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.

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.

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.

I've heard Braggadocio about excess baggage charges, multiple unused hotel rooms, and rental cars held unused for long periods of time, which makes me lose respect for certain photographers. Sometimes it's worth it to spend money on a good idea, but wasting money makes me ill.

I sold all my medium format equipment in 2005 after Canon came out with the 12 megapixel EOS 1Ds.

Having a partner who is your wife traveling with you can be great. We each have our roles in the work and then can help each other out on the emotional front when things get stressful, which they are.

To me a translator is very, very important. If the fixer is also the translator, so much the better. I have known photographers who didn't speak the language and would work in a place for weeks without one, getting by on common sense and smiles. But how many situations did they miss because they couldn't talk to someone and get the back story on details, small daily life things, etc.