I was starting to land my own shooting jobs. I had recently returned from a 10 day trip, photographing a William Least Heat-Moon travel piece on the North Shore of Lake Superior for Gourmet magazine. Prior to that, I'd mostly been working for other photographers, as an assistant. I was happy to get whatever work I could.
Someone called and asked if I might drive down to Apple and help another photographer shoot a portrait for an international magazine. Perhaps they mentioned Steve Jobs, I'm not sure. I wouldn't have recognized his name if they had. Yes, I owned a couple of Macs. But I never thought about the guy who invented them, any more than I thought about Henry Ford when I drove my car across the Golden Gate Bridge.
I met the photographer at his hotel in San Francisco. He'd flown up from Los Angeles the night before, where he'd been shooting some ads. His main thing was fashion, and the editors figured he'd make an interesting shot of Steve Jobs with his latest product: the iPod. (something else I'd never heard of).
We drove down to Cupertino, about an hour along the coast. All the while, the photographer chatted on his cell phone with his publicist, pitching his idea for a reality show about himself. Eventually, we arrived at Apple, and set up equipment in a conference room.
Steve Jobs walked in, holding an iPod with the headphones in. The photographer tried to say hello, but to no avail. Jobs was listening to music. He couldn't hear a word. During the shoot, Jobs didn't talk -- or turn it down. He just stood there with the iPod, nodding his head to the music, ignoring the photographer's gestures. And then he left.
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