Viacheslav Ratynskyi

For four hours he crossed minefields, trenches and drone-filled skies through one of the fiercest battle zones in Ukraine. Near Ukrainian lines, a Russian drone spotted him and dropped a grenade... You can read his story in full here: thetimes.com/world/russia-u… photos by @ratynskki

„Zwischen Dokumentation und Emotion.“ Was kann Fotografie im Krieg leisten? Der ukrainische Fotojournalist Slava Ratynkyi @ratynskki spricht im Interview mit @PoliluevSchmidt über Bilder als Beweis, Propaganda und Erinnerung. 📷 Link im Kommentar 🇺🇦 Читайте українською тут!

🔹What types of drone detectors are there? 🔹Which drones do they protect against? 🔹How does it work in the field? Read the article by Viacheslav Ratynskyi: imi.org.ua/en/monitorings…

A drone detector is the new must-have piece of kit for frontline reporting. The closer you get to the front line in Ukraine, the more deadly Russian drones of all kinds there are. Because of this, journalists are now filming the war far less. But if you have a drone detector, your chances of escaping an FPV drone are slightly higher — it gives you time to react. Documentary photographer Viacheslav Ratynskyi shared his thoughts and experience in an article for the Institute of Mass Information. He said that western news outlets regard drone detectors with suspicion and view them as weapons that would put journalists on par with combatants. But the world has changed, the war has changed, so the rules governing journalists’ work must also change for the sake of everyone’s safety.

THE NEW WORLD WAR by @Will___lloyd As the fourth anniversary of the invasion of Ukraine approached last month, Zelensky inflated his rhetoric. He used the same formulation I had heard countless times from Ukrainians every time I visited. This was not a conflict between Ukraine and Russia any longer, if it had ever been that to begin with. These were, Zelensky told the BBC in February, the first years of the Third World War. In the early weeks of the war, so many British citizens drove vans full of aid to the Polish border that Ben Wallace, then the defence secretary, had to ask with some tact that people send money instead. Clips of born-in-the-USSR Russian incompetence electrified social networks. No war ever seemed to cost so little. It generated a new, brief faith in ourselves, even in Boris Johnson. Our capabilities, our diplomacy, our technology, our sanctions packages, our intelligence services, our rules-based liberal order. We didn’t even have to fight. The Ukrainians would do that for us. Ukraine was a good war, a morally clean war, giving a precious gift to Europe’s leaders: meaning, valour, solemnity, glory. That was not how it looked in Kyiv this winter, where the congealed violence of four years of war had transformed the country into something many in Europe no longer want to think about: a war of extermination fought between two militarised societies barely two days’ drive from Dover. The teams of men coldly eyeing their live feeds in bunkers, busily assassinating each other with drones, then posting the results online. The schools where children learned underground, as if they were surviving a nuclear winter. The old men and women who froze in their apartments and had to be cut out from them once their neighbours realised what had happened. The war had pulled the US and Europe apart, invented a whole new machinery of death, underlined our dependence on brutal petro-states, flooded this corner of Eastern Europe with several generations worth of weapons. A British official told me that Ukraine’s population, which had been estimated at just over 40 million in 2014, had shrunk to something like 20 million by 2025, significantly less than most estimates in the public domain. I came to the war late, first visiting at the end of 2024. I witnessed Europe’s early hope and energy begin to curdle and move elsewhere: to Gaza and Greenland, Venezuela and now Iran. The world was a mess, expensive munitions for advanced air defence platforms were running low and needed everywhere from Kyiv to Tel Aviv to Abu Dhabi; Ukraine was not a front-page story anymore. The same image, the same blood, the same nation. Shrug. A terrible thing was happening somewhere far away. A few days after I returned from Kyiv last month, Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu launched their war on Iran. Turkey, the keystone that sits directly between Ukraine and Iran, may yet be pulled into it. The vengeful Iranian Shaheds, so familiar to Ukrainians after four years of nightly terror, now rained down all over the Gulf. There were rumours that they were being mass-produced in China. Taken aback by the violent efficiency of the Iranian counterattack, Trump was demanding a Western armada enter the Gulf. War was spreading.

Viacheslav Ratynskyi: Поїхати до Костянтинівки зараз — це не лише безпековий, а й емоційний виклик. Теперішній вигляд Констахи для тих, хто провів там частину життя, — справжнє випробування.

This is what Christmas looks like on the Ukrainian frontlines — fragile, fleeting, human. Before the holidays, writer Myroslav Laiuk and photographer @ratynskki visited Kostiantynivka in the Donetsk region, documenting life in a war-scarred city while hiding from drones.

Крізь роки Україна продовжує боротися за свободу та справедливість. І сьогодні ми дякуємо тим, чия рішучість стала поштовхом до перемін, — ви назавжди змінили хід нашої історії. Пам’ятаємо кожного, хто у різні часи захищав нашу гідність, поклав власне життя за наші свободи. Дякуємо всім, хто нині творить спільне майбутнє. З Днем Гідності та Свободи! Фото: @ratynskki

The following excerpts are taken from the first report in our new series on frontline towns. The story is written by Ukrainian writer Myroslav Laiuk, the author of Bakhmut, with photography by @ratynskki. Read the full story on our website: ukrainer.net/en/pryfrontovi…

Viacheslav Ratynskyi gets rare access to one of the bloodiest battlegrounds of the Ukraine war, where weary but determined soldiers are resisting Russia’s attacks

Коли за вшановування наших військових беруться профнепридатні йолопи з Мінвету, то дуже важко підбирати слова. Розписав короткий тред обурення про ту порнографію, яку хочуть встановлювати на могилах наших герої в Національному військовому меморіальному кладовищі під Києвом:

Ukrainian photographer Viacheslav Ratynskyi joined Platsdarm (Bridgehead in Ukrainian) Organization for several missions to recover fallen soldiers in Kharkiv and Donetsk oblasts in October 2024 and January 2025. kyivindependent.com/mission-to-rec…

Russian and Ukrainian forces launch reconnaissance and attack drones in what has been called the first full-scale drone war in history reut.rs/4kzwDRz 📷 Viacheslav Ratynskyi

A service member of the 81st Separate Slobozhanska Airmobile Brigade of the Ukrainian Armed Forces sits inside a Stryker APC during exercises at a training ground in Donetsk region, Ukraine. More photos of the week: reut.rs/4ldbGNr 📷 Viacheslav Ratynskyi

An artilleryman of the Ukrainian Armed Forces looks out for Russian combat drones at a position on the front line, near the city of Kostiantynivka in Donetsk region, Ukraine. More photos of the week: reut.rs/4ky3ztG 📷 Viacheslav Ratynskyi

A foreign volunteer of the National Guard of Ukraine looks on during a military exercise at a training ground near the frontline in Kharkiv region, Ukraine. More photos of the week: reut.rs/4kbn62H 📷 Viacheslav Ratynskyi

Ukrainian photographer Viacheslav Ratynskyi joined several missions to recover fallen soldiers in Kharkiv and Donetsk oblasts in October 2024 and January 2025. "My goal is to lift the veil on this hidden process and document the journey of the fallen." kyivindependent.com/mission-to-rec…

Кривий ріг у моє серці Ну і Дніпро теж, звісно

Український художник Орест Кузів ( 1997 р.н.) " Різдвяна ніч"

December 2024