The death of former Canadian Prime Minister Brian Mulroney this week meant going back into the slide file boxes to scan film of him from my time in Ottawa while he was Prime Minister. Three slides were selected and upload to Canadian Journalist and Redux Pictures.
Mulroney wading into the crowd on Parliament Hill greeting visitors, Mulroney with US President Ronald Reagan and Mulroney with his wife and children.
Looking at this photo I’m reminded of how important it is for a news photographer covering politicians to stay close to the subject in order to put the viewer in that intimate zone and feel like they are there with the photographer and the subject. This requires being in close with wide lenses. It can’t be done from 50 metres away with a 300 or 400mm lens.
Needless to say, working on Parliament Hill and competing with another 15 or 20 photographer, TV camera people, and reporters can be a bit of a rugby match. Which is why its called a “scrum” …a rugby term. You have to polite while being physical. If you snooze you lose!
But as a photojournalist I firmly believe you have to be in close in order to give your reader/viewer the feeling he is there.
Technical notes:
Shot on Fujichrome 100 transparency film. Standard stock for magazine news photographers in the day.
My cameras at the time were the Nikon F3s. A workhouse for working photographer and I carrying them for 15 years.
Film was scanned in a ancient Nikon Super Coolscan 9000
