Photos

In decisive mode

Visual Journalism I, assignment 1: The decisive moment.

A university police officer helps a handcuffed suspect into a patrol car outside the Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Joint Library Wednesday afternoon.

I came across this scene, which involved at least three suspects, when this guy was still sitting on the curb. I sat down on the library steps, set up my exposure with a wide aperture to throw the background out of focus, and waited for this moment. Once things started happening, I went to shoot and discovered that the battery in my F3 had died right after metering the scene. With uncharacteristically speedy thought, I closed up the aperture enough that I could shoot at 1/60, the speed of the mechanical backup shutter, and managed to get off a couple of clumsy shots. Given those circumstances, I’m thrilled that this one worked out at all. And as a bonus, with the tighter aperture, the man on the right came into focus.