"Old Cameramen Never Die; They Just Lose Their Loops."

"Shoot First" Author Hank Schoepp welcomes email comments and questions about his memoir!  In fact it's quite fun to read feedback from different age groups and folks associated, or not, with broadcast journalism.  We have another reader who has submitted an interesting question for Hank.  Coles Powell asks, "In the book, you say 'Old cameramen never die; they just lose their loops.'  Can you explain more what you mean by this expression?"

Schoepp:
     At KPIX, the advent of shooting the news on videotape came in 1980.  Prior to that time, the medium was 16 millimeter film.  So, before I can answer your question properly, I must first dispel the myth of what makes motion pictures move.  The common misconception is that these images are exposed onto film while it moves behind a camera lens.  If this were true, there would be no images for the eye to see, only a blur.  Because the film doesn't really move behind the lens.  It stops, or halts ever so briefly, at the rate of twenty-four times a second, recording a serious of still photos, like tiny snapshots, on that narrow strip of film, thereby creating the illusion of pictures that move. 
     In order to insure the precision of a mechanical process which creates the motion picture illusion, also known as "intermittent action", a fluid supply and release of film must occur just before and after it passes behind the camera lens.  This happens with slack, where the film forms a small loop just above the lens and another one just below.  If something unexpected happens, such as film fed from inside one magazine chamber holds back or film taken-up inside the other chamber lags behind, the loops above and below the lens collapses and the camera jams.

Powell:
     But how does this relate to the "old cameramen" you refer to?

Schoepp:
     And for this part of my answer you would either have to be from my generation or a young student of history.  If so, you would recall that President Harry Truman fired General Douglas McArthur as commander of our troops during the Korean War because he publically disagreed with the president over his foreign policy.  The last sentence of the general's farewell speech, delivered to the cadets at West Point, stated that: "Old soldiers never die; they just fade away."  Well, some of those old cameramen whom I have known and worked alongside over the years may have died but they will never fade away, not from my own memory.  I can only imagine that the very least misfortune bestowed upon them on Judgment Day would have been for them to lose their loops.
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Have Camera, Will Travel

Hank Schoepp, retired KPIX news cameraman, was based in the San Francisco Bay Area but his career often took him abroad.  Schoepp has seen the world through a lens and brought back a myriad of images, a few from hell and one from heaven: Pope John Paul II in the Vatican, up close and personal.

Schoepp:  "I had never been to Rome before, let alone the Vatican.  In March of 1987, television station KPIX sent a news crew to profile Pope John Paul II, prior to his planned visit to the United States in September of the same year.  Accompanying me as a working member of the press, the son of the head of the Vatican Communications Office was able to provide us with access to people and places which, until then, had not been observed through a camera lens.  We were privileged to an exclusive coverage of news seldom, if ever, granted to other members of the press.  Certainly, being in close proximity to someone best described as no ordinary man was one of them."

EXCERPT (Chapter 23: Have Camera, Will Travel)   Once again, the Holy Father moved among those who had come to see and touch him, gesturing to all in his path with the Sign of the Cross.  And, once again, I followed along with the camera and my Swiss Guard chaperone, as the pontiff approached a rostrum with a microphone.  Then, just before stepping up to address the crowd, he paused for a moment to acknowledge a little girl who handed him a single flower.  A beautiful child with olive skin and dark eyes, she couldn't have been much older than three or four years.  Pope John Paul II reached down and lifted the child up, kissed her on the forehead and held her tightly in his arms, as if he might be holding onto God, which, of course, he was.  For my part, that moment alone was worth the trip to Rome, to where all roads lead and this chapter ends.

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Excerpt: Confessed killler of Polly Klass

Author Hank Schoepp recalls the day he was assigned cameraman to shoot.

"On December 7, 1993, thirty-nine year-old Richard Allen Davis, who confessed to the abduction and murder of twelve year-old Polly Klass, was formally arraigned in the Sonoma County seat of Santa Rosa, California.  Due to the high profile nature of the case, only one camera was allowed inside the courtroom," he said.  "As the pool cameraman, I was assigned to capture through my lens the likeness of the defendant.  And to this day, it's the one that lingers on."

Shoot First: Code of the News Cameraman book excerpt: 
His face was full, ruddy, time-worn, or worn perhaps from bearing witness first-hand to pain and suffering he had caused.  His beard, thick moustache and hair on his head was long, wavy and gray, and his eyes, though partially shielded behind horn-rimmed glasses, seemed no less cold or distant, looking nowhere and at nothing, if not inward to where he had been, at what he had done there and to whom, and without remorse.  (Chapter 15: 207)

Read More excerpts from Shoot First: Code of the News Cameraman

About the Author

On The Other Side of the Camera...The Reporter

Hank Schoepp’s memoir "SHOOT FIRST: Code of the News Cameraman" spans 29 years (1968-1997), a significant period in television news history. While on assignment for KPIX/CBS 5 in San Francisco, he captured events through the lens of his camera which commanded regional, national and worldwide attention.

Reader Suzanne Flores asks Schoepp about his experiences working with his colleagues on the other side of the camera.

Flores:  As a news cameraman, no doubt every work day experience was a different "story", but I can imagine that this dynamic would vary greatly depending on who your partnering reporter was for the assignment. Can you tell us about your working relationships between the personalities of different reporters, and remark on some of the experiences you've had while working with reporters?
 
Schoepp:  First of all, as a cameraman shooting the news, you need to be able to "size up" or "get the feel" of who you are working with.  If it's for the first time, this must happen in very short order.  You don't have the luxury of a gradual process of familiarity.  You are assigned to cover a story together, right now, as a team: he or she with words, you with pictures.  Sometimes ego gets in the way, on either side.  In which case, I would prefer not to mention the name of the reporter who, because of a demeaning attitude and verbal abuse directed toward me in front of others, I left standing at the curb when I wrapped the assignment and drove off on my way back to the station.  Fortunately, this never happened more than once, and I am privileged to have only fond memories of my working relationship with countless other reporters throughout my long career. 

 

Flores:  Tell us more about some of your fond memories. Who were some of your favorite reporters to work with, and why?

 

Schoepp:  Twenty-nine years saw a great many reporters come and go at KPIX, and with fond memories of my working relationship with almost every one of them, it would a take another book to tell all their stories.  However, there will always be someone who you remember and who stands out for a particular reason. 

 

    Mike Hegedus impressed me as one who had complete control of a feature story.  Every time.  He knew in advance exactly who to interview, what to say during his stand-p to the camera, and, most important, left me to my own devices, deciding and shooting whatever B-roll I felt we needed. 

 

     Pam Harper had what I used to call the "gift of approach."  She had that rare combination of professional savvy and sensitivity to victims of a tragedy which, on more than one occasion, we experienced while telling a news story under difficult circumstances.

 

     Whenever Rolando Santos spoke to my camera and microphone and the viewers at home, he would ask for my opinion afterwards, not only on its content but on his appearance while delivering the stand-up.  And, from time to time, he would comment about how he felt more destined toward a career in news management rather than reporting in the field.  Some years later, after holding managerial positions at various other television stations around the country, Rolando settled in Atlanta as president and head of CNN.

 

     And some reporter/cameraman partnerships just end up as long lasting friendships.  That's what happens when two great minds are required to think alike.  In all modesty, coming up with original and entertaining ideas and then producing over two hundred Car 5 feature stories in a single year doesn't happen by accident.  Needless to say, working alongside reporter John Lester in 1979 was one of the highlights my entire career.  

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Veteran news cameraman Hank Schoepp, who worked for San Francisco’s KPIX/CBS 5 from 1968-1997. His book covers a one-of-a-kind view on some of the biggest stories of that time.

 

Read more about the stories captured by Schoepp and many of the high profile reporters of that time.  Click here to purchase the book- $4.99 on Amazon.  "SHOOT FIRST: Code of the News Cameraman"

 

 

KPIX/CBS Presents a Tribute to Hank Schoepp's Career

Hank Schoepp's career at KPIX/CBS spans 29 years (1968-1997), a significant period in television news history.  While on assignment in San Francisco, he captured events through the lens of his camera which commanded regional, national and worldwide attention.

Click here to view a KPIX/CBS tribute to Hank Schoepp's career

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Industry Colleagues Endorse "Shoot First: Code of the News Cameraman"

"If you've ever wondered what it takes to bring you that 90 second report on the evening news, Shoot First gives you a true insider's look.  Hank Schoepp takes you on a journalist ride through some of the biggest stories of the last three decades. Hank was there for all of them and offers a fascinating account of the people, pressures, and the perspecitve that only an insider could have. A first-rate, first-hand look at life behind the camera lens of a veteran news photographer."
---Kate Kelly, Anchor/Reporter, KPIX/CBS San Francisco

"A wonderful living history as captured through the lens and mind of a great television news photographer.  His insights now are as sharp as his focus when it was happening."
---Ron Magers, Anchor/Reporter, WLS/ABC Chicago

"Hank Schoepp lived and worked as a news cameraman during one of the most exciting periods of San Francisco history.  Through his viewfinder we get an informed, inside look at the major stories which captured that era, for San Francisco and for the nation."
---Kevin J. Mullen, San Francisco Deputy Police Chief, retired, author of Chinatown Squad: Policing the Dragon from the Gold Rush to the 21st Centery


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Shooting for Pool at the Patty Hearst Kidnapping Trial- 1976

Shoot First: Code of the News Cameraman

Book Excerpt:

Chapter 15: 207

 The police code for a kidnapping is 207…

On February 4, 1976, two years to the day following her abduction in Berkeley, Patty Hearst appeared in Federal District Court in San Francisco for the beginning of her trial.  It lasted two months.  During that time, the assignment desk sent my camera colleagues and me to cover all bases at the Golden Gate Avenue location: the press room on the twentieth floor, where attorneys and anyone else qualified to face the media sat behind a large table clustered with microphones; the entrance to a down-ramp leading to the parking garage under the building where a vehicle carrying Hearst arrived each morning; and inside the garage, where, on several occasions, I was the pool camera selected to capture the defendant on film.  Firing off a motorized rapid shutter, a still photographer worked alongside me as pool for newspapers, wire services and the like.  Afterwards, the film we shot would be rushed to a lab to make copies for other media organizations, which qualified by having their cameras positioned elsewhere at the scene of the story.

Routinely, a United States Marshall escorted the still photographer and me down to the garage beneath the Federal Building and stayed with us for Patty Hearst’s arrival.  Oddly enough, security at the closer San Francisco County jail on Bryant Street was deemed inadequate, and Hearst was transported each day of the trial from the San Mateo County jail in Redwood City, some twenty-five miles away.  Silhouetted by sunlight outside the ramp, the vehicle carrying Hearst would enter the garage and pull into a parking space a short distance from a waiting elevator.  That didn’t leave a lot of time for film footage, but the marshals were running the show here.  For maximum end-to-end coverage, my lens would be pre-focused, camera already rolling and battery light burning at the very first sight of them.

Patty Hearst's Parents- Photos courtesy of KPIX/CBS 5

Janey Jimenez was appointed personal guardian to Patty Hearst and usually preceded her when stepping from the car.  She was a fine looking woman in her uniform of a United States Marshall. Because of her role, she became a celebrity in her own right.  She was soon followed out of the vehicle’s back seat by the passenger in her custody.

My first impression of Patty Hearst at closer range was of how much shorter she appeared than in the pictures I had seen of her, including the one from the Hibernia Bank.  (Toting a semi-automatic weapon tended to add a few inches.)  Here, she was frail, a bantam weight in the neighborhood of ninety pounds, her face pale and drawn, sad eyes, mostly downcast, adding all the more to her vulnerability.  She seemed to me like a small bird, wings clipped (and handcuffed), removed from one cage and placed into another.  Filming became a matter of first-you-saw-her, then-you-didn’t, from car door to elevator door in fifteen seconds, in frame but out of sight, as the elevator door closed between us.

Shooting pool camera was almost the same as shooting for a single television station, with one exception.  If you screwed up, lost your film loop and had a camera jam or fell on your ass while walking backwards, then every other station, network, cable channel, foreign television, or broadcasting outlet in need of pictures that moved screwed up too.  They ended up empty-handed, and you with egg on your face.  Knock wood, it never happened to me.  But additional pressure was always brought to bear whenever assigned as a pool camera, which was why it was more often assigned than volunteered.

Read More Excerpts from Shoot First: Code of the News Cameraman

Buy it on Amazon.com  $4.99