Neil Leifer

Neil Leifer was born December 28th, 1942 (Wikipedia, Neil Leifer)  photography career has spanned over 50 years since becoming a professional while still in his teens. Beginning in 1960, his pictures regularly appeared in every major national magazine, including the Saturday Evening Post, Look, LIFE, Newsweek, Time and, most often, Sports Illustrated (Biography,Neil Leifer).
Leifer eventually became a staff photographer for Sports Illustrated before leaving in 1978 to become a staffer for Time magazine. In 1988 he was made a contributing photographer at LIFE magazine and spent the next two years dividing his time between Time and LIFE. When Leifer left Time Inc. in 1990, his photographs had appeared on over 200 Sports Illustrated, Time, and People covers—at that point, the most ever published of one photographer’s work in Time Inc (Biography,Neil Leifer)..



Team USA hockey players celebrate their Miracle on Ice win over the Soviet Union during the 1980 Winter Olympics at the Olympic Fieldhouse.
Lake Placid, New York 2/22/1980

Leifer has published 16 books, 9 of which have been collections of his sports photographs. Sports, his 1978 Abrams book, is considered by many to be the quintessential sports photography book. His two most recent, Ballet in the Dirt and Guts and Glory—both published by TASCHEN, showcase the very best of Leifer’s professional baseball and football photographs(Biography,Neil Leifer).
Leifer has traveled all over the world on sports assignments. He has photographed 16 Olympic Games (7 winter and 9 summer), 4 FIFA World Cups, 15 Kentucky Derbies, countless World Series games, the first 12 Super Bowls and every important heavyweight title fight since Ingemar Johansson beat Floyd Patterson in 1959. He has photographed his favorite subject, Muhammad Ali, on almost 60 different occasions—covering his biggest fights and over 30 one-on-one studio sessions(Biography,Neil Leifer).

In spirit of it being Masters weeks, above is a photo of Tiger Woods celebrating with caddie Steve Williams celebrated after Woods chipped in for birdie on the 16th hole of the 2005 Masters(Sports Illustrated). This shows his impeccable timing in capturing the emotion of the moment.
Works cited:

Leifer, Neil. "Biography." Neil Leifer. WordPress.com, n.d. Web. 08 Apr. 2014.

"Neil Leifer." Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, 04 June 2013. Web. 09 Apr. 2014.

Photo URLs:  Tiger Woods Jpeg. link http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/main/photos/1304/sis-100-best-masters-photos//34/#ixzz2yR3i6o3w
U.S. Men's Hockey Jpeg. link http://neilleifer.com/portfolio/u-s-olympic-hockey-team/