How does a professional photographer travel? 2/3
Travelling to do reportage is good — actually doing the reportage is better. Second article in this series.
In the first article we covered the outbound journey — the leg that gets you to a hotel, a guesthouse, an expat house, or a room in a fire station or hospital. The reportage starts at that very moment. The point is to get into the right frame of mind to succeed at the reportage, not just take photos.
On-the-ground organisation
For the outbound journey, the gear was packed to handle a possible hold-luggage check, so you have to repack the bags — particularly to prepare for the day's shooting and to manage the gear that stays at your accommodation: hotel room, guesthouse, on-call room in a hospital or fire station, etc.
The watchword is, undeniably: Organisation! It starts the moment you arrive at your accommodation, whatever it is. First, clear space to lay out the gear and identify the wall sockets to charge camera batteries, laptops, etc. The indispensable instrument of any multi-day reportage: the power strip! Without it, you're in trouble. To organise my gear I use the as a stand for charging devices, and I look for a desk or a shelf to lay out the reportage gear that needs cleaning, checking, dumping cards, etc.
The photo below shows the workspace for the reportage on the firefighters of SDIS 25: 4 days with the pager on, ready to head out on calls — fires, casualty rescue, road accidents, etc.
Once the gear is unpacked and checked, I take time to assess security so I know whether the gear can be locked away or has to be hauled around all day. Hotels often have safes, in the room or at reception, and so do guesthouses. On reportages with firefighters or medical facilities, there's always a secure storeroom where gear can be stowed. I also use and to roughly secure the gear that stays in the room. No need to bring specialised ones — I use the locks that fit hold luggage.
A day of shooting
A day of shooting always starts the same way, with the same question: which photos do I need?
In fact, the day of shooting starts the night before — out of the question to prep the gear the same morning. Anyway. Once the question of which photos are needed is settled, other questions help prep the gear — actually, it's the answers that help you organise:
- How long does the reportage last? — how many batteries, how many memory cards, etc.
- What's the terrain like? — which lenses to take, do I need a weather-sealed body, a , do I need particular kit like a helmet, etc.
- Will there be a lot of walking? — should I cut down the gear to travel light, leave room for water or food, etc.
- What will the lighting conditions be? — do I need one or several flashes, , , etc.
- What will the weather be like? — what clothes to bring, do I need for the gear, etc.
Once the gear is ready for the day, a good (but often short) night's sleep is welcome. In the field, shooting becomes relatively simple if all the gear has been prepped correctly. You have to remember the photos needed, the various angles required. A lets you tick off shots as you take them, plus the names and email addresses of people you've interviewed or photographed. So in addition to your body, your lenses, etc., don't forget your notebook and two or three pens. I've never understood pens' ability to vanish to the bottom of bags during the day and only resurface in the evening!
If you'd rather skip pen and paper and use a digital memo, you could look at: Google Tasks, OneNote, Evernote, etc. Keep it simple though — and remember that the more you depend on electronic devices, the more vulnerable you are in tough environments. When I did the reportage with the French Cave Rescue, I hadn't anticipated the humidity in underground cavities. Less than an hour after reaching the back of the galleries, my audio recorder, flash and mobile phone had all given up. It wasn't until the next day that the whole lot worked again. Hence the value of the good old notebook!
Coming back to the shooting itself: nothing revolutionary. Make sure you alternate portrait and landscape framings, and don't hesitate to move around your subjects a lot to vary the shots. The longer the day stretches, the more fatigue will eat into creativity. Switching framings and positions has to become a reflex.
In the next article we'll see how to organise the end of the day and the return journey.