When I met Frank Owen, his energy was electrifying. A celebrated, and sometimes controversial writer, he had enough colorful stories to paint a thousand pictures. After the three-hour drive to our subject in Southern Missouri, I realized that this man was a creative genius, the likes of which I rarely meet – or at least team up with to cover a story for Playboy! A prolific talker, he was mysteriously quiet when it came to discussing the assignment at hand. What did he have in mind? What was his take on this story? How could I partner with him to support his vision? I asked a lot of questions until I realized he was not really the ‘plan it out’ type. “Let’s see what happens.” he said. Finally he shared a thought … “I would love to see an image of him gazing out over a distant hill, sun peeking over the horizon... prepared for the world as we know it to end – the dawn of a new era.” Ok. Now we’re getting somewhere. It was 45 minutes before sunset and we asked our subject, “Any hills around here?” Yup… but they’re 40 min away. Hmm… that will leave us 5 min to scout and shoot. Buzzed from Frank’s energy, I said, “Let’s go!”

Part wild-goose chase, part do-or-die mission, I was going to make this happen for Frank. I wanted to impress him. We got to the hills with 10 minutes to spare. Scouting was not so easy. It is a good thing there were no cops around because all the starting, stopping, quick u-turns and off-road driving were pretty much illegal, and being stopped (with a man that looked like Sean Connery carrying guns and binoculars) would be hard to explain… “Yeah – sure you’re ‘shooting’ for Playboy….”

With less than 5 min to go, we peeled up a dirt road, hopped out and shot. I showed Frank the image and he said, “yes! That will be the opening spread! Perfect!” We both could see it in our mind’s eye… man was Hef gonna be happy. We celebrated with beers and, yes, more Frank stories.

Well, as it turns out, the creative department at Playboy, while very happy with the shoot – had a different approach in mind. They did use the shot, but as part of a collage, running maybe ¼ page. The full-page opener was more illustrative than photographic.

Just goes to show… not all minds think alike when comes to editing. Meeting and working with Frank was fun and inspiring… something I hope I get to do again down some road at sunset with a gun.

Listen to a 26 minute interview with Frank Owen by Fresh Air's Terry Gross about his book No Speed Limit: The Highs and Lows of Meth.