InterviewMeet Paul Taggart| 00:02 |
(MUSIC) My name's Paul Tigard/g, I'm a
photographer.
| | 00:07 |
I mainly do photo journalism and
documentary work.
| | 00:09 |
But I also do a little bit of multimedia
and film making.
| | 00:13 |
I love telling stories and I love meeting
people.
| | 00:16 |
And my entire career, since I've been
about 17 years old, I'm 33 now.
| | 00:21 |
Has been traveling the world, meeting
cool people, and telling stories through pictures.
| | 00:27 |
My passion is really photo essay, or
photo stories.
| | 00:30 |
And taking lots of still images and
putting them together in a meaningful and
| | 00:34 |
thoughtful sequence to tell, to tell a
narrative.
| | 00:38 |
And I've been doing it now for how ever
many years that is, and I love it and I
| | 00:41 |
just can't stop.
I'm addicted to it.
| | 00:45 |
So my interest in photography has always
been pretty well defined, because from
| | 00:49 |
kind of an early age, I didn't, I didn't
just want to be a photographer.
| | 00:54 |
I knew exactly the kind of thing I wanted
to do.
| | 00:56 |
I was a stubborn kid, and (LAUGH), my
brother took pictures, my mom took
| | 00:59 |
pictures, like everyone in my family took
pictures and there was always cameras
| | 01:02 |
sitting around.
but I remember, I was probably in like
| | 01:07 |
seventh or eighth grade, and my parents
had a subscription to the Sunday New York Times.
| | 01:14 |
And, that Sunday, there was a magazine,
they have the magazine insert, and there
| | 01:18 |
was an image in there, and I didn't know
who it was, I didn't know anything about
| | 01:21 |
photographers or any of that.
And there was this amazing image and it
| | 01:27 |
just, for, I was like 12 or 13, it just
didn't make any sense to me.
| | 01:32 |
But all I knew was like, something about
it drew me in, it was a picture of this
| | 01:36 |
woman, and it was really close on her
face, and it was black and white, and her
| | 01:39 |
eyes had this like glazed over look, and
they were watery, and it just, it blew me away.
| | 01:47 |
I was looking at this and it turned out,
it was a photo essay on drug addiction,
| | 01:51 |
and (LAUGH) it was by this amazing
photographer Eugene Richards.
| | 01:57 |
And there were so many things about this
I didn't understand as like a kid growing
| | 02:00 |
up in Oklahoma, but something really
struck it with me.
| | 02:03 |
And my brother, who was older than me..
Said well man, if you like Eugene
| | 02:06 |
Richards, you like this photograph, then
you should look at this other
| | 02:09 |
photographer, Eugene Smith.
And so, I went to the library and I got
| | 02:15 |
all the books I could find on Eugene
Smith.
| | 02:19 |
I'm like getting a little watery about
this, because it still gets me to this day.
| | 02:22 |
But there's this one image by Eugene
Smith called "Tonoko in the Bath," and it
| | 02:27 |
was a photo essay he did in Japan on
mercury poisoning.
| | 02:33 |
And he took this one image of this woman
who was poisoned, and the mother is
| | 02:38 |
holding her in this bath and bathing her,
and it's, it's an absolute perfect photograph.
| | 02:46 |
And it's one photograph in an essay that
Eugene Smith did that changed policy,
| | 02:50 |
changed the way people viewed some
environmental issues that were going on
| | 02:55 |
at the time.
This was at the end of Eugene Smith's
| | 03:00 |
career really, and he, there were some
things that happened to him because of
| | 03:04 |
telling that story.
But anyways, the point is, the it just
| | 03:11 |
struck me and I was a very young age, and
then I looked at the rest of Eugene
| | 03:14 |
Smith's work, and he had very simple
photo stories that he did.
| | 03:20 |
He would do stories on, there was one
called "Nurse Midwife," and another one
| | 03:24 |
just called "Country Doctor".
And some of these, you know, would end up
| | 03:29 |
in Life magazine with just seven pictures
and some would be much larger, but his
| | 03:33 |
life, and his career, and his photo
stories, to this day are like, my guiding
| | 03:37 |
light on how you tell a story.
like I said, now it's however many years
| | 03:44 |
later, and I can still perfectly imagine
that Eugene Smith image in my head, and,
| | 03:49 |
you know, it's like the guiding light and
if, you know, it's taunting too, it's
| | 03:54 |
awful, it's this awful thing, just
like...
| | 04:00 |
He got that one image, and that's what
it's all about.
| | 04:02 |
Like, if you can get that one single
photograph in your entire life, your
| | 04:05 |
entire career, then that's it.
And like, I clearly have not gotten that yet.
| | 04:11 |
I've got friends who, who are
photographers that have gotten that image.
| | 04:14 |
I don't know if they realize they've
gotten that image yet but they've got it.
| | 04:18 |
and I want it.
I want that one image that some kid's
| | 04:23 |
going to look at when they're 13 in like
50 years and go, hey I want to do that
| | 04:26 |
for a living.
So, still working on it.
| | 04:30 |
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Photography versus photojournalism| 00:01 |
First and foremost, I'm a storyteller.
And sometimes I work as a
| | 00:03 |
photojournalist, and other times, I just
work as a photographer.
| | 00:06 |
When I'm working as a photojournalist,
there are some rules and guidelines that
| | 00:10 |
I have to abide by when working for a
newspaper or a news magazine.
| | 00:14 |
and when I'm working as a photographer,
I'm just out there making images, and I'm
| | 00:18 |
always doing it in an honest way.
But the rules are separate from when I'm
| | 00:23 |
working for a newspaper.
Nowadays I'm working more as an editorial
| | 00:27 |
photographer and filmmaker, and so those
rules are a little bit more laxed.
| | 00:31 |
When I'm working for a newspaper, there's
some very definite things that I have to do.
| | 00:36 |
I have to get names right, I have to get
locations right, I can't move anything
| | 00:39 |
inside my frame, I can't ask people to do
anything inside my frame.
| | 00:44 |
it's it's a box that you have to work in
creatively.
| | 00:49 |
And I actually enjoy that a lot.
And I respect the industry immensely.
| | 00:52 |
It's how I came up as a photographer.
It's where I hope to end up when I'm an
| | 00:56 |
old man dying, I still want to be
shooting newspaper images.
| | 01:00 |
But when you get outside that box and
you're working just for editorial
| | 01:03 |
publications or working as a filmmaker,
or any other industry sort of outside of
| | 01:07 |
the news industry telling stories, it's a
very freeing way to express yourself.
| | 01:12 |
So within the genre of photo stories,
there's a very specific kind of story
| | 01:17 |
that, in my career so far, I've tried to
tell.
| | 01:22 |
it's usually been something related to a
conflict or a social cause and usually a region.
| | 01:32 |
For five, six years I was very interested
in what was happening in the Middle East
| | 01:36 |
and North Africa.
when I was coming out of art school, it
| | 01:41 |
was 2001, 2002 and 911 had just happened.
And, that greatly impacted my career.
| | 01:49 |
automatically, every single front page of
every single newspaper in America had
| | 01:53 |
something to do with the Middle East.
it was within two years that I made my
| | 01:59 |
first trip to the Middle East and ended
up in Iraq working there, and then later
| | 02:04 |
on, was based out of Beirut.
so most of my stories in my career, my
| | 02:11 |
photo essays have been rooted in those
conflicts or in the history of those
| | 02:16 |
countries in the, 2002 to about 2009.
and what I do when I'm trying to tell a
| | 02:24 |
story, is I'll, I'll find an actual event
that's happening, so it might be an
| | 02:29 |
earthquake's just happened or a tsunami's
just happened, or there's a war going on
| | 02:34 |
or there's a famine going on.
or, for a while I was interested in
| | 02:42 |
working with the mountain gorillas in
Congo and there were some, some conflict
| | 02:46 |
elements were involved with that, that
affected the gorillas.
| | 02:52 |
but what I do is I look at the bigger
picture, and I'll go to that place, let's
| | 02:55 |
say it's a war, I will go to that war
zone.
| | 02:59 |
but then, that's not the story.
The story is much smaller, and so you go
| | 03:03 |
from the, this bigger place of a war, and
then you find that one person, and you
| | 03:07 |
want to spend a week with that one person
and tell their story and do a photo essay
| | 03:10 |
on them.
Or one small topic.
| | 03:14 |
I was living in Beirut in 2006 when
Israel invaded and started bombing South
| | 03:20 |
Lebanon, and I covered the whole 34 day
war.
| | 03:26 |
But one of the photo essays that I loved
the most is during the war and then
| | 03:30 |
shortly after the war.
I was commissioned by the United Nations
| | 03:35 |
to do a set of pictures on cluster bombs,
which is a small munition that's outlawed
| | 03:40 |
internationally but Israel used in the
south of Lebanon.
| | 03:47 |
And so, I was tasked to go down the south
and photograph child victims of this, and
| | 03:51 |
this is a story that I, you know, was
tragic and heart-wrenching, but it's also
| | 03:54 |
a story of empowerment of these children
that had survived.
| | 04:00 |
And actually go from village to village
sort of telling their friends you know,
| | 04:04 |
don't pick up these little bomblets that
you might find in a field because you're
| | 04:08 |
going to lose your leg too.
so again, it's about, you know, I'll be
| | 04:14 |
tasked to go someplace and there's a
bigger story, like a war, and I'll do
| | 04:18 |
lots of different assignments for
different publications there.
| | 04:22 |
But it's the focusing in, and focusing in
and focusing in more on the more local
| | 04:26 |
level that you get the really meaningful
stories that I love.
| | 04:30 |
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Planning a photo story| 00:01 |
So every great photo essay or photo
story, or at least in my process, starts
| | 00:04 |
with research.
Once you've got the idea of what you want
| | 00:08 |
to shoot, or the concept, then it's time
to like, get down and dirty and spend the
| | 00:10 |
time doing your research.
And nowadays it's all online but the more
| | 00:15 |
informed you are about the topic that
you're shooting the better your pictures
| | 00:18 |
are going to be because you're going to
come up with ideas that you never had before.
| | 00:23 |
A couple years ago, I was in Congo and
working on a photo essay about some of
| | 00:26 |
the illegal mining that goes on there.
And once I started doing research and
| | 00:31 |
looking at maps on where some of these
mines were, and some of the organizations
| | 00:34 |
that were controlling them, I got all
sorts of new ideas of what kind of images
| | 00:37 |
I needed.
The next step for me then, once I'm in
| | 00:41 |
the field and I've flown into the country
is, I sit down, I have a little notepad
| | 00:45 |
that I carry around, and I actually start
storyboarding these things.
| | 00:50 |
And a lot of these images that I draw
never end up in the final photo essay,
| | 00:53 |
but for me it's just a way to get my
brain thinking visually, and also they
| | 00:55 |
act as placeholders in the story.
So it's like, okay, I'm going to need
| | 01:00 |
these 20 images, and I already start
thinking out, you know, these different
| | 01:03 |
elements I'm going to need to put in
those places.
| | 01:06 |
and like I said, those elements will
change.
| | 01:08 |
You know, I might want this one picture
and it's going to rain that day and I
| | 01:11 |
can't take that picture because it was
raining.
| | 01:14 |
I didn't have the light that I wanted.
But then, you know, it informs another
| | 01:17 |
image so, but always, sort of, I
actually, you know, between the
| | 01:19 |
storyboards and in the shot list, I
literally just go down and start crossing
| | 01:22 |
these things off.
And then, you know, as I'm shooting, I'm
| | 01:26 |
adding new things to the top of the list
and new things to the bottom of the list,
| | 01:28 |
and I'm crossing off.
But for me I need that structure to work
| | 01:31 |
in, and it just gets my brain thinking in
the right, in the right direction.
| | 01:35 |
So, because once you get on that plane
and you fly home, there's usually, for
| | 01:38 |
me, I don't have enough money to fly back
and re-shoot the thing.
| | 01:42 |
So if you don't get it in the can then,
you're not going to get it.
| | 01:45 |
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Sequencing photos to tell a story| 00:00 |
Sequencing images for your photo story
is, one of the hardest things.
| | 00:05 |
And there's no right answer, and there's
no right sequences.
| | 00:10 |
There's a lot of wrong sequences, but for
me, it's still something I struggle with.
| | 00:16 |
I think I'm pretty good at editing down,
let's say it's a big project, 10,000
| | 00:21 |
images and getting it down to a 100.
And then getting it down to that magic
| | 00:26 |
25, but then getting that 25 in the
proper order isn't always an easy task.
| | 00:32 |
I'll usually do a first pass, and then
for me, my workflow is, then I send that
| | 00:36 |
out to friends and family, even.
And then also over the years, I've got a
| | 00:40 |
lot of friends that are editors, that are
photo editors.
| | 00:44 |
And I send it to them and they'll give me
informed ideas about how to sequence things.
| | 00:49 |
and then also, if I'm having trouble,
usually if it's a larger project and
| | 00:52 |
there's more images.
what I'll do is I'll just, I'll walk away
| | 00:56 |
from it.
I'll put all the pictures on the wall,
| | 00:58 |
and I'll have them mapped out the way I
want it, and then I just walk away from
| | 01:00 |
it and then I go look at photo books.
I collect photo books, I've got a
| | 01:04 |
thousand of these things.
And you just start looking at how photo
| | 01:07 |
books are sequenced, because they're
brilliant, you know.
| | 01:10 |
And then you come back to it, or you
could watch a movie or something else, I mean.
| | 01:15 |
Film making informs photography in
incredible ways.
| | 01:18 |
And if you can sort of harness what you
see on film or in a photo book and then
| | 01:21 |
bring that back to your just 25 images.
Sequencing 25 images all of a sudden
| | 01:26 |
becomes rather simple.
so I guess bringing in outside sources
| | 01:30 |
and other people's opinions really
informs the way that I organize the
| | 01:34 |
sequence by photo for photo story.
| | 01:37 |
| | Collapse this transcript |
| The importance (and unimportance) of gear| 00:00 |
One element of being a photographer, is
you've gotta have lots of this stuff, you
| | 00:04 |
gotta have cameras.
And a lot of gear, and a lot of people,
| | 00:08 |
that's their segway into photography, is
getting really obsessed with the
| | 00:12 |
technical side of it.
And getting really obsessed with the
| | 00:15 |
newest lens, or the newest camera body,
or the newest tripod or the newest flash.
| | 00:20 |
And I gotta say, it just doesn't interest
me at all (LAUGH).
| | 00:21 |
I'll get a camera and it'll work and I'll
just run with it.
| | 00:26 |
And when it doesn't work, and you know,
this one right now doesn't, this is like
| | 00:29 |
really rough to zoom and it you know,
makes my life hell.
| | 00:32 |
But I know that it'll work and I know the
kind of images I get out of it.
| | 00:36 |
And the thing that I always tell people
is, they're hammers.
| | 00:40 |
They're tools, that's what we use them
for.
| | 00:42 |
And, they're not precious items, you can
see mine is a little beat up.
| | 00:46 |
It's got tape on it, it's broken um,
(LAUGH) but as long as it works and it
| | 00:49 |
shoots and I've got something that's
going to record light.
| | 00:53 |
And I've got a lens in front of it that's
going to do what I need it to do, you
| | 00:56 |
make pictures, and you tell stories with
them.
| | 00:59 |
And yeah well, you know, I love looking
at B and H or whoever, and checking out
| | 01:04 |
the newest gear.
And Leicas are really cool looking, but
| | 01:08 |
at the end of the day, the thing I never
want to hear from an aspiring
| | 01:12 |
photographer or student is like.
I couldn't do that because I couldn't
| | 01:17 |
afford this lens or this camera,
whatever.
| | 01:21 |
Because I was shooting in my first war
zone with a camera that, you know, was
| | 01:25 |
not very good.
I was borrowing equipment and all this.
| | 01:30 |
So, you know, the equipment should never
be hindering the process.
| | 01:34 |
Also, as far as gear I'm also a total
geek and I get geeky about gadgets and
| | 01:37 |
stuff like that.
And I, I do definitely have like a
| | 01:40 |
workflow as far as like when I'm packing
my bag and I'm getting ready to head out.
| | 01:46 |
for me personally, I don't like carrying
bags into the field, I like to just have,
| | 01:49 |
I do like to work with two cameras.
I'm fortunate enough now that I can
| | 01:54 |
afford two cameras, and I don't like
switching lenses in the field if I don't
| | 01:57 |
have to.
Because I just want to know my camera and
| | 02:01 |
grab it and shoot.
And so what I do, and this is pretty
| | 02:04 |
common for photojournalists, is I have
two camera bodies.
| | 02:07 |
they should be identical, mine aren't
identical.
| | 02:10 |
And have one on each shoulder, and I'll
have a wide zoom and I'll have a longer zoom.
| | 02:15 |
So for me its a 17 to 35 and an 80 to
200.
| | 02:18 |
And just based on the weight on the
shoulder, I automatically know which one
| | 02:21 |
it is, and I do a little swing, and I
pull it up, and I shoot.
| | 02:25 |
And I do a little swing on the other one,
and I pull it up, and I shoot.
| | 02:27 |
And you know, it's, it's part of the
process now is I don't really think about it.
| | 02:32 |
You just kind of, you just kind of go
make pictures.
| | 02:34 |
that said, I mean, the one thing I'll say
for, for aspiring photographers or people
| | 02:39 |
that are just learning, is very early on.
When I was I don't know teenager working
| | 02:46 |
you know at a local newspaper.
I wasn't shooting, I was a copy clerk,
| | 02:50 |
but I really wanted to be a photographer.
Is I just, I did learn the process and
| | 02:54 |
the technical stuff.
and really became a nerd about it.
| | 03:00 |
And, you know, you can do that in like
two weeks.
| | 03:02 |
There's not, there's not much to taking a
picture.
| | 03:04 |
You've got, if you look at this thing,
we've got, focus, I've got a zoom on this
| | 03:08 |
one, sometimes you don't even need a
zoom.
| | 03:11 |
But basically you have focus, you've got
your shutter speed.
| | 03:15 |
You've got your aperture, you've got your
film speed, like that's it.
| | 03:18 |
Like, all the cameras are going to have
those, they might call them different
| | 03:21 |
things, like maybe it's Gain, instead of
ISO, or something.
| | 03:24 |
But you essentially have like three or
four elements and that's it.
| | 03:27 |
And you learn those, and you lock it into
your brain, how they work, and then you
| | 03:30 |
never think about it again.
Because when I'm out there in the field,
| | 03:34 |
I'm not sitting there going, oh, am I at
five, six or two, eight dadada, you just
| | 03:37 |
do it.
And, for me, that's one reason while I'll
| | 03:40 |
hold on, even though there's better
cameras out nowadays.
| | 03:43 |
I don't want to switch cameras because
motor memory kicks in.
| | 03:45 |
And so for me, like, when I want to, when
I'm, let's say I'm outside in a bright
| | 03:49 |
situation and I walk through a door into
in the interior and it's dark.
| | 03:55 |
My thumb knows like if I spin the little
wheel on the back of my camera it's only
| | 03:58 |
going to take so many clicks, and that's
going to get me into the interior space.
| | 04:02 |
I'm not thinking, oh well shooting at
F11, now I'm at two eight, like that
| | 04:05 |
thought had happened I don't know, eight
years ago.
| | 04:09 |
And now I just know and (SOUND) it
happens.
| | 04:11 |
seo you just get to know your equipment,
and, make some great pictures, but at the
| | 04:15 |
end of the day, I'll say it again.
It's a hammer, it's a tool.
| | 04:19 |
Don't don't treat it preciously.
Go use it.
| | 04:22 |
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Being a storyteller in the Internet age| 00:00 |
So, after you go make some really great
pictures or you shoot a photo story.
| | 00:04 |
The next obvious question is, what do I
do with these pictures?
| | 00:08 |
And depending on, if you're doing this as
a career or if you're doing this just for
| | 00:11 |
your personal enjoyment.
you've got, you know, a shoebox full of
| | 00:14 |
photographs and now you've gotta go do
something with it.
| | 00:18 |
When I first started out in this job I
was working for newspapers.
| | 00:22 |
I had a a photography agency, or a couple
photo agencies that would represent me,
| | 00:26 |
and my images would be used for
newspapers or magazines.
| | 00:31 |
That's not the case anymore somewhere
around 2007, 2008, the industry
| | 00:35 |
completely changed.
Which was really disappointing, I mean I
| | 00:40 |
love doing newspaper work and I love
doing newspaper work the way that I did it.
| | 00:43 |
It's like, kind of got to pick the
stories that I want to shoot and I'd go
| | 00:46 |
shoot them, and then like, an agency
would figure out how to sell it, I didn't
| | 00:49 |
have to mess with that.
and it's not that way anymore, and for
| | 00:54 |
about two years, I really struggled with
that trying to sort of hold on to this
| | 00:58 |
job that I used to have that didn't
exist.
| | 01:02 |
But now I've sort of embraced a new, a
new thing which is just, you know,
| | 01:05 |
getting away from just being this
photojournalist from 2002 that doesn't
| | 01:08 |
exist anymore, and being a storyteller.
And now it's about the story and
| | 01:13 |
sometimes I'm going to find a client that
will let me do it with video and
| | 01:16 |
sometimes I'm going to find a client that
will let me do it with stills or
| | 01:19 |
sometimes I'll find a client that will
let me do it with both.
| | 01:25 |
and you just embrace that and it's
going to change again.
| | 01:28 |
The industry is always changing and the
great thing now is I can I can take a
| | 01:31 |
bunch of pictures, and I can take a bunch
of video, and I can record a bunch of
| | 01:34 |
audio, and I can put it all together and
I can, you know, work and collaborate
| | 01:38 |
with other people to make a meaningful
piece.
| | 01:43 |
And then, in about 10 minutes I can throw
it up on the internet and I can link it
| | 01:46 |
to a bunch of stuff and people can see
it, and that, that didn't exist when I
| | 01:49 |
started out.
When I started out, like I barely used
| | 01:54 |
email, and now I can send a feature
length film to somebody to watch, and
| | 01:58 |
they can click a button and it's there.
So, I mean, this is probably, it's too
| | 02:04 |
late in the 2000s to talk about how cool
the internet is, but it really is the
| | 02:07 |
most amazing distribution tool.
And it's something that I think everybody
| | 02:13 |
really should embrace.
that said, I still love it, if when you
| | 02:17 |
get to see one of your images on the
front page of a major newspaper, and it's
| | 02:20 |
a story that you really care about, it
doesn't just get any better than that,
| | 02:24 |
and I miss that.
But again, like as story teller, we
| | 02:29 |
shouldn't get upset about the, the final
format changing, we should embrace the
| | 02:33 |
new thing.
And there's some photographers now that
| | 02:38 |
I'm, I'm, looking at that are
distributing images in small batch book
| | 02:41 |
publications and I love it, it's amazing.
They spend a lot of time you know, making
| | 02:47 |
really beautiful prints in small batch
books of like 20 to 100.
| | 02:52 |
I don't think that's the right format for
maybe something like conflict
| | 02:56 |
photography, obviously.
I think that makes the image too precious
| | 03:00 |
and it shouldn't be a precious image.
But I think there's other stories and
| | 03:03 |
that's the perfect format for it.
I'm looking for the right story to do
| | 03:06 |
something like that.
I would love to do a small batch of photo books.
| | 03:10 |
So, I think there's just a lot of
opportunities right now.
| | 03:13 |
that if you think outside the box and
embrace them, it's a really, really cool
| | 03:16 |
time to be a storyteller.
| | 03:19 |
| | Collapse this transcript |
| A sampling of photo stories| 00:00 |
So in the genre of working in photo
stories, professionally I work a lot in journalism.
| | 00:06 |
But then, you know, I can't leave, I
can't leave it alone just at work, I
| | 00:10 |
bring that home too.
I'm always taking pictures, and in the
| | 00:14 |
last two years, (LAUGH), I my girlfriend
at the time, my wife now, she had some
| | 00:18 |
back problems.
And, I, I went to the hospital and
| | 00:22 |
photographed her, you know, getting ready
for surgery and getting prepped.
| | 00:27 |
And then going into surgery and then
coming out and the whole process, cause I
| | 00:30 |
just can't stop taking pictures.
And even when I'm doing something like
| | 00:35 |
that, is that, I'm still thinking of
making it into a narrative.
| | 00:39 |
What picture I need at the beginning,
what picture do I need at the end, what
| | 00:42 |
do I need in the middle?
You know, what kind of filler elements do
| | 00:46 |
I want to make visually more interesting?
You know, and then, also I've got a
| | 00:50 |
stepdaughter and she's in this really
cool community garden program in Pennsylvania.
| | 00:55 |
And, I do all the photographs for that,
and, you know, when we have our, we have
| | 00:59 |
a pesto day once a year.
And we all get around the kitchen table
| | 01:03 |
and make pesto with all the kids, I do a
photo essay of that.
| | 01:07 |
Because, for me, telling stories with
photos, is a really satisfying
| | 01:11 |
experience, and I do it, for everything
in my life.
| | 01:15 |
I don't ever stop taking pictures, and
the way that I do, that is with telling stories.
| | 01:20 |
I guess some people can do it in one
frame and I try to do that, but I really
| | 01:24 |
enjoy the idea of grouping images
together to tell a story.
| | 01:30 |
One of my more published photo essays,
was a story that wasn't even my idea.
| | 01:34 |
It was a story that the agency that I was
working for at the time, pitched to me,
| | 01:38 |
and they asked me if I would go do it.
And it was a project down in Antartica on
| | 01:43 |
this organization called the Sea Sheperd.
And now a lot of people know about this
| | 01:48 |
group, because they had a reality TV
show, but this was before that reality
| | 01:51 |
show happened.
I went down there and did this photo
| | 01:54 |
story for the agency, and it inevitably
it ended up being for National Geographic
| | 01:57 |
Adventure magazine.
we, I went down to Australia and I got on
| | 02:03 |
this boat full of, I don't know, 40 or 50
vegans, and they headed to the waters off
| | 02:07 |
of Antarctica.
To battle it out with the Japanese
| | 02:12 |
whaling fleet who annually goes down
there and slaughters whales.
| | 02:18 |
And their idea was to go down there with
their little-bitty boat that goes about 5
| | 02:22 |
knots, and try to stop this huge industry
boat.
| | 02:26 |
And something about this story at the
time just connected with people, and,
| | 02:31 |
it's probably the most publicized full
photo essay that I've ever had.
| | 02:38 |
I mean, I've had individual images from
wars and things that have gone lots of places.
| | 02:43 |
But as far as like, a multiple picture
essay, the project on Sea Sheperd,
| | 02:47 |
definitely went as a package to more
places.
| | 02:52 |
and I think it resonated for a number of
reasons, 'cuz it was a cause that people
| | 02:57 |
could get behind.
and then visually, it was shot in a very
| | 03:02 |
energetic way.
There's this one image that people always
| | 03:06 |
sort of, sort of resonates with people.
This guy named Joel who was on a small
| | 03:10 |
zodiac raft, and it's going around the
front of the Nisshin Maru, it's a huge
| | 03:13 |
boat and as it's turning.
Joel's got this look of fear on his face,
| | 03:18 |
like, oh, you know, this, this huge
boat's going to just eat me.
| | 03:22 |
And it, you know, it would, if the zodiac
had stopped, the Nisshin Maru would have
| | 03:25 |
ran him over.
but I think it resonates with people.
| | 03:29 |
And it's usually opening image to that
essay.
| | 03:32 |
so, I guess the point of the story is,
you know, if you, if you get one really
| | 03:36 |
great image to interesting story.
It'll actually go far, because, people
| | 03:41 |
will remember that one.
| | 03:43 |
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Stories are all around you| 00:00 |
So it's really easy to look at these
amazing bodies of work in war zones and
| | 00:04 |
places like this, but also, some of the
best, most interesting photo essays and
| | 00:08 |
stories you're going to find are your
neighbors and your family, and the things
| | 00:13 |
in your everyday life.
I've been wanting to do a photo story on
| | 00:19 |
my nephew's football team for years.
And, he was when I first got the idea he
| | 00:25 |
was probably like 12 or something, and I
saw this picture of him and he's like
| | 00:29 |
this little bitty guy with like, the big
shoulder pads and all this.
| | 00:35 |
And I thought, man, this is, this is
cool.
| | 00:37 |
I want to do like an entire season of
this, a photo story of an entire season
| | 00:41 |
of Beggs, Oklahoma's Pee Wee Football
League.
| | 00:45 |
And I didn't do it.
I never did it.
| | 00:46 |
And every year I'd say, oh I'll go back
and I'll do it.
| | 00:48 |
I'll do it.
And now he's 21 or 22 years old and I
| | 00:50 |
didn't do it, and I'm kicking myself for
it.
| | 00:52 |
But, you know, it's not just the big
stories that you go do.
| | 00:56 |
You find the things that just interest
you, and you go do it.
| | 00:59 |
And the, the, the access is what makes a
great story.
| | 01:03 |
And we all have access to our brothers,
and our sisters, and our nephews, and our
| | 01:06 |
nieces, and our neighbors, and our
colleagues, and, you know, if you go to
| | 01:09 |
church, the people at your church or the,
you know, the people you meet in the park
| | 01:12 |
when you walk your dog.
And it's all about story telling.
| | 01:17 |
You're sitting at the bench with your dog
walking people and they tell you a story.
| | 01:20 |
And you go, wait a minute, that would
make a great photo essay.
| | 01:23 |
but once you click that switch in your
head and you say, you know, you're always
| | 01:26 |
thinking about stories, you know, and
somebody tells you a story.
| | 01:30 |
Oh, I could photograph that.
And in photographing that, I can put a
| | 01:33 |
piece of myself in it, because the way
that I'm going to tell that story is
| | 01:36 |
going to mean something to me, as well as
them, because you're representing them.
| | 01:41 |
photo students or aspiring photographers
often times just say, well, I don't know
| | 01:45 |
what to photograph, or I don't have
access because I don't have a press pass,
| | 01:48 |
or something like this.
And it's like, you don't need a press
| | 01:53 |
pass to photograph your nephew's football
game.
| | 01:56 |
And you don't need a press pass if your
grandfather is getting ready to die, and
| | 02:00 |
he's got one year left, and you have
opportunity to sit down with him and make
| | 02:03 |
pictures and audio recordings and find
out what it was like for him when he was
| | 02:06 |
a 19 year old man in the Depression or
whatever.
| | 02:11 |
You know these are these great stories,
and the camera gives you a reason to go
| | 02:14 |
ask the questions and be a part of these
people's lives.
| | 02:20 |
And don't ever use the excuse, you know,
I don't know what to photograph.
| | 02:23 |
It's all out there.
Go do it.
| | 02:24 |
| | Collapse this transcript |
|
|
