The Moment It Clicks: Photography Secrets From One of the World's Top Shooters

McNally, your guide and teacher, is not only the very best at what he does, but Joe is truly one of the most genuine, big-hearted, and downright lovable guys in the business. His passion for sharing what he’s learned comes across in everything he does, and I’m so proud to introduce this one-of-kind photographer, instructor, and author to you, as his amazing images and thoughtful words take you to “the moment it clicks.”

    Scott Kelby
Editor-in-Chief, Photoshop User magazine

Acknowledgments

     

    As I always tell young photographers, it’s a business where you have to have heroes. I’ve got lots of them. It’s a business comprised of special people, and I’ve been blessed to have encountered and been influenced by many of them.

    First and foremost is my dad, who loaned me his range-finder camera, the family snap camera, a Beauty Lite III, when I started taking photo courses. He was a pretty good photographer and an artist who was never allowed to take those skills and hone them, given the strictures of working for somebody else for a living. He always told me, hang out your own shingle. When I started taking photo classes, I was fortunate enough to have Fred Demarest as my professor. Fred, retired now, was the chairman of the Syracuse University photo program. He was everything a professor was supposed to be; without his patience and guidance, I would never have become a photographer. Tony Golden, now the chairman, has carried on that tradition, educating and preparing many photographers, including this one, to engage in this crazed but wonderful profession.
     
    In so many ways, former Life staff photographer Carl Mydans is my hero. Carl was friend, mentor, teacher, orator, historian, gentleman, scholar, and, perhaps last of these things, a great photographer. He left behind a legacy of decency and photography that will reverberate always, for all shooters. Also at Life , I had the good fortune to shoot for John Loengard. His influence as an editor is throughout this book.

    I consider myself damn lucky to have been shouted at, cursed, and praised (every once in a while) by some wonderful editors. Without good editors, as photographers we are lost. They are our anchor, our barometer of success and failure, and shapers of our skills. Early on, I got a no-shit, straight-up version of where to go and how to shoot it when I got there from some great wire service guys…Larry DeSantis at UPI and Tommy diLustro at the AP. Later, I consider myself fortunate to have shot stories for the Newsweek gang: Tom Orr, Jim Kenney, John Whelan, and Jimmy Colton.
     
    I’ve bounced around the halls of many magazines, and fortunately have had a chance to shoot for some great people. Dan Okrent and Dick Stolley turned the amazing trick of being managing editors while also believing whole-heartedly in the power of pictures, a rare occurrence indeed. Barbara Henckel gave me my first job at Sports Illustrated . Mary Dunn and M.C. Marden were a wondrous team at People . John Durniak and Mark Rykoff at Time , Mel Scott, Bob Sullivan, Andy Blau, Melissa Stanton, David Friend, Peter Howe, and Bobbi Burrows at Life , and Karen Mullarkey at a bunch of places, all gave out great assignments and advice, not all of it photographic. I still shoot for Sports Illustrated , where Steve Fine is the DOP, and has the often thankless task of juggling budget, pictures, and the nutty timetable of sports, and he does it amazingly well. Jimmy Colton migrated to SI from Newsweek and other points, and together they are like Stockton and Malone, Montana and Rice, Mantle and Maris. SI has always had a group of terrific editors: Porter Binks, Maureen Grise, and Matt Ginella to name a few. Matt has now moved to Golf Digest , where he continues to engineer wonderful assignments and has pushed that magazine to new photographic heights.

    National Geographic
has always stood alone in the scope of its visual ambition and achievement. I had the amazing good fortune to be invited to shoot there by Tom Kennedy, who tolerated my early failures, and brought me along as a project. As the stories I shot there gathered weight and import, I found myself assigned to picture editor Bill Douthitt, who became my dear friend and best man at my wedding.
     
    His lunatic ravings spice certain stories in this book, as does his exceedingly twisted sense of humor. So does his faith in photography. Lots of pictures in this book would not be here if Bill hadn’t simply said,