Ring. Ring.
"Hello."
"We need a photo of a corn harvest. Now."
Newspaper photographers have to be ready to deliver on a moments notice. When I got this little assignment I had to find someone harvesting corn. Half of our talent is being part Sherlock Holmes.
I found this guy working his fields about 15 minutes up the road from where I live. I lucked up. I could have been driving the roads for hours with a deadline looming. Here I had a nice blue sky to work with. Sometimes we have to deal with terrible lighting conditions.
Moving my camera to a different location I lost my light.
Naturally, I had to flag the operator down and interrupt his work to get his name. To get a better photo I begged a ride. You can see the corn at the bottom. This was taken inside the cab - smoked glass was not perfect for the shot, but just one of those things out of my control (news photographers always have to work with things out of their control).
And we have to be brave. I opened the door, and hanging by one hand, shot with the other as we were moving along.
I do have to say that people around here are very nice about being interrupted to let me intrude on their lives. Some mighty fine people live in Crisfield! They make my work much easier.
