Dellaria shares what journalists must do to survive the demanding field
By Jesus J. Montero
Journalists are privileged bystanders to history. Photojournalist David Dellaria knows that firsthand.
“I don’t think I’ll ever forget the loud crackling noises made over a mile away,” Dellaria said when sharing his experience filming the space shuttle launch from the Kennedy Space Center in 1981.
Dellaria fondly remembers camping out for hours waiting to document the first orbital spaceflight of NASA’s Space Shuttle program. The cramped space reserved for the press was at Launchpad A – the same pad where the Apollo missions were held. Journalists slept standing up because of the tight quarters.
The liftoff sent an awe of shocking waves that hit the bodies of those recording the event, an experience that couldn’t be captured on film. The thrust and deafening noise rang through the ears of those lucky enough to see the bright red-yellow flames punch the sky. The defying gravity moment is what Dellaria explains as something that couldn’t be fully experienced on film or written articulately about. Instead the moment had to be experienced firsthand.
Dellaria is a freelance cameraman from San Francisco whose work has won numerous national and regional Emmys. His worked has been seen on Frontline, 60 Minutes, as well as a long list of reputable journalism and non-journalism programs. His work has featured the likes of celebrities and political figures from Robin Williams, Mark Zuckerberg, Arnold Schwarzenegger, and Michael Jordon.
When not on the road filming Dellaria and his wife are often cycling. Their interest in riding started from a short 10-mile ride to now when possible a 120-mile ride or charity event. His competitive nature in life is a beneficial personality trait, he believes, for those who want to work inside a newsroom one day. “I think in order to survive in the media business you need to be competitive. You can’t just show up and think you’re doing a 9 to 5 job.”
He believes that being active inside and outside the newsroom helps him significantly. “It’s not surprising that I’m a competitive person,” he said. “My colleagues, I’m proud to say they’re just as competitive in their ways. I relate to other people doing what I do because I think that we all want to keep ourselves up. To do this job, you have to keep your mind sharp. Often you’re thinking on your feet.”
Dellaria’s journalism career started in college at San Jose State University. As an undeclared freshman he first picked up a camera. That’s where the bold darkness of a developing darkroom and the mixture of chemical baths brought photo negatives to life—in what Dellaria calls developing photos in “soup”—and sparked the growth of journalism for him.
Dellaria, a member of the gymnastics team, used what was familiar to him for his first story. Borrowing color film from a friend at a local TV news station, he recorded his meet, wrote a script and later sold it to the sports director of the same station who used it verbatim. Dellaria’s reaction to his first published story was, “Wow, this is great! I got paid $25, both my script and my footage got on the local news and I felt like that was quite an accomplishment.”
He stresses the importance of having a diverse skill set. “As a young journalist getting into this business, you can’t just get into it and say I want to shoot,” he said. “You have to have a pretty broad skill set…there’s a lot of technology that’s out there that’s many skills that you’ve got to bring.”
Dellaria sees many similarities to what journalists today have to face compared to when he first started. Journalists with diverse skill sets have more control with their story and can add elements that other journalists cannot.
These skills he says must stand out in the newsroom. “It’s starting to look like it’s coming back to the old way. So, you’ve got to learn the cameras. You need to have basic editing skills, writing succinctly and in declarative sentences, and all this needs to happen fairly quickly.”
Dellaria also stresses the demanding environment journalism brings and the nature needed to succeed. “It could be an 18-hour day,” Dellaria shares. “You’re not able to eat some of the times. The job is so demanding that you have so many things to get done in a short window of time.”
Freelancing in journalism is more common now than ever. Shrinking newsrooms across the globe make it harder for full-time employment.
Dellaria believes what newsrooms are looking for are journalists who gives it their all, “They want a hundred and ten percent. If you don’t give it your all, you’ll never get hired again.”
“When you freelance, you’re only as good as your last job in many ways – that statement is true.” Word of your work travels fast in the journalism community Dellaria said. “A lot of our work is word of mouth and then the same people that know us continue to hire us for their projects because we bring a certain amount of integrity and production skills.”
Dellaria’s shooting assignments have taken him to unique locations with unforgettable interactions, from silk in Thailand to the brutal rules of football in Australia. He’s lugged large camera gear between two small boats a mile off the coast of Fiji.
One assignment Dellaria remembers fondly was meeting someone from his childhood dreams. On assignment for 60 Minutes, Dellaria’s brushed with history again when he interviewed Alan Shepard, the first American who traveled into space and later walked on the Moon in 1971.
Dellaria describes meeting Shepard as not only a career milestone but more importantly a personal achievement, having devoured books about him and other astronauts growing up.
Dellaria has a tripod that he proudly displays that he asked Shepard to sign. “For me, I got to meet a real American hero. That was big,” he said. A privilege courtesy of being a journalist.