Last week, I delivered an article regarding the sophisticated yet sinister and egregious grifting presented as photography contests. Conveniently, the theme of the grift alluded to the high stakes risks associated with entertainment in Las Vegas. As a result, another story came to mind about my own experiences as a professional photographer who has visited Sin City a couple of times.
The photo above was taken completely in error during my early years as a cityscape photographer. In fact, this photograph was captured four months before TIA International Photography came into existence!
With my camera lens, I was trying to focus on the neon cowboy when I mistakenly pressed the shutter button. Serendipity was on my side as an illuminated double-decker bus was passing by during the ONE SECOND exposure, et voilà! The timing was truly unbelievable.
Ultimately, this very unexpected capture has become my favorite photograph from Las Vegas. Presently, there is an enlarged 24in x 36in metal print of this image on display in my home. I am very proud of it, in retrospect.
Quizzically, I have been unable to decide on a title for the image. Many years have passed since I have inquired several times about the official name of this sign (or statue or sculpture). No one has been able to answer definitively!
As a result, for a title, I typically bounce between “Neon Cowboy” and “Yippeekaiyaaay!”
Despite the entertaining circumstances, the same photograph randomly sparks acute moments of uncertainty for my career in photography. I’ll explain.
Shortly after I shared the image on my Flickr account in July 2009, a major tourism publication based in Las Vegas had contacted me with a very keen interest in publishing “Neon Cowboy” as the *magazine cover image* for an upcoming issue!
Unfortunately, the magazine editor(s) decided to go in a different direction at the last minute. As a result, sometimes I wonder what would have followed for TIA had the image been published as a magazine cover and disseminated to the masses of entertainment, travel enthusiasts, as well as other photo editors and art directors.
The uncertainty remains because many original TIA cityscapes have experienced iterations of this same scenario since the “Neon Cowboy” near miss. The same “planned-but-eventually-canned” cycle has occurred with different media outlets for years.
Here are three examples of when this scenario occurred and left my head spinning afterwards:
- A television studio in London was interested in licensing one of my cityscapes of New York as the back wall of a stage for a new night-time talk show for the UK markets.
- A popular airline was preparing an international campaign ad that would feature my cityscape of Hong Kong on billboards located in multiple megacities throughout East Asia and compensate TIA generously for the photo license.
- A publisher in Argentina was interested in licensing an original TIA urban landscape of Buenos Aires for the cover of a Latin American study abroad publication aimed at university students around the world.
All of these were scrapped days before “go time”, so yes, it still makes me wonder “What if?” like Gwyneth Paltrow’s character in the movie Sliding Doors.
To be fair, as I mature and progress in the photography world, I’m less concerned about this matter compared to when I was new with eyes gleaming at every possible opportunity. I realize that I am in competition with thousands of photographers, some of whom are much better connected, and others who have different circumstances than myself. Also, it is commonplace that business projects that utilize creative works from multiple sources get scrapped or canceled for any number of reasons, and during the last hour.
Fortunately, I credit my personality with an inexplicable abundance of patience, so we’ll see if I can land that magazine cover or billboard ad someday soon.
I remain coolly optimistic without my previous naiveté of the business.
