I did a lot of freelance work in the early 1980s before going to work at the National Enquirer. I sold my pictures and some stories through the Gamma Liaison Picture Agency (now defunct) that would assign me if they had a magazine or newspaper wanting some person, place, thing or situation covered, or take my photos for work I did in and around Washington.
I have uploaded a number of tear sheets of some of those stories - I did dozens of them in the seven years I worked as a professional - to my "Turning Pro" section under the heading "Gamma Liaison Picture Agency Tear Sheets."
This is a pretty good sample of the kind of work I did. Sometimes I would illustrate stories that writers had developed and I would just show up and have to interpret the story line in an essay. Other times I was working as a genuine paparazzi and caught celebrities (like Sophia Loren or Sylvester Stallone). There were also times when I developed my own stories, and I have a clip included from Grit Magazine on a group of young computer whizzes in Boston.
Most of these clips have languished in boxes all these years and it feels very good to get some of them out, dust them off, and put them into the website. It's sort of a testimony to the work I did and reflects how hard I actually worked to develop myself as a photojournalist. By 1985, just before reluctantly (just for the money) giving up most of the shooting to sit behind an editor's desk, I had a good feel on how to work a news or feature story.
RPW
I have uploaded a number of tear sheets of some of those stories - I did dozens of them in the seven years I worked as a professional - to my "Turning Pro" section under the heading "Gamma Liaison Picture Agency Tear Sheets."
This is a pretty good sample of the kind of work I did. Sometimes I would illustrate stories that writers had developed and I would just show up and have to interpret the story line in an essay. Other times I was working as a genuine paparazzi and caught celebrities (like Sophia Loren or Sylvester Stallone). There were also times when I developed my own stories, and I have a clip included from Grit Magazine on a group of young computer whizzes in Boston.
Most of these clips have languished in boxes all these years and it feels very good to get some of them out, dust them off, and put them into the website. It's sort of a testimony to the work I did and reflects how hard I actually worked to develop myself as a photojournalist. By 1985, just before reluctantly (just for the money) giving up most of the shooting to sit behind an editor's desk, I had a good feel on how to work a news or feature story.
RPW