CRITICAL PHOTOJOURNALISM

Todd Heisler has been a staff photographer for The New York Times since 2006. He was previously a staff photographer for the Rocky Mountain News. In 2010 he was part of the team that won the National News and Documentary Emmy for One in 8 Million, a web series for the New York Times chronicling the lives of every day New Yorkers. He has won multiple Pulitzer Prizes over his career, both as an individual photographer and as part of newspaper teams.

The interview was lightly edited for clarity and length.

“Show, don't tell.” I can’t remember who said it, but this advice has informed my work from the beginning. I want to be with people who are actually doing the work. That's what I want to see and be close to. And I think the project, “Final Salute,” is a really great example of that.

Dr. Lopera, a Columbian doctor who worked with Alzheimer’s patients for years— researching their families and looking for solutions—is another perfect example, as well. He  lived it—going into the countryside to negotiate with families so he could conduct research on the brains of their loved ones who died from the disease. He was incredibly personally invested in his work and in all of the families that he introduced us to.

My favorite type of assignment is one where I'm the only photographer. Also, it's an assignment about something on the periphery of major news, but not necessarily in the center of it. I want to be able to build a connection with the people I'm working with so I'm able to just spend time. It doesn't have to be weeks or months—it could be a few hours but the interaction can still be really special …those situations when you feel like you're in the right place at the right time and things just seem to click, that is the absolute best. It's important to build that awareness. When I was working on “Final Salute,” I was much younger, but I think on a visceral level I knew I was in the “Zone.” I didn’t truly understand what it was then, not the way I do now. You know it when you feel it—when you get into situations and everything is happening all around you and there’s a point when you realize that your paths have connected at the right time, in the right place—in this arc of an incredible story. 

And I've had situations go the other direction—where people either kindly ask me to leave or it's just a situation where I realize that I'm just not going to get as deep as I want to go, either because of somebody's comfort level or timing. And in those situations, you do the best you can to…. I don't like to use the word “negotiate,” but honestly, it is a negotiation at times, depending on who you're dealing with. You do your best to have a conversation about what you want to do. That's why I think it's really important that you know why you're there, and what the story is, and what your presence there means, because you don't want to waste anyone’s time. If you can get people talking then maybe you can work it out and people can understand where you're coming from.

It's also important to realize when to just move on. As a professional, when you have an assignment to do, you can't always just say, “Oh well. This is not working out. I’m outta here.” You have to come up with something. You have to complete the assignment and tell the story. But I always want to push past that, if I have the time. And that push is really more internally than physically. A lot of times that means just talking to people and waiting. I think it's so important to talk to people, because you need to hear what their story is from their perspective. That informs where my pictures come from.

I learned so much from Jim Sheeler (the writer for “Final Salute” who also won the Pulitzer Prize—Feature Writing) when we were working on “Final Salute” about being a good listener and that’s why I loved working with him. He had his questions. He knew what he wanted to know, but he also left a lot of room for serendipity and surprise. When we met Katherine, whose husband, Jim, had just been killed in Iraq, she started talking about how she had knitted a blanket for her unborn baby, and that her husband, Jim slept with it before he left so it would smell like him. If we didn't sit there and just listen to her, we wouldn't have known that bit of information. And then Jim says, “Can I see it?” Often as photographers, we want to see it. But writers don't always do that. Jim was a very visual writer. So she brought it out and then she smelled it—it was an incredibly heartbreaking moment that I would have never had thought of and put on a shot list. Another thing that’s really important is to be prepared to discard the shot list. That takes a lot of patience and a lot of time. And you know, I think time is the most precious commodity that we have.

Back to that moment with Katherine in “Final Salute,” we connected a couple of years later at one of the Marine events, and somebody asked her why she let us in. She said that other reporters had come and interviewed her and when they got what they wanted, they packed up and left. She said, “Jim and Todd just listened to me. They wanted to hear what I had to say. They weren't waiting for something specific.” I've certainly had that experience when I’ve been interviewed. You give them a good sound bite or a certain quote, and you can hear the person wrapping it up because they got what they wanted. Often, that's okay. But I think when the stakes are much higher, with a story like Katherine's or any story that revolves around grief and trauma, you have to be very careful to ensure that people are being heard.

I’ve been working on a story about immigration because that's one of the bigger stories of our time in this country. I've always been more interested in how it plays out away from the border—away from where everybody else is covering the story and finding a different point in the narrative. I was in El Paso and there were lots of people sleeping in the streets because shelters were out of space. Most were Venezuelan. When I returned to New York, I was walking by a huge hotel where lots of immigrants were staying. I walked past an area where people were sitting and talking at a corner near the hotel and I could hear they were Venezuelan. So I stopped and just started talking to some of the guys there about how long they had been staying there and asked about the hotel. While I am not fluent, I speak conversational Spanish. I've worked really hard to learn, because I think it's important for what we do. 

Anyway, so I put the idea in my back pocket. A little while later, I was in the office talking with a Metro picture editor (Eve Edelheit) who had been tracking the story about immigrants having to sleep outside on the street and that we had people covering it like a daily news story. She said, “We're trying to do an essay on this corner. Would you want to do it?” And BOOM, there it was again, my favorite word, serendipity. And so I went out there and spent a day meeting and talking to people. Some people were fleeing from violence or political persecution and they might not want to be photographed. I always try to be aware of that. 

And so I kept at it, and literally the next morning, I went out at like 6:30-7:00 am to check things out, and by 10:00 am literally everybody was gone! The city had somehow found places for everybody. So then the story changed from the corner to tracking down where everyone was going. I was lucky to get two more months to go out and explore where people were being housed and what the communities’ reactions were, if any. There's certainly more to do and I'm trying to get more access. But I think it’s a good example of being flexible as the story changes and for lobbying to get the space to follow the reporting. Let the reporting inform you of where the story is going. Don’t force it into something it isn’t.

Sometimes your editors might say that they are going to run the story in a week. So you pick up your tempo a bit. What we ended up doing was choosing a number of places that we knew were rich environments—where there were a lot of people and we might be able to get a little access. There were some places that were a total bust, but others were amazing. Another piece of advice is that we have a ton of sources because we collect phone numbers from everybody and communicate through WhatsApp. Always remember to collect contact information so you can get back in touch. In such a transient environment this was crucial so reporters and I could follow up with people. 

Something else I do that I find useful is to go back to see things at different times of day. Talk to people and find out when the best time to be there is and then sometimes, just go for the light. And if you have the time, just keep at it. Keep taking another look. Keep going back if the people will have you.

Don’t only pitch your story ideas to editors—also pitch ideas to writers you trust and enjoy working with. I like to work with writers who want to be there—who want to be on the ground. I like to work with writers who want to see for themselves, such as Dan Barry. I have learned so much from Dan as a storyteller. But he also has an incredible eye. He often says, “I want to slow it down,” which is so intrinsic to the beauty of photography. Again, thinking about Jim, he always had his list of questions, but he also knew when to just shut up and observe. It's important to learn how to read the room and hone your instinct. Going back to “Final Salute,” we kept asking Katherine, “Are you okay with us being here? You can just tell us to go and we'll leave.” And finally, she said, “It's fine. Just stop asking.” 

Being present in people’s lives is something that should never be taken for granted. But my experience has been that very often people want me there and have said as much—sometimes even thanking me for being there. I think if you do it right, then that is probably the norm. And I've also learned how to feel when I'm not going to be let in. I'm more than happy to just keep moving because my best work doesn’t come from photographing people who don't want to be photographed. 

One thing I learned from photo editor Mike Davis is to always base your approach depending on what your story is and what your resources are. Ask yourself, “What is the story that you want to convey and what's the best approach to tell it?” Sometimes doing a straight narrative photojournalistic story does not work, say if you don't have the time or the resources. There are so many creative and beautiful ways that you can tell the story visually. It's important to be open to exploring different ways.

The thing I wrestle with always—I was thinking about this concept recently around instinctively making photographs while not overthinking and staying in the moment. Basically, if you thought about it, you missed it. A lot of times when I'm working on stories, I'm looking for well-researched photos. But I think it's important to step back and just respond to things. Mike Davis’ (Read Davis' ViewPoint) simple advice in doing stories was always make the photograph that represents what that particular situation feels like. When you're following a story, every situation that you're in has a different feeling to it, and there's a photograph that somehow captures that feeling. I think it's important to just be open, to try to not be so beholden to that shot list. 

Having time to work on a project is a luxury, but that can also be detrimental because you can tell yourself, “I can always go back. The light isn’t quite right.” And look, If a situation isn't there, the situation's not there. But somehow, you have to keep making the images. If you trick yourself into thinking you have more time, you might be overlooking opportunities right in front of you, in the moment. 

I also try to not focus too much on what you don't have and really focus on what you do have. You have to have hopes and dreams for getting some images. But don't let that cloud what's right in front of you that has potential. When I look back at older work—I think everybody does this—and especially “Final Salute,” it was very driven by emotion and ceremony and sort of meditation. And if I went back and did it again, I would try to slow down and look for more subtlety and still lifes—things that happened in the moment that I didn't see. 

Another thing to think about is that we all make different pictures. It's important to look at other people's work for inspiration, so the next time you're out there, you might look at things a little differently. You keep what works for you and let the rest go. You need to learn what your pictures are. I'm always in awe of the photographers covering politics, because a matter of inches will make a completely different photograph. It's fascinating. There are times when I wonder why there are so many photographers covering something. But we all make very different images; everybody has a different take on what’s happening. In environments like that, you learn quickly that you need to know what your pictures are and then consider, “Am I contributing to the noise or am I making something that stands out from the noise? That's always your goal. Don't make more noise.