I’ve needed to get my picture taken recently. Once was for an upcoming Globe and Mail article about how and why doctors sometimes misdiagnose patients, the consequences. and some theories about how the medical profession can reduce the number of times it happens. The other for my new job at CJBK. And they were very different experiences!
Glenn, the photographer for the Globe and Mail, took me all over the southwest part of London looking for a place that would tell the story of my health crisis four years ago. (Well documented in previous posts.) Each time we pulled up in front of a clinic, a pharmacy or a hospital, there was hope. But everything fell short of Glenn’s expectations.
“Are you ever happy?”, I asked.
“Not really”, he said with a grin.
“Well, at least I know what we’re dealing with.”
I don’t even have an opinion about the photo that was finally selected. It is what it is, and having me pose in front of a giant EMERGENCY sign explains the situation as well as it can be explained, I suppose. The tears in my eyes are because I couldn’t wear my sunglasses in the bright sunlight! If you’re interested, the article is at this link: Globe and Mail.
On the other hand, the photo shoot for the radio station took about five minutes.
I stood, danced, goofed around, stuck out my tongue and then gave Julie, the web content editor for London’s Bell Media, some smiles. “That’s all I need!” she said, and sent me on my way.The photo above is an outtake, by the way. I asked for a copy of it because it made me smile. Proof of my goofiness tends to do that.
The Globe and Mail photo will be here one day and gone tomorrow. The radio station photographs will be around a long time. Funny how one took forever and the other took a moment!
I had a thought for what might have been a good place for your Globe and Mail photo, a little morbid though. They could have taken your photo at a cemetery in a way that you looked like you had one foot in the grave and the other clinging to life. I think that would get the sense of urgency and importance across.
Well, that actually could be seen as sensationalizing the issue, I think, although I also think it could have been a moody, cool shot.