#joe leery x you

[keerysfreckles]

falling in — steve harrington

pairing: steve harrington x fem!reader

summary: when a burnt down mall sends y/n to steve

warnings: use of y/n and she/her pronouns, steve got his ass beat (who's surprised), s3 spoilers duh, pure fluff/comfort, blood and injuries mentioned, pretty detailed makeout session

a/n: for my wife @keerysbrowneyes ily

masterlist !

꒰ა ☆ ໒꒱

y/n sat nervously at the edge of her couch in her small living room. she watched her small flickering tv at the other end of the room with nothing but worry.

helicopters roaring, a blazing fire and multiple reporters surround the loved starcourt mall. y/n's heart almost burst out of her chest when one reporter stated most people made it out safely.

steve harrington was the first person to flood her mind. the girl hasn't heard of him for the past three days, which only made her nerves skyrocket.

"sources say scoops ahoy workers were at the scene, with multiple young kids and parents. . ."

y/n was out the door, struggling to put on her other shoe while running to her car.

—

y/n didn't even let the car come to a complete stop before she was running past concerned townspeople, reporters and cops. she easily slid under the caution tape and fit in between two firetrucks, not bothering to listen to the cops and other authorities yelling for her to stop.

y/n looked from left to right. she first saw nancy and jonathan, and robin sitting in the back of one ambulance. will was with his mother, with el and mike besides them. lucas was comforting max. she looked at the last ambulance and saw steve.

as soon as their eyes met, time slowed. steve dropped the blanket from his shoulders and y/n's worn out converse hit the asphalt again.

steve stood from the ambulance, and for the first time tonight a smile broke out onto his face. he didn't care it was hurting his eye.

his arms are wide open once y/n reaches him. hers instantly wrap around his shoulders as he lifts her off the ground.

"you're okay," y/n lets the tears fall from her eyes, her voice is strained. "you're here, you're really okay."

steve kisses the side of her head before setting her back on the ground, however neither of them let go of each other.

"i thought i lost you," y/n admits.

steve chuckles, "you could never get rid of me that easily."

y/n leans back, her eyes roaming over the boy in front of her. she sees the large bruise surrounding his swollen eye, and the tiny cuts on his lips.

steve copies her actions, not believing the girl in his arms is really here. this feels too much like a dream that he didn't want to wake up from.

y/n puts her hand gently on steve's cheek just as a tear falls from his right eye. his voice is soft and broken, "can you take me home?"

y/n nods immediately, and carefully takes his hand in hers to lead them both to her car. they're stopped briefly by a cop, to which they explain y/n would be taking steve home.

they sit in the car for a moment, while an abba song plays quietly over the radio. y/n leans forward to turn it off. she didn't think steve was in the mood to dance to anything, let alone listen to a happy pop song.

"are you okay?" y/n knew it was a stupid question to ask, but she had to ask anyway.

steve only nods, as he wipes his cheeks as more tears fall. y/n simply gives him her hand. his rough hand holds onto it the whole drive back to y/n's small one bed-one bath house.

"wait, i thought you were taking me home," steve announces once he watches her turn down the wrong street.

"you really think i'd let you stay home alone after whatever you went through?"

steve shrugs.

"how hard did they hit you?" y/n lets out an airy laugh, which steve reciprocates.

y/n looks over to the passenger side after parking on the street in front of her dark red door.

"thank you," steve's voice fills the silence of the car.

the two walk out of the and in the housr wordlessly. they both leave their shoes in a pile by the front door, and steve follows y/n to her room. he sees she left the tv and lights on, guessing she left in a hurry.

"you take a shower okay? then if you want i can help with the other cuts."

steve gratefully accepts y/n's offer. he lets out a breath he didn't know he was holding once he sits on the edge of y/n's bed. she comes out of the bathroom after starting the shower, and making sure it wasn't too hot.

steve holds his arms open again, making y/n walk towards him. she stands between his thighs as he rests his head against her chest, hearing the pulse of her heartbeat. the girl leans down to place a kiss on his matted curls.

"i'll be here when you get out," y/n whispers into his hair.

as steve showers, he's careful when he reaches and cuts or bruises, and can't help but let more tears fall. by the end of it he couldn't tell if it was tears or water running down his face.

he's quick to dry off and doesn't mind the water falling back onto his face and neck from his wet hair.

he noticed his dried bloody work uniform was replaced by a pair of sweatpants, a tshirt and boxers. he smiled at the thought of y/n keeping a pair of his clothes here for him.

steve leaves the bathroom and is met with y/n coming back into her room with a small basket in her hands.

"hey," she smiles towards steve, "how are you feeling?"

"that was a must needed shower," he chuckles.

"what's that for?" he points to the wooven basket now placed on the bed.

"a couple things to help with your cuts."

after steve came over to y/n's house their junior year, with the aftermath of a fight with jonathan byers, the girl knew to keep a first aid kit just for steve.

y/n instructs for steve to lay on her bed. he gladly let a loud sigh leaves his lips once his back hits the mattress, making y/n chuckle.

she sits on the left side of steve, making her be in the middle of the bed. she easily leans over him to turn on the lamp placed on the night stand. steve can't help but blush at the close proximity.

"these are just wipes, to get any extra dried blood off," y/n starts walking him through the steps.

she's careful when wiping around the cuts on his lips, and is surprised he only winces once.

she moves to his hairline and bruise covering his eye. the swelling has gone down drastically, and she can now look at both of his beautiful brown eyes.

steve keeps his hands folded on his stomach while y/n takes care of him. she goes to the next step and takes peroxide and cotton balls to the cuts.

after the cotton meets his lips he grabs y/n's wrist. she mutters out many apologies, not meaning to hurt steve more.

"it's okay," he stops her rambling apologies, "just hurts way more than i thought it would."

y/n continues treating his wounds. every so often steve's eyes would float to her features. to her concerned eyes, crinkling at the corners. or to her hair that kept falling over her ear, to which she always put back, yet it never stayed.

y/n finally takes a warm towel, steve guessed was from the dryer, and she dabbed it over his lips and eye. she watched his shoulders relax as she held it over his eye.

"are you alright?" she felt like she asked the question a million times tonight.

steve nods, "never better."

another comfortable silence fills the room. steve now sits up, making y/n bring the towel to her lap. steve breaks the silence.

"did you always have that freckle?" his thumb traces the light freckle on her cheek. she blushes from the contact. before she answers, steve moves his hand to fix the strands of hair that have fallen in front of her ear. his hand goes back to holding her cheek.

y/n's eyes move between both of steve's brown ones.

"steve," y/n warns in a whisper as he starts moving closer to her.

"i want you y/n. thats the one thing i've never been more sure of tonight."

his soft words leave a tickling breath over y/n's lips.

y/n makes the move to lean forward. her right hand reaches to hold onto steve's bicep as her lips collide with his. the kiss only lasts for a few seconds before y/n pulls away. her cheeks are flushed as she sees steve's widened pupils.

steve simply pulls her back to him with the hand that was still on her cheek. he turns his head to deepen the kiss, and he can't help but smile against y/n's lips after feeling her hand move to his neck. she grips the damp hair, threading her fingers through it.

steve's left hand goes to y/n's lower back as he moves her to lay down. he's now hovering over her, with his thighs falling between hers.

the two pull away, both with blown pupils, flushed cheeks and swollen lips.

"do you want me to stay–"

"yes."

steve couldn't even finish his question before y/n answers quickly and pulls him down tp kiss him again, with much more hunger than before.

[queenimmadolla]

𝐏𝐎𝐖𝐄𝐑𝐌𝐎𝐕𝐄

(Steve Harrington x afab!Reader SMUT)

summary: you give Steve some fanfuckingtastic brain (head). 

warnings: smut, reader is a spunk gobbler (cum eating), Steve can look but can’t touch, and yeah, reader is once more in control (go us). a/n: combined this prompt with this one. enjoy and, as always, let me know what you think! **if you know who made this gif, let me know so I can switch it out with the one linked to their tumblr.

Days off were so bittersweet for you. You loved not having to go into work or deal with the general public but you always wound up so bored.

It wouldn’t have been all that bad if you had Steve but he wasn’t lucky enough to have the same days off as you. In fact, his schedule rarely lined up with yours. It was something you detested not being able to work around, especially considering your current dilemma.

See, you hadn’t seen your boyfriend in about a week. That was incredibly unusual, regardless of how busy your work schedules were. A week without Steve, meant you’d gone a week without his cock. A week without his cock, specifically, in your mouth.

Giving Steve head was a powermove on your part, gave you a real sense of control. Sometimes you let him think he was the one with the power, let him guide your head along his cock or hold it still while he fucked your throat but it was his dick that needed your mouth to cum. Who’s really in control in a liaison like that? You’d called Steve at work, asking him to come over later to which he happily promised you he would. When he finally showed up, letting himself in with the key you’d made him, you’d been counting on him making himself comfortable and he didn’t disappoint, giving you a quick kiss before he slipped past you to get to your room where you planned on trapping him.

He paid no mind to you as you shut your bedroom door behind you, locking it while he pulled out a pair of sweats from one of the drawers you’d emptied just for his stuff (he practically lived at your place since his was always empty and you knew how lonely he got) and quickly discarded his shirt.

You waited for him to undo his belt before you struck, pushing him onto your bed.

Steve let out a surprised grunt as he fell back onto your soft blankets, staring up at you with wide eyes and holding himself up on his elbows.

You were impatient, though, hands eagerly pulling the belt from its place before your fingers made quick work of the button on his jeans, then you were yanking both his jeans and his briefs down his meaty thighs, mouth watering as his hard cock bobbed upwards once free and nudged along the hairs of his happy trail, pearlescent bead of precum smearing along it to give it some shine.

Steve let out a moan and you hadn’t even touched him yet.

“Baby—,” he started, quickly cutting off on a guttural groan as you wrapped your hand around the thick base (fingers unable to even fully wrap around him) and took him into your mouth, sucking on the mushroom head with nearly reckless abandon.

Your eyes fluttered shut at the salty taste of him and the heady scent of his musk invading your nostrils, mouth going slack as you took him further into your mouth with your tongue sliding against the prominent vein that ran along his length. You could feel him begin to writhe underneath you as your jaw began to ache and you’d only gotten started, but you were used to the sensation; Steve’s cock was the largest you’d ever handled, he was hung. It had been intimidating at first but now you reveled in the pain, because with it came a whole lot of pleasure.

Steve seemed to agree, if his moans were any indication to go by. He had his head thrown back, eyes blown wide as he stared at the ceiling, trying to hold back from cumming too soon by sheer will. His skin had broken out into a sweat as your fingertips dug into his slick thighs, trying to find purchase so you could hold him down when his hips began shallowly thrusting into your mouth. You loved it when he face-fucked you but right then, you were in control so you couldn’t have any of that.

He was desperate for contact that he made the mistake of reaching down to cradle the side of your face, something you knew he did when he planned on continuing his attempts at rutting into your throat so you slapped his hand away, pulling off with a string of spittle still connecting your lips to the head of his wet cock, red and angry as it twitched, seeking out the warm suction of your mouth. “No.” You hissed before you dove forward again, head bobbing in earnest while your fist jerked over what you couldn’t fit in your mouth (unless he was just sitting in your throat) and Steve let out a pathetic sounding whine, high in pitch as he panted, a hand gripping tight at the sweat soaked roots of his hair while the other nearly ripped into the blankets below him. Steve tore his gaze away from the ceiling when he felt you swallow around his bulbous head, and though he knew watching you suck his cock would bring him to his end much faster than he’d like, the visuals were too much for him to miss out on; your cheeks were ruddy, lips stretched wide around him as you struggled–and god, he fucking loved how you struggled–to take it all. The sight of you and the feel of your hot, wet mouth sucking him in over and over again was almost too much for him, but it was when you pulled off of his cock with a particularly brutal suck and trailed kisses down his length that he knew he was in trouble.

For a moment, Steve thought you were giving him a break but he should’ve known better; you never went easy on him when you blew him, always eager to take him to the edge as fast as you could. “Oh, god, honey–please!” He begged when you sucked one of his balls into your mouth, giving it the same avid treatment you’d shown his cock. His freehand twitched but he knew what kind of response he’d get if he touched you again and he didn’t want you to take your mouth off of him for a single second, so he moved the hand that had been gripping the blankets to his cock, jerking it furiously as your spit provided the perfect amount of lubrication.

You’d been with Steve long enough to know his limits, how to get him to cum fast, how to draw it out for him, how to make him beg but you needed that mouthful more than anything, were absolutely greedy for it. Steve’s panting turned into a lewd gasp as you moved to his other sac, sucking a little harsher than you had before until you felt his thighs begin to jitter underneath your palm. Then you let it go, pressing a kiss to both of them as you moved his hand away from his leaking red tip so you could take it into your mouth, focusing on it as you sucked fervently; the taste of his precum coating your palate as the amount he secreted increased with the pleasure you were providing him. You stared up at Steve and watched the almost painful look cross his pretty features. His hairy chest rose and fell rapidly with his panting as he stared back down at you with pleading eyes, a leg repositioning itself on the bed in preparation of cumming. You caught him off guard when you sank all the way down, the head of his cock lodging in the back of your throat as you gagged on it and Steve was helpless as his mouth dropped open, thighs tensing while his balls pulled tight to his body to pump one, two, three long bursts of cum up his shaft and into your throat. You choked only for a moment–and Steve let out a cry that you felt as well as heard when you did–pulling back to keep just the tip in your mouth as your hand resumed jerking him off so you could catch the rest of his spend in your mouth while you drew it from him.

When you were sure he’d given you everything, positive that you’d milked him dry, you pulled off and let his cum sit on your tongue for a few seconds, satisfying your own gratification before swallowing.

Steve sank into your bed, breathing harshly as he came down from subspace and let out a weak moan when you began licking his cock clean. Despite having had the cum sucked right out of his balls, almost quite literally, his dick twitched with interest. “Fuck, you’re gonna kill me. You’re gonna be the death of me, honey, I just know it. Jesus, Mary and Joseph…” Steve ran a hand down his face before he threw an arm over his eyes as they squeezed shut, feeling almost fatigued as you climbed up the bed and curled into his side.

“That's the plan.” You sang, wiping your mouth as you smirked and admired the mess you made of him, his hair in disarray, face red and sweaty along with his body. He was going to need some major recovery time. Yeah, powermove.

[nicolewoo]

I’ve been Dreaming about you

Pairing: Joe Anoa’i X Reader

Warnings: None

Fluff Fluff Fluff

It was a silly radio call in contest.... Win tickets to Smackdown live plus backstage passes. I grabbed my friend, Laura, to go with me.

We were escorted back stage before the show started, and got to see the set up. Our tour guide, Danny,  led us through the arena's backstage area showing us everything from catering to dressing rooms to the gorilla. It was definitely worth going early for the full tour. We learned about how medical set up, how the wardrobe department worked, even a little about the broadcasting. I was eating it all up.

Laura was a little less enthusiastic. In truth, she was only interested in the talent.... particularly Braun Stroman. So when she wasn't paying attention to the tour and noticed an open door, she peeked her head in. I went to pull her back to the tour when my eyes locked with Roman Reign's eyes. He was in the room seated on a table in the back of the room surrounded by other talent. Of course, Dean Ambrose and Seth Rollins were next to him. It was a mere second before the door closed behind us, but it was enough to.... connect? Was that the right word?

Oh please! I was being crazy. Roman can have any girl he wants. I'm sure he was just surprised at seeing a new face backstage or bored of whatever meeting he was in. Either way, I knew that was going to be the best moment of the night. I focused back on the tour guide and enjoyed the rest of our tour.

Then we took our seats ringside. I'd had good seats before, (4th row, 7th row) but I'd never been in the front row before, and we were seated just at the corner of the ramp and the ring. We had the perfect view of everything. Some of the talent even slapped my hand as they made their way down the ramp.

Nia Jax beat Ember Moon in a killer match. Laura nearly squealed when Braun Stroman came out, and I practically had to wipe her mouth as she drooled over his every move. As he slammed Baron Corbin into the mat, I swear I heard her growl in desire. He wasn't my first choice, but if she liked him, that's fine by me.

There was one more match.... The Shield vs Jinder Mahal, Bobby Lashley and Dolf Ziggler. This was going to be one hell of a match, and as the music began and the “heels” started their way to the ring, the crowd got louder. It was infectious. I was getting more excited, as the crowd got hyped.

When The Shield's music hit, the crowd began looking for where they were entering through the crowd. Normally, they were across from the cameras at the top of the first tier of seats. The whole crowd looked there, and then looked around. They were nowhere to be found. As the crowd found them, they turned toward us. I looked behind me to find the Shield headed straight for us. Their normal “security” followed behind with our tour guide, Danny who looked very out of place.

As soon as Roman found me, he locked eyes with me. All three of the Shield members looked upset, but I saw one corner of Roman's mouth quirk up when he saw me. “Is he smiling at you?” Laura asked me. I couldn't answer. I was completely stunned by his eyes. Roman only looked away from me to watch where he was walking. I watched as they jumped the barricade next to us and as Roman stared at me from the ring. “Why are they all looking at you?” Laura asked again.

I tore my eyes away from Roman for a moment to see that she was right, Dean and Seth were looking at me too, although they looked unhappy to see me. “Girl, what the hell is going on?”

I was getting ready to tell her I didn't know when a hand tapped my shoulder, “Y/N,” I turned to find Danny, the tour guide. He handed me a note. I opened it and scanned it quickly.

Please stay after the show. Danny will come get you. I need to talk to you, Roman Reigns.

“What the fuck?” Laura said eyeing the note over my shoulder.

She looked from me to Danny who simply shrugged. “I was just told to give her the note and come get her after the show. He didn't explain it to me, and I've never seen anything like this. Not from Roman” He said. “I'll come back for you after this match.” He said as he walked away.

I looked up to the ring. The Shield was hamming it up.... drinking in the adoration of the crowd, but before taking his corner with his brothers, Roman looked at me again. He mouthed PLEASE to me, and I nodded yes. The corner of his mouth curled up in a smirk again.

The match seemed to go on forever. The fans cheered as the talent put on a great show, and everyone was completely wrapped up in the show.... except me. I was so confused. I was pretty sure Roman looked at me a few more times before he got tagged in. Once he entered the ring though, he was completely focused on what he was doing, which is good. I don't want to see anyone get hurt.  Honestly, I didn't want Roman to get hurt.

I watched as he speared, super man punched and dominated the rest of the match, finally pinning Dolf. As the Shield exited up the ramp, Roman was sure to come to me and hold my hand for a split second before exiting.

It was time. Danny would be by to take us backstairs soon. The wait was frustrating. We watched as the arena emptied out almost all the way. Laura talked about the show and how great it was, but she could tell I was..... what was I? Confused? Shocked? Scared? She could tell I was off... that my mind was backstage already. She tried to distract me, but it didn't work.

I was just about to give up on Danny when I saw him come down the ramp. “I'm sorry I took so long.” He said as he moved the barricade so we could come through. Distracted or not, I was still fan-girling about walking up the ramp, about being backstage, about the whole day. Instead of walking in to the gorilla, Danny took us to a side entrance. We ended up back in the room where I'd first seen Roman.

We were reviewing the pictures Laura had taken of the show when I heard a voice behind me, “Ladies?” I turned to see Seth and Dean. They didn't look mad anymore, but they didn't look happy either. They looked.... leery. “What are you doing here?” Seth asked.

Was I in the wrong place? “I... uh.... Danny brought us here.” I said meekly.

“No. What are you doing at the show tonight? How did you get a tour backstage?” Dean asked rather rudely.

The tone of voice made Laura bristle, and I saw a protective vibe come over her, “She won tickets from a radio station.” She said it as she took a step in front of me like a mama bear protecting her cub.

I stepped in front of her then, “Mr. Rollins, Mr. Ambrose is everything ok?” I asked as nicely as I could.

“Actually,” Seth started, “I'm Colby Lopez. This is Johnathan Good. Mr. Anao'i, that's Roman's name, will be out soon. He is still showering. What’s your name?” Seth sounded much calmer now. “I'm sorry if we sounded like jerks. We're just looking out for our brother.”

I'm sure my confusion showed on my face. “I’m Y/N. What are you talking about?”

“Doll,” It was Dean/Johnathan this time, “Ya gotta understand. Our brother is special. We want to make sure you're not some sort of gold digger.” I waited for him to start laughing, because this was obviously a joke.

“Gold digger?” Mama Bear Laura said, stepping between me and the two men. “All this woman has done is come take a tour and see a show. She won those tickets fair and square.” Her voice got louder the more she talked.

I placed a hand on her elbow, “Calm down, Laura. Let's find out what's happening before we go on the attack. I looked to the other men as I drew Laura back to stand beside me. “Mr. Lopez, Mr. Good, We aren't hiding anything. We don't have some secret agenda. We won tickets, we came, then Danny brought us back here. That's all.”

“Is it?” Seth said turning a chair and straddling it so he was sitting backwards on it, but facing me. He crossed his arms over the back.

“Back down, Colby!” Roman's voice boomed from the door behind me. “Sorry, they're a little over-protective.” He said calmly to me. I turned to find him freshly showered in slacks and a button down shirt, hair up in a bun. Our eyes locked on each other's again. “Hi,” he reached to shake my hand, “I'm Joe.”

He towered over me, but instead of finding it scary, I felt safe in front of him. “I'm Y/N.”I answered.

Joe's voice got softer as he talked to me. “I don't have a lot of time here. We are headed to Kansas City tonight, but I had to talk to you.” Logically, I figured that Joe was trying to get a booty call, but looking into his eyes, I saw something else. Something I couldn't decipher. “These guys have agreed to wait ½ hour to leave so we can talk.” He gestured to Dean and Seth. “Can we... uh... can we talk alone?” He asked tentatively.

“No.” Laura said. I chuckled at that.

“At ease, soldier.” I laughed to her.

“I'm not leaving you alone with him.” She demanded.

I looked to Joe who grinned slightly. “Laura, can you and the guys go out into the hall? We'll keep the door open, mom.” I teased her.

Dean chuckled with me and Seth gathered he and Laura up. “Come on, I'll buy you a cup of coffee.” Seth offered to Laura.

Once they were all gone, I felt a sense of relief. No more evil looks from The Shield brothers and no more over-protective Laura.

Joe motioned to a chair, “Have a seat.” Part of me was on high alert... wondering what the hell was going on, but when I looked at Joe, I calmed down. Something about him just seemed so comforting.  We both sat down at a little table. “I...... uh....” He stopped talking. He just chuckled to himself as he looked down to the floor. “Sorry.” He looked back up and I saw a blush starting to form on his cheeks. “I.... I don't know how to say this. It sounds crazy, even in my head.” He struggled to find the words. “I've been” he paused “dreaming about you for months.”

I was stunned. Truly stunned. “What?” I asked.

“I don't know how else to say it. I've been dreaming about you for months.... actually.... for over a year.” He said again. He stood up and started pacing for a second, but then sat back down and looked at me. “For a year now, I've dreamed about you..... your hair, your voice. Three or four times a week.”

Surely this was a pick up line. It had probably worked dozens of times on other women, but not with me. And yet, as I looked at him, all I saw was him being vulnerable. “Are you serious?” I asked.

“I am.” He looked down and shook his head in disbelief. “I've been dreaming about you for over a year. I never thought you were a real person, until I saw you tonight. I don't know what to do now that I found you, but I do know I want to get to know you.”

Ok. I resigned myself to the fact that he was trying to hook up. This had to be an act.  I opened my mouth to talk, but couldn't figure out what to say.

“Like I said, the guys have given me a half hour to figure this out. So, first, can I have your phone number?” He smiled up as he handed me his phone. Still stunned, I grabbed his phone and typed in my number. “Say something, please.” Joe pleaded.

“I... I don't know what to say.” I admitted which made him smile warmly and something about the smile made me melt a bit inside. “Is this..... are you trying to hook up with me?” I hadn't meant to say that out loud, but there it was.

Joe laughed harder. “No.... Listen, I'm not kidding. I've honestly been dreaming about you. Now that I found you, I don't know what to do, but I know that I can't let you go until we figure this out. I'm not looking for a hook up.”

His smile was infectious. “Good.” I smiled back at him.

He reached out and took my hand between his, “I know this sounds insane. Trust me, I feel insane saying it out loud. Seth and Dean are really concerned about me. They've been hearing me talk about you... well... the dreams about you, and then I just see you. It's.... I don't know. It's something.”

“It's something alright.” I had to admit, I loved the feel of his big hands holding mine.

He chuckled again. “Lets start with this. Do you live here in St. Louis?” he asked.

“Actually, I live across the river in Illinois. It's about a 20 minute drive here.”

He looked surprised and pleased. “Can I come visit you on Tuesday?” he asked suddenly.

I was stunned yet again, “What?”

“I have Tuesday and Wednesday off. Can I come see you? I'd like to take you out on a date. Maybe take you out to dinner?” he rubbed a thumb over my knuckles. “I'll stay at a hotel. I'll be happy to get you a room if you don't want to drive back and forth or not. It's up to you.”

“Are you serious?” I asked. “We just met.”

“He's serious,” I heard Seth say. “We've been hearing about you forever.” I looked to find Seth, Laura and Dean coming back in the room. “He's got it bad for you.”

The comment made Joe blush again and he looked down at the floor before taking a breath. “He's right. I don't know how or why, but I know.......I don't know..... I just need to get to know you.” He smiled so warmly at me with a look of slight embarrassment. It made me melt a little more.

“They've been telling me all about his dreams.” Laura said as she handed me a bottle of water. “He's telling the truth.” She reassured me.

I thought for a second before I tried to answer, “Well,” I looked into his eyes “Yes. Yes we can go out to dinner on Tuesday.”

That made Joe smile even more. “All right! Ok, we've got a bit more time. Tell me everything about yourself.”

I laughed a bit, “My whole life in what... 15 minutes?”

He laughed with me. “How about just some things...... What do you do for work? What do you do for fun? Are you  wrestling fan?”

“Oh yeah she is,” Dean interrupted, “I saw her following the match closely. She even winced when you took the kick to the chest from Dolf and landed wrong. She knows wrestling.” He was incapable of standing still... instead he paced back and forth. “She knows.”

I smiled and nodded at Joe. “Yes. I follow wrestling. I have for a few years.” I answered. I work for a marketing firm, and I love to paint.”

“Painting... like art?” Joe asked. I nodded yes.

“What do you do for a living?” I joked.

Joe just laughed. He looked up to Seth, “How does Finn say it?” He looked back to me, “I wrestle grown men in my underwear.”

We all laughed at that, which seemed to calm our friends who were now hovering over us. I felt  like we had chaperones. Laura and Seth took a seat at a table on the other side of the room, and Dean paced between the two tables anxiously.

Joe and I settled into a conversation. We talked about our lives and our beliefs, and time flew by.

“Joe.” Seth called from across the room. “5 minutes.” He warned, which shocked both of us.

“Ok, Like I said, these guys want to get to Kansas City.” He stood up, taking my hand in his again and leading me to stand. He turned so he was between our friends and us, and his broad frame almost completely blocked them out. “I can't believe you're real.”

“I'm real. I promise.”

“Can I text you later tonight?” He asked shyly.

“Yes.” I shook my head at him. He stared into my eyes for a second before bending down to give me a chaste kiss on the lips which brought a big smile to my face.

“Thank you,” He said. “We'll make plans for Tuesday over the phone, ok?” I nodded in agreement.

“Come on, loverboy!” Seth's words broke us up. “You can talk to her on the phone.”

Joe pressed a sweet kiss to my forehead and said goodbye.

Laura and I were left in the room..... both confused a bit.... me a little weak in the knees.

“What the fuck?” She asked.

“I don't know.” I answered her.

We started walking out to our car, “Do you believe this whole dreaming of you thing?” She asked.

I thought for a minute before I answered. “I think I do.” I answered.

[weirdletter]

Sorrow: A Horror Anthology, edited by James Ward Kirk, James Ward Kirk Publishing, 2019. Cover art by Mike Jansen, info: amazon.

Authors from around the world address the idea of sorrow through the lens of horror. These stories approach a feeling of deep distress caused by loss, disappointment, or other misfortune suffered by oneself or others. Sorrow is an universal emotion, and sometimes it frightens us. Come and see. You'll not be sorry.

Contents: Absorption – Joe X Young Girl, Waiting – Marge Simon Underworld – Sheldon Woodbury In the Short Season of a Long Year Without You – Bruce Boston Soul Seeking – Mike Jansen Baby, Come Back – Kenneth C. Goldman Curse of the Werewolf’s Wife – Bruce Boston Where They Buried Me – Wendell Cooper Copper Menagerie – Bruce Boston Trash Vortex 696 – Alessandro Manzetti Doll Eyes – Joy Ruijmgaart Damnation/Salvation – Trevor Hallam White Siege – Marge Simon & Alessandro Manzetti I’ve Already Forgotten Amy Bailey – Stephen McQuiggan Stars May Rise to Hell and Back – Bruce Boston Single Slice – Lucas Leery The Lights Go Out – Brian Rosenberger Summer’s End – Brian Rosenberger At the End of the Ocean Is the Past – Rob Teun Why Are You So Dark? – James Michael Shoberg The Last Door – RJ Meldrum Double Layer – Andre Sanders I’m Back – Mathias Jansson Survivor – Thomas M. Malafarina When Death Comes Back – Cindy O'Quinn In Absinthe Dreams – H.R. Boldwood Where the Ash Falls – Hillary Lyon Seated ’Twixt the Shadows – Roy Ruijmgaart e-Roger Swimming Upstream – J. Michael Major The Shade and the Abyss – Jerry Langdon Inquietari Umbris – Scáth Beorh The Darkness of the Embrace – Lee Clark Zumpe The Scent of Mothballs – Lee Clark Zumpe An Unhaunting – Mark Silcox Where Secrets Linger – Lee Clark Zumpe Sand – Vada Katherine   Cold – Reed Alexander Terror of the Soul – Norbert Góra Author Bios

[xavierfiles-blog]

Entry 065 - Polaris

Art by Jim Steranko

Name: Lorna Dane

Code Names: Polaris, Magneta, Malice, Magnetrix

First Appearance: X-Men #49

Powers: Mastery of Magnetism

Teams Affiliation: X-Men, X-Factor, Starjammers

About

How important is your parentage? Are you defined by who raised you or your genetic code? For Lorna Dane it wasn’t that simple. She wavered between the person she thought she was, and the person she was fated to be. She wanted desperately to be normal, but normal was never going to be an option for Magneto’s daughter. It comes down to a classic question, nature or nurture. And the answer, it’s not so clear.

Lorna didn’t remember much before the plane crash. There was some yelling, someone was angry. Then screams, someone was afraid. The young Miss Dane blacked out and awoke to viridian hair and dead parents. From there she grew up fairly normal, and without Cerebro she would have remained that way. The X-Men came to recruit her for their school, but so did Mesmero, a servant of the master of magnetism himself. Mesmero hypnotized her and brought her to meet the man who claimed to be her true father, Magneto. Their shared control over magnetism seemed to cement their relationship but after a complicated plan, one that involved Cyclops dressing up in Viking bondage gear, the X-Men were able to save the girl. She joined the Xavier School and trained to become an X-Man.

Art by Jim Steranko and John Tartaglione

At the school, she met Havok and the two quickly fell in love. They dreamt of leaving their adventuring lifestyle behind them and were given that opportunity when the Professor recruited a team of all-new, all-different X-Men. The lovebirds decided to pursue their dreams and worked on their education in geophysics in the American Southwest. That concept of a “normal life” would always be out of Lorna’s grasp as she and Alex were mind controlled by Erik the Red (who was an alien dressed in the same Viking, bondage gear that Cyclops wore) and attacked the X-Men.

Art by Dave Cockrum, Sam Grainger, and Don Warfield

They would spend the next few years alternating between trying to live a normal life, finishing their PhDs, and getting drug into superhero shenanigans. Lorna’s life would get derailed when the Marauder/evil choker necklace known as Malice took over the body of Polaris. Malice controlled Lorna as the Marauder’s continuously attacked the X-Men after the mutant massacre, but the death of Mr. Sinister weakened Malice’s hold over the girl. This was just in time for Zaladane, the Savage Land priestess, to convince her that they were secret sisters because the “Dane” at the end of their names. I want to take a moment to point out that a basic understanding of how last names work would have solved all of this, but I digress. Long story short, Lorna got rid of Malice, figured out how sisters work, and got mysterious flying brick powers that no one ever explained. This was not good times for Lorna Dane.

Art by Marc Silvestri, Dan Green, and Joe Rosen

Polaris went to Muir Island to try and understand her new powers, and wouldn’t you know it, she got possessed again. This time by the Shadow King, because of course she did. After the X-Men saved the day, Lorna was approached to join the new government sponsored X-Factor, once again alongside Havok. They had changed in the years apart, and their relationship didn’t start as smooth as it had been. The final straw broke when Havok turned heel and became a mutant terrorist (he was actually undercover but whatever). After that, the team got darker, too dark for her taste, and she left X-Factor.

Art by Joe Quesada, Al Milgrom, and Marie Javins

Lorna was determined to discover the truth about her parentage which led her to Genosha, the mutant nation under Magneto’s control. The locals loved Magneto and treated Polaris as a princess. It would have been a good life but the former X-Man couldn’t watch as her father reverted to the maniacal villain she always feared he was. Worse for her, she discovered that all the metal on her parent’s plane was magnetized before the crash. She left several times but she was drawn back to the island.

Soon, Cassandra Nova attacked Genosha and killed over sixteen million mutants who lived there. Polaris was able to survive the onslaught, but was traumatized by the genocide around her. She was a blank slate when the X-Men found her, wandering naked though the devastated island. With her, were the magnetic patterns, recordings, of the last moments of Genosha. It drove her nearly mad, she had to boost the signal. Of all the voices she kept, all the ambient magnetic fields, Magneto’s was the loudest. She broadcast his final moments throughout the island, accepted his death, and was calm for the moment.

Art by Phil Jimenez, Andy Lanning, Chris Chuckry

She returned to Westchester, and to Havok. Lorna was erratic, the stress of Genosha had crippled her mind. She was desperate for some sort of normal, some sense of stability, and asked Alex to marry her out of the blue. It was a short engagement, rushed even, but Polaris didn’t take the groom’s absence well. Her mania came to the surface and she attacked the guests while wearing a Magneto helmet fashioned out of the spoons and forks from a reception that would never be. The X-Men let her stick around after that and it wasn’t long until she lost her magnetic powers in the Decimation. She tried to hide it from the others, but when her deception came to light, she was strongly encouraged to take a break from super heroing.

Art by Philip Tan

Lorna was soon approached by Apocalypse with an opportunity, serve him as Pestilence and regain control over metal. For the daughter of Magneto it was no choice. She attacked her former friends as Apocalypse tried to fill the power vacuum after M-Day. The X-Men were able to save their friend from Apocalypse’s control and Lorna wanted to atone. She made it her mission to destroy the Clan Akkaba and set off to Egypt.

Art by Salvador Larocca

Professor Xavier recruited her to join his X-Men on their mission to stop Vulcan. Havok was on the squad too. When they were unable to stop Vulcan from becoming the King of the Shi’ar Empire, Lorna and Havok led the Starjammers in rebellion.  After many battles, Polaris and Havok were captured by the Shi’ar and left to rot in prison on some backwater world. They escaped, as one does, and assisted the Guardians of the Galaxy in defeating Vulcan in the War of Kings.

Art by Paco Diaz, Vicente Cifuentes, and Brian Reber

With the mission over, Havok and Polaris returned to Earth. After some coaxing from Wolverine, they took over X-Factor Investigations from a presumed dead Jamie Maddrox (he came back). Earth brought back memories, and Polaris began dwelling on her parents again. With the help of Longshot, Ms. Dane was able to see what really happened that fateful day. Her parents were fighting in the cockpit, her father found out about her mother’s affair. She didn’t want them to fight, or yell, or get a divorce. She was so scared. The plane shook, the bolts came loose, and Lorna’s powers manifested there and then, ripping the plane in two. This revelation left Lorna in a daze, she began drinking heavily and soon ended in the care of Harrison Snow with an offer.

Snow was putting together an all-new X-Factor. A corporate superhero team for his multinational, Serval Industries, and he wanted Lorna to lead it. She was a strong, determined leader for the squad but the project soon fell apart. At the end of the world, the final incursion, Polaris made peace with her father, Magneto, and used her power to supercharge him as he tried to prevent the end of all things. She hasn’t been seen since.

Art by Kris Anka

Must Read

I’m gonna be straight with you, the best Polaris story has yet to be written. In lieu of something good, why not try something interesting like her first arc in X-Men #49 – #52. It is a truly bizarre arc that emphasizes everything cool about Silver Age comics. The plot doesn’t make much sense, the motivations are vague at best, but the art is killer and the story is absurd enough to enjoy. Check it out on Marvel Unlimited.

Art by Marie Severin and Joe Sinnot

Ranking

I know there are a ton of people out there who really like Polaris. I am not one of them. She spent too many years alternating between mind control and parentage drama that would make Maury a little leery. I can’t think of a single thing to describe her that doesn’t involve her powers, her family, or her hair color. She is just so inconsistent in all of her appearances that I can’t form an attachment to her. I legit like Skullfire more than her, same with Darwin. Mastermind has the Dark Phoenix working for him so she drops below him, but Sage has nothing going for her. That’s why Polaris is squeezing in at number 54 in the Xavier Files.

If you have a request just submit it at the bottom of this article and I will add it to the list that currently stretches well into 2018! If you want to cut to the front of the line, we have a Patreon you can support for just $1 to get a line cutting reward.

Make sure you check out Legion Quest a new podcast where me and Newsarama reviewer Matt Sibley talk about the FX show Legion. You can follow the show at any of these sources (iTunes | Google Play | Sticher | RSS).

Click here if you want to see the full ranked list, with links to every entry in the Xavier Files so far.

If you liked what you read be sure to follow Xavier Files on twitter, Tumblr, Facebook!

Next week it’s Hellion! See you then!

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Entry Key

Entry 065 – Polaris was originally published on Xavier Files

[waroftwowolves]

Mm, I've been seeing a lot of this stuff going around, as well as confessionals about how things have soured people and the realm dynamic has shifted from open to reclusive due to drama.

Sorry to use you to make a point, Susan, but your current string of comments from the wra secrets peanut gallery have tipped me out of my usual desire to keep my mouth shut and simply roll my eyes and onto my rather dusty soap box.

First off, while I fully understand the Mods of WRA secrets desire to remain non partisan as far as commentary goes, I have to ask when enough is enough. It reaches a certain point where fairness to post everyone's opinions no longer remains simply that, but only adds kindling to a fire that doesnt need any more fuel.

Everything involved in rp and our realm as a whole is based on choices, not fairness. There's honestly no such thing as being fair anymore because no matter what you do, someone's nose is going out of joint. This is when we need to start making choices. Not fair ones, but ones that are right, that help rather than hinder. People can choose to lift the community and it's players up, or choose to entertain such vitriol like what Susan has been enduring.

Imflammantary comments don't need to be aired. Doing so does nothing but make things worse and turn molehills into mountains, making all of us look like childish assholes. It's like watching a school yard: "I want to play G.I. Joe, but that other kid has a Transformer and I hate Transformers so I'm not going to play my game and have fun and instead ruin both our recess!"

Everyone is running around posting how things used to be and what made their personal experiences change. And a lot, if not all, are focused on the way they were treated, how the rumor mill picked them up and spat them out and how people just wouldn't let them be or their friends be.

We're a growing community of jaded souls and things like above are only causing more issues. I applaud the attempt at an open forum to allow rp'ers to get things off their chest, but airing your dirty laundrey just waves a big stain around and leaves a bad smell. Besides, there are private forums to let off steam, like friends or PVP that are much more conducive to your emotions with people you trust that is far more respectful.

Back to choices.

Rp is based on choices. It's our choice to rp what we enjoy, and others choices to either be a part of it or not.

If you don't want to be a part of it, then dont. No one is forcing you. Don't like another player? Don't interact. Your friends interact with them? Well I hope you and your friends have some respect for eachother and common sense to not force interactions. There's always ways around things, it just means you have to think.

It's your choice to make a comment about something you don't know a lot about as well. Or to even speak up like the original comment above.

Again I'll use Susan as an example.

I'll admit I was a bit leery of the whole Brothel thing, and the Sisters in Sin events, add in that a few people were warning me to avoid them at all costs. But I sat back and read the stories other players wrote about attending, Susan's included! And I got curious to see if rumor was true, or the stories themselves.

In all my years I can count on one hand where rumor was true, and this was not one of them.

I went on an alt and had a great time.

The bartenders had me cracking up, the entertainment (which while yes was certainly not for children, it wasn't x rated either) was well written and enjoyable, and the guests were all around relaxed and having fun. There was drama with rp stories, there were new friendships forged, and silliness as well (I lost an arm wrestle to a potatoe. I'm still figuring out how but to date one if my favorite rp's)

I liked it so much I took Lochlan for a job as security and my alt as an entertainer.

There was and haven't been any orgies, and if there was it was by player choice in private. The entire event is based off of respect for other players, and it was something that drew me to want to be involved. That respect.

We are all welcome to our choices, but the cruel ones always come with consequences.

Make the good choices. You don't have to like everyone and what they do, hell, there's players and characters I've ran into that I don't like or approve of. But I respect myself and them enough to just go my own way and do my own thing.

You want things to get better? Be happier?

Make good choices, and keep the laundrey in the basket.

That's my two cents. Take it as you will.

When our IC paper and server is just okay with giant erp orgy events being the norm shits gone downhill

Who cares

[stompitdown]

“And here are your winners....!”

Wrong.

Something was wrong. There was a frown on Joe’s face as he pulled himself up and Jon felt his heart start to race, pound against the cage of his ribs.

Wrong.

Drew was standing, looking as smug as can be with his hand raised high. There was a tightness around his eyes though and the way the ref dropped Drew’s hand all too quick and slipped down on his knees by Colby’s head made that feeling of wrong grow stronger.

Colby wasn’t supposed to take the pin.

The Shield wasn’t supposed to lose, was supposed to go over and win and celebrate their last match together. As Jon pulled himself up and slide into the ring, Colby still hadn’t moved and then, the Ref was shifting, hands forming an X.

Jon panicked then, rushed to Colby’s side and Joe was there too, crouched by Colby’s head and Jon didn’t recall how, but he had Colby’s hand, wasn’t sure what he was saying and didn’t become truly aware of what he was babbling until the trainer was in the ring and Colby weakly squeezed his hand.

It was slow going, but Colby was awake, was being helped up by the trainer and Jon’s hands were on Colby’s shoulders and Colby patted the side of his face as Joe’s hand curled around his arm, gently helped Colby to wobbly feet. “S’okay,” Colby was saying and Jon felt anger replace the panic that had gripped him, had made the bottom of his stomach fall out. “S’okay.”

The look on Joe’s face silenced Jon’s tongue and together, they helped Colby to the trainer’s room in the back. Colby was too quiet, leaned too far into Jon’s side, breath too ragged and heavy, clung to Jon in ways he hadn’t clung since they were young and more than two people who just happened to work together. Jon stayed silent, slipped so, so easily between Colby’s thighs, cradled his face in his hands, saw the ugly mark blooming along his cheek and he knew. He knew then and there someone slipped, made a mistake and Colby took a ClayMore full on to the jaw.

“Concussions really sweeten our boy up, huh?” Joe tried to joke, standing by Colby’s shoulder, hand curled loose at the nap of Colby’s neck.

Jon forced a laugh, even as Colby huffed yet, made no effort to wiggle his way from between them. “Only time he is sweet.”

This was nothing to joke about though and it was the slamming of the door that had Joe moving, pressing closer and Jon turning, hiding Colby from whoever barged in. Saraya stood there, looking pale and sick and suddenly Jon remembered. Remember Colby wasn’t his, wasn’t theirs hadn’t been theirs in a long, long time.

It had been so easy to slip, to get caught up in the moment, in the touch and warmth of his boys. Touch after all, was something they always did, always took comfort in, even when they were mad and wanted nothing to do with each other; they were always touching in some way, shape or form.

“Oh muffin.” She was whispering, taking a step forward only to pause, really drink in the sight before her. “Is.. Is he okay?”

Colby’s head thumped lightly against Jon’s shoulder, his cheek warm and slick against the skin bared there. “He is right here.” Colby was mumbling. “He can answer questions.”

“He,” Joe pipped up and by the soft noise Colby made against his shoulder, Jon knew Joe had squeezed Colby’s neck just right. “Is concussed and should probably get checked out at the hospital.”

Saraya’s eyes darted between them and Jon knew, knew by the way she fiddle with her fingers, bit her lip what she was going to do and he wasn’t going to let her. “We’ll take him. He’s an utter brat when he’s like this.”

Colby made another sound, shifted and Jon felt the tickle of his hair, the soft heat of his breath. “I’m right here!”

Joe laughed and by the grumble that left Colby, Jon had a feeling Joe had pulled Colby’s hair. “See? A brat. We’ll take care of our boy here tonight, last time we can do it.”

Still, Saraya seemed iffy and Jon couldn’t blame her. If he hadn’t been able to see his lover while they were hurt, he would be leery letting said lover go into someone else hands. It was Colby though and Colby had always been theirs would always be theirs.

“I’m okay,” Colby finally spoke, hands pushing at Jon’s shoulders and Jon stepped to the side, let Saraya finally lay eyes on Colby fully. “Let them baby me even though,” He added, swatting at Joe’s hand and nudging Jon’s hip with his boot. “I don’t need it and will be fine.”

Saraya shifted, awkward, obviously wanted to say something more, to dart to Colby’s side and run her fingers over h is face, over the ugly bruise forming along his jaw. She didn’t. She stayed silent, nodded and spun on her heel and left the room.

That night, in the hotelroom, with Colby’s hair in his mouth and Joe’s finger caught in his own, Jon felt settled.

It had been a long time since he had both his boys, since he felt so at ease in his own skin. To think, at the end, when everything lay broken between them, they had this again. Jon wondered then as Colby shifted and all he smelt was the hint of coffee and coconut from Joe’s fancy creams, what would have happened if he didn’t cave to WWE’s demands?

If he had stayed with Colby, if he never married Renee.

If only, if only, if only...

“Thinking too hard,” Colby spoke, soft and slurred into his neck. “Sleep my heart, sleep.”

Jon’s thoughts stopped and his heart began to race. He knew it was only because of the mild concussion Colby had called him that, knew if Colby had been in his right mind, never would he ever let that endearment slip free. Years. years upon years ago, when they were young and in love, before Joe slipped into their tangle webbed, that was what Colby called him when they were alone, when he was soft and loose and so, so in love.

Choked with emotion, Jon brushed a kiss to the top of Colby’s head, replied: “You as well my soul, you as well.”

Because it was never I love you between them.

They were each others heart, their soul and now? It they could never be so again.

[photomaniacs]

An Interview with Photographer Joe McNally http://ift.tt/2s443xc… http://ift.tt/2sKi4Cm

An Interview with Photographer Joe McNally http://ift.tt/2s443xc

Joe McNally is a photographer and a storyteller. The word photography comes from Greek and means to write with light. That, in a nutshell, is what McNally does: he a writes with light, whether it be daylight or Speedlight. And for a student who started out as a writing major and ended up being a photographer, that is just the perfect result.

McNally has shot in 70 countries around the world and has been a staff photographer for LIFE magazine, a contract photographer for Sports Illustrated, and a contributing photographer for National Geographic. His photographs have appeared in TIME, Newsweek, Fortune, Entertainment Weekly, The New York Times and Men’s Journal, just to name a few.

In the heyday of publishing, McNally was the only photographer who had the cover of National Geographic and LIFE on the newsstand simultaneously.

Faces of Ground Zero, Portraits of the Heroes of September 11, 2001 Collection is one of McNally’s most well-known works. It is a compilation of 246 Polaroid portraits that are life-size and at 40×80 inches (4×9 feet framed) they came out of the camera in that size. The exhibition was seen by a million people in seven cities and along with the book helped raise over $2 million for the 9/11 relief efforts.

Besides editorial photography, McNally has also pushed the envelope of creative imagery to his commercial clients, which include FedEx, Sony, ESPN, Adidas, Land’s End, Nikon, General Electric, Epson, MetLife, USAA, New York Stock Exchange, Lehman Brothers, PNC Bank and the Beijing Cultural Commission.

A Nikon USA Ambassador, McNally has lectured at the Santa Fe Photographic Workshops, Eddie Adams Workshop, National Geographic Expeditions, The Annenberg Space for Photography, Smithsonian Institution, Rochester Institute of Technology and more. His upcoming workshops this summer range from Hawaii to Tuscany, Italy.

The Bolt. Jamaican sprinter, Olympic medalist, Usain Bolt, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, 2016.

McNally’s social media following is more than half a million, and his blog and books, two of which made the Amazon top 10 list, are very popular with photographers wanting to add new lighting and techniques to their repertoire.

Phil Mistry: How did you get started in photography?

Joe McNally: It wasn’t by design. I was in school to become a journalist, a writer and I was required to take a photography class, and that opened up a door for me that I decided to walk through.

And which school was this?

Syracuse University in upstate New York.

The Donald. Donald Trump, in the back seat of his limousine, 1987.

And what was the next step?

I stayed in school because I started learning about photography late in my tenure as a student, so I stayed two more years and did a graduate degree, masters in photojournalism at the Newhouse School of Journalism.

I learned a lot though school doesn’t completely prepare you for the real world of journalism. So I went to New York City and looked for work as a photographer, but mostly unsuccessfully. I took a full-time job as a copy boy at the New York Daily News, which was a major newspaper at that time. It was a minor job, but a foot in the door. I spent three years there but was never a photographer.

I was let go in a staff reduction but by that time I had made contacts with a lot of NY services like Associated Press, United Press International, NY Times and I was able to start freelancing for these news organizations.

Swamp Woman. Performance artist, Deidre Deane, rises from the lake, Santa Fe, NM, 2008.

You have bridged the world of photojournalism and advertising. Which do you like shooting more, today?

There are good assignments and not so good assignments, but no matter what genre of work I am engaged in, I enjoy the aspect of executing the assignment as a photographer whether it is photojournalism or commercial work. Commercially sponsored work dominates our landscape now because many of the traditional magazines that I shot for have disappeared or receded in their power of the budget.

How long have you been a Nikon Ambassador?

This is a rough guess that the Ambassador program has now been running as a full-fledged formal program for about three years. And I have been in the first group of Ambassadors that were asked to join. I have had a long relationship with Nikon and bought my first Nikon camera many, many years ago and have been a Nikon user throughout my entire career.

Tony at the Coffee Shop. Consummate performer, Tony Bennett, enjoys a quiet cup of coffee, Queens, NY, 1995.

Wasn’t there a Nikon program even before the Ambassadors?

They have had for many years, Legends Behind the Lens, and I was named in that program as well, but that was a less formal program. It was an acknowledgment, a tip of the hat that you were a Nikon shooter and that you have had an impressive career.

What do you do as a Nikon Ambassador?

It’s an excellent collaboration. When they come out with new gear, they will reach out to some of their Ambassadors to shoot with the gear on assignment to generate material with new cameras and lenses. They will get our opinion on where the technology needs to go, what could be improved, things we need. We have an excellent collaboration on social media and try to promote each other.

Defying Gravity. Rayshine Harris, AntiGravity performer, in mid-air, NYC, NY, 2011.

Which was your first Nikon?

It was called the Nikkormat FTn with a 50mm lens.

What was your very first camera?

It was my father’s camera called Beauty Lite III [35mm rangefinder], which I borrowed for my photo class. I have it right here with me.

Pegasus. Experimental X-47A Navy drone, China Lake Naval Air Station, CA, 2003

You did the first all digital shoot for National Geographic in 2003, which was the 100-year anniversary of the Wright brothers’ first flight, which ended up being one of their popular covers. Was it your idea to go digital?

Yes. My story editor, Bill Douthitt, and I thought, why not propose this. Digital was at everyone’s doorstep, and Geographic had yet to shoot an entire story with digital material.  We suggested that and it was accepted. It was also a future-looking story as it was called The Future of Flight and it all seemed to work at that time to come together as an idea that Geographic approved.

Did you also shoot film just for safety “back-up?”

Nope. I didn’t. I never shot a scrap of film during the entire shoot.

Fire Dancer. Polynesian fire knife performer, Mervyn Lilo, at sunset in the tropics, Oahu, Hawaii, 2006.

How was the workflow different in 2003 of a digital shoot from what it is today?

Pretty much the same. I was shooting with a Nikon D1X camera, which produced good quality digital files, but they couldn’t stand up to the digital files we have access to now.

I shot to Lexar cards the entire thing, and the biggest card that was available was 1 GB card, which was very expensive at $700. I would shoot and then download, backup on external hard drive, edit in Photo Mechanic, make selects and pretty much what we do now, though now the process has been significantly enlarged through advancements in technology.

You used a Nikon D1X, and today you use a Nikon D5, which is a lot higher quality, but would the difference be apparent in a magazine reproduction?

Yes, I would say absolutely, it would be apparent. Also, a lot of magazines in the early days of digital had a hard time handling and reproducing digital material, and they were a little bit leery of it. It took awhile for the whole industry to come to terms with digital and embrace it fully.

But now, the quality of the cameras is quite astonishing relative to the cameras I grew up with. Yes, you can see a significant difference regarding reproduction and the depth of the quality of the image.

You started shooting for National Geographic in 1987. Which shoot did you enjoy the most?

The most enjoyable shoot I did was a cover story on The Globalization of Culture [this was before the Internet]. We identified three epicenters of this globalization process, and one of them was India, another was Shanghai in China and Los Angeles in the US.

We took a look at cultural trends and how they were being shared. Our movies get shared all over the world, and we share fashion trends like the tradition of henna from India, certain wedding traditions, music, etc. All these experiences are becoming common cultural experiences.

Which film did you use at Geographic?

Across the board when I was shooting for Geographic, basically shot with Kodachrome—a great deal of Kodachrome 64 and Kodachrome 200.

Is the current Nikon D5 quality equal to Kodachrome?

The images that come out of a D5 are much better than what I got on Kodachrome.

Louie. Firefighter, Engine 47, FDNY, Faces of Ground Zero, NYC, NY, 2001.

In the acclaimed series Faces of Ground Zero — Portraits of the Heroes of September 11th, you shot a collection of 246 giant 40×80 inch Polaroid portraits. Tell us about the photographic challenges that a 35mm shooter would face when using a camera as large as a single car garage?

I had one experience before 9/11. I had worked with the camera once before and could work it pretty well. It was a combination of old and new technology. I felt that that camera was an excellent instrument to take a look at these people who had intersected with the 9/11 tragedy. It became a vehicle to look at their courage and persona as a human being. It is a formal process, a very formal camera but I found out I adapted to it pretty well.

So, was this a personal project for you? Did you propose this or was it given to you?

It was my idea. I went to Time Warner and sought funding for it, which they gave me almost immediately.

How much was the funding?

My initial ask was for $100,000.

Backstage. Bolshoi ballerinas await their call to go on stage, Moscow, Russia, 1997

When we shot Polaroids in the old days, we took out the film and shook it to dry. You didn’t, I suppose, shake it dry?

No, what we would do is peel the chemical backing off of it, and the print would be a positive print as all Polaroid is, and it would be laying on the floor all wet. There were big drying racks as each image was about 40” wide by 80” long. We would take the wet Polaroid and lay it on a drying rack and let them essentially cure over the course of a day or two.

What did one exposure of that size Polaroid cost?

About $300.

So did they say they didn’t want you to be trigger-happy and restrict your shooting?

No, that was completely self-enforced. I knew I had a budget and wanted to photograph a variety of people. For 80 to 85% of the subjects, I made only one exposure.

Bolshoi prima ballerina, Nadia Grachova, Moscow, Russia, 1997.

Would you then wait till it was processed to make sure the subject had not blinked?

Absolutely. 90 seconds later I would have a giant Polaroid, and we could go in and take a look at it.

What was the shutter speed on that camera?

There was no shutter speed as there was no shutter in the lens and you would like camera obscura. I would work in a completely blacked out room, and I would pull out a cap off of the lens, and then I would hit a cable release that was attached to a Mamiya RZ Pro II which was bore sighted right underneath the giant Polaroid lens. In a dark studio, the Mamiya would trigger about 30,000 watt seconds of light strobes, and I would simultaneously get a 6×7 chrome and a 40×80″ giant Polaroid.

What was the aperture on the giant lens?

We shot somewhere around f/32, as I recall. It was not a precise instrument in the sense that you had to feel your way to it. We did not have an ISO rating on the film batches. Every fresh roll of Polaroid that we took out we had to test what ISO it was.

Joe & Nadia. Joe McNally and Bolshoi prima ballerina, balance themselves on a rooftop, Moscow, Russia, 1997.

How many flash heads did you have to get that kind of juice?

We had 10 or 12 heads. We had multiple 2,400 watt second units firing through silks to create the main light and then accent lights, background lights, etc.

What brand of lights was that?

Profoto.

How did you come to select a white background?

I did not want to use black, also logistically as I knew I would be photographing a lot of firefighters and that could be a separation problem. So white just came to be formal, clean and completely devoid of information. It enables you to simply concentrate on the human being that is in the picture.

It was reported in April that the NY Times was going to increase their day rate for photography from $200/day to $450/day. How can a photojournalist in New York City using his own equipment work on $200/day?

No, can’t, not possible. They did do the very good thing about moving the day rate from $200/day to $450/day.

That [the old rate] makes life very difficult as a photojournalist. A career, I mean.

It makes it virtually impossible. I congratulate the New York Times for increasing their day rate, but all they have done is bring the day rate to where it should have been back around 1990. So we still have about 20+ years of catching up to do, and of course, that is never going to happen.

Your social media following is half a million to date. To what do you owe that following?

We take it seriously, and we try to be responsible on social media. We try to be consistent; we try to post good material or hopefully, thoughtful stuff. My blog has been an enjoyable thing to write. It kind of reopens doors to my original education in journalism, which was to become a writer; so I find I have enjoyed writing the blog and people have responded. I am very grateful for that, that we have a bit of a voice in the industry.

Strength. Gail Devers, in 1996 was the world’s fastest woman, Santa Monica, CA, 1996.

Lewis Hine, the social documentary photographer, said ‘If I could tell the story in words, I wouldn’t need to lug around a camera.’ Does the photographer of today have to be a wordsmith as well with his blogs and social media to be successful?

Yes, I think it is an absolute necessity to be a thoroughly good storyteller. And that requires an ability to write, as well as shoot. It needs the savvy and the ways of the Internet in getting the story that you are trying to tell out and about, so people can see it.

You have a high level of expertise with lighting. And you prefer to use smaller hot shoe flashlights in multiples rather than studio strobes. Why?            

I would say that might be an opinion or conjured up on the Internet because I do teach Speedlights a fair amount. I use both interchangeably.

I have been fascinated with Speedlights for a long time in the sense that when I was doing a lot of global work for the National Geographic, they would often assign me to do exciting and challenging topics that often involved medicine and technology. I would be traveling by myself and would go to these places, and it would simply be required that I would do a little bit of lighting here and there. I was working by myself, so I started getting familiar with the idea of using these small flashes.

On the other hand, I have also done for the Geographic and other clients some really, really big production work: lighting telescopes, lighting buildings, Faces of Ground Zero. All of that is big flash work, so I step in between two worlds very easily. What is the bottom line is, as always, the nature of the job: what does the job require me to do.

The Eye. A captivating look into the artistry of the human eye, Los Angeles, CA, 1993.

The new Nikon SB-5000 has radio-controlled operation. Has that changed your workflow in any way?

It has changed it considerably, and it has enhanced it and made it easier to work with small flashes. The SB-5000 AF Speedlight is quite simply the best Speedlight I have ever worked with.

What is the maximum number of Speedlights you have used in a shoot?

There were a couple of instances where it was pushed out to me to use a lot of Speedlights as a demonstration kind of thing. I would say, up to about 20 Speedlights I have used in a practical fashion on location.

Cream City Sweets. Girl about to eat a summertime ice cream cone, Cookeville, TN, 2015.

So, how many Speedlights do you typically travel with on a shoot?

I have… I own right now eight SB-5000 and four of the old SB-910. If I am going on an extended trip or someplace where I think I will use Speedlights, we have a case that we take with us, it’s our Speedlight case and that will usually have ten.

You also combine Profoto B1. How many of those heads do you travel with?

We have two B1 kits and they each have two heads in them. Depending on the size of the job we will take one B1 kit, which has two heads or both of them, which gives me up to four. So between the Speedlights and the Profoto B1, I can pretty well light just about anything that I encounter.

Just recently at Creative Live out in Seattle, I brought Profoto Pro-B4 because I knew I needed a big pop of light.

Shadow Dancing. Jonathan Connell, gymnast & martial artist, does a balancing act, Brooklyn Navy Yard, Brooklyn, NY, 2011.

Do you shoot in manual mode or with the TTL automated mode when you are just using your Nikon Speedlights?

It’s really situational. I start off with TTL, which is my default. I can find my way to a good combination, often just using TTL flash. Once I find my way, I often will then simply lock it down into manual because maybe at that point I have a couple hundred frames to shoot and I don’t want to deal anymore with the potential variance of TTL. But TTL is an excellent tool when you are doing fast-moving flash.

Even with 10 flashes or 20 flashes?

Well, when I get myself into a big scenario I find I am using my zones. With the SB-5000 I have 6 zones of control. I can put flashes in A, B, C, D, E and F groups. I will find the mosaic that gets put together in a situation like that. Might have A, C and D group operate in TTL and B and E running in manual.

Long Boarders. Seattle, Washington, 2010

Do your journalistic portraits have different lighting than your advertising ones?                                              

That’s a good question. It depends on the sensibility of the job. When I am out as a journalist or out on my own trying to tell a story, 95% of the time I don’t have an art director there. So I can follow my nose and hopefully come up with a good set of pictures that speak to the situation.

When you are doing commercial work many, many times, you will have an art director on set with you. You will be shooting their ideas. You will be shooting to a sketch. And that will often tremendously influence the nature and quality of your approach and subsequently, of course, your lighting.

When you were at LIFE, the classical master of all lighting techniques, Gjon Mili was there. Did you know him?

I knew Mr. Mili but in a very casual fashion. I started shooting for LIFE in 1984 roughly as a freelancer and Mr. Mili had his offices up on the 28th floor with the rest of the many other photographers at Time Life. And so I had the great honor of meeting him. I will not claim to be familiar with him or know him and he was an amazing craftsman with light.

Sparks in the Sky. A welder works the night shift on the ledge of a building, Beijing, China, 2005.

So did he influence you in any way?

Absolutely, I think he influenced a whole generation of photographers in the way he used light. He was an innovator for sure but also wasn’t just an engineer. He was poetic in the way he used light. His stroboscopic studies of dancers were just beautiful, the way he portrayed Picasso was innovative and in his own way just as daring as some of Picasso’s own art.

He was quite a formal gentleman. I never joked around with Mr. Mili. Just being in the room with him you needed to pay him respect. I always appreciated what he did and it still carries with me. Some of the pictures, The Lindy Hop, for instance, is just a wonderfully exuberantly flash photograph.

You shipped 47 cases of gear to Chile to shoot giant telescopes for National Geographic. What did you have in all those cases?

Mostly lighting, heavy-duty lighting. The big telescopes are 15-20 story buildings. They are enormous and you have to light this very cavernous space inside the telescope, which is never seen as always telescopes are always operating in darkness. I had to light these massive structures.

We would routinely take 10-12, 2,400 watt second cases. So, if you take 12 numbers of 2,400 watt second packs, that is 12 cases right there and then the rest of the heads can be 5-6 cases. So before you leave on the plane, you are looking at 20 cases of just the lighting. Then you have to have ways to support all that lighting, stand upon stand, upon stands, safety wire, clamps, ropes and then you’d better bring your cameras too.

Diamond Roll. The U.S. Navy’s Blue Angels, performing a maneuver above the Naval Air Facility, El Centro, CA, 2003.

And was there place for your Speedlights in that shoot too?

No. The telescope shoots…I mean, I did have a couple of Speedlights occasionally in the control rooms you could find room to use a small Speedlight, say in front of a small computer screen or something like that but the actual physical reality of telescopes was way beyond the scope of small flash.

What brand of flash did you use?

Profoto. I use Profoto big lights. It is to me the most sophisticated, durable big flash system in the world.

Would you consider doing this kind of shoot with continuous light or light painting?

No, I occasionally did some light painting with the head light from my car, driving it around while the camera is open, that kind of thing. At that point when I was doing the telescope work, LEDs were not in vogue. They hadn’t been developed.

Even so, a big hot light is massively heavy, bulky and dangerous. It gets very hot, needs a lot of electricity and the bulbs routinely break. You don’t have the sophistication of approach: you have barn doors and things like that not necessarily the kind of light shapers that routinely come along with say a Profoto system.

I can take a 2,400 watt second pack, which is sizable but not overwhelming and bang that into a telescope and I can get a lot of play out if it. You would need just a ton of hot light to get the equivalent amount of f/stop out of it.

Body Expressions. Contemporary dancer & artist, Gilbert Small, Vancouver, BC, 2012.

Digital has many upsides from film, what are the downsides?

You know, I can’t really think of much. To be honest, everybody is always nervous about losing their digital images, but if you are safe and careful, you won’t lose them. To me it’s much less anxiety-producing than putting three weeks of work, i.e. 100 rolls of Kodachrome in a FedEx bag; sending it to National Geographic from a foreign location and not knowing for three days or so whether your package got there. That’s very nerve racking.

Human Architecture. Members of the dance troupe “Pilobolus” comfortably mold themselves

You have been described by American PHOTO magazine as perhaps the most versatile photojournalist working today and you were listed as the 100 Most Important People in Photography. But today both American PHOTO and Popular Photography are gone. Do you see a future for print photo magazines, knowing that their news is always going to be one or more months old?

Well, it is the constant dilemma of print to remain relevant in a very fast paced digital world. But I still think there is an absolute need and future for printed photo magazines and printed magazines in general.

The tactile experience and the permanence of actually having a library, a reference point is still extremely valuable. Websites and Instagram and all of that are the currency of the moment, and I think it’s wonderful. But there is room for both expressions and I hope that the magazines that we have left will stick around.

When you photographed Pope John Paul II on a visit to his homeland of Poland you were with 9 other photographers of Newsweek and Time had 14. Would today any magazine commission 14 photographers to cover a single event?

I don’t think magazines would, as they no longer have that budgetary power. But an outfit like Getty would. When I was at the Rio de Janeiro Olympics, Getty had 140-150 photographers, that was what I was told. An agency like Getty has that economic clout; magazines do not.

Water Polo Boys. U.S. men’s water polo team display their top form, CA, 1996.

Your much talked about photograph for LIFE showed the members of the 1996 Olympic team in the nude on the cover. How did you convince them to do the pose? Did you clear the shot before with the photo editor?

The magazine was behind it a 100%. My editor at that time, Dan Okrent, was a big fan of the idea. Dan was a risk taker and he appreciated and understood photography. When I got into the field, I found most of the athletes were quite comfortable. I told them it was completely an above-board effort. It was not sensational. I was trying to show their musculature and physical attributes. And they were at the peak of their lives, physically and showed off their physiques.

Which is your go-to lens?

My most popular lens, most used lens would be a Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8

Synchro Divers. Dumain Brothers fly in synch off the 10-meter board, Austin, TX, 2000.

At the 2000 Sydney Olympics synchronized diving was introduced. You shot a four-page gatefold on film that had multiple exposures of the athletes during different times in the fall and also illuminated the pool. How difficult was that?

Lord….the shot took five days and cost Sports Illustrated a lot of dough. We had to turn the diving stadium at the University of Texas at Austin into a giant, stroboscopic photo studio. It meant the divers had to throw themselves off the 10-meter platform in utter darkness, with just a flashlight over the water to give them an idea where the surface was. Shooting film, no digital, no LCD.

I confirmed each try (mostly failures) on a Polaroid camera I fired simultaneously with the other cameras. The divers would be out of sync, and then I would be out of sync. It was a nightmare. Processed each night to see if we got anything. Finally had my frame on the 5th day. Had six zones of flash, five over water, one firing into portholes underwater to make the water blue. Plus hot lights on the top of the dive tower. NEVER AGAIN.

The Scream. Performer, Manu, expresses himself, Las Vegas, 2017.

From 1994 until 1998 you were with LIFE magazine as a staff photographer, all by yourself, possibly the first staffer in 23 years? Is that good to be a solo operator?

It was pretty great while Dan Okrent was the managing editor there. He moved on during that time and it became a lot harder to work out longer projects. He had great confidence and knew how important pictures were—a rarity among Time-Life managing editors.

I self-generated a lot of stories, and did anything and everything they threw at me as well. It was a lot of work, but it was welcome. LIFE was actually making money during those Okrent years, but then, after he left, it seriously tanked.

Your Indiana High School basketball feature, which you shot for Sports Illustrated, ran over 30 pages. Would you ever get such coverage in print or even online today?

No, never. It was unusual to get that many pages even back in the day.

You got your Masters in Photography 27 years late. How did that happen?

I never finished my thesis. I left with my entire course work done, but no thesis completed. I was anxious to start a career. They ended up accepting the Faces of Ground Zero book as my thesis, and I am forever grateful.

Have you ever shot a wedding?  

Many, both large and small, but no more.

Can you share with the readers of PetaPixel what equipment is in your kit bag?

Well, you can take a look at my gear page on my blog to see the range of stuff we have. It doesn’t all come into play, obviously. I have done a lot of big production work over time, so I have a lot of lighting, etc.

But the basics are very similar to any shooter. A couple of digital cameras, in my case Nikon D5, usually. 14-24, 24-70, 70-200 lenses go with me virtually all the time. A couple of fast primes like the Nikkor 105 f/1.4, and 35 f/1.4. Three or four Speedlights, the SB-5000 radio TTL units. Profoto B-1 is usually out there with us as well.

Donald in the Wind. A gentle soul, caught in a windstorm, Santa Fe, NM, 2010.

Today there are numerous contracts out there to be able to shoot. Would you be willing to sign many of them?

Not many. We walk away from lots of work.

You photographed Cher right after her best-actress winning Moonstruck. At that time you said, “If you can’t make them good, make them big and in color.” What did you mean?

I actually photographed Cher before her win, just as the movie was breaking. It is one of those assignments I look back on as a blown job. The old adage of “if you can’t make ‘em good, make ‘em big and in color” [lay out the photo feature with larger photos and more pages] was an old inside joke at LIFE.

If you could do only one kind of assignment for the rest of your life, what would it be?

Stay at home and stare at my wife, Annie!

You can follow Joe McNally and see more of his work on his website, Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, Google+, YouTube and Nikon Ambassador.

About the author: Phil Mistry is a photographer and teacher based in Atlanta, GA. He started one of the first digital camera classes in New York City at International Center of Photography in the 90s. He was the director and teacher for Sony/Popular Photography magazine’s Digital Days Workshops. You can reach him via email here.

Image credits: All photos © Joe McNally and used with permission

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June 23, 2017 at 08:00PM

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June 23, 2017 at 09:05PM

[theirnarrative]

ofpatria liked x for a starter:

“SHIT.” The swear is muffled by the fact that dry lips clutch onto a cigarette. His thumb runs along the back of his lighter that is failing to produce even the smallest of sparks. Fingers part as the cigarette is pulled from his mouth and cradled between his index and middle fingers. He was as far away from the SS building as his feet could carry him and had only stopped to take a smoke. Juliana Crain was dead. She hadn’t been found which he knew directly translated into no longer breathing. He cared for the woman from Canyon City despite knowing that he shouldn’t. He thought should would have been safe after he left with the film. Could have gone back home to Frank and have some sort of normal life again. Nothing ever seemed to go according to plan for him. 

A sigh passes through his lips as his head turns towards the direction of footsteps. He’s leery at first fearing that they belonged to an SS officer, ready to drag him back to the headquarter building that very instant. Instead they belonged to a raven haired woman. “Sorry to bother you, ma’am but do you got a light?” Joe calls out to her, lips turning into a soft smile despite how much pain and anger coursed through his veins. 

[photomaniacs]

An Interview with Photographer Joe McNally http://ift.tt/2s443xc

Joe McNally is a photographer and a storyteller. The word photography comes from Greek and means to write with light. That, in a nutshell, is what McNally does: he a writes with light, whether it be daylight or Speedlight. And for a student who started out as a writing major and ended up being a photographer, that is just the perfect result.

McNally has shot in 70 countries around the world and has been a staff photographer for LIFE magazine, a contract photographer for Sports Illustrated, and a contributing photographer for National Geographic. His photographs have appeared in TIME, Newsweek, Fortune, Entertainment Weekly, The New York Times and Men’s Journal, just to name a few.

In the heyday of publishing, McNally was the only photographer who had the cover of National Geographic and LIFE on the newsstand simultaneously.

Faces of Ground Zero, Portraits of the Heroes of September 11, 2001 Collection is one of McNally’s most well-known works. It is a compilation of 246 Polaroid portraits that are life-size and at 40×80 inches (4×9 feet framed) they came out of the camera in that size. The exhibition was seen by a million people in seven cities and along with the book helped raise over $2 million for the 9/11 relief efforts.

Besides editorial photography, McNally has also pushed the envelope of creative imagery to his commercial clients, which include FedEx, Sony, ESPN, Adidas, Land’s End, Nikon, General Electric, Epson, MetLife, USAA, New York Stock Exchange, Lehman Brothers, PNC Bank and the Beijing Cultural Commission.

A Nikon USA Ambassador, McNally has lectured at the Santa Fe Photographic Workshops, Eddie Adams Workshop, National Geographic Expeditions, The Annenberg Space for Photography, Smithsonian Institution, Rochester Institute of Technology and more. His upcoming workshops this summer range from Hawaii to Tuscany, Italy.

The Bolt. Jamaican sprinter, Olympic medalist, Usain Bolt, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, 2016.

McNally’s social media following is more than half a million, and his blog and books, two of which made the Amazon top 10 list, are very popular with photographers wanting to add new lighting and techniques to their repertoire.

Phil Mistry: How did you get started in photography?

Joe McNally: It wasn’t by design. I was in school to become a journalist, a writer and I was required to take a photography class, and that opened up a door for me that I decided to walk through.

And which school was this?

Syracuse University in upstate New York.

The Donald. Donald Trump, in the back seat of his limousine, 1987.

And what was the next step?

I stayed in school because I started learning about photography late in my tenure as a student, so I stayed two more years and did a graduate degree, masters in photojournalism at the Newhouse School of Journalism.

I learned a lot though school doesn’t completely prepare you for the real world of journalism. So I went to New York City and looked for work as a photographer, but mostly unsuccessfully. I took a full-time job as a copy boy at the New York Daily News, which was a major newspaper at that time. It was a minor job, but a foot in the door. I spent three years there but was never a photographer.

I was let go in a staff reduction but by that time I had made contacts with a lot of NY services like Associated Press, United Press International, NY Times and I was able to start freelancing for these news organizations.

Swamp Woman. Performance artist, Deidre Deane, rises from the lake, Santa Fe, NM, 2008.

You have bridged the world of photojournalism and advertising. Which do you like shooting more, today?

There are good assignments and not so good assignments, but no matter what genre of work I am engaged in, I enjoy the aspect of executing the assignment as a photographer whether it is photojournalism or commercial work. Commercially sponsored work dominates our landscape now because many of the traditional magazines that I shot for have disappeared or receded in their power of the budget.

How long have you been a Nikon Ambassador?

This is a rough guess that the Ambassador program has now been running as a full-fledged formal program for about three years. And I have been in the first group of Ambassadors that were asked to join. I have had a long relationship with Nikon and bought my first Nikon camera many, many years ago and have been a Nikon user throughout my entire career.

Tony at the Coffee Shop. Consummate performer, Tony Bennett, enjoys a quiet cup of coffee, Queens, NY, 1995.

Wasn’t there a Nikon program even before the Ambassadors?

They have had for many years, Legends Behind the Lens, and I was named in that program as well, but that was a less formal program. It was an acknowledgment, a tip of the hat that you were a Nikon shooter and that you have had an impressive career.

What do you do as a Nikon Ambassador?

It’s an excellent collaboration. When they come out with new gear, they will reach out to some of their Ambassadors to shoot with the gear on assignment to generate material with new cameras and lenses. They will get our opinion on where the technology needs to go, what could be improved, things we need. We have an excellent collaboration on social media and try to promote each other.

Defying Gravity. Rayshine Harris, AntiGravity performer, in mid-air, NYC, NY, 2011.

Which was your first Nikon?

It was called the Nikkormat FTn with a 50mm lens.

What was your very first camera?

It was my father’s camera called Beauty Lite III [35mm rangefinder], which I borrowed for my photo class. I have it right here with me.

Pegasus. Experimental X-47A Navy drone, China Lake Naval Air Station, CA, 2003

You did the first all digital shoot for National Geographic in 2003, which was the 100-year anniversary of the Wright brothers’ first flight, which ended up being one of their popular covers. Was it your idea to go digital?

Yes. My story editor, Bill Douthitt, and I thought, why not propose this. Digital was at everyone’s doorstep, and Geographic had yet to shoot an entire story with digital material.  We suggested that and it was accepted. It was also a future-looking story as it was called The Future of Flight and it all seemed to work at that time to come together as an idea that Geographic approved.

Did you also shoot film just for safety “back-up?”

Nope. I didn’t. I never shot a scrap of film during the entire shoot.

Fire Dancer. Polynesian fire knife performer, Mervyn Lilo, at sunset in the tropics, Oahu, Hawaii, 2006.

How was the workflow different in 2003 of a digital shoot from what it is today?

Pretty much the same. I was shooting with a Nikon D1X camera, which produced good quality digital files, but they couldn’t stand up to the digital files we have access to now.

I shot to Lexar cards the entire thing, and the biggest card that was available was 1 GB card, which was very expensive at $700. I would shoot and then download, backup on external hard drive, edit in Photo Mechanic, make selects and pretty much what we do now, though now the process has been significantly enlarged through advancements in technology.

You used a Nikon D1X, and today you use a Nikon D5, which is a lot higher quality, but would the difference be apparent in a magazine reproduction?

Yes, I would say absolutely, it would be apparent. Also, a lot of magazines in the early days of digital had a hard time handling and reproducing digital material, and they were a little bit leery of it. It took awhile for the whole industry to come to terms with digital and embrace it fully.

But now, the quality of the cameras is quite astonishing relative to the cameras I grew up with. Yes, you can see a significant difference regarding reproduction and the depth of the quality of the image.

You started shooting for National Geographic in 1987. Which shoot did you enjoy the most?

The most enjoyable shoot I did was a cover story on The Globalization of Culture [this was before the Internet]. We identified three epicenters of this globalization process, and one of them was India, another was Shanghai in China and Los Angeles in the US.

We took a look at cultural trends and how they were being shared. Our movies get shared all over the world, and we share fashion trends like the tradition of henna from India, certain wedding traditions, music, etc. All these experiences are becoming common cultural experiences.

Which film did you use at Geographic?

Across the board when I was shooting for Geographic, basically shot with Kodachrome—a great deal of Kodachrome 64 and Kodachrome 200.

Is the current Nikon D5 quality equal to Kodachrome?

The images that come out of a D5 are much better than what I got on Kodachrome.

Louie. Firefighter, Engine 47, FDNY, Faces of Ground Zero, NYC, NY, 2001.

In the acclaimed series Faces of Ground Zero — Portraits of the Heroes of September 11th, you shot a collection of 246 giant 40×80 inch Polaroid portraits. Tell us about the photographic challenges that a 35mm shooter would face when using a camera as large as a single car garage?

I had one experience before 9/11. I had worked with the camera once before and could work it pretty well. It was a combination of old and new technology. I felt that that camera was an excellent instrument to take a look at these people who had intersected with the 9/11 tragedy. It became a vehicle to look at their courage and persona as a human being. It is a formal process, a very formal camera but I found out I adapted to it pretty well.

So, was this a personal project for you? Did you propose this or was it given to you?

It was my idea. I went to Time Warner and sought funding for it, which they gave me almost immediately.

How much was the funding?

My initial ask was for $100,000.

Backstage. Bolshoi ballerinas await their call to go on stage, Moscow, Russia, 1997

When we shot Polaroids in the old days, we took out the film and shook it to dry. You didn’t, I suppose, shake it dry?

No, what we would do is peel the chemical backing off of it, and the print would be a positive print as all Polaroid is, and it would be laying on the floor all wet. There were big drying racks as each image was about 40” wide by 80” long. We would take the wet Polaroid and lay it on a drying rack and let them essentially cure over the course of a day or two.

What did one exposure of that size Polaroid cost?

About $300.

So did they say they didn’t want you to be trigger-happy and restrict your shooting?

No, that was completely self-enforced. I knew I had a budget and wanted to photograph a variety of people. For 80 to 85% of the subjects, I made only one exposure.

Bolshoi prima ballerina, Nadia Grachova, Moscow, Russia, 1997.

Would you then wait till it was processed to make sure the subject had not blinked?

Absolutely. 90 seconds later I would have a giant Polaroid, and we could go in and take a look at it.

What was the shutter speed on that camera?

There was no shutter speed as there was no shutter in the lens and you would like camera obscura. I would work in a completely blacked out room, and I would pull out a cap off of the lens, and then I would hit a cable release that was attached to a Mamiya RZ Pro II which was bore sighted right underneath the giant Polaroid lens. In a dark studio, the Mamiya would trigger about 30,000 watt seconds of light strobes, and I would simultaneously get a 6×7 chrome and a 40×80″ giant Polaroid.

What was the aperture on the giant lens?

We shot somewhere around f/32, as I recall. It was not a precise instrument in the sense that you had to feel your way to it. We did not have an ISO rating on the film batches. Every fresh roll of Polaroid that we took out we had to test what ISO it was.

Joe & Nadia. Joe McNally and Bolshoi prima ballerina, balance themselves on a rooftop, Moscow, Russia, 1997.

How many flash heads did you have to get that kind of juice?

We had 10 or 12 heads. We had multiple 2,400 watt second units firing through silks to create the main light and then accent lights, background lights, etc.

What brand of lights was that?

Profoto.

How did you come to select a white background?

I did not want to use black, also logistically as I knew I would be photographing a lot of firefighters and that could be a separation problem. So white just came to be formal, clean and completely devoid of information. It enables you to simply concentrate on the human being that is in the picture.

It was reported in April that the NY Times was going to increase their day rate for photography from $200/day to $450/day. How can a photojournalist in New York City using his own equipment work on $200/day?

No, can’t, not possible. They did do the very good thing about moving the day rate from $200/day to $450/day.

That [the old rate] makes life very difficult as a photojournalist. A career, I mean.

It makes it virtually impossible. I congratulate the New York Times for increasing their day rate, but all they have done is bring the day rate to where it should have been back around 1990. So we still have about 20+ years of catching up to do, and of course, that is never going to happen.

Your social media following is half a million to date. To what do you owe that following?

We take it seriously, and we try to be responsible on social media. We try to be consistent; we try to post good material or hopefully, thoughtful stuff. My blog has been an enjoyable thing to write. It kind of reopens doors to my original education in journalism, which was to become a writer; so I find I have enjoyed writing the blog and people have responded. I am very grateful for that, that we have a bit of a voice in the industry.

Strength. Gail Devers, in 1996 was the world’s fastest woman, Santa Monica, CA, 1996.

Lewis Hine, the social documentary photographer, said ‘If I could tell the story in words, I wouldn’t need to lug around a camera.’ Does the photographer of today have to be a wordsmith as well with his blogs and social media to be successful?

Yes, I think it is an absolute necessity to be a thoroughly good storyteller. And that requires an ability to write, as well as shoot. It needs the savvy and the ways of the Internet in getting the story that you are trying to tell out and about, so people can see it.

You have a high level of expertise with lighting. And you prefer to use smaller hot shoe flashlights in multiples rather than studio strobes. Why?            

I would say that might be an opinion or conjured up on the Internet because I do teach Speedlights a fair amount. I use both interchangeably.

I have been fascinated with Speedlights for a long time in the sense that when I was doing a lot of global work for the National Geographic, they would often assign me to do exciting and challenging topics that often involved medicine and technology. I would be traveling by myself and would go to these places, and it would simply be required that I would do a little bit of lighting here and there. I was working by myself, so I started getting familiar with the idea of using these small flashes.

On the other hand, I have also done for the Geographic and other clients some really, really big production work: lighting telescopes, lighting buildings, Faces of Ground Zero. All of that is big flash work, so I step in between two worlds very easily. What is the bottom line is, as always, the nature of the job: what does the job require me to do.

The Eye. A captivating look into the artistry of the human eye, Los Angeles, CA, 1993.

The new Nikon SB-5000 has radio-controlled operation. Has that changed your workflow in any way?

It has changed it considerably, and it has enhanced it and made it easier to work with small flashes. The SB-5000 AF Speedlight is quite simply the best Speedlight I have ever worked with.

What is the maximum number of Speedlights you have used in a shoot?

There were a couple of instances where it was pushed out to me to use a lot of Speedlights as a demonstration kind of thing. I would say, up to about 20 Speedlights I have used in a practical fashion on location.

Cream City Sweets. Girl about to eat a summertime ice cream cone, Cookeville, TN, 2015.

So, how many Speedlights do you typically travel with on a shoot?

I have… I own right now eight SB-5000 and four of the old SB-910. If I am going on an extended trip or someplace where I think I will use Speedlights, we have a case that we take with us, it’s our Speedlight case and that will usually have ten.

You also combine Profoto B1. How many of those heads do you travel with?

We have two B1 kits and they each have two heads in them. Depending on the size of the job we will take one B1 kit, which has two heads or both of them, which gives me up to four. So between the Speedlights and the Profoto B1, I can pretty well light just about anything that I encounter.

Just recently at Creative Live out in Seattle, I brought Profoto Pro-B4 because I knew I needed a big pop of light.

Shadow Dancing. Jonathan Connell, gymnast & martial artist, does a balancing act, Brooklyn Navy Yard, Brooklyn, NY, 2011.

Do you shoot in manual mode or with the TTL automated mode when you are just using your Nikon Speedlights?

It’s really situational. I start off with TTL, which is my default. I can find my way to a good combination, often just using TTL flash. Once I find my way, I often will then simply lock it down into manual because maybe at that point I have a couple hundred frames to shoot and I don’t want to deal anymore with the potential variance of TTL. But TTL is an excellent tool when you are doing fast-moving flash.

Even with 10 flashes or 20 flashes?

Well, when I get myself into a big scenario I find I am using my zones. With the SB-5000 I have 6 zones of control. I can put flashes in A, B, C, D, E and F groups. I will find the mosaic that gets put together in a situation like that. Might have A, C and D group operate in TTL and B and E running in manual.

Long Boarders. Seattle, Washington, 2010

Do your journalistic portraits have different lighting than your advertising ones?                                              

That’s a good question. It depends on the sensibility of the job. When I am out as a journalist or out on my own trying to tell a story, 95% of the time I don’t have an art director there. So I can follow my nose and hopefully come up with a good set of pictures that speak to the situation.

When you are doing commercial work many, many times, you will have an art director on set with you. You will be shooting their ideas. You will be shooting to a sketch. And that will often tremendously influence the nature and quality of your approach and subsequently, of course, your lighting.

When you were at LIFE, the classical master of all lighting techniques, Gjon Mili was there. Did you know him?

I knew Mr. Mili but in a very casual fashion. I started shooting for LIFE in 1984 roughly as a freelancer and Mr. Mili had his offices up on the 28th floor with the rest of the many other photographers at Time Life. And so I had the great honor of meeting him. I will not claim to be familiar with him or know him and he was an amazing craftsman with light.

Sparks in the Sky. A welder works the night shift on the ledge of a building, Beijing, China, 2005.

So did he influence you in any way?

Absolutely, I think he influenced a whole generation of photographers in the way he used light. He was an innovator for sure but also wasn’t just an engineer. He was poetic in the way he used light. His stroboscopic studies of dancers were just beautiful, the way he portrayed Picasso was innovative and in his own way just as daring as some of Picasso’s own art.

He was quite a formal gentleman. I never joked around with Mr. Mili. Just being in the room with him you needed to pay him respect. I always appreciated what he did and it still carries with me. Some of the pictures, The Lindy Hop, for instance, is just a wonderfully exuberantly flash photograph.

You shipped 47 cases of gear to Chile to shoot giant telescopes for National Geographic. What did you have in all those cases?

Mostly lighting, heavy-duty lighting. The big telescopes are 15-20 story buildings. They are enormous and you have to light this very cavernous space inside the telescope, which is never seen as always telescopes are always operating in darkness. I had to light these massive structures.

We would routinely take 10-12, 2,400 watt second cases. So, if you take 12 numbers of 2,400 watt second packs, that is 12 cases right there and then the rest of the heads can be 5-6 cases. So before you leave on the plane, you are looking at 20 cases of just the lighting. Then you have to have ways to support all that lighting, stand upon stand, upon stands, safety wire, clamps, ropes and then you’d better bring your cameras too.

Diamond Roll. The U.S. Navy’s Blue Angels, performing a maneuver above the Naval Air Facility, El Centro, CA, 2003.

And was there place for your Speedlights in that shoot too?

No. The telescope shoots…I mean, I did have a couple of Speedlights occasionally in the control rooms you could find room to use a small Speedlight, say in front of a small computer screen or something like that but the actual physical reality of telescopes was way beyond the scope of small flash.

What brand of flash did you use?

Profoto. I use Profoto big lights. It is to me the most sophisticated, durable big flash system in the world.

Would you consider doing this kind of shoot with continuous light or light painting?

No, I occasionally did some light painting with the head light from my car, driving it around while the camera is open, that kind of thing. At that point when I was doing the telescope work, LEDs were not in vogue. They hadn’t been developed.

Even so, a big hot light is massively heavy, bulky and dangerous. It gets very hot, needs a lot of electricity and the bulbs routinely break. You don’t have the sophistication of approach: you have barn doors and things like that not necessarily the kind of light shapers that routinely come along with say a Profoto system.

I can take a 2,400 watt second pack, which is sizable but not overwhelming and bang that into a telescope and I can get a lot of play out if it. You would need just a ton of hot light to get the equivalent amount of f/stop out of it.

Body Expressions. Contemporary dancer & artist, Gilbert Small, Vancouver, BC, 2012.

Digital has many upsides from film, what are the downsides?

You know, I can’t really think of much. To be honest, everybody is always nervous about losing their digital images, but if you are safe and careful, you won’t lose them. To me it’s much less anxiety-producing than putting three weeks of work, i.e. 100 rolls of Kodachrome in a FedEx bag; sending it to National Geographic from a foreign location and not knowing for three days or so whether your package got there. That’s very nerve racking.

Human Architecture. Members of the dance troupe “Pilobolus” comfortably mold themselves

You have been described by American PHOTO magazine as perhaps the most versatile photojournalist working today and you were listed as the 100 Most Important People in Photography. But today both American PHOTO and Popular Photography are gone. Do you see a future for print photo magazines, knowing that their news is always going to be one or more months old?

Well, it is the constant dilemma of print to remain relevant in a very fast paced digital world. But I still think there is an absolute need and future for printed photo magazines and printed magazines in general.

The tactile experience and the permanence of actually having a library, a reference point is still extremely valuable. Websites and Instagram and all of that are the currency of the moment, and I think it’s wonderful. But there is room for both expressions and I hope that the magazines that we have left will stick around.

When you photographed Pope John Paul II on a visit to his homeland of Poland you were with 9 other photographers of Newsweek and Time had 14. Would today any magazine commission 14 photographers to cover a single event?

I don’t think magazines would, as they no longer have that budgetary power. But an outfit like Getty would. When I was at the Rio de Janeiro Olympics, Getty had 140-150 photographers, that was what I was told. An agency like Getty has that economic clout; magazines do not.

Water Polo Boys. U.S. men’s water polo team display their top form, CA, 1996.

Your much talked about photograph for LIFE showed the members of the 1996 Olympic team in the nude on the cover. How did you convince them to do the pose? Did you clear the shot before with the photo editor?

The magazine was behind it a 100%. My editor at that time, Dan Okrent, was a big fan of the idea. Dan was a risk taker and he appreciated and understood photography. When I got into the field, I found most of the athletes were quite comfortable. I told them it was completely an above-board effort. It was not sensational. I was trying to show their musculature and physical attributes. And they were at the peak of their lives, physically and showed off their physiques.

Which is your go-to lens?

My most popular lens, most used lens would be a Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8

Synchro Divers. Dumain Brothers fly in synch off the 10-meter board, Austin, TX, 2000.

At the 2000 Sydney Olympics synchronized diving was introduced. You shot a four-page gatefold on film that had multiple exposures of the athletes during different times in the fall and also illuminated the pool. How difficult was that?

Lord….the shot took five days and cost Sports Illustrated a lot of dough. We had to turn the diving stadium at the University of Texas at Austin into a giant, stroboscopic photo studio. It meant the divers had to throw themselves off the 10-meter platform in utter darkness, with just a flashlight over the water to give them an idea where the surface was. Shooting film, no digital, no LCD.

I confirmed each try (mostly failures) on a Polaroid camera I fired simultaneously with the other cameras. The divers would be out of sync, and then I would be out of sync. It was a nightmare. Processed each night to see if we got anything. Finally had my frame on the 5th day. Had six zones of flash, five over water, one firing into portholes underwater to make the water blue. Plus hot lights on the top of the dive tower. NEVER AGAIN.

The Scream. Performer, Manu, expresses himself, Las Vegas, 2017.

From 1994 until 1998 you were with LIFE magazine as a staff photographer, all by yourself, possibly the first staffer in 23 years? Is that good to be a solo operator?

It was pretty great while Dan Okrent was the managing editor there. He moved on during that time and it became a lot harder to work out longer projects. He had great confidence and knew how important pictures were—a rarity among Time-Life managing editors.

I self-generated a lot of stories, and did anything and everything they threw at me as well. It was a lot of work, but it was welcome. LIFE was actually making money during those Okrent years, but then, after he left, it seriously tanked.

Your Indiana High School basketball feature, which you shot for Sports Illustrated, ran over 30 pages. Would you ever get such coverage in print or even online today?

No, never. It was unusual to get that many pages even back in the day.

You got your Masters in Photography 27 years late. How did that happen?

I never finished my thesis. I left with my entire course work done, but no thesis completed. I was anxious to start a career. They ended up accepting the Faces of Ground Zero book as my thesis, and I am forever grateful.

Have you ever shot a wedding?  

Many, both large and small, but no more.

Can you share with the readers of PetaPixel what equipment is in your kit bag?

Well, you can take a look at my gear page on my blog to see the range of stuff we have. It doesn’t all come into play, obviously. I have done a lot of big production work over time, so I have a lot of lighting, etc.

But the basics are very similar to any shooter. A couple of digital cameras, in my case Nikon D5, usually. 14-24, 24-70, 70-200 lenses go with me virtually all the time. A couple of fast primes like the Nikkor 105 f/1.4, and 35 f/1.4. Three or four Speedlights, the SB-5000 radio TTL units. Profoto B-1 is usually out there with us as well.

Donald in the Wind. A gentle soul, caught in a windstorm, Santa Fe, NM, 2010.

Today there are numerous contracts out there to be able to shoot. Would you be willing to sign many of them?

Not many. We walk away from lots of work.

You photographed Cher right after her best-actress winning Moonstruck. At that time you said, “If you can’t make them good, make them big and in color.” What did you mean?

I actually photographed Cher before her win, just as the movie was breaking. It is one of those assignments I look back on as a blown job. The old adage of “if you can’t make ‘em good, make ‘em big and in color” [lay out the photo feature with larger photos and more pages] was an old inside joke at LIFE.

If you could do only one kind of assignment for the rest of your life, what would it be?

Stay at home and stare at my wife, Annie!

You can follow Joe McNally and see more of his work on his website, Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, Google+, YouTube and Nikon Ambassador.

About the author: Phil Mistry is a photographer and teacher based in Atlanta, GA. He started one of the first digital camera classes in New York City at International Center of Photography in the 90s. He was the director and teacher for Sony/Popular Photography magazine’s Digital Days Workshops. You can reach him via email here.

Image credits: All photos © Joe McNally and used with permission

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June 23, 2017 at 08:00PM