Ted Kennedy
December 18, 2020
The break down of how I captured the national award winning photograph of Ted Kennedy and the process of making a great print in the darkroom.
I'm talking about Ted Kennedy in 1973 I was working for the Utah daily Chronicle. As one of the photographers, Ted Kennedy was coming to the campus to speak. And of course, I was being one of the photo journalists on the newspaper was assigned to go photograph him. I thought, how am I going to photograph Ted Kennedy, I have twin lens two and a quarter yashica mat 124 camera, which was a beautiful camera I bought a few years beforehand. When I left the army cost me 95 bucks was great. And it was a wonderful camera. I did great work with it. But you had to be up close to get anything. And there was a guy on there that his name was less and less had a 35 millimeter Nikon with a 200 millimeter zoom and a 500 millimeter Canon lens. And I mean, he had all of these things. And he was like, he could stand at the back of the room and get a good shot at Ted Kennedy. And I thought how am I going to do this? I have no idea. I went in there and the room was packed. Of course it would be I mean, it's Kennedy for heaven's sakes. But well, the only way I'm gonna get a picture is if I get up close. So I've put my little Chronicle badge on and I walked up close to the front and got up there. And I thought, wow, I'm still not going to be able to get anything. I noticed there was this little spot up behind him. That was kind of like up above. I thought I could go up above and I thought, well, it's better than nothing. I don't think I'll get anything really good. photographing his back. But it's like, okay, better than nothing.
So I went to my little spot get up there. It was kind of like I think it was hanging on a ladder. I'm not sure what it was it made me give the elevation. But I got up I was looking through the lens. And I thought, yeah, I'm doing is getting his bag. And the guys in the front row course, you know, this is the 70. So this is the time when all of the early 70s when there were protests going on, and the Black Panther groups are going on. And so all this stuff. So it was like all the radicals who wanted to hear all the political crap was like, they're on the front row, they were around everywhere. I thought, well, getting the back at Kennedy is not as bad as they think it would be. Then I kept watching and watching and this roll of film has 12 exposures. And that's it. So have 12 shots. I didn't get to like have a camera, I could just quit quickly. Even the 35 would have had a 36 exposure in it. But no, I got 12 shots. And I'm going wow, I guess I could only get a couple of his back. And if you maybe if he turns. So I kept watching and watching and he turned a couple of times as he was speaking. And so I thought, okay, that's my opportunity right there. What I have to do is wait for him to turn at the right moment. I did a turn, I clicked up a couple of shots. It was got them and then I was going okay, so I just kept clicking when he turned when I had my 12 shots done. Because I could have loaded another roll of film. But I'm in front of everybody. I mean, the whole crowd could see me. So I thought well, I can't be loading another roll of film here. So I finished my 12 shots, climb back down. I think somebody else jumped up and took my spot because they thought it was pretty cool.
So I took it back and went to the darkroom straightaway and developed it. And as I developed that I saw this that was sharp and nice. And as you look at the print, you could I could read his notes on his page. I was like, wow, this is really cool. But I thought well, it's still not the headshot front beautiful picture, a political thing that the newspaper wanted and everybody liked. But I liked it. So I made up the print and submitted it to the newspaper. They loved it. And they printed it. And I got my 20 bucks. That's what we got. We got paid $20 per shot. Every time we got it in the newspaper. If we didn't get anything in the newspaper. We were working at the Chronicle for free. We had a place to kind of hang out if we wanted to. And they gave us a I think maybe a 20% discount on our tuition or something not very much. So I thought okay, well, this is cool. They printed I got my 20 bucks. This is great. Well, a little later on. I was asked to submit that photograph to a college contest for you News work. So I made a preprint we had an advisor who worked down at the Salt Lake Tribune, and he thought, you know what, this could be a good thing for you. He's the one that did all the work. I made the print, send it down to him, and he submitted it to the conference that they had for the photojournalist in the western United States came back in and I won the conference, first place, then they submitted it for the National of university, photojournalists, and I won the National Award for newsprint from now on. So it was like, I was like, Okay, this is really cool. But it didn't give me anything. No, I can be two certificates that were like run off on a copy machine was like, nothing beautiful, nothing big no money was like, but they the satisfaction is that you know that you have won the national competition. In news reporters amongst university students, I was happy with that. If you look at the Instagram photo of Ted Kennedy, giving the speech, you're going to notice that you see the front row with the people there. And ted kennedy speaking, what I did was in the actual photograph, the front row and the people behind them, were actually really predominant, it actually distracted from picture of ted kennedy himself. So I thought, what I need to do is burn that in the darkroom, you have the ability, once you, you can't see it on your print, because you just have a blank piece of paper there. But I knew exactly kind of where I wasn't. So I burned in I gave that top part more light than the bottom part, and burned it in so that their faces and their stuff would be they'd be there. But they wouldn't be predominant, they wouldn't be the first thing that you see. Because what happens is, when you look at this photograph, you'll see that the light goes directly to the paper first, that's what you see first is his page, because that's the lightest part of the print, then you pop up, see his face, then you pop over and see the other people who are on the front row. And so that's what you want is you want the light party a picture to be the most predominant part where your eye goes first. And it went to these people first. So I just took it went in, and I burned that. And then it took me quite a few prints to get it. So I burned it exactly right to where I wanted it.
Then, once I got it was your beautiful print, I was happy at that point with how it turned out what it looked like I used the word burn on I'm talking about burning in the image on the print. And I decided I better describe to you what that means. In the darkroom. vernacular, the word burn means to take and make the light that you have coming from the enlarger go longer on one part of the paper than the other. So if I had half the paper, that was a 10 second exposure, and the other half of the paper that I burned in, I would burn in for maybe 20 seconds more. So one would have 30 seconds, the other would have 10 seconds, so one would be much darker than the other. Now, I also mentioned the word dodge. And dodge means that, okay, if I want this part of the image to look good, I have to have it less light. So then what happens is I take a little tiny tool that you either buy or you make I made most of mine. And I would take this little scrap of paper, tear the edges, so it didn't have a hard edge on it. And it would be maybe like within a half inch to a one inch circle and tear the edges and that would or if it was in a line, I would make a linear piece of look like I could burn it in....
So I went to my little spot get up there. It was kind of like I think it was hanging on a ladder. I'm not sure what it was it made me give the elevation. But I got up I was looking through the lens. And I thought, yeah, I'm doing is getting his bag. And the guys in the front row course, you know, this is the 70. So this is the time when all of the early 70s when there were protests going on, and the Black Panther groups are going on. And so all this stuff. So it was like all the radicals who wanted to hear all the political crap was like, they're on the front row, they were around everywhere. I thought, well, getting the back at Kennedy is not as bad as they think it would be. Then I kept watching and watching and this roll of film has 12 exposures. And that's it. So have 12 shots. I didn't get to like have a camera, I could just quit quickly. Even the 35 would have had a 36 exposure in it. But no, I got 12 shots. And I'm going wow, I guess I could only get a couple of his back. And if you maybe if he turns. So I kept watching and watching and he turned a couple of times as he was speaking. And so I thought, okay, that's my opportunity right there. What I have to do is wait for him to turn at the right moment. I did a turn, I clicked up a couple of shots. It was got them and then I was going okay, so I just kept clicking when he turned when I had my 12 shots done. Because I could have loaded another roll of film. But I'm in front of everybody. I mean, the whole crowd could see me. So I thought well, I can't be loading another roll of film here. So I finished my 12 shots, climb back down. I think somebody else jumped up and took my spot because they thought it was pretty cool.
So I took it back and went to the darkroom straightaway and developed it. And as I developed that I saw this that was sharp and nice. And as you look at the print, you could I could read his notes on his page. I was like, wow, this is really cool. But I thought well, it's still not the headshot front beautiful picture, a political thing that the newspaper wanted and everybody liked. But I liked it. So I made up the print and submitted it to the newspaper. They loved it. And they printed it. And I got my 20 bucks. That's what we got. We got paid $20 per shot. Every time we got it in the newspaper. If we didn't get anything in the newspaper. We were working at the Chronicle for free. We had a place to kind of hang out if we wanted to. And they gave us a I think maybe a 20% discount on our tuition or something not very much. So I thought okay, well, this is cool. They printed I got my 20 bucks. This is great. Well, a little later on. I was asked to submit that photograph to a college contest for you News work. So I made a preprint we had an advisor who worked down at the Salt Lake Tribune, and he thought, you know what, this could be a good thing for you. He's the one that did all the work. I made the print, send it down to him, and he submitted it to the conference that they had for the photojournalist in the western United States came back in and I won the conference, first place, then they submitted it for the National of university, photojournalists, and I won the National Award for newsprint from now on. So it was like, I was like, Okay, this is really cool. But it didn't give me anything. No, I can be two certificates that were like run off on a copy machine was like, nothing beautiful, nothing big no money was like, but they the satisfaction is that you know that you have won the national competition. In news reporters amongst university students, I was happy with that. If you look at the Instagram photo of Ted Kennedy, giving the speech, you're going to notice that you see the front row with the people there. And ted kennedy speaking, what I did was in the actual photograph, the front row and the people behind them, were actually really predominant, it actually distracted from picture of ted kennedy himself. So I thought, what I need to do is burn that in the darkroom, you have the ability, once you, you can't see it on your print, because you just have a blank piece of paper there. But I knew exactly kind of where I wasn't. So I burned in I gave that top part more light than the bottom part, and burned it in so that their faces and their stuff would be they'd be there. But they wouldn't be predominant, they wouldn't be the first thing that you see. Because what happens is, when you look at this photograph, you'll see that the light goes directly to the paper first, that's what you see first is his page, because that's the lightest part of the print, then you pop up, see his face, then you pop over and see the other people who are on the front row. And so that's what you want is you want the light party a picture to be the most predominant part where your eye goes first. And it went to these people first. So I just took it went in, and I burned that. And then it took me quite a few prints to get it. So I burned it exactly right to where I wanted it.
Then, once I got it was your beautiful print, I was happy at that point with how it turned out what it looked like I used the word burn on I'm talking about burning in the image on the print. And I decided I better describe to you what that means. In the darkroom. vernacular, the word burn means to take and make the light that you have coming from the enlarger go longer on one part of the paper than the other. So if I had half the paper, that was a 10 second exposure, and the other half of the paper that I burned in, I would burn in for maybe 20 seconds more. So one would have 30 seconds, the other would have 10 seconds, so one would be much darker than the other. Now, I also mentioned the word dodge. And dodge means that, okay, if I want this part of the image to look good, I have to have it less light. So then what happens is I take a little tiny tool that you either buy or you make I made most of mine. And I would take this little scrap of paper, tear the edges, so it didn't have a hard edge on it. And it would be maybe like within a half inch to a one inch circle and tear the edges and that would or if it was in a line, I would make a linear piece of look like I could burn it in....