The photo above was done on Oahu early in the month. There will be many more from this series posted here in the future. For those of you out there who are not surfers or water people, note the following: 1. The size of the wave, it is about 7 ft judging from the bodies in it. 2. Note the shape, a vertical wall. 3. Note where it is about to break, the sand. That means that the people in that wave are about to be smashed into the sand with the full force of an 7ft Hawaiian wave. I had the opportunity to experience what that was like when I was in that wave taking photos with a water housing. If I would stay out past where the wave really jacked up, I could dive under and not get taken for a ride. A couple of times I didn’t get the timing right, or was more interested in getting the shot than my personal safety. The experience feels like being in a rock tumbler then being smashed onto the matt by a pro wrestler. One these episodes actually cracked the heavy duty Lexan corners of my water housing. Good clean fun.

More to follow in the coming weeks.

Canon 1DSIII, 50mm 1.4 copyright David Harry Stewart

It is often only when I have taken the photo that I realize it may be linked to something I have seen years ago.

This picture was done during a session about the youth, music and rebellion. The magic happened because it was setup to happen. There was dance between all of us on one side of the camera and the girl on the other. Sometimes there is a lot of talking during these dances. In this particular case it was more that her gestures were an echo of our gestures. The direction often begins with words, then moves to more of a sense, a body move, that shows approval from our side of the camera to the other. This is the dance that allows the magic to happen on its own.

A photograph is a fact that leaves room for us to put on to it the meanings we chose.

Mike Tyson

Everyone has an opinion about Mike, most are not good.

When I got the call from the NYTimes Magazine that they wanted me to photograph Mike Tyson, my first thoughts were of self preservation. It so happened that the call in when I was on set photographing David Blaine, also for the Times Magazine. Of course I said something to David, and it turned out that he and Mike were friends. Even weirder, that David Blaine, Mike Tyson and Michael Jackson were all friends. Go figure. Word was Mike was a total sweetheart, I had nothing to worry about, which is not something I took to heart, as Mike had just eaten a man’s ear on live television.

My assistant and I fly to Maui to meet Mike at his training camp. The first thing is that we have to attend a “media session”. This is when Mike’s PR people (can you imagine doing PR for Mike Tyson?) laid out the ground rules for what was cool and what was not. This was not really meant for us, but more for the 20 or so TV teams that were there. The short version was just keep it to boxing and stay out of Mike’s private life. Yea, right.

Our session was scheduled for the next day, after the TV interviews, which took place every 10 feet or so going around a large banquet room. Everything is fine, Mike going from station to station talking boxing until he gets to the FOX Sports station. They of course are the only ones with a female reporter. The first thing out of her mouth is ” Why do you hate women?”. It escalates from there and within a couple of minutes Mike is screaming, fist raised, quite seriously going to kill the woman. Only 2 very big very strong guys are saving her life. She had been sent there to bait Mike, so that FOX could get a circus moment on the evening news. Mike gave it to them in spades.

Knowing that I was in the very near future going to be inches away from one of the most dangerous men on planet, who was now mad as a hornet, was not a particularly comforting thought. Bad of me I know, but at that moment I was thinking it was a shame about those two big handlers being there to restrain Tyson.

Back to the hotel, we wait and practice what we will be setting up. The call may come at anytime. I was on the phone with Kathy at the Times letting her know the situation. For some reason, they had me pegged as the go to guy for the dangerous, the felonious and the transgressives. Some other lucky photographer was pegged as the movie star shooter, me, I get the toughies.

The call comes in at noon the next day. We were given directions to Mike’s secret training facility. The scene was disconcerting. From the fighting ring, which has been set up in a closed building, we hear loud rap music and the occasional thump of pain. The area outside is littered with huge bleeding men, sitting in stunned silence. I get a glimpse of the Mike boxing. He hits a one of these monsters in the gut with an uppercut and lifts him off the ground. We are talking a 300lb guy. Terrifying.

The writer comes out to say hi mentioning Mike is in a foul mode from the day before. To work it off, he was training particularly hard and had already thrown up once that day. This is not good, not good at all.

About 2 hours and half dozen bleeding monsters later, Mike comes out walking straight towards me followed by a phalanx of handlers. I go directly up to him, show him a polaroid of what we are doing, and tell him this is for the NY Times Magazine. First thing I notice is that Mike has a rather high pitched voice, the second is that he is quick to smile. My anxiety level is reduced from near death experience code red to something more like normal pre-shoot anxiety. But Mike doesn’t want to shoot the picture at the training camp. Because it is the Times, he wants to look sharp, get his hair cut and clean up. Off to Mike’s seaside condo to set up again, a new problem enters my mind. We need to be on an 8pm flight out that night to be in Paris for another job the following day.

We setup and the first thing Mike does is start running his ” I am a very bad man” rap on me. This was a test, but happening 3 feet away it was a very scary test. My adrenals surging, I reach out, slap Mike on the shoulder and say ” Come on Mike, you’re not so bad”. Suddenly the whole vibe changes, I passed the test, and Mike thinks I am ok. Slapping Mike Tyson when not knowing what will happen, is on a fear level with blind bungee jumping. Turns out, Mike is great, super nice and chatty guy. The man is fascinated with world politics. We talk about Mao, about Che, about Osama and Bush. I discover he is covered with political tattoos. Who knew? What strikes me as most unusual about Mike is that he really wants people to think he is worse than he is. Anyone else I have ever photographed, killers to movie stars to politicos, always want me to think they are better than they are. We do 2 setups, quickly, very quickly. At the very end I see Mike in his boxing trunks cradling his 6 month old daughter. A shockingly tender moment, a picture I knew would be worth a lot, and one that I knew he would let me take. But I passed. Somethings are better left alone, and after seeing the FOX baiting, Mike’s private moment with his kid seemed like one of those. The whole shoot took about 30 minutes, then STP, straight to plane.

The lesson I have learned from years of doing portraits is that the bad guys are never that bad and the good guys are never that good. Everyone is somewhere in that grey murky area in the center.

Canon 1DSIII 100 f2.8 @8.0 ASA 100 1/250sec Copyright 2011 David Harry Stewart

Canon 5DII, 300mm f4 @5.6, 1/160th, ASA 400 Copyright David Harry Stewart 2011

What can we make today? Having too strict of a pre-conceived scenerio can feel forced versus a more organic ‘set-up’. People are comfortable if there is construct to work within, but a loose one in which they can express themselves. Even with great actors, I like to go in to the location, see what can happen, allow the talent to work with the it and with the wardrobe. In this dance between me and my people, I like to be able to be free to follow the action, so there tends to be a lot of cameras laying around. My set up is very mobile. The magic is in this dance, me seeing and photographing, my people being free to go with what is natural for them and their character. The production, the shot list, these are the structures within which the moments are allowed to occur naturally. I talk to talent, mostly to help them forget about me and be to be themselves or their character. We are aiming for a moment that is free and true, often accidental and unexpected while still naturally capturing everything that is needed.