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

news-man, and always decent to work with and easy to make a picture of. He said to me in Belfast, “So what they want here, Joe, is the trenchcoated anchorman on the streets of the war-torn city, right?” I nodded.

    The North calmed down and I headed for London. ABC contacted me again. Shoot Jennings at the bureau. I walked in, and five minutes later, the wires started clacking furiously. The pope had been shot.

    “This is the type of business where you have to make uncertainty your friend.”

    “Jennings told me I could come with him to Rome. I called my agency in N.Y. They were screaming, ‘Go, go!’”

    Jennings told me I could come with him to Rome. I called my agency in New York. They were screaming, “Go, go!”

    I arrived in Rome in the wee hours aboard a private jet with Jennings, his producer, and myself. Peter checked me into the Cavalieri Hilton, one of the nicest hotels in the city. I had a maxed out credit card and about 10 bucks in my pocket. My agency wired me money the next day. I spent the next two weeks in Rome on assignment for
Newsweek
and
Bunte
magazines, the same magazines that had picked me up in Ireland.

    I went broke and without prospects, and came back with a freelance career started. As fellow shooter Keith Carter is fond of saying, this is the type of business where you have to make uncertainty your friend.

     

The Best Pictures Are Right Under Your Nose

    Claire

    You don’t have to go to Afghanistan to shoot good photos. The most important pictures you will shoot are right there in front of you, of the people and places closest to you.

    My kids and I were at Walt Disney World, at the hotel pool. Claire, about eight at the time, decided to be a torpedo and pushed off the bottom in the nine-foot-deep section to zoom to the surface. Thing is, she zoomed at an angle, not a straight line, and her face crashed full speed into the wall of the pool. Ouch.

    After we got everything calmed down and figured out no permanent damage had been done, I pulled out a Coolpix to JPEG a damage report to her mom. (This was my first vacation as a divorced dad with just me and the kids. Figures.)

    The result was one of my favorite pictures. At a tough, painful moment in her young life, Claire looks back at the camera undaunted and unbowed (you lookin’ at me?). Her eyes are deep pools of resolve. I suspected then, as I do now, that Claire will live life on her own terms, and won’t take much grief from anyone. (Uh, this would include her dad.)

    Lovely, intimate bits and pieces like this are the glue that hold together the scattershot life of a photog. In my helter-skelter pursuit of “big” pictures, I ignored too many quieter, close-to-home moments. As I look back, I wish I had more of ‘em. Especially now, ‘cause my kids won’t put up with me pointing a camera at them anymore.

    “In my helter-skelter pursuit of big pictures, I ignored too many quieter, close-to-home moments. As I look back, I wish I had more of ’em.”
Learn from Those Around You
    “Like I said, there ain’t nobody like him.”

    Face it, Walter Iooss is the coolest photographer walking. I mean, he’s just Walter, man, and there ain’t no other.
     
    I was assigned to shoot the 1980 U.S. Open Golf Championship out in New Jersey. I had never shot a golf match before in my life. I had no idea what I was doing.

    But Walter Iooss did. So I stuck with Wally all day. Looking back, I was kind of blatant about it, but he didn’t seem to mind. I was a pup, and he was, you know, Walter, even back then. He had an assistant who carried only one camera, I think, with a 600mm lens. Walter would stride down the fairway unencumbered.
     
    I was carrying all my stuff: a six, a four, a three, all with motors, wide glass, camera bag, strobe. It was tough keeping up, I tell ya. Walter takes one step to every four of mine.

    We come to the last hole. Iooss gets a spot, and I’m right next to him. Nicklaus holes out and wins the tournament, and goes jubo right there. I get the only good golf frame I’ve ever shot.
     
    Like I said, there ain’t nobody like him.

     

    Jack Nicklaus
My Most Important Piece of Equipment
    “She said, ‘It’s for luck, Daddy.’”

    I was in the basement preparing to go off somewhere, as usual, and I was doing the checklist thing. You know: cameras, lenses, batteries, film, chargers, cords, bunny head….
     
    Bunny head?

    My daughter Caitlin was about three at the time, so I brought it