Talk:Robert Capa

Death of a loyalist soldier

the technical talk about this photo, seems way too technical for an article about Cappa the photographer. Maybe the photo deserves a page on its own.

Fake proven: location 30 miles from the fighting

The references I put here prove that the photo was staged. Combats in Espejo, where the photos were taken (see graphical demonstration http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/worldnews/article-1201116/How-Capas-camera-does-lie-The-photographic-proof-iconic-Falling-Soldier-image-staged.html ), took place the days 22-25 of September, but the photo was made public about 25th of September in France (I don't know exact date). Combats in Cerro Muriano ended the 5th of September. So it's clear that it was staged. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.38.233.74 (talk) 17:28, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Edit: The photo was published the 23th of September, in Vu magazine. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.38.233.74 (talk) 17:33, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

That does seem rather convincing, doesn't it? Still, not sure it meets authoritative standards? Anyone? Rwintle (talk) 17:23, 30 March 2012 (UTC)

Capa's political believes

i miss some information on Capa's left wing attitudes. he deeply disliked capitalism and of course fascism. iirc he was a militant in his youth and he continued his work with some perspectives of a better & peaceful & socialist world. however interesting the angle-of-the-sun might be, we could do greater justice to the man in remembering his dreams and what he lived for.

Sinzov 07:37, 3 November 2007 (UTC)

Capa's arms on DDay

It says that Capa was armed with just cameras during the D-Day invasion. If he was in the first wave, wouldn't he be supplied with at least a pistol? It seems hard to believe because of the danger and possibility of combat he was in.--Exander 07:24, 26 May 2006 (UTC)

Hard to believe, but true - no weapon at all.

Xdamr 09:08, 26 May 2006 (UTC)

Born in Hungary?

I'm watching a documentary on TV right now - they say he was actually born in Paris, France, but grew up in Budapest, Hungary.

According to his brother, Cornell Capa, "Endre Erno Friedmann was born on October 22, 1913 in Budapest." Also, the most recent bio of Capa, "Blood and Champagne," states that Capa was born Endre Friedmann in Budapest, Hungary, in 1913. See also, "The Great Escape: Nine Jews Who Fled Hitler and Changed the World." Same date and place of birth.

Capa did eventually live in Paris, but as an adult. What is the documentary which gave his birthplace as Paris?

The documentary, "The Mexican Suitcase" indicated that he was born in Hungary.

Personal Life references source

The book "The Great Escape: Nine Jews Who Fled Hitler and Changed the World." by Kati Marton has information regarding Capa's birth, time in Paris, and relationships with Gerda Pohorylle and Ingrid Bergman. Maybe someone with the book in hand can add the references? I would do it, but I do not have have a copy of the book at present.--Ggeller (talk) 20:08, 2 July 2011 (UTC)

missing information

I think it should be mentioned that Capa worked together with the famous writer John Steinbeck. They went to USSR in 1947 and Capa took the photographs for the book A Russian Journal.

trivia removed

An editor removed the trivia; I don't disagree, but it may be that some of it can be worked into a longer more detailed article at some point. So I'm listing here for easier finding:

• The blurred shots he took during D-Day informed the look Janusz Kaminski used for Saving Private Ryan.
• The song "Kamikaze Cappa" was written by the Austrian pop star Falco in 1986 as a tribute to the late Robert Capa.
• Apart from his reputation as a photographer, Capa was known as a gambler and socialite. One noted affair was with Ingrid Bergman - only publicized many years later in her autobiography.
• During his lifetime Capa befriended many Hollywood icons, writers, and artists such as Ernest Hemingway, Pablo Picasso, John Steinbeck, John Huston, Howard Hawks, and Humphrey Bogart.

Excessive detail?

It seems to me the paragraph added by Desertfax is a great deal of unreferenced detail, possibly OR, about one photograph, not even the man being discussed. The header "Spanish Civil War" is dominated by a complex analysis of a single, albeit significant, photograph. Any objection to my removing it, or greatly abbreviating it. It could be copied to the talk for incorporation elsewhere if appropriate? Goodnightmush^Talk 01:25, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

It is by tradition known that the Borrell Garcia picture was made at Cerro Muriano on September 5, 1936, about 1300 Local Zone Time for Spain, this being GMT + 1 hour. The soldier's vertical image, his shadow and the line from his head to its silhouette graphically describe an equilateral triangle. This feature is sufficient to configure and work up a two triangles system containing Garcia supposedly having run sidelong the direction of the sun appearing southwestwards at about 68 degrees azimuth. The line interconnecting Garcia's head and its silhouette on the hillside with [out of picture] trenches has a computed 30 degrees inclination with regard to the horizontal plane which is astronomically parallel to the celestial horizon. When subsequently sun's altitude over Cerro Muriano is checked for 1300 local time, 1200 GMT, it is found to be 59 degrees. It is thence a reasonable assumption that the picture has been taken earlier, or conversely later on the day. For the respective time points we find 0843 and 1655 Local Zone Time [the Time Equation for simplicity deleted ]. In 2002 Richard Whelan in a biographical article of Capa states that Garcia fell in the presence of witnesses as the first of two identified soldiers at the same place at 0500 p.m. in the immediate vicinity of trenches on a slope of Mount Las Malaguenas. The 1655 Local Time solution should therefore be considered representative. If eventually, sun's computed altitude for 1655 LZT over Cerro Muriano is established to be 30 degrees for sun's 7 degrees declination, it is clear that the about 1655 LZT point of time of the recording exactly matches the helio–geographical configuration of Cerro Muriano in coordinates 4 deg 47'–W ; 38 deg–N for September 6, 1936, at about 1555 GMT with sun's azimuth N–247–W. This renders the picture suspicious in a minor sense as far as only the time point is concerned for a for practice zero difference [actually 6 minutes with application of the Time Equation of [+]1 minute for September 5] with Whelan's conclusions and a difference of 4 hours for the traditional point of time, both differences unavoidably suffering some inherent inaccurateness due to graphical measuring . Whatever the outcome of precise timekeeping might be, it does not injure the authenticity of the picture as a live recording made at about 1600 GMT on September 6, 1936.

I've removed it and brought it here for anyone interested to clean up, reference, and reincorporate where it belongs. Goodnightmush^Talk 02:54, 16 November 2007 (UTC)

Beware the name is desertfax / One Wikipedia heading on this article says : "..detailed guide to articles on the history of photography on Wikipedia.." Sometimes details require quantitative research since a problem is not simpler than its difficulty is. 84.80.66.78 (talk) 21:21, 19 November 2007 (UTC) desertfax Nov 07 .

No tradition, also wrong

The "tradition" that it was Cerro Muriano is a case of invented traditon, as shown by the more recent "tradition", that is was taken near Espejo. So it also was not Garcia and, as no fighting took place at Espejo, when Capa was there, it is a fake - good intentions or not.--Radh (talk) 07:55, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Death of a loyalist soldier

Jeffpw edited the caption of Death of a loyalist soldier to Loyalist Militiaman at the Moment of Death. In his edit summary, Jeffpw said that his change was made to be the "actual title of photograph." Without any documentation of this change, I find the new title to be cumbersome and not as accurate. A quick Google search of the new title finds 186 references. However, a check of the title "Death of a loyalist soldier" find 1,130 references. On this basis, I reverted the change and suggest that it be discussed here. To add to the discussions, I would also point editors to the NY Times article of today that replicated the photo in question. The Times caption?: "The Falling Soldier," a title that garners some 1,390 Google hits. TheMindsEye (talk) 01:09, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

Cumbersome or not, that is the official title of the photograph, according to our own article on the subject of the photo. Seems to me that as an encyclopedia, we have an obligation to use the actual title. Jeffpw (talk) 05:30, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

No my point is not that the title is cumbersome, its that you have no documentation that it is the "official" title. Using Wiki as a reference is a Self-Reference. The article you cite has no documentation, just another unsupported claim. Moreover, the article refers to the photo as "The Falling Soldier" in three references. TheMindsEye (talk) 14:49, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

The original title is available at pbs --220.245.152.34 (talk) 07:34, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

What is "original" title supposed to mean? ICP? Wheatley likes the name, because he cannot stand the idea - plain fact, since the identification of Espejo as the locale of the picture, that the photo was faked.

The negative has been lost since the war; there still are, it is said, the original contact prints and Capa's notebooks - is the title from there or is it from the first publications in Vu or from Life?--Radh (talk) 13:43, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Mine

Do we know who laid the mine which accounted for his death? Drutt (talk) 18:03, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

First or Second Assault Wave?

I have read conflicting articles from different sources. Several saying he went in with the first assault wave and several saying the second. We need to clarify wich stage he went on to the beach with and correct the article. 69.18.107.112 (talk) 05:04, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

Well, that depends on whether Capa was mistaken/lied about another point. He claims to have landed with E Company, 2nd Battalion Landing Team, 16th Infantry Regiment, 1st Division, on beach sector Easy Red. If this is true, he would have been scheduled to land in one of the first four increments of units to hit the beach between H-5 and H+8 minutes. These increments included (per the plan) 96 tanks, 16 teams from the Special Engineer Task Force and eight infantry assault companies. These units are informally described as the First Wave in the Army's official history.

H-Hour was 0630 hours on Omaha. Low tide at that beach was at 0525 hours. And therein lies the problem.

At 0630 hours (H-Hour) the beach obstacles were not yet covered by the rising tide - which was a key factor in planning, so that the 16 Engineer teams (arriving H+3 to +8)could access and blow the obstacles. Now, here's (http://www.dptips-central.com/robert-capa.html) a page with some of Capa's photos. Note the third one of D Day. From the camera angle, you can see he's still up on the bow ramp of the landing craft (an odd place to stand erect while taking photos if actually under intense fire). See how the tide has already risen all the way through the obstacles? See how much further it has risen beyond the obstacles - so much so that it has covered the road wheels of Tank #11? That could not possibly have been taken at H-Hour.

Further, Capa claimed he landed on Beach Easy Red. In fact, of E Co.'s 6 boat sections, only one actually landed on Easy Red; the rest ended up on Fox Green. [Also on Easy Red from the first wave were 4 tanks - one disabled, two boat sections from E, 116th Inf Regt and one from F, 16th Regt. Not much for the largest beach sector on Omaha - almost 2000 yards. What should have landed on Easy Red were two full rifle companies - 12 boat sections - and 16 tanks.] Fire on Easy Red was among the lightest of the Omaha sectors, with only the F Co. boat section taking siginficant casualties from the boat to the shingle.

As an indication of how light the fire was on Easy Red, consider the Engineer plan. They were supposed to initially blow two gaps through the obstacles in each of 8 beach sectors (total, 16 gaps). In fact, only 6 gaps were initially blown, and fully 4 of them were on Easy Red, where only two had been planned. This was a lot of work accomplished, given that only one third the infantry and one fourth of the tanks made it there to cover the engineers. These facts so clearly contradict Capa's dramatic description of the hell he encountered on the beach that it is obvious something is not right. Given that by his own admission, he bugged out on the first landing craft he could catch, one is tempted to suspect he exaggerated the intensity of the fire to make his hasty exit seem more understandable. Even his own photos tend to support this. Half of his few surviving shots show his boat section moving fairly well through the last of the obstacles. Capa himself apparently went down and stayed down immediately with those who wouldn't advance beyond the cover offered by the obstacles - all the rest of his surviving shots are from the vantage point of behind an obstacle, pointing back towards the water. The emphasis on these few last photos has distorted completely what happened on Easy Red and leaves a decidedly incorrect impression of troops pinned down in the water.

Further, the lone boat section of E Co. 16th Regt that did land on Easy Red was none other than the famed boat section of Lt Robert Spalding - one of the first units to reach the top of the bluffs within about 30 minutes of H-Hour (about 0700 hrs). That boat section lost only 6 men getting to the bluff top. Clearly this couldn't have been the unit Capa landed with - as far more than six men are pictured huddled behind the obstacles - but it is the one he claims he landed with. Something is seriously wrong here.

I think there is no doubt Capa did not land with whom he claimed and. From the tide in his photos, we can conclude he was not in the first wave. From Coast Guard photos of the 16th Regt support BLT's landing (the 1st BLT, landed between 0740-0800) on the very same section of beach, it's clear the tide was further in than when Capa landed. So it's a good guess he landed about 0700 hours with the reserve company or HQs section of an assault BLT - which would have put him in the second 'wave.' Where he landed seems clear - Easy Red, a conclusion supported by tank #9 in Capa's photo and tank #11 in the Coast Guard photo. Both belonged to A Co., 741st Tank Bn and came in on adjacent LCTs. As fire on this sector was so light for the first wave, I again believe it supports a second wave conclusion. Fire was much greater on Easy Red when G Co. landed at about 0700 hours, and they lost most of their 63 casualties crossing to the shingle. Co G's experience seems much closer to that described by Capa, so I'd be comfortable to conclude he came in about the same time G did - which again puts him in the second 'wave.'

For further deatils, see The War Department's "Omaha Beachhead" (http://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/USA/USA-A-Omaha/index.html) 67.181.72.173 (talk) 08:16, 30 July 2009 (UTC)

The article already says "second assault wave." I trust that's what the reliable sources say. If not, it has to be changed. If sources conflict, the article can reflect that. I've always wondered about this myself, and the points you raise in your analysis are well taken. --JohnnyB256 (talk) 15:08, 30 July 2009 (UTC)

Adjustment to Historical Accuracy of the Number of Frames Saved from D-Day.

The references cited 11 frames, and pointed to Capa's own book "Slightly Out of Focus" on Page 151. On this page he references 8 saved frames, not 11. There has been some conjecture on this, as other sources have reported 10 or 11 frames. These sources could be added, and the section could be revised. Peter Howe writes on page 21 in "Shooting Under Fire" (ISBN 1579652158) 10 frames were saved, this is one source that could be used to update the total.

Sean Leslie (talk) 17:02, 22 March 2009 (UTC)

Independent article

Has some, but very few facts, interesting, but does not have 1 thing to say about the question of the fake-death-picture. Left-wingers obviously simply cannot believe, that they have been played for suckers to further Capa's career.--Radh (talk) 06:27, 13 June 2010 (UTC)

Is this worth anything

Cillian Murphys character in Danny Boyle's Sunshine was named Robert Capa —Preceding unsigned comment added by 173.32.23.165 (talk) 02:08, 11 October 2010 (UTC)

File:RobertCapabyGerdaTaro.jpg Nominated for Deletion

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About the "Falling soldier"

In the section Spanish Civil War and Chinese resistance to Japan, second paragraph it is stated that In 1936, Capa became known across the globe for the "Falling Soldier" photo, and later Capa remained conspicuously unwilling to discuss The Falling Soldier, which was published shortly after Taro's death. The article about Gerda Taro states that she died on July 26th, 1937. It should probably say In 1937, Capa became known..., or was the picture really published in 1936 when Taro was still alive? --Fpainke (talk) 09:07, 6 April 2013 (UTC)

The "Career" chapter

Parts of this seems to be at odds with the Wikipedia entry on Gerda Taro, which goes into some detail about how "Robert Capa" was a fictional American character, invented to sell both of their photos. It also describes which "Capa"-photos she took, and which were Friedman's. Either the sources for this article on Friedman are not trustworthy, or the sources on Taro, as these two versions can't both be true. --Ronja R (talk) 02:42, 3 February 2014 (UTC)