When your parents, teachers, and counselors harp on the importance of landing an internship while in college — a good one, not some coffee-caddying crock that becomes little more than a bullet point on a résumé — they’re basically saying, “this could lead to a job straight out of school for you.” There’s a lot of truth in this sentiment, to which Emil Wesolowski can attest: one of his recent assignments came with a paper that the Swedish photographer has worked for in various capacities since college. The job this time around? Get imagery of Malcolm Gladwell. Emil comments:
The publication is called Dagens Nyheter — literally “Today’s News” in Swedish. It’s the biggest and most widespread daily newspaper in Sweden. I did a four-month internship as a staff photographer at the paper back when I was in journalism school and kept doing freelance work for them after that.
During my time in New York, these guys were my bread and butter. They put a lot of resources into covering the U.S., and I got to be a part of a lot of it. They have two correspondents based in the U.S., one in D.C., and one in N.Y.C.
Emil has since relocated to his home country, but last fall saw the freelancer photographing one of the most famous authors in the world in his Manhattan office. The last part of that sentence should tell you all you need to know about how much time Emil had to get his shots.
The pitch went something like this: ‘We have an interview with Malcolm Gladwell in two months. Here’s the challenge though: we need a cover and six pages for the weekend magazine, but you only have an hour to share with the reporter. Can you do it?’
This shoot took place at Malcolm’s office in Greenwich Village. I usually like to do the shoot after the interview is done. That gives me some time during the interview to walk around, move furniture, and build small setups where I’ll simply lead the subject when it’s my turn.
When the time actually came for Emil to shoot Malcolm, he had less of it than originally settled upon. Fortunately, Emil planned for this occurrence and was ready to do his work within a scant five-minute window.
I had agreed with the reporter to split the time 50 minutes for him and 10 minutes for me, knowing that he’d probably go over. He did.
That wasn’t the only aspect of Emil’s meticulous preparation. There are two main things the Stockholm-based photographer had to account for in the two months leading up to the shoot: the subject and the location. Since Malcolm Gladwell is, you know, Malcolm Gladwell, Emil was already familiar with his work. Thus, he channeled his preparative energies into listening to recent interviews the Canadian had done as opposed to diving into the man’s bibliography.
When photographing writers, I usually try to read at least one of their books prior to the shoot. I’m not sure if that helps in any way, but I like the idea of knowing their work before meeting them. Having read “Outliers” a couple of years ago, I didn’t read anything new this time, but I listened to a bunch of his podcasts and interviews with him.
As for the other piece of prep, location scouting, Emil devised a couple of creative workarounds in the week before the shoot. Since he couldn’t simply visit Malcolm’s office before the day of the interview, Emil checked it out online and studied previous portraits of Malcolm to get a sense of his subject and, potentially, his subject’s environs.
I usually scope out the location as much as I can a couple of days before, first on Google maps and then in person. This is to get a sense of where there are good backgrounds, how the light is behaving, and so on.
More often than not, the interview will take place at the subject’s home, office, or another place I can’t access. Sometimes, it helps to look at other portraits and interviews, since these are likely to have taken place at the same location. This also helps to get a sense of how your subject will react to the camera. I just try to find out as much as I possibly can, so I can simulate the shoot in my head as close to reality as possible. I also bring a ton of gear to these shoots to prepare for every possible situation.
Funny enough, the interview was about a book that covers something that was literally taking place during the shoot: meeting new people. Due to time constraints and personal preference, Emil didn’t spend much time speaking with Malcolm. Not that he needed to, anyway — he was right there as the story’s writer, Björn af Kleen, chopped it up with the best-selling author.
The interview was mainly focused on his new book “Talking to Strangers.” It’s about the fatal misunderstandings that might occur between people the first time they meet. The interview also touches on Malcolm’s process and how he is with strangers himself.
Besides giving direction, I don’t like to talk to my subjects that much when shooting. I got a chance to sit down and listen to the interview, though, which is something I really enjoy with this profession. It’s kind of like an uncut, private podcast.
This is not an assignment for someone who works slowly and doesn’t do well under pressure. The numbers behind Emil’s final deliverables are staggering and, considering the context, he got the job done and then some.
I think I did okay in the time I had. I managed to squeeze out about 200 photos out of those minutes. This equates to a little over 0.5 photos per second, which sounds insane when I write it out. But the client was happy, I was happy, they got their two spreads worth of decent portraits, and I didn’t screw anything up.
Check out more of Emil’s work on his website.
Credits:
Writer: Björn af Kleen
Editor: Matilda E. Hanson