One of the things I pride myself on as a photojournalist is the ability to work quickly. I specialize in doing "run n'gun" portraits. 

Sure, I love having the time to make things great, whether it's a couple of hours for a portrait, or a few weeks to get a magazine spread shot. But, so often, you're working on a time crunch.

That was the case for photographing Pradeep K. Khosla, the chancellor of the University of California, San Diego.

The communications staff was able to offer me 15 minutes with Dr. Khosla and, seeing that he was running a bit behind schedule already, I knew we would want to work quickly. We chatted briefly, got a couple shots I was really happy with and got the Chancellor back to work in under 10 minutes. Here are a couple of my favorites.

Journalism is all about relationship building. You'll hear that 1,000 times throughout J-School, whether they're talking about building relationships with clients or relationships with story subjects.

What they don't often talk about is the photographer-reporter relationship. It can make or break a story. Whether it's an in-depth piece of reporting where the two of you must walk a delicate tightrope together with the subject, or whether it's just being able to feed off a reporter's story and deliver photos that both complement the work and help it grow into something larger.

Over the years, I got to walk this tightrope many, many times with my friend and colleague Rob Davis. He began reporting at Voice of San Diego when I was still an intern there and had barely ever touched a camera. He helped me craft my first cover letters and dragged me to environmentally sensitive sites that through runoff had become virtual toxic dumps. We drove along highways for hours together on an investigation listening to The Doors and chugging Redbull. And he gave me an informal, annual performance review at The West End over glasses of cheap whiskey. That's where he had first pulled me aside when I was hired as a photojournalist and told me that under no circumstances should I screw up this opportunity -- that there were too many solid photographers waiting in the wings who would kill to be in my shoes.

So, it seemed only fitting that when Rob penned one more story in San Diego before taking a job at The Oregonian, that I would get the chance to shoot it. The story was a good one. It followed the narrative of Diana and Carolina Valdivia, two young immigrants who had crossed into the United States from Mexico with their parents right around the time they became teenagers. The two are undocumented immigrants who are currently staying in the U.S. on two-year deportation deferrals. They're very accomplished women and are Dreamers. Both have Master's degrees from San Diego State University, where I photographed them.

The art director at SDMag and I wanted to try to connect them to their young life and home in Mexico, but it can be difficult for a photographer to tell in images what happened in the past. So, we had the subjects hold photos. Below are images of them both in Mexico, and in the U.S. today, as well as some portraits that we weaved into the story.

This is all a way of saying that a lot goes into those articles you pick up on the newsstand or read online. This took the great writing of a reporter, the collaboration of an art director and photographer and, most importantly, the willingness of a subject to have their story told.

Take a few minutes to read the story over at San Diego Magazine.

I was finishing up toning a deadline assignment for a client a few weeks ago when I got a call from the business desk at The New York Times. They needed a photo of a CEO who was in town. They needed it right away. And they needed it to be the centerpiece for the next day's paper.

This is where newspaper photographers are really tested every day. I always tell people I can work fast, but I forget just how fast until I'm put on a crushing deadline like this. Us West Coast photographers have the additional challenge of being three hours behind New York, so we're always scrambling to get our work in very, very early.

The subject was Michael Farkas. He's the CEO of a company called CarCharging Group, which has been rapidly acquiring electric car-charging stations around the country. He's a busy guy, so I anxiously awaited his arrival at a location in downtown San Diego and prayed that the parking lot attendants wouldn't give us too much grief. We had a good chat and I promised him I would work quickly for both our benefits. I got home and scrambled to file, making sure I dotted those I's and crossed the T's in the captions.

I was so excited to see it the next day as the centerpiece for Business Day and it's a good reminder to keep those batteries charged and hard drives clear. When those last second calls come in, it's nice to be able to deliver.