This is Ebody and X, and this is The Candid Frame.

Longevity as a photographer is always a tricky thing.

Because though passion can bring you into the game, it's other circumstances

and other choices that determine whether your entire professional life revolves around photography.

It's not just about longevity. It's about having a career that evolves and changes and allows you to be your very

best. That's a career to aspire to, to be proud of. I think that can be said of the career of

photojournalist David Burnett, a photographer who for decades has established himself as one of the world's best visual

storytellers. Whether it's with images of politics, sports, or conflict, David has made it his

life's work to get the images other photographers couldn't. But it's the story, and not just the

image he's often in pursuit of.

It was a lesson he began to learn as a young photographer photographing the war in Vietnam.

I mean, I'd say the one interesting thing for me at the beginning of my decision to go in 1970 was John Derniac was in the photo editor at Time Magazine, and he could be a pretty tough customer,

but he always appreciated when photographers would come to him with ideas, because I think he felt

that an idea was something you could never replace. And when I told John I was going to

Vietnam and I didn't know how long I was going to stay there, he decided, I think really just as a

favor to get my airline ticket paid because I bought a San Francisco-Sygon one-way ticket just because I

didn't know if I was going to stay two weeks or two months,

and I ended up staying two years.

But I went to see John for the last time before I left, and he gave me a big box of film,

which was a real gift because film was hard to come by in Saigon.

And he said, okay, give you a $500 guarantee. And the day rate in those days was $125.

So it's basically like a four-day assignment or guarantee.

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