One of the things that I really miss about being a newspaper photographer is the camaraderie between journalists at big news events. Standing shoulder-to-shoulder with Philadelphia and New York personalities, and actually having them talk to you as an equal, was one of the best job perks. It sure helped pass the time when we all had to wait several hours together in the the State Police parking lot for a perp walk that would take all of seven seconds to shoot.

That's not to say that the camaraderie with local journalists was not equally fun. There was nothing better than getting to a spot news scene and finding someone cool from the competing media like Bruce Winter or Bill Crumlic to chat with and get caught up on their lives. I guess we should have been more competitive with each other since we were all out to get our photos on the Web before the other guy, but I've learned over the years that you can get more information at the scene by being friendly to the competition than by acting all snooty and pushing your way in front of them.

When our jobs demanded that we shoot video as well as stills, the stakes got even higher. Now we were competing with the television guys, too. Nothing was more humbling than showing up at a news scene with my 8-inch Sony videocam—dwarfed as it was on a massive, sturdy tripod—and having to stand next to videographers with real TV news cameras, the big studio cams with shoulder mounts and external microphones and lenses that you could actually change the aperature on. It certainly brought me back down to earth in a hurry.

And then, of course, there was the bad side of news reporting, like having to slog up a half-mile hill with 20 pounds of camera gear on my back to get to a fire or accident scene only to be stopped by the local fire police because it's a fatal and the coroner's out of town and no, you can't go any further. Believe it or not, there were actually times when even I couldn't charm my way onto the field.

Working on a story with your own really cool Morning Call reporter always made for a great time. I loved to hang at the projects with Will "Dimples" Ford or drive an hour to the Poconos with Tom Coombe and talk about everything under the sun. And if I stop to think of how much I have learned from photographers like Fran Kittek and Pete Shaheen it makes the cruel reality of corporate downsizing amazingly clear. When a company (like Tribune) deliberately loses its' seasoned talent it is like cutting off their right hand to spite the left. Like Pete always said, the inmates are running the asylum. But don't worry, I'm not going to get up on my soapbox again. I just wanted to give a nod to all my creative and hardworking journalistic colleagues who have recently found themselves on the wrong side of a beancounter's list. Let's go take them out to lunch.