1,000 Words
By
When my friend Joe Kaczmarek got this photo a few days ago – of a Rolls Royce driver dining at Burger King drive-through window – I thought about my photojournalism students, and I told him “You can’t teach that in school.”
Like a lot of my own work over the years, this is the sort of photo that never wins awards judged by lofty photojournalists, but it pushes buttons for the readers. The essential acts required of the photographer include constant analytical perception, and sometimes a sense of humor, but above all: a killer instinct, to drop everything and take the picture immediately. Of course, technical preparedness is essential as well.
Within 24 hours, Kaz got kudos from photo editors far and near, saw his photo at the top of The Drudge Report, and watched Regis and Kelly have a laugh on their morning TV show with a copy of the photo they found in a New York tabloid. (Blogger hijacking wasn’t far behind though I got permission. For what’s it’s worth, I just searched and found a surprisingly similar photo.)
Check out Joe’s work from the crime beat in Philly and the surf scene in Maui.
2 Comments
December 19th, 2008 at 5:29 pm
Worst thing about that photo: I’ve been complaining for months that a similar scene in Iron Man would never happen. Then he goes and documents it. I’ll take my crow flame-broiled, please.
December 19th, 2008 at 9:28 pm
RT @JimMacMillan 1,000 words: My friend took this picture, which took on a life of it’s own this week: http://is.gd/cA63