Zach Neven | Photographer & Artist

View Original

Famous Photographer #22

Neil Leifer


Born 1942 (77 years old

He is a photographer and film maker. He is mostly known for some of the most famous sports photos like the first one on the side.

His first photography experience was with the Henry Street Settlement House. They offer classes for the lower class.  John Iacono, Manny Millan, and Stanley Kubrick are also some big names to come out of the classes.

He was an average American boy working odd jobs till he could buy his first camera.

When he first started taking sports photos, they were at Giant’s games, he got to go in for free in exchange for helping handicap guests. He got to go on the field with the other photographers.

He went to the “Greatest Game Ever Played.” which was between the  Baltimore Colts VS giants game. He sold some photos of the game to SI (sports illustrated).

He got his first cover photo at SI when he was just 19 years old and they loved working with him.

Neil was also known to be a risk taker with his camera, putting the camera in places where he and or the camera could have caused an accident or gotten him self hurt.

Besides working for SI, he also worked with TIME.