The Shot
Page 16
At this point the story was taking shape: Jessica Watson, who at sixteen was sailing around the world solo, was off the coast of Chile, getting close to Cape Horn. News wanted me to fly the parents, Roger and Julie, to where she was and photograph them interacting with their daughter. How hard could it be?
Both picture managers guaranteed me everything was arranged and there was a helicopter on standby for me. I took that as read. But our first problem was the gear: if I was going to record the parents talking over the radio with Jessica as we circled her yacht – Pink Lady – then we’d need radio mics jacked into my camera, otherwise there’d be no conversations recorded. My manager said, ‘Well, get ’em.’
That took a day out of our planning as the gear was couriered up to Sydney. I met with Roger and Julie, and we went through the plan; there wasn’t a journo on this trip, so I had to manage the whole thing. We got along very well – they’re great people – and they were feeling an understandable mix of nerves and pride and excitement as we flew to Santiago. They had various ways of staying in touch with Jessica, and of plotting her approximate whereabouts. They showed me on a map where they thought she was, and I left the hotel and went down to the charter services company to finalise the trip we were going to make on the helicopter the next day.
The lady at the counter looked at me blankly. ‘Señor?’
There was no booking for News Ltd, there was no payment from Australia. I was standing in this office in Santiago thinking, This is why you always let the photographer plan the gig. Here’s a tip for young players: always do your own planning and logistics, and always confirm bookings prior to departure. You might still bugger it up, but you’ll only have yourself to blame.
So I stayed cool and explained to the woman at the helicopter office, ‘I need to be on a helicopter tomorrow morning.’
The woman told me there was no chopper available, and anyway, Pink Lady was too far out to sea and they had no helicopter which could handle that trip. But the woman was helpful, and she told me that while a chopper wouldn’t do the trip, a fixed-wing would. She agreed to shift her bookings around a little and allowed me to charter a Twin Otter – a twin-engine plane used by medevac and air rescue organisations because of its versatility and reliability.
I was happy, because now I could check in with Sydney and say with a straight face that everything was on track.
Having eaten well and had our beauty sleep, we got out to the airport the next afternoon and plotted the course to Jessica, who was about forty nautical miles off the Chilean coast, heading south for Cape Horn. Then we climbed aboard the Twin Otter, and off we went.
We flew out to the south-west and into this wild part of the world where the Pacific eventually turns into the Atlantic. We flew around for an hour, until the pilot gave us a fuel warning. There was no sign of Jessica. The way it was turning out, we’d barely have fifteen minutes over the target area before we had to turn back. So knowing the location of Pink Lady was crucial or we’d be doing a very short photo shoot. But this was largely academic – we never saw her.
Once back at the hotel we sat down and looked at the maps again. We decided she must be further south than was calculated, and she was probably at that moment going through Drake Passage and around the Cape. So I booked a commercial flight to Buenos Aires in Argentina, hoping to do the shoot on the other side of South America, where she’d be sailing into the Atlantic.
We flew into Buenos Aires and, once at the airport, searched for a fixed-wing charter service. The only one with planes available was the flying school. They had this little trainer plane with the wing over the top of the fuselage. They had enough fuel, and they seemed to know what they were doing. We were fairly tired by the time we got into that plane, and I knew as soon as I was seated that it was a mistake. It was a small four-seater, so you’ve got Roger and Julie in the back row, chins on their knees, and me beside the pilot so I have the best chance of getting the shots. The cockpit was so small that I couldn’t lift the 600mm telephoto lens up to the window as I was too close to it – once I’d aimed the lens at the window, the camera body jammed up into my cheek. I had a back-up camera for stills and I was hulking the video camera. And I’m six one, and a bit leggy for a space that resembles a dog kennel. But we pushed on, and before we’d been flying twenty minutes, we were turned back by the weather, which in the South Atlantic can turn nasty very quickly.
So now we were back on land, and I was feeling like Wile E. Coyote. I don’t give up on these things. I got talking to the harbourmaster, initially because I wanted an authoritative opinion on the weather. He was English, and when I told him how small this trainer plane was he suggested I have a chat to the company that ran the medevac plane. This harbourmaster was also excellent at getting us good coordinates for Pink Lady.
The medevac company agreed to help us. We finally took off in the Twin Otter and after an hour of flying we got Jessica on the radio. It was very exciting and Julie had a little cry as Jessica’s voice crackled out of the radio. Her girl was down there somewhere. We talked with Jessica and coordinated it with the pilot, and finally – as I’m freaking about the fuel running out and getting ten seconds to take my shots – the pilot said, ‘This is the spot.’ He descended through the clouds, and in front of us was this grey-green expanse of ocean, all choppy seas and whitecaps. And she wasn’t there.
We flew for a minute or so down the line the pilot had plotted, and we came up empty-handed again. I was really over this.
On the radio Jessica was saying, ‘I can’t see you,’ and Julie was saying, ‘We’re here.’
The pilot said we were in the right spot, but perhaps she was behind us. So we threw a U-turn and flew back the way we’d come, and twenty seconds later, there was Pink Lady. It was exhilarating hearing Jessica’s voice yelling out of the radio, ‘There you are,’ and then she was crying and so were Julie and Roger.
Now came the hard part. I needed to keep the pilot over that spot for as long as I could, which in the end was twenty minutes. We flew around the yacht and I had to shoot stills, and then video, from a Perspex bubble window that stuck out the side of the fuselage. It wasn’t until I started shooting in earnest that I realised how scratched the Perspex was, and I was paranoid about the images coming out properly.
Actually, for such a difficult and frustrating gig, it turned out nicely. The images weren’t too bad and it was a really emotional job; the reactions of parents and daughter when they were so close but so distant was quite something. I also learned two lessons: the photographer has to plan everything – the fact that someone else got it wrong is absolutely no use when you’re in the field and trying to get it done. Second, I used the wired mics to get audio on the video, but they were also invaluable when flying. They allowed me to jack into all the communications on the aircraft, and that gave me an idea for my next assignment.
20
A Photographer Packs His Bags
The job at News Corp was both satisfying and exhausting. My responsibilities gradually expanded to the official title of News Corp Australia’s Network Chief Photographer at the Canberra Bureau at Parliament House. Try getting that on a business card.
You wouldn’t think having to be Johnny-on-the-spot for a parliament full of politicians would be physically tiring, but there were some days when I’d crawl back home and just lie on the bed for a couple of hours. Parliament House is large enough that when a photo call comes it usually involves a lot of walking: the National Press Gallery offices are on the second floor of the building, able to look down on the Senate chamber. But when a member is making a media announcement it’s invariably on another level of the building, or outside in a courtyard, or in the ministerial wing. Australian Parliament House has 4700 rooms and covers 32 hectares, and News Corp photographers at Parliament House service a lot of newspapers, in many cities, with a host of different needs and agendas. My job is to manage my staff making sure we stay on top of the jobs and deliver the best product we can.
It’s a team effort.
Despite having this flat-out day job in Canberra, by 2010 I’d decided that I wanted to continue my combat photography. I felt very strongly that we had thousands of our people serving in Afghanistan and that there wasn’t enough journalistic material on this long war. By then we had been in Afghanistan longer than both world wars combined. Because of my military background, and my media access, I’d basically given myself the tap on the shoulder. There’s no use whining about a state of affairs if you’re the person who can actually do something about it. I was going to do something about it.
I consulted with Ali and told her what I wanted to do: she’d been very understanding about the 2009 tour in Afghanistan. My style was not to tell her the stuff about rocket attacks and children with legs hanging off them, but she works in the ABC newsroom, so she’d read the story and heard the audio from Sally Sara a few hours after the rocket attack we endured in Afghanistan. So she knew about those rockets, and how close we were to death, and she didn’t appreciate me sweeping it under the carpet. Our new agreement was that I could go and do this work with her blessing, but she had to know everything. No secrets.
Less than a year after I’d been under rocket attack in Afghanistan, I told her I wanted to take a few months of leave and spend it in-country in Afghanistan with a combat unit. I wasn’t sure if that unit would be Aussie, British or American, but the plan was to embed, go forward and make some memorable photographs of this war. Ali is never happy about these trips, but she knows I’m careful and prepared, and she puts on a brave face. This is a great gift, because it allows me to focus on what I have to do.
The folks at Holt Street were good about my leave request – or as good as you’d expect an undermanned, overworked picture section to be. Like all newspapers, there are fewer photographers employed than there were ten years ago, and all of us have to work a bit harder to get the shots. They wanted me back for the federal election, which was expected in the later part of that year, and I promised to oblige.
I’d been in conversations with my contacts in the US Defense Department’s media and publicity section, and I was over the first hurdle. The Pentagon had checked my bona fides and cleared me to be in a US military compound, travel in a US military vehicle and eat US military food. That was a good first step, but it wasn’t the only one: the Pentagon allows its officers on the ground to decide which media they embed and under which circumstances we can tag along. This is fair enough, because in a combat situation you don’t want a captain becoming distracted by journalists who are out of their depth. In Afghanistan, there could be bullets flying, people injured, IEDs going off. It’s not for everyone and the American operational leaders have to be comfortable before they take you out with them.
PHOTO: GARY RAMAGE COLLECTION
Ali is never happy about these trips, but she puts on a brave face.
I was also in contact with the Australian Defence Force public affairs people, especially my old mate Lieutenant Colonel Mike Harris. They could get me into Dubai and then Kandahar. And after spending a month with the US Marines, the ADF was going to let me spend some time with D company 6 RAR. This was a pretty special moment for me, because D company 6 RAR was my old rifle company from Enoggera, and in July they would be replacing the Dutch at Patrol Base Razaq and taking on a leadership role in Uruzgan Province. Early discussions were promising, because if things turned out I’d be the first photographer allowed to embed with an Australian infantry unit full time in a combat zone (usually the media is escorted in for two days, under tight control, and then removed). If I could pull this off it would be a great get.
I was happy with the progress of things and I was nailed down for a June start with the Americans. It would be summer in Afghanistan, when the Taliban and its militias launch assaults and ambushes, put IEDs in the roads and harass the farmers. It wasn’t the kind of detail I dwelled on with Ali, but I put even less focus on where I would be going: Marjah, Helmand Province, probably the most violent part of the world at the time.
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One of the main differences between a keen amateur photographer and a full-time professional is the preparation. There’s a very high standard of affordable, readily available cameras and lenses for sale, and there are many courses that camera owners can do to become highly proficient with these powerful bits of gear. I’m impressed with the results that many passionate photographers get. But the difference for someone like myself is that we’re not hobbyists, so we don’t get to come back to the newsroom and say we didn’t get the shot. You can’t not get the shot. When you see professional photographers walking around with those enormous back-breaking bags across their shoulders, you are looking at someone who has a back-up for every piece of their kit. And I’m no exception.
When I pack for three months in a combat area, I assume there will be equipment failures and I have to ensure that the failures don’t leave me without the ability to take photographs. These days my first step in preparation is to have a good professional service behind me. I used Nikon for all those years in the army, and when I got out and went to News I was straight into Canon. Canon’s CPS (Canon Professional Service) is legendary, and I would feel naked if I was working overseas and they were not behind me. CPS boss Rick Slowgove and manager Jay Collier are brilliant.
With the CPS sorted, I set about building the case that I travel with. For two-week jobs I might take two smaller camera cases, but for a three-month stint I take one big camera case and arrive with around a hundred kilograms of gear, including my own ballistic body armour and helmet. Packing can take two weeks and involves at least three packs and repacks, with everything spread out on the floor in the garage. I start with a case: for the long jobs I use a Pelican 1650, which is a large, plastic case with heavy-duty lockable clips to keep it closed. It’s dustproof, crush-proof and watertight, and it comes with a wheelie trolley. Into this case I load various camera bodies: a Canon 5D mkII, a Canon 5D mkIII, a Leica M6 TTl and a Hasselblad XPan, which is a 35mm panoramic camera. I always take my favourites, two Canon 1DX, with me on the plane. The D series Canons are very good, very tough cameras that will shoot publishable images. I use these Canons because I can also get excellent video performance out of them.
In 2011 I opted for a designated Canon video camera as well. However, a lot of my video footage has ended up in television news segments and you’d never know it was shot on a DSLR. I also like the ability to move freely when I’m in a combat zone, and I know how to tuck a DSLR under each armpit when the shit hits the fan.
I put in three or four zoom lenses, each with a back-up lens: in the old days I used 70–200mm, 16–24mm and 28– 70mm (all zooms), but now I take a selection of prime lenses, with back-ups, and they’re all checked before I leave. Each camera has a battery, a back-up battery and its own charger for the battery; I take stacks of AAs for the flash units and nine-volt batteries, and a box of basic camera cleaning and maintenance kit. I also take a bunch of compact flash cards (CFs) for the DSLRs: eight 32GB cards, four 16GB cards and four 4GB cards. I use 32GB cards as my primary cards in the DSLRs, which are much smaller capacity than is available. When you’re shooting for the media you have to keep track of what you’re shooting and where it fits into the story. When we send shots to picture editors, they have to be captioned and put into a context. Sometimes an extended caption is the basis for the story that runs. With digital cameras there’s a temptation to over-shoot – to just hold down the button and hope you get something. You can’t do that if you’re doing my job, because you’d spend too much time looking for the shot and trying to remember what it all meant. When I use a 32GB card, I use it like the old thirty-six-shot film rolls: one roll for one subject or one gig. It helps me link the job to the shots, and it keeps me focused on framing up something really good rather than just shooting as much as I can.
I also take three 2-Terabyte hard drives – and back-up – onto which I download the images every night (or when I can) and file them into
an archive system. The 1DX Canons have two CF slots, so I shoot each image in both RAW (unprocessed data collected by the image sensor) and Large (for example, Canon’s large JPEG file format, up to 6MB). When I archive them I save all my images from the RAW card onto the hard drive, while the Large files go in a different folder. When I want to send the images somewhere I email the Large files, because RAW’s too big to email. The files are emailed from a MacBook Air and I always take two of them, with a charger for each. The connection I use to get the images back to Sydney is via a BGAN sat-phone, which I use because it’s the standard issue for News Corp picture desks and so I know how to use it. The BGAN is a not a large piece of equipment but it’s very reliable. It plugs into the side of the MacBook and acts as the internet connection. If you follow the on-screen directions and aim the little dish at the satellite, then it doesn’t matter where you are in the world, you can get a data or voice connection.
I also travel with two Leica TTL M6s, which are German 35mm film cameras – rangefinders, not SLRs. When I go in-field I’ll typically have a Canon D series over each shoulder, held by my quick-release shoulder harness that allows them to hang down against the side of my ribs, while the two Leicas are also on quick-release buckles but attached to my Kevlar vest. I guess it’s a little eccentric, but there are occasions when I see something that I just really want to shoot on film. The Leica M6 allows me my indulgence – it’s so small and light that I can justify bringing it along for the ride.
Along with my camera harness, I also take a selection of gear that’s all-important in a combat zone. I use a military- style set of pouches hanging off my webbing to carry bits and pieces around my torso and ensure the weight is spread around. These, like my harness, were custom made by Griffgear. I have a Kevlar vest which was made for me by another mate, Craig Line of Armor Australia, a specialist armourer in Sydney who makes ballistic vests for military and special forces around the world. In the 2009 embedded tour with the US Marines in Afghanistan, I was issued a News Ltd-owned bright blue ‘UN’ vest. It was probably safe, but it weighed twelve kilos, and a couple of days into that trip I realised I needed something that wouldn’t inhibit my movements the way that thing did. So I went and bought a custom-made Kevlar vest that was the envy of every soldier I embedded with – I need a special licence to possess it in the ACT, because it’s listed as a prohibited firearm. I wear a combination of ESS and Oakley ballistic sunglasses, which will apparently stop a 9mm slug and blast fragmentation, and on my back is a 5.11 patrol pack, which is supplied standard to Australian soldiers. It’s very strong and light, and into this I put my military food ration packs – enough to last three days – and my sleeping bag and extra water. This last one is crucial: I carry around 10 litres of potable water when I go in-field. In the rear slot of the ballistic vest is a three-litre camelback water bladder and the rest I spread around in my pouches and my pack. When you embed with a combat unit, a walking patrol (generally six to eight hours) can turn into a three-day detour, and if you don’t have water you become parched very quickly. Water is a precious commodity among soldiers and it’s quite rude to be tagging along as the media, unprepared, and ask a soldier for his water. In East Timor once, I was with a Kiwi unit. We met up with a New Zealand 60 Minutes crew and about an hour into the walk, the TV crew started whining about being thirsty. They’d set off on this patrol, on a steaming hot day, without water. I felt for them, and because I carried extra, I offered a bottle to this TV producer. He said, ‘Thanks,’ and poured it over his head.