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, go and try it. Win, lose, or draw, Bill believes fiercely in the capabilities of the lone photographer in the field to produce significant, moving images. He defends the process, and has faith in ideas, even some of the nuttier ones I have had. The mandate to simply go out, unfettered, and find stuff to make pictures of is the greatest gift a picture editor can give a photographer.
As far as shooters go, so many heroes, so many influences. In school I wanted to be W. Eugene Smith. I devoured the work of Leonard McCombe, John Zimmerman, Gjon Mili, Ralph Morse, and Gordon Parks. When I got to New York, I encountered real pros (there is no higher praise). Guys like Danny Farrell, Jimmy McGrath, and Mike Lipack showed me the ropes at the Daily News. In the magazine world, I always stood in awe of Wally McNamee, Neil Leifer, David Burnett, Jim Stanfield, Jim Richardson, Alex Webb, Brian Lanker, Greg Heisler, Michael O’Neill, Bill Allard, David Alan Harvey, Walter Iooss, and Jay Maisel, to name a few. I always tell young photographers to study the work of others. It is the shoulders upon which you stand.
I bought my first Nikon camera in 1973 and, little did I know, I bought much more than a camera. Over the years, I have become part of the Nikon family, and they have been a source of strength, counsel, and support in amazing ways, including the creation of this book. People like David Lee, Anna Marie Bakker, Ed Fasano, Bill Pekala, Jay Vannatter, Joe Ventura, Frances Roth, Barbara Heineman, Lindsay Silverman, Melissa DiBartolo, Mark Kettenhofen, Bill Fortney, Sam Garcia, and Carol Fisher are the human face of a great camera system. Nikon puts their people in the trenches with us, like my blood brother Mike Corrado. Guys like Mike are the reason their cameras are so good, and why being a “Nikon shooter” has always been something special.
Every photographer needs a support system and mine is extraordinary. My sisters Kathy and Rosemary are also my dear, dear friends. Their phone calls often start with the question, “Where are you?” Even though a bit of my life remains a mystery to them, and I am often far away in the field and out of touch, we are extraordinarily close. They are always there for me, and are far wiser than I. Their love, advice, and confidences are shelter from the storm. My friend and studio manager, Lynn DelMastro, has held together the ramshackle enterprise known as McNally Photography for 15 years now, through thick and very thin, and continues to this day to be a friend, the smart and engaging face of our business, a source of wisdom and humor, a confidante, and an astonishingly skilled producer. The list could go on. Lynn wears many hats during the course of an average day at the studio. (When did we last have one of those?) All that aside, at the end of the day, it is her deep and abiding friendship, her wit and wisdom, her love of this collective enterprise, her unshakable faith and trust that enables me to once again put the cameras on my shoulder and go out and make a picture. She is one of the treasures of my life.
About a year ago, a very atypical Tennessean named Brad Moore walked in our doors. He is an able field assistant, a computer wizard, an excellent photographer who is represented in this book, and a devotee of funny, bad, good, and just plain strange movies. He has become a fast friend to Lynn and me, indispensable at the studio, and, at many points, the glue that has held together this book project. Much the same could be said of Ellen Price, who is the shepherdess of the Faces of Ground Zero—Giant Polaroid Collection. She has been tireless in seeking support and a repository for the pictures, which is no simple task, seeing as the collection consists of twelve 2,000-lb. crates of framed, life-size Polaroid prints of the heroes of 9/11. Her faith in the importance of these photographs will find them a home. Likewise, Allison Lucas, Chris Parker, and Meghan Long work at our studio. They share in the adventure, the wonderful and daunting process of running a very small photo business.
I have been fortunate to meet and work with some of the very best people in this business. Kriss Brungrabber of Bogen, Dan Steinhardt of Epson, Michelle Pitts of Lexar, Justin Stailey of Leica, Bahram Foroughi and Martin Gisborne of Apple, John Omvik (formerly of Lexar), Reid Callanan at the Santa Fe Workshops, Elizabeth Greenberg at the Maine Media Workshops, and Gen Umei of K & L Inc., Tokyo, all have been sources of wisdom and support. That is especially true of Sid and Michelle Monroe. They run the Monroe Gallery in Santa Fe, a wonderful repository of powerful pictures that stands astride the worlds of journalism and art. The fact that they have chosen to hang some of my work on their walls is one of the honors of my career.
Photographers often develop extended families. As I write this I am out with a wonderful part of mine, my DLWS family. Legendary wildlife shooter Moose Peterson and his wife Sharon created the Digital Landscape Workshop Series a number of years ago, barnstorming around to beautiful parts of the country, teaching shooting and computer skills. I was lucky enough to join the team of Moose, Sharon, Laurie Excell, Joe Sliger, Kevin Dobler, and Josh Bradley to share pictures and laughs in equal measure, at the same time sharing our love of photography with lots of great folks. One of them was Scott Kelby. It was in a DLWS class that the light bulb Scott speaks of in his foreword went on. We were on a lonely road in Vermont, and he said, “Joe, come take a walk with me.”
When Scott asks you to take a walk with him, you go. He is genius, friend, and mentor, and he knows a thing or two about writing books. He’s also got a warm heart and a generous spirit, in addition to being a heckuva good photographer. We have had many long talks about light, the language of photography. He and his buddy, Dave Moser, believe in the power of images and the importance of education. At the end of our walk, Scott gave me this very good advice. He said, “Joe, you need to write this book.”
For once, I actually listened to good advice. Scott and his wife Kalebra, Dave Moser, and Kathy Siler combine to run Kelby Training, NAPP, and a whole bunch of other stuff. They, in turn, brought the project to Nancy Ruenzel and Ted Waitt at Peachpit Press. Together, these folks are a force of nature, and I consider it my incredible good fortune they swept me up in their creative whirlwind. Doing the book brought me into contact with Jessica Maldonado, a peerless designer who took my pictures and some fairly lunatic ramblings and made coherent, beautiful pages out of them. Editor Cindy Snyder has been everything you want from an editor—calm, organized, forward moving, and smart. In addition to being all of those, she has taught me a great deal about the English language along the way.
At the end of the day, nothing is possible without the women in my life—Caitlin, Claire, and Annie. Caity and Claire are becoming amazing women and citizens of the world: adventurous, smart, beautiful, empathetic, and just plain with it. I hope their often-absent, nutty photog father has shown them that it is in fact a large and astonishing world, filled with knowledge, possibilities, and difference. I hope I have helped them get ready for it, just a little bit.
And my wife, Annie...I feel her sweetness, decency, love, humor, friendship, faith, and loyalty every day, in every breath. While this book is largely about what has gone on, and pictures that have been made, it is also very much about now. I could not have written this from another place, a place different from where I am now. And that place is the happiest place I have ever been. That place is Annie.