I have a different shooting style to the other photographers. Part of that is from a different learning process, part of it is technical.
The single best feature my cameras offer me is silence.
Photography started with silence and after a long, long time of clacks, whizzes and burrs, it is returning to silence.
Animation like this, which was very representative of the person, would have been hard to replicate artificially.
The general process, especially with TV present, is that the interview is conducted with the photographer waiting till the end, then a shot or two is taken. It is a process, tried and true, but limited in options and to be honest, a little dated.
With a silent camera, it is possible to get that natural, empathic and genuine shot while the interview is in progress, even with sensitive TV mics near by. It is even possible to get an image that the subject will like.
Occassionally, I have noticed more clued in subjects, such as performers, politicians etc, can also play in this space, bringing their best to the process, which is good for all.
The second most useful feature, directly tied to the application of this is the responsive back screen that allows that silence to be used at angles previously not exploited.
The subject here was in casual conversation with our journalist, which allowed me to shoot low without being obvious.
Other benefit of no give away sounds, is no startled children, no wary or skittish animals and no breaking of the existing flow.
There are however some down sides that must be taken into account.
Depending on the camera, no flash will fire, sometimes banding is introduced under artificial lighting, especially at high ISO settings and sometimes, a lack of sound can be seen as sneaky.
Fill flash was employed here, the only image that made some gentle noise and of course the flash. I took plenty of silent ones first, then chanced this one, which was admittedly the best, but it broke the spell.
The flash thing is rarely a problem, the banding issue is getting better and there are sometimes ways around it and the sneakiness is fixed by simply being up front and pleasant (unless sneaky is called for).