On the Job: The Prom Queen

Posted on September 15, 2010 by Tim Porter

Old joke: How do you live to be 100? Make it to 99 and then be very, very careful.

Being, as my wife says, a cornball at heart, I told that joke, which I heard many times from my father, to Jean Murphy when I met her at the Redwoods retirement community in Mill Valley, where I was photographing her for a feature for Marin Magazine.

Jean, 99, smiled mildly at my attempt at witticism, a smile she had no doubt developed during her many years of teaching and had reserved for those student she considered beyond salvation. Reaching 100 is no joke for Jean, and she is hardly sitting around waiting for her odometer to hit three digits, which it will do on Dec. 2.

In the hour we spent together in her crowded, but comfortable first-floor studio, Jean told me of outings to S.F. Symphony or Berkeley Rep or a community drumming session or protesting with The Mill Valley Seniors for Peace.

A busy lady, Jean was also this year’s prom queen at The Redwoods, an honor awarded to the oldest attendee at the event. Here’s hoping Jean wears the crown again next year.

Grab Shots: Eyes on the Prize

Posted on May 12, 2010 by Tim Porter

I saw ad this morning on the op-ed page of the New York Times touting the winners of the Hillman Foundation’s annual journalism awards for social justice journalism, so I jumped to the site to see the photojournalism winners. Sadly — and oddly — the page names the winners but doesn’t link to the work itself. Allow me:

* Childhood Poverty in Colorado — The Denver Post’s owner may be recovering from bankruptcy, but the photography (and reporting) staff is hard at work. Wonderfully intimate and ultimately saddening images from variety of families. The splash page is above.

* Ian Fisher: American Soldier — Photographer Craig Walker of the The Denver Post (again) follows the enlistment, war and homecoming of one soldier. Walker’s work also the Pulitzer this year for feature photography.

* The other photojournalism Pulitzer winner this year was Mary Chind, who shot the dramatic photo below of a construction hanging for a crain in order to rescue a drowning woman. Here’s the story behind the shot.

The Real Mexico? ¿Y cuál es ése?

Posted on May 8, 2010 by Tim Porter

Last night while at a reception at a local art gallery I was talking with Edgar Sóberon, a talented painter whose work was chosen for the next cover of Marin Magazine. Sóberon, a native of Cuba who now lives in San Miguel de Allende, the central Mexico city known for its large community of both artists and North American expats.

I mentioned to Sóberon that my wife and I have a house in Oaxaca in Southern Mexico. Hearing that, a woman in our conversation pocket said she planned to visit Oaxaca this summer and wanted to know what it was like. “Ah,” said Sóberon, “Oaxaca is what’s left of the real Mexico.”

As soon as I heard those words, I thought: The real Mexico? Which one is that?

Is the real Mexico in San Miguel, where thousands of older Americans, some wealthy, others living on Social Security, enjoy the tranquility, historical ambiance and mild weather the strong dollar buys them in this prosperous hillside city?

Is the real Mexico the terrorized border cities like Ciudad Juarez or Nuevo Laredo, where narco militias kill at will to protect their trafficking empires?

Is the real Mexico the one this art gallery guest hopes to visit in Oaxaca, where vendors sell colorful balloons in the zócalo, where the streets are lined with shops of artesania and where the cafés are crowded with language students having soulful discussions with their teachers?

Or is the the real Mexico the other Oaxaca — where government at all levels is marked by corruption, cronyism and crass disregard for the welfare of its citizens, where the average level of education is six years, where three quarters of the population lives in “extreme poverty,” and where rural Indian communities continue to engage in tribal turf battles reaching back to pre-colonial times?

Real Mexico? These are all real Mexicos. And there are many others as well — the modern avenidas of Monterrey, the cosmopolitan chic of Mexico City and, the one known by most Americans, the self-contained resorts of the Pacific and Caribbean coasts.

Sadly, the Mexico most Mexicans must endure is a dysfunctional one, where government cannot — and often chooses not — to provide basic services, where narco-violence is on the rise and where the rule of law is something read about in textbooks not practiced in real life.

This is the Mexico that Laura Carlsen, director of the Americas Program at the Center For International Policy, labels on the Huffington Post as living in a state of impunity. Carlsen write in response to the April 27 murder of two human rights workers in a remote indigenous Oaxacan village, she frames the attack in the broader context of the state government’s history of not only siding with the powerful against the powerless but of actively repressing dissent.

“Layers of impunity and injustice have covered crimes in Oaxaca for years,” writes Carlsen. Her list of examples is long — the shooting death of U.S. journalist Brad Will during the bloody 2006 teachers strike for which no one was ever convicted even the though shooters were video-taped; the continued iron-fisted arrogance of Oaxacan Gov. Ulises Ruiz Ortiz despite a ruling by the Mexican Supreme Court that he had committed human rights violations during that strike; and, now, the belief by human rights activists that paramilitary members sponsored by the government were behind the April 27 ambush outside San Juan Copala.

When the leaders of a society operate with corruption, arrogance and impunity, they create an atmosphere in which law has no meaning. As Carlsen puts it:

“Impunity is not merely a lack of justice and due punishment; it’s an incubator of violence and crime. When impunity becomes state policy, the rule of law crumbles. “

Although Carlsen is addressing Mexico’s most serious issues, her observation also applies to the quotidian illegal floutings of many Mexicans, who routinely run red lights, cheat on taxes, steal supplies from government contract jobs and see bureaucratic nepotism as a money-making opportunity.

I say these things even though I love so much about Mexico — its rich, blended culture; its amazingly diverse geography; its family centered communities; and, of course, its food (especially in Oaxaca). But I also love Mexico in the way I’d love a friend or relative with a substance-abuse problem — with sadness over his state, with anger his your self-destruction, and with hope that someone, some how, stages an intervention soon.

There is a Mexican saying, a dicho, that my first Spanish teacher taught me. It is apt here and goes like this: No hay mal que por bien no venga — “there is no bad that comes without a good.”

The real Mexico? That’s the one still waiting for the good to come.

On the Job: Good Work is Still Work

Posted on May 7, 2010 by Tim Porter

Toward the end of my newspaper career, I became intrigued by the concept of “good work,” effort that not only benefits society and meets certain standards of professional excellence but makes its practitioners feel personally fulfilled. Good work, as Bill Damon describes it in “Good Work, When Excellence and Ethics Meet,” is something “that allows full expression of what is best in us, something we experience as rewarding and enjoyable.”

It didn’t surprise me that the industry cited by Damon as antithetical to good work was newspapering. I, as ink-stained and wretched as anyone who ever chased a story, had been inside the news factory for 25 years and knew first-hand how the demands of deadline, the burdens of tradition and the rigidity of newsroom hierarchy stifled creativity, personal expression and, ultimately, the ability to consistently do the social good that newspapers in particular heralded as one of their primary reasons for existence.

After I left the industry a decade of transition defined alternately by periods of purposeful self-reinvention and intermissions of questioning self-doubt brought me to a fortunate point in my life: An opportunity to find “good work” as a photographer.

By many standards, I have successfully taken advantage of that opportunity. I shoot regularly for a local magazine, have published a much-praised book on organic farms and have managed to learn — through much trial and much more error — the basics of several types of photography.

But, as satisfying as these achievements are, I would like more. I want to be a better photographer, by which I mean one who is more creative and less constrained by the ideas of others. I want to be a better technician so I can make happen images I see in my head but elude me in camera. And I want to build my photography as a business so I have more financial freedom.

Lately I have found that pursuit of the last goal can impinge accomplishment of the first two. In other words, the more business I get the less time I have for purely creative endeavors, which are often the pathways to leaning new techniques.

I am having a decent year as a photography business (compared to the doldrums of last year), so I am not complaining (or am I?), but I am a bit tired. I am doing a lot of events and corporate work, which involve long hours on the job, a lot of gear schlepping and then longer days processing on the computer. My youthful ambition is colliding with my not-so-youthful body.

In other words, even “good work” is still work. It fulfills mentally and emotionally — and I am thankful beyond expression for that — but it’s taking a toll physically.

In the ideal world (where is that place?), I’d grow my business with more advertising and product photography. I’ve found I like working in the studio. I enjoy both the control I have over the lighting, and also the challenge of making the simple seem more exciting. The studio is also less stressful — the gear is there, I don’t have to produce 75 or 100 pictures form a shoot and clients are often looking at the photos on the computer while I shoot, meaning they aren’t suggesting afterward that I should have shot something else.

Until then, I’ll take almost any work that comes my way. At this point of my career, it’s all “good.”

+++

Photo notes: Flatbread by Rustic Bakery of Larkspur; shot for The Marin Store.

On the Job: “Mine” vs. “Theirs”

Posted on April 22, 2010 by Tim Porter

I am not sure what came first in my life, photography or journalism, but both influenced me greatly as a young man.

While I was in college, I worked in the darkroom at UC Extension in San Francisco, where my fellow lab rats were mostly students at the San Francisco Art Institute. In our spare time, and there was plenty of that after the day’s chemicals were mixed, they taught me to print deep blacks and luminous whites on rich, expensive sheets of Agfa paper and instilled in me the belief that each of us can see the world in an unique manner if we only look long and hard enough.

After work, I studied photojournalism, which had its own, and very different, definitions of photography. It focused on people, it told stories, it exposed injustice, it was active and, my favorite teacher, Fran Ortiz, used to say, it was done best close in. If your pictures aren’t good enough, he’d preach, get closer.

I took all those messages to heart and, as most students do, made photographs that imitated the best photographers of both worlds. The artist in me photographed empty beds, their white sheets lit by sunlight from open windows, and then spent hours making one print in the darkroom. The photojournalist in me chased news — the trial of kidnapped newspaper heiress Patty Hearst — then rushed to UPI where I developed and dried the film (with a hair dryer!) in two minutes, made a one-minute print and put it on the wire, all for glory and $15 a shot.

Eventually, the journalism won out and by the time I was ready to leave college more than anything I wanted to be a newspaper photographer. That was not to be, though, for several reasons. I had talent, but I lacked confidence in my work and doubted my instincts, a bad combination in an industry that rewards drive and ambition (as well as talent), so when the photo editor of a big San Francisco paper suggested I try another field I was crushed.

I moved on to a job as a reporter (who did some photography) and then into a long period of editing. I did well, ran a couple of newsrooms and got to be waist deep in some of the biggest local news of my generation. Fast forward a few years past the Internet boom and there I was successful and skilled in many things except that which I always wanted to do — photography.

About that time, when I was finishing a book on newspapers and facing an intersection on the road ahead, my wife gave me a little digital camera. That gift changed my life. I began shooting and shooting, amazed at the possibilities of digital but also frustrated by the camera’s shortcomings, so I bought my first DSLR, a Nikon D70s. Quite serendipitously, a friend co-founded Marin Magazine about the same time and asked me to be involved.

Suddenly, I became a photographer (who does some writing). The learning curve was steep. I knew the basics, I had a decent eye, I could think on my feet and I could navigate a story like a journalist, but I knew little about lighting, Photoshop and the demands of magazine photography, which are more about editorial style than the raw truth-telling of photojournalism.

But I’ve learned. I’m better. I can light just about anything, can make the software do pretty much what I want, can walk into most any situation and come out with something to publish, and can make almost anyone look good.

I consider those the basics — the things any photographer needs to make “their” photos, “their” meaning the clients, whether a magazine, a baker or a university, all of which I’ve shot for this month.

What I want now is a vision — the thing I need to make “my” photos.

Yesterday, I posted a some links to art photographers I like (see Grab Shots: Get Out of the Rut). When I see this sort of work, I see photographers shooting for and creating images for themselves, not for others. Don’t misunderstand, I am thrilled by the opportunity to make “their” photos — few people get the sort of second chance I’ve been given — but as much as I wanted to be a newspaper shooter when I was younger I now, much older, want to find photography that is “mine.”

Do I know what “mine” is? No, not yet, but there is a kernel of it in this picture, which I made for Marin Magazine to illustrate a story on school costs. The magazine used a different frame, one a bit more flattering to the girl, the child of a local parent. That was theirs.

This one is mine.

Grab Shots: Get Out of the Rut

Posted on April 21, 2010 by Tim Porter

When I’m feeling less than creative (too often) or think I’ve fallen into a rut (taking the same shot over and over), I look to other photographers for inspiration, especially those whose images are very different than mine. Here are a few I admire for their eye and creativity:

* Erica Allen — The image at right is from her series Untitled Gentlemen, which she calls “fictional portraits created using discarded studio photographs and anonymous faces from contemporary barbershop hairstyle posters.”

* Ross Sawyers — Like me, he’s intrigued by empty rooms. Unlike me, he photographs them and makes rich, emphatic images.

* Bill Mattick — I can see him wandering the fringes of L.A., pausing before empty lots, dirt roads and billboards, and seeing among the detritus an honest, but lonely beauty. See it for yourself in the Gardens of Los Angeles.

* Phil Toledano — This London photographer says “photographs should be like unfinished sentences. There should always be space for questions.” His series on plastic surgery, A New Kind of Beauty, raises plenty of questions. (See Conscientious for more on Toledano and the project.)

Grab Shots: Get Some Perspective

Posted on February 27, 2010 by Tim Porter

Here in the United States, with politicians and pundits of all stripes yammering ad nauseum about each other’s shortcomings, and with our insatiable obsessions with media and celebrity, it’s easy to lose perspective about what’s important in the world. Despite the tolls taken by the recession, we Americans still live in a comfortable bubble marked by the personal freedoms of expression, consumption and, most fundamentally, democratic standards — liberties denied to millions of other people on the planet by oppressive governments, megalomaniac dictators and hard-fisted clerics.

Photojournalism provides us with a window into that crueler world. Here’s a sampling:

* Planet War: Foreign Policy editors put together a powerful photo essay on the 33 conflicts “raging around the world today,” reminding us that “it’s often innocent civilians who suffer the most.” Above, an Iranian dissident in December 2009.

* 2nd Tour Hope I Don’t Die: A narrated presentation of still and video images made by Magnum photographer Peter van Agtmael reflecting on his coverage of Iraq from January 2006 to December 2008. He describes it this way: “I tried to make pictures that reflected my complex and often contradictory experiences, where the line was continuously blurred between perpetrator and victim, between hero and villain. In time, the labels that had heretofore defined my perceptions of the world became meaningless.”

* Hell on a Small Island: Dirck Halstead writes about two photographers, Damon Winter of the New York Times and Shaul Schwarz of Reportage/Getty Images, who covered the horrific human disaster that followed the January 12 earthquake in Haiti. For them, says Halstead, “the camera becomes a shield, a protective layer between terrible death and the photographer.” Here is Winter’s gallery, and her is Schwarz’s gallery.

On the Job: Marin Magazine Cover

Posted on January 21, 2010 by Tim Porter

Marin Magazine gave me a wonderful opportunity in the February issue — eight pages of photographs to illustrate the beauty of Marin County. To my surprise, the editor also chose one of the images for the cover — a grove of oak trees on a Novato hillside.

I made this photo quite by accident a year ago. I was looking for an elevated vantage point to photograph the Buck Institute’s distinctive I.M. Pei building as part of a story on Buck’s scientists. As I climbed this little hillside with my gear, the sun suddenly came out from behind some storm clouds and lit up the grass and the trees. I shot about 10 frames before the cloud cover returned. Another shot from that moment is in the photo layout.

The text I wrote to accompany the pictures is below.

See all the photos in a slideshow. And, of course, they are available for purchase as fine art prints through the Marin Store.

—————————————————————–

Marin Views (text from magazine)

Much of my career, in photography and in journalism, has focused on people and their peccadilloes. They were rogues and rascals mostly, types you wouldn’t readily invite home for family dinner. Such was the business of news.

That changed when I began making pictures for Marin Magazine. Even though we have our share of local rapscallions, what captivated me as I ventured deeper into Marin than ever before were its various scapes—landscapes, seascapes, and, yes, bridgescapes. I was often out and about at first light or early evening, when nature presents its very best.

The beauty of this marvelous place filled me with wonder—the forested wilds of Tam, the windswept solitude of the beaches, the verdant promise of spring farmland, all of it connected, majestically, by a golden span to San Francisco.

–Tim Porter

On the Job: Jewelry

Posted on January 11, 2010 by Tim Porter

Jewelry by Alix and Co.

Today and tomorrow I am shooting jewelry in the studio for the magazine. Even though I am happy to have the work–especially after the advertising disaster that was 2009–photographing jewelry is one of my least favorite things to do.

I do a pretty decent job with it– the above shot is of bracelets from Alix and Co., Mill Valley jewelers–but there is still plenty for me to learn. There are nuances to the lighting, especially to minimize unwanted reflections, I haven’t mastered, and I’d love to have a camera with perspective control into order to control depth of field more, but I’m not planning on buying a 4×5 any time soon.

I spent several hours in the studio yesterday working on new lighting set-ups, and even woke up last night about 3 a.m. thinking of another. This time, I am using more diffusers (including scrimming the whole shooting table) and more fill, and shooting on white plastic, which bounces the light very evenly. The quality of the light is the best I’ve made so far. Still, I have not figured out how to keep the camera from appearing in a reflection and continue to have difficulty controlling highlights while shooting on white.

Since I returned to photography five years ago–after a 20-year detour into newspapering–I have learned a great deal about the technical aspects of the craft, but acquiring the knowledge about shooting jewelry – or other tabletop products for that matter – is difficult for me because I don’t learn in a linear fashion. I am a sporadic learner, taking bits of know-how from here and there until I’ve put together a workable toolkit. Jewelry techniques, however, require certain amounts of exactitude and understanding of math and are best learned in a step-by-step manner, a method I have always found elusive.

At times like these, I wish I’d had the opportunity to apprentice with a commercial photographer and acquire some tricks of the trade from a master instead of picking them up piecemeal from books, the Internet and, of course, the lessons of past mistakes. But that is not the route my life took, and my photographic journey continues, one day at a time, one shot at a time.

I’ll let you know how it turns out.

Grab Shots: Afghanistan Photojournalism

Posted on January 8, 2010 by Tim Porter

Afghanistan soldier

The battlefields change, the combatants differ, the technology improves, but some things about war remain constant: Soldiers are young, innocents die and photojournalists capture the carnage. Great human photography often emerges from terrible circumstances. Here are some examples from Afghanistan:

* The Long Haul: The Digital Journalist has a piece by photojournalist Lucian Reed about his life and work in Aftghanistan. It begins: “I’ve been to Afghanistan eight times in the last 18 months. My apartment is slowly taking on the look of a caravanserai. I have more friends in Kabul than Manhattan. My mind is full of snippets of Dari, counterinsurgency strategy and half-remembered warlords, major and minor. My son – not yet quite born – will have a Pashto middle name. I make no claims to being an expert on the place but, God knows, I seem to love it.”

* Field Test, Under Fire: Freelance photojournalist Danfung Dennis writes a technical piece on on DSLR News Shooter about using the still and video capabilities of the Canon 5DmkII in Afghanistan. He starts: “The 5D Mark II is capable of unprecedented image quality, but since it is a stills camera, there are several limitations that I had to address before using this camera in a warzone.”

* Getting Exisential in Afghanistan: Photojournalist Chris Hondros trails a platoon of GI’s on a hunt for Taliban caves. Stuck halfway up a hillside he ponders: “Why am I here? How did this happen? Why exactly am I hanging on the side of a mountain in Afghanistan this morning? I’m not in Army, I didn’t sign up for this. I should be back home, watching TV or canoodling in bed or having a strong espresso in Brooklyn. Or just about anywhere else.” (In dscriber.)

* Gallery of War: Visit Battlespace, a powerful online gallery of images from Iraq and Afghanistan.

On the Job: Austin de Lone

Posted on January 6, 2010 by Tim Porter

Austin de Lone

I love photographing artists and musicians where they work. Some have studios, some have garages, some have bedrooms in their homes that double as office, closet and creative space all crammed into a corner. And that’s where I found Austin de Lone, amid his keyboards and computer, wedged into a tiny spare bedroom in his Mill Valley home.

De Lone, known to fans and friends as Audie, is a former stage-mate of Elvis Costello and longtime Marin musician who sings and plays with his soul exposed and his heart wired to an amp. Marin Magazine was doing a profile of him in advance of a benefit he had put together to raise money to fight his young son’s rare illness, Prader-Willi syndrome.

Austin’s cramped studio was a joy to behold–perfectly, artistically cluttered–but also a challenge to shoot in. A grand piano not only dominated the room, but pretty much filled it. The instrument filled nearly one wall, and left only a narrow passage to walk through on the other side. Its top end abutted a closet and at the business end was just room enough for Austin to sit with a desk behind him. The room was also dark, little by only a 60-watt lamp.

In that cozy space, I needed a small light. I had brought along a small, 17-inch square softbox that fit over a Speedlight. I wanted to hang it from a boom over the piano, tight in on Austin so the light wouldn’t spread too much. There wasn’t enough room, though, to fully open a lightstand. I managed to get the legs of one half open, hung three 15-pound sand bags over them and cranked the boom out over the piano with the light on the end. It wobbled precariously. I prayed to the stability gods and started shooting.

As you can see from the distortion, I was in close, a couple of feet away. I moved around as best I could, but Austin provided much of the action. He played a bit, hummed, sang a few bars, and told a story or two. All in good spirit.

In 20 minutes, I made several pictures I really liked. Austin was completely relaxed and at times seemingly unaware of me and my camera. I’ve seen other artists and musicians do the same in their studios. I think studios become extensions of their artists, a place where the hands and eye and the heart are indistinct from the tools–the keyboard or brush or computer. The studios and the artists meld, and there, even when creativity turns elusive (as it so often does) they find their most comfort–and in that comfort good pictures can be made.

On the Job: Tim Hockenberry

Posted on January 4, 2010 by Tim Porter

Tim Hockenberry

Tim Hockenberry, a Mill Valley singer and musician, is the kind of good-looking guy women notice — tall, stylish and, as my wife would say, twinkly. He caused quite a stir the day he came to my studio in San Rafael to do a shoot for Marin Magazine. One of my building-mates is a food stylist whose kitchen and studio is down the hallway from mine. She and a photographer were shooting hamburgers the day Tim arrived, and they had the door open when he passed by their studio from the elevator en route to my space.

After I got Tim settled in, I left him for minutes to chat with the writer and went down the hall to get something. The stylist called me in as soon as she saw me. “Who is that?” she said in a voice much spicier than the food she was styling. I told her. “Send him down here when you’re done.”

An hour, and several changes of clothes, later, Tim and I were done. We’d had a great time shooting — he was fun, engaging and knew how to pose, everything that makes my job easier. I made a variety of shots, including a batch with his trombone (his first instrument). For laughs — and much to the delight of the writer, a woman — we also shot a few shirtless ones as he changed clothes. I submitted about two dozen proof shots to the magazine, which ultimately used the one you see here and another in the table of contents. The shirtless photo didn’t make the cut, apparently, but later, on a visit to the magazine, there was a printout of it hanging above the desk of one of the writers.

Grab Shots: Expo Exposed

Posted on October 26, 2009 by Tim Porter

Photo Plus Expo, the mega photo show in New York, was last weekend. I uusually don’t have much interest in these events — I don’t need any more reasons to separate me and my money — but after reading and seeing these reports from the show I might have to make it to one. Here’s a wrap-up:

* Think Tank video: Photographer Kurt Rogers, one of the founders of Think Tank Photo and and ex-newspaper colleague of mine, assembled a video of the action at Think Tank’s booth. That’s Kurt’s wife and co-founder Deanne Fitzmaurice, left, who won a Pulitizer while shooting for the S.F. Chronicle.

* Kelby’s Take: Scott Kelby provides a big wrap on the show, highlighting the buzz (video on DSLRs, what was missing (Adobe) and New York food (Keen’s Chophouse — “amazing steaks and atmosphere.” Only one low spot: A workshop in which “the instructor didn’t teach anything—he just showed slides and talked about himself (and how much smarter he was than the art directors, and the clients, and well…everybody).”

* Video Reports: John Harrington of Photo Business News walks the floor and does on-camera interviews with Think Tank, Photoshelter, Orbis and more. Here are his reports from Day 1 and Day 2.

On the Job: A Rainbow Burns

Posted on October 22, 2009 by Tim Porter

Barbara Meislin

I’ve met countless hundreds of people in my many years of journalism and photography, but few possessed the uncomplicated goodness and sweet soulfulness of Barbara Meislin, the Tiburon writer and singer best known as the Purple Lady. Following the death of her young daughter, Meislin dedicated her life to bringing happiness to children. Her symbol was a rainbow; everything else in her life — clothes, cars, garden and home — was purple.

Yesterday morning, the Purple Lady’s home, a large, airy structure astride a hillside above San Francisco Bay, burned. The flames took almost all she owned, leaving her — as is the cliche in these events — with little more than memories of the 43 years in which she made that home distinctly her own.

I photographed Barbara in her home a couple of years ago for a Marin Magazine profile of her. She told the writer, while speaking of her daughter’s death, “Loss can be an incredible teacher. Often, the highest and best teachers appear when one’s loss and sorrow is the deepest.”

Prophetic words indeed.

Barbara Meislin Barbara and I became friendly acquaintances and I would see her occasionally during my jaunts around Marin. She is a bright spirit and any encounter, like one a few weeks ago at Ruth Livingston’s gallery in downtown Tiburon, made me feel good.

Standing in her driveway yesterday talking to neighbors, firefighters and a reporter, Barbara was a portrait of sadness. As much as she mouthed words of hope — “I’ll have to rebuild this house,” she told the Chronicle — her eyes, moist and red, spoke of the ache in her heart. She was dressed in blue.

Clutching a box of tissues and an orange in one hand, Barbara talked distractedly, her thoughts spilling out as they occurred — how the fire started, why didn’t 911 answer, the narrowness of her escape and the fate of her many, many photographs.

It was a familiar scene for many journalists, but not one I’d witnessed for many years. As a young photographer, and later reporter, I’d stood on many sidewalks outside burned homes or across from crashed cars and seen the very same face Barbara was wearing — drawn, vacant, a bit confused about how all that was good suddenly went so bad.

Later, as I became an editor and traded in the streets of journalism for its desks, others went to the scenes and returned with the stories that, to the cynical — and, sadly, there is much cynicism in the news business — seemed cliched, tired and repetitive. I confess that, at times, I was one of those.

I often tell people who ask what I do now that I’ve returned to my roots — writing and photography. But, in truth, the roots go deeper, extending into a belief that itself has become a cliche: That in everyone there is a story. That in the ordinariness of life, we find the extraordinary. That people are, for better or for worse, endlessly fascinating.

As I drove away from Barbara’s house yesterday, the golden sweep of the Marin hills and the Golden Gate unfolding before me, I noticed I smelled like smoke. I thought again of this wonderful woman, standing tearfully in her driveway, grieving in public, and marveled at the privilege I have to share the lives of others.

Grab Shots: Grit, Wisdom & Laughs

Posted on October 12, 2009 by Tim Porter

Spent the last couple of days making the leap from PC to Mac. While setting up the browsers, I did some link cleaning. Some are worth sharing — a true grab bag:

Scoltt Kelby * Get Gritty: Scott Kelby tells us how to get that “cool, gritty look.”

* Find Some Release: A page of model releases from the National Press Photographers Association.

* List of Lists: This buy has made a list of 87 photo sites he consider great.

* Talking about Seeing: Pixchannel has interviews with great photographers — like Eddie Adams and Ruth Bernhard — on why they do what they do.

* Obama Rama: The New York Times as a zippy compilation of readers’ photos of the Obama inaugural (told you I was doing some deep cleaning!).

* Foiled Again: David Hobby, aka The Strobist, tells us how to use aluminum foil for shiny table top photos.

* For Laughs: Get your eyes out of the histogram and onto xkcd, a web comic. Here’s a panel about photography.

Grab Shots: Pixels about PJ

Posted on September 4, 2009 by Tim Porter

*How Not to Get Shot in a War Zone: Advice from conflict photographer Teru Kuwayama. First on the list: Wear your seat belt because “it’s the traffic that’s most likely to kill you.” (Via Photo Editor.)

* Does the World Even Need Photojournalists? That’s a question being asked on Lightstalkers by Aaron J. Heiner. He comments: “Truth be known it’s hard to see why the media would want to pay us to do a task that people are willing to do for free. yes, we have training, and experience, but it seems that the big boys (the networks, CNN, FOX and so forth) would gladly give that up for free man-on0the-street coverage.”

* Dispatches: Report from Afghanistan on The Digital Journalist by photographer David Bathgate. A quote: “Attacks with rocket-propelled grenades and small arms were nearly a daily occurrence during my stay at Firebase Lindstrom.”

* Burn, Baby, Burn: Emerging photographers show their work at Burn Magazine.

*Magnum Blog No More: Photojournalism agency Magnum has put its blog on hiatus, promising new things on its website. You can follow Magnum on Twitter or Facebook.

America’s National Pastime

Posted on August 29, 2009 by Tim Porter

Now, don’t get me wrong — I love overindulgence and have indulged overly and often throughout my life. I’ve always believed, though, that incessant feeding of the inner beast (corporal or emotional) also requires eventual self-correction. In other words, excess is a big “yes” and it comes with a bill that must be paid with the currency of “no.”

Sadly, many of us — and particularly Americans — just ain’t got no “no’s” when it comes to food and drink. Few places is that more on display than during a game of America’s favorite pastime, where what’s happening between the foul lines often seems secondary to what’s happening in the beer and pizza lines.

Last night, my wife and I saw a great game of baseball — Giants vs. Rockies with the Giants winning 2-0 — in arguably the country’s greatest ballpark. We took the boat from Marin, sat down low, saw the Little Panda homer and had a couple of beers and dogs. All good.

What was evident, though, from the moment we boarded the ferry in Larkspur until we returned hom five hours later was many people view a ballgame as simply an excuse to publicly drink and eat as much as possible.

Guys were buying beers and cocktails two or three at time on the ferry, enough for them to get well lit by the end of the hour-long bay-crossing. At the park, people around us ate non-stop for nearly three hours. I watched them inhale hot dogs and mounds of garlic fries, crunch down plates of cheesy nachos and bags of peanutes, then wash it all down with beer after beer after beer.

The result was not bad behavior — nothing more than the usual Bud and testosterone-fueled boisterousness at any Giants or Niners game — but bad bodies laden with fat, sugar and carbs.

The young couple in front of us (above) were in their 20s, but were already 40 to 50 pounds overweight apiece, poundage that surely increased during the game. Nearby seats will filled with “older” people — 40s and 50s — whose beer-bellied guts ballooned out like those of pregnant women, whose knees, aching from carrying the extra weight, wobbled on the stairs, and whose backs, pulled forward by years of too many pounds, were hunched and rounded. They looked and acted decades older than their age.

And, yet, young and old alike, they ate and ate and drank and drank throughout the game, saying “yes” to thousands of calories. Clearly, they had indulged their ravenous appetites for years outside of the ballpark, but just as clearly the game provided an opportunity — and an excuse wrapped in the bunting of the national pastime — to amp up that indulgence to a feverish pace.

Why should I care? For a couple of reasons.

First, the drinking among men in their 20s and 30s these days seems to outpace even that of my generation, and I always thought we had set a high benchmark for self-excess. Of course, I realize this observation is ridden with irony and smacks of inter-generational typicalness.

More importantly, though, I should care (and so should you) because Americans are eating themselves to death and costing our society billions in the health care needed to treat diseases cause by obesity.

During the whole contentious debate on U.S. health care reform, obesity has been called the elephant in the room — one most Americans don’t want to hear about because it would force an admission that a simple change in behavior would improve their own health (and their children’s) and lower the overall price all of us pay for medical care.

If America’s National Pastime was just saying “no” to overindulgence more often, we could start saying “yes” to health care reform. Yes, it is more complicated than that, but it’s a good place to start.

On the Job: Going With the Wind

Posted on August 18, 2009 by Tim Porter

” You can’t always get what you want, And if you try sometime you find, You get what you need.”

— The Stones

It was the first day of summer, the solstice, and a chill wind was blowing fierce off the ocean. Perched as we were on a ridge high on Mt. Tam, we were catching it full on — me, my wife, a friend and her husband, who was the “model” for the above photo.

The wind was so strong that even 50 pounds of sand and two people could barely keep the softbox from becoming airborne.

We were here to make a picture for Marin Magazine, where I do a bit of writing and a lot of shooting. The editors needed an opening image for the magazine’s annual Editors Choice issue that illustrated the thrill of living in Marin County.

The top editor had an idea in mind — something she had seen in a stock shot — of someone stretching languorously against the sky, relaxing and letting out the jams after a hike or run on Mt. Tam, the 2,600-foot peak that forms Marin’s skyline signature.

The whole concept of the shot depended on location, a place that overlooked the ocean, faced the sun and had enough other visible landscape to say “Marin” — golden hill, blue sky, etc. I only had one day to scout and the evening before the shot drove all over the mountain looking for a spot. None were perfect, but I thought this ridge might work even though at this time of year the sun sets much more to the north than to the west.

Soon after we set up, though, and I began making test shots while waiting for the sun to drop further it became clear the angle was not going to work. Even on a ladder, I couldn’t get all the elements in the frame the way I wanted.

There was one other complication: Our “model,” while in decent shape was far from buff. Cove-up was needed. My wife donated her vest.

We shot for about 45 minutes up and down the ridge, and I didn’t have what I needed. Pack it up, I said. We opened a cooler, broke out the brew and began stowing gear. Just as we started to break down the strobe, the sun touched the top of a hill to the north, spraying golden light all over us.

I jumped up with a camera, the model set down his bear, the others grabbed the light (just holding the boom in their hands) and I shot about 15 or 20 frames, switching for the last few to a 17 mm with a graduated neutral density filter screwed on the front.

There it was. A shot. Not the one I came for, but one I could take home.

(Here’s a slide show of the whole Editors Choice shoot.)

Grab Shots: Craziness & Bizz-i-ness,

Posted on August 17, 2009 by Tim Porter

Link-gathering while I’m on hold with Adobe:

* Woodstuck: Magnum puts up a slideshow of photos by Elliot Landy from Woodstock. And, yes — since you asked — I was there.

* Crazy, man, just crazy: Dirck Halstead at The Digital Journalist gets asked, “Why would you be a photojournalist today?” And answers, “You have to be crazy.” Then adds: “I have always considered being crazy as important to a photographer as being curious.”

* Taking the biz out of news business: Jack Shafter says at the Slate that what’s bad for business just might be good for journalism: “If the downside of the battered-down barriers to entry is less pay and lower status, the potential upside is that a flood of new entrants into the field could portend a journalistic renaissance.” Now, let’s see about getting paid.

* Putting the bizz into journalism: National Press Photographers Association has a toolkit of business practices.

* Eddie Adams reviewed: Sportshooter has a review of “Eddie Adams: Vietnam.” One quote from Adams: “Making pictures in Vietnam is easy…Things are happening all around you and you just have to press a button and not get killed.”

Walkin’ the Dog

Posted on August 6, 2009 by Tim Porter

What do you get when you combine the relentless self-absorption of Mill Valley with the cheery self-entitlement of dog owners? A cluster of dogs, people of all ages, wandering tourists and the standard assortment of Marin eclectics, all crammed into a corner of the downtown square on a foggy late afternoon for a cute dog contest. (See the slide show.)

Sponsored by Pacific National Bank, the contest attracted hundred of entries, including my mother-in-law, who entered her rambunctious terrier, Topper. A snapshot I made of him was displayed among with those of fellow contestants on the bank’s windows.

The winners — small and large — were chosen yesterday and the grand prizes (paintings of the winning dogs by a local artist) were secondary to the event itself. As dogs strained at leashes, reaching for tables of dog biscuits, chews and chocolates, owners socialized, strutted and, some too obviously, preened vicariously for their canines. Good fun.

As I meandered through the scene, I shot with my 17 mm held low to the ground, using the auto-focus to get down to the dog’s level. Some shots came out pretty well. Take a look.

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