I don't shoot many corporate or commercial jobs, but when you do, you had better have someone helping who has done it before.

With the Internet, you can get lots of info in advance, but a local person who knows how to work the system is invaluable.

RAW is very forgiving. I was photographing a farm woman in Ecuador cooking over a small fire and my fill flash didn't go off a few times. I was about to delete the RAW files but decided to play with the curves first because I like the composition. It turned out that the image, although underexposed by two stops, was better than the fill-flashed images because the fire was the only source of illumination and it looked more real.

As a senior in high school my counselor recommended that I soften my science and math direction with an art course. Fortunately my high school offered a new course in B&W photography, so I opted for that instead of art, towards which I had an aversion. Composition is something that comes pretty naturally to me and I appreciate ordered chaos: the photo class turned out to be fun.

Freelancing in Somalia during their civil war and in Kuwait right after the first Bush War, I had some rather intense experiences that made life in the U.S. seem rather shallow and superfluous.

Pre-planning is essential. Research, research, research. If you are going to do a portrait, know as much as you can about the person beforehand. The web makes this very easy.

Everyone should understand that getting good photos is paramount to everything. You have to do what it takes and often comfort and sleep are the first casualties of an assignment.