Our Grand Christmas Dinner 2016 was held, as it had been for the previous eight years, in the magnificent Regency
Restaurant at the Institute of Directors (IoD) at 116 Pall Mall, London; it was organised as usual by Features Editor Gillian Greenwood with her customary élan, and was, according to feedback, a spectacular success. When we announced the name of our guest speaker, the event sold out in a matter of days.
We started a waiting list for any cancellations but there were none. The buzz and excitement was palpable. We had visitors from all over the country and Europe, and regular Nikon Owner correspondent Robert Falconer flew over from Canada.
What was all the fuss about? Well, we were very lucky to have a brilliant presentation by the internationally acclaimed photographer and Nikon USA Ambassador Joe McNally. His expansive career has included assignments in over 60 countries. He is an ongoing contributor to the National Geographic, shooting numerous cover stories and highly complex, technical features for the past 25 years, a contract photographer for Sports Illustrated, the last staff photographer in the history of LIFE, and he has photographed cover stories for TIME, Newsweek, Fortune, New York, and The New York Times Sunday Magazine. His client list includes FedEx, Nikon, Epson, Sony, General Electric, MetLife and Adidas and he has held numerous lectures and workshops at distinguished institutions such as the National Geographic Society, Smithsonian Institution, the Disney Institute and the U.S. Department of Defence.
Our guests arrive
Gray Levett, Sophie Gooders, Joe McNally, Michael Putland
Clive Carpenter, Uri Zakay
Jesse Wilson, Daniel Croft, Tara Gibson
Reception held in The Morning Room
Reception held in The Morning Room
Robert Falconer, Kentaro Kusakari, Andrew Main Wilson, David Wigg
Dinner is served in the Grand Restaurant
Dinner is served in the Grand Restaurant
Robert Noel Lancaster Herald of Her Majesty’s College of Arms, Annie Cahill, Joe McNally
Simon Weir, Michael Eleftheriades
Raffi Silvanian, Alison Batchelor
Tabitha and Tom Hardy, Becky Danese
Linda Pym, Ian Moseley, Peter Hearson
Joe’s talk is underway
Joe talking about his photo of the Chrysler Building
This photo, taken atop the Burj Khalifa, earned Joe a new pair of shoes!
One’s of Joe’s most famous images, taken in Beijing
Joe giving away some of his film noir lighting secrets
Gray Levett, Joe McNally
Joe was listed by American Photo as one of the 100 Most Important People in Photography and described by the magazine as “perhaps the most versatile photojournalist working today”. He has been honored as a member of Kodak-PDN Legends Online, as well as being a Nikon Legend Behind the Lens.
In 2010, he was voted as one of the 30 most influential photographers of the decade in an industry wide Photo District News survey. McNally won the first Alfred Eisenstaedt Award for Journalist Impact for a LIFE coverage titled, “The Panorama of War.” He has also been honored numerous times by Communication Arts, PDN, Graphis, American Photo, POY, and The World Press Photo Foundation. His fine art work is represented by the Monroe Gallery of Santa Fe, and his prints are in numerous collections, most significantly the National Portrait Gallery of the United States.
Two of McNally’s books, The Moment It Clicks and The Hot Shoe Diaries, both cracked Amazon’s top ten lists of best sellers. Other books include Guide to Digital Photography, and Sketching Light. In addition to these books, McNally’s work is also featured in several 9/11 books, Faces of Ground Zero – Giant Polaroid Collection; One Nation; The American Spirit; and One Nation – America Remembers September 11, 2001, Ten Years Later. In addition to books, Joe has his own instructional DVD, The Language of Light.
McNally is known internationally for his ability to produce technically and logistically complex assignments with expert use of colour and light. As part of his teaching activities, he conducts numerous workshops around the world. McNally continues to hold wide acclaim for his international workshops and seminars. Besides many U.S. venues, including those in New Mexico and Hawaii, Joe teaches in locations that include Dubai, Malaysia, Mexico, Hong Kong, Italy, Denmark, Norway, Finland, Iceland, Sweden, Amsterdam, Germany, Switzerland, Austria, Slovenia, St. Lucia, Philippines, Australia, Canada, Saudi Arabia, Nigeria, and South Africa.
The huge applause that greeted Gray Levett’s introduction to him and the thunderous applause when he finished showed him as a gracious master of his craft as well as a gifted speaker.
