The Assignment Didn’t Go as Planned

On photographing a Smithsonian Magazine story in Cambodia when the camera failed, the narrative shifted, and there was no room for mistakes

At the end of last year I was commissioned by Smithsonian Magazine to photograph a story in Cambodia that ran in early April. On paper it was a great assignment, and Smithsonian always is. Strong stories, solid budgets, and access to fascinating historical narratives.. The kind of work you don’t overthink, you just say yes and figure it out on the ground and embrace the adventure.

The pitch sounded straightforward at first. A story that lived in two timelines. The past centered on André Malraux, a young French writer who in 1923 attempted to cut ancient Khmer carvings out of a temple at Banteay Srei and smuggle them out of Cambodia. Not subtle work. He literally removed pieces of a temple wall, packed them into crates, and tried to move them out through the river system before being caught, arrested, and put on trial. The present side of the story was supposed to follow efforts to recover stolen artifacts and return them to Cambodia, which is where I thought the real visual weight would be.

That assumption didn’t hold.

I was scheduled to meet the writer, who was flying in from Europe, but around the same time I had surgery for a deviated septum and realized I couldn’t fly for a few weeks. Not ideal timing, but my editor adjusted the schedule and made it work so I could still overlap with the reporting. That overlap matters more than people think. Sometimes the writer has a very clear direction, sometimes they don’t, and sometimes it changes while you’re there. As a photographer, you have to be ready for all three scenarios.

I met the writer in Siem Reap after he had finished reporting in Phnom Penh. We had two days to shoot in Siem Reap and one day in Phnom Penh. That’s not a lot of time for a story that spans a hundred years, and once those days are locked in, there’s no extending them. You’re paid per day, everything is agreed in advance, and whatever you don’t get in that window simply doesn’t exist.

Cambodia is a place I know well and it still feels special every time I go back. It was one of the first places I traveled before eventually moving to Southeast Asia, and there’s something about the people, the culture, and the quality of light that stays with you. Temples like Banteay Srei are visually incredible, full of detailed sandstone carvings that have survived for centuries, but that doesn’t mean the work is easy. Places like that have been photographed endlessly. If you’re not intentional, you end up repeating what’s already been done.

For gear I brought my standard editorial setup at the time, a Leica M11 with 35, 50, and 75mm lenses, along with a backup M10-D. It should have been the perfect setup for a slower, observational story, but the M11 started acting up almost immediately. Misfires, shutter delay, inconsistent performance. It’s the kind of thing that frustrates you more when you’re on assignment because there’s no room for excuses. I ended up switching over to the M10-D and kept working. This is exactly why backup gear exists. Not as a safety net you hope you won’t need, but because you eventually will.

Most of our time in Siem Reap was spent moving through temples, trying to visualize something that happened a hundred years ago. That’s always the challenge with historical stories. You’re not documenting an event, you’re interpreting what’s left behind. Malraux and his team didn’t just take artifacts, they cut them directly from the stone walls, packed them up, and tried to move them quietly through Cambodia before being stopped. None of that exists anymore. You’re left with space, light, texture, and the responsibility to make it feel like something happened there.

At the same time you’re working around the writer, letting interviews happen, and trying to build a visual narrative that includes some kind of human element. Environmental portraits, observational moments, anything that gives the story a sense of presence instead of just documentation. The challenge here was that the direction of the story felt vague from the start, so instead of narrowing my focus, I expanded it. More coverage, more variations, more options. When the story isn’t clear, you don’t take fewer photos, you take more, because you know something will change.

Phnom Penh became about filling in gaps. Museums, institutional context, and locations tied to Malraux’s arrest. Museums are always difficult to photograph, restrictive, repetitive, and often limited by permissions. At one point I was told I couldn’t shoot at all, and without my fixer stepping in and resolving it, that part of the story would have disappeared entirely. That’s another reality people don’t talk about enough. You are completely dependent on the people helping you on the ground.

The images I personally liked most came from Siem Reap. The temples, the atmosphere, and the moments that felt more alive and grounded. But the story shifted. The final piece leaned heavily into the historical narrative, focusing more on Malraux, colonial-era looting, and the broader context around it. The modern thread became secondary. That’s not unusual, but it does change what images carry weight in the final edit.

In the end, it didn’t really matter what I preferred. The camera gave me problems, the story direction wasn’t clear, and the narrative changed after everything was shot. And it still worked. Not because things went smoothly, but because I had enough coverage to support whatever direction the story took.

That’s the job.

You’re not shooting for the version of the story you’re told. You’re shooting for what it could become. You build in flexibility, you protect yourself from uncertainty, and you make sure that when the edit happens, even if you’re not in the room, the work still holds together.

If you do that well, everything else tends to take care of itself.

Here are some of my favorite images and here is a link to the full article.