmares and paranoia – 
walking around the house 
with the lights on but the shutters closed, 
‘in case of snipers’. 

He realised that he was suffering 
from 
post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). 

PHOTO:http://www.jasonphowe.com/  and http://blog.photoshelter.com

Jason P. Howe:
from amateur to travel to photojournalism to a war photographer
Howe was 13 when he first picked up a camera – photographing his school band and wildlife around Woodbridge, East Anglia, where he grew up. After leaving school aged 16, he worked in a camera shop in Ipswich, where he would meet professional photographers who had returned from assignments around the world.
Inspired, he decided to try to make a living as a travel photographer. From 1994 onwards he made 25 trips to Latin America, visiting 18 countries and getting published in travel magazines.

PHOTO: http://www.jasonphowe.com/

PHOTO: http://www.jasonphowe.com/

PHOTO: http://www.monfilspictures.com/jason-howe.html

PHOTO: www.jasonphowe.com

In 1998 he visited Colombia as a backpacker. By now, Howe says, he was ‘getting bored with photographing beautiful scenery’ and was becoming interested in photojournalism. ‘I wanted to report on stories that would otherwise go unreported,’ he said. ‘It was the first time I heard about the conflict.’ The war that had started in 1964 – with the country’s Marxist-inspired rebel group Farc, far-right paramilitary groups and the government all fighting for control – was ongoing. ‘It seemed that Colombia was my story,’ he said.

PHOTO: http://www.monfilspictures.com/jason-howe.html

PHOTO: http://www.monfilspictures.com/jason-howe.html

Photojournalist Jason P. Howe has spent over a decade covering breaking news on the front lines of conflict zones worldwide, including Iraq, Afghanistan, Lebanon, and Colombia.

PHOTO: http://www.monfilspictures.com/jason-howe.html

The most dangerous scenario he witnessed
In November 2011 I was on an operation with British Forces in Helmand province, Afghanistan. I followed 6 soldiers through a doorway into a compound, each of us stepping in the footsteps of the other after the ground had been swept with a bomb detector. As the soldier behind me stepped onto the ground I had just left, an IED exploded and blew off both of his legs. After making images of the medics working on him, I joined the stretcher party and helped carry him towards the inbound MEDIVAC helicopter. There was a high threat that the ground we were covering may be hiding more IEDs. If even one of us stepped on another one, we would have had a mass casualty situation. As if this was not bad enough, as the stretcher bearers ran towards the helicopter a Taliban sniper opened fire.

PHOTO: www.jasonphowe.com

PHOTO: www.jasonphowe.com

PHOTO: www.jasonphowe.com

PHOTO: www.jasonphowe.com

It was one of the most intense situations I have found myself in and required constant decision-making where the wrong decision could result in further injury or death. I had to think about where and how to move without risking triggering other IEDs or cause problems with shocked and angry soldiers who had just seen their friend horribly wounded. How and when to stop being an observer and do something to help save the life of the wounded man is a tough choice.

Appearance of his post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) symptoms
He worked more than 400 days in Iraq. ‘Eventually I stopped having any kind of real emotional reaction,’ he said. ‘I would come back from photographing a suicide bomb with bits of people all over the place and order some food to eat while editing the pictures. It became quite clinical.’

He sank into a deep depression. ‘My pictures hadn’t made any difference, so I couldn’t see the point to anything,’ he said. ‘Why bother getting up? Why bother washing?

PHOTO: http://www.monfilspictures.com/jason-howe.html

After a few ‘tough months’, gradually his new life seemed to be helping him. He forged a simple structure to his day: feed the chickens, take the dogs for a walk, tend the vegetables in his garden. He avoided coffee and cigarettes, and stopped reading the news or watching films about war – triggers for his symptoms. The problems were still there, as were the nightmares and depression, but he said he had been managing it. 

PTSD, his main debilitating issue is depression. ‘I have a very dark view of the world where, whatever I do, it doesn’t change,’ he said. But it is compounded by problems concentrating and hyper-vigilance – he exhaustively imagines the worst outcomes of every situation.

He also feels anger. And at times he feels abandoned by the media industry, but ‘then I feel I have nothing to complain about since it was my choice to go to war, and I have to deal with the consequences myself’. Because he has not been able to work, Howe is now facing eviction from his farmhouse. He is planning a road trip around Europe, photographing people who seek a simpler, more sustainable way to live than modern life offers.

PHOTO: James Arthur Allen

He plans to trade website photography for campsites and meals.
‘I am a very positive person, a fighter and a survivor,’ he said at the end. ‘But it is a hard battle and one that I do not always foresee there being the energy available to fight.’

'War comes to an end,

but 
many bring back a burden of 
physical and psychological damage.'

-Simon Akam

PHOTO:http://www.jasonphowe.com/  and http://blog.photoshelter.com
#Sites thankfully consulted, shared and recommended for more text or viewing his photo gallery:
www.jasonphowe.com
www.conflictpics.com
http://www.fotoevidence.com/jason-p-howe
http://jasonphowe.photoshelter.com/image/I0000UABJmpSAuXo 
http://blog.photoshelter.com/2013/08/survival-tips-for-the-aspiring-conflict-photographer/
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/11211285/War-photographer-Jason-Howes-battle-with-PTSD.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Beautiful_Mind_%28film%29
(A Beautiful Mind: a biopic of the meteoric rise of John Forbes Nash Jr., a math prodigy able to solve problems that baffled the greatest of minds. And how he overcame years of suffering through schizophrenia to win the Nobel Prize)

#Photography related more blog post from the same author: 
kevin carter
anja niedringhaus
steve mccurry
macro methods