Never Stop Caring

"He's got the whole world, in his hands
He's got the whole wide world, in his hands..."

Sometimes that seems a glorious, booming refrain.
Other times it thins to a tinny trickle coming from a transistor two rooms away, like a fading echo.
It is tragic when one more bombing half way around the world seems like "just one more bombing half way around the world"
because it never is
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...for Sergio Vieira de Mello, and all who were killed and injured a year ago today in the bombing attack on the UN in Baghdad
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Lament for 2 UN diplomats: http://www.globalpolicy.org/security/issues/iraq/after/2003/0824journalists.htm
We are looking for a hole in the clouds: http://www.ilo.org/public/english/employment/recon/crisis/download/sergio.pdf

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For a while I have known exactly what I wanted to do today. I was nervous about getting it right because it meant a lot to me.
I'm fairly pleased as it came out just about how I imagined.
I started with the original shot: http://www.pbase.com/image/32777091 ,
then removed the color and darkened the black and white while adding contrast: http://www.pbase.com/image/32777081
I wanted the hands to be a little gritty looking and set back from the color, and finally decided on the 'water paper' effect in Photoshop.
That done, I went back to my original and rubberstamped the color element back into the photo.