The Story Behind The Image; Battling A House Fire At Night

I made this image of this dramatic battle in September, 1977. (click to enlarge)

I've won every photography contest I've ever entered!  True!  That being said, I've only entered one and won so I quit while I was ahead.  Lol.  This was the image I submitted to that contest.  Here is the story.

As I have been copying my 35mm slide archive, I found the image posted above.  I made this image in September, 1977.  At that time I was a forensic police detective and was working the evening shift.  If memory serves me well, it was close to midnight and I was on the way back to police headquarters after doing all of the CSI stuff at a crime scene when I heard the dispatcher send a couple of police units to the scene of a fully engulfed house fire to perform traffic control duty.  Since the location was on my way, I thought I would stop by and take a look see what was going on and see if I could help.

In those days, I was still learning photography and had been for about 7 years.  It was much different then.  Nothing about photography was easy back then.  Everything was manual, nothing automatic.  If you have been a regular reader of my blog, you may remember me writing in the past that I am self-taught.  I learned to photograph proficiently due to four main reasons.  First, I developed a real passion for photography and everything about it.  I couldn't get enough of photography.  Still can't.  You have to be passionate about something to really want to learn and become proficient in every aspect of it and do whatever has to be done to become good (and I'm not implying I'm good).  

Second, I devoured every magazine and book I could find to learn everything I could about the craft.  I spent most of my discretionary income on photography related magazines and books (my salary was $6200 a year then! Yes, a year! We worked overtime with no pay as well).  I also looked at thousands of other photographers' photos to learn what a good photograph looked like trying to learn light, shadow, composition, color, gesture, depth of field, etc.  There was no Internet, You Tube, Blogs, etc. then.  One had to buy magazines, books, etc., find a mentor and study.  Most libraries had a couple of photography related magazines and books, but not what I would call a lot.  I read what they had in the library and bought what else I could find to learn.

Third, I had a supervisor whose philosophy was, "Shoot as much film as you want, on and off duty, because I don't want any excuses for you screwing up your pictures at a homicide or other major crime scene.'  The reason is that you have one opportunity to get everything right.  There is no going back.  There are no do-overs.  I worked over a hundred death investigations, countless rapes, robberies, burglaries, fatal accidents and never once screwed up my photos.   I'm very proud of that!  One of my colleagues, however, did work a homicide and forgot to load film in his camera!  Not good.  I did shoot a lot and it paid off.

Third, I practiced, practiced, practiced and not only kept the police department photo gear with me, I kept my own and would photograph interesting things that I may have encountered during my travels around the city while working.  I photographed just about every day off duty as well.

The police department's photography gear at the time consisted of a screw mount Pentax Spotmatic with a 50mm f/1.4 Super Multi-Coated Takumar lens attached (excellent lens, by the way) and a huge Honeywell Stobonar flash with a 510 volt battery attached to our belts.  The two were connected by a coiled cord.  The battery was not much smaller than a motorcycle's battery.  Big and heavy.  We called them potato mashers.  

We each had that set of gear assigned to us.  We rolled our own Tri-X film, developed it and printed it ourselves for court exhibits.  The reason for only a "normal" lens was the key to having the photographs successfully introduced in court was we had to testify that the photographs represented "a true and accurate representation of the scene as I found it." (A wide angle or telephoto lens distorts perspective and can fool a viewer into thinking two objects are farther from or closer than they really are.)   Funny thing about being a true and accurate representation, though.  The photographs were black and white and not color!  Color was considered too inflammatory for a jury back then.  However, around 1978-79, we finally convinced the judges that black and white was not "true and accurate" and color was.  That caused a huge change in all of our procedures as I now had to learn color processing, densitometry, process control, etc., which was 100 times more difficult than processing and printing black and white.  But I LOVED IT!  I digress....

My personal gear at the time and the gear with which I made this photograph was a 35mm Nikkormat (a less expensive version camera Nikon made than their F-series) and a 50mm Nikkor f/2 lens.  I couldn't afford a Nikon F or the f/1.4 version of the lens.  I also had a 28mm f/2.8 lens and a cheap telephoto zoom that was an independent brand.  This image was handheld and I was shooting Kodachrome 64.   I'm sure I was using a very slow shutter speed with the lens wide open as the film is ISO 64 (ASA back then).  I have two other images of the same scene but this one is the best of the three.  

Looking now at the image, I see it isn't very sharp and is really grainy, but for me, it is all about the subject matter.  That is what is important. I find importance in what is going on in the frame, intensity of the situation and the gestures and postures of the firefighters.  There are so many things happening at once.  The groups of firefighters holding the hoses steady on the fire, the supervisor pointing at something in the fire, the firefighter on the extreme left carrying something toward me as well as the details and texture of the flames and the shapes of the hoses on the street.  Grain and sharpness are really not important at all.  This image is about emotion; emotion of the scene and the emotion it evokes in the viewer.

Sometime after making this image, while reading a Kodak industry/law enforcement magazine that we received at the department, I saw they were running a contest for photographs taken in the line of duty by law enforcement officers.  I submitted this image and won!  Very much to my surprise.  I received a nice certificate and a couple of other Kodak related bobbles.  No money to the best of my recollection but photography for me has never been about money.  Not to push my luck, I never entered another photo contest to this very day!  I retired from the contest scene as a winner!  Lol.

That's the story and context of how this image was made.  It brings back some fond memories of a time when life for me was simple and very rewarding.  I accidentally became a police officer (my college degree is in geology), fell in love with the idea of knowing what's going on behind the scenes, solving crimes, taking bad guys off the streets, helping people who may not be able to help themselves and making a difference in others' lives.  It also didn't hurt, with my science background and photographic interest, that I was assigned to the forensic unit and had the opportunity to practice my photographic passion at work.  I guess that is why I try to continue to do that through this blog.  Sharing my knowledge and experience.  Helping others enjoy photography as much as I have.  

I hope you enjoyed this little story.  It was fun walking down memory lane.

Join me over at Instagram @dennisamook or my website, www.dennismook.com. 

Thanks for looking. Enjoy! 

Dennis A. Mook 

All content on this blog is © 2013-2019 Dennis A. Mook. All Rights Reserved. Feel free to point to this blog from your website with full attribution. Permission may be granted for commercial use. Please contact Mr. Mook to discuss permission to reproduce the blog posts and/or images.