September 5, 2008 "Boston: A Year in the Life", photojournalism by Bill Brett Play video

(Greg Wayland, NECN: Boston, MA) - Boston, day-by-day, moment-by-moment. At dawn. At dusk. And after dark.

I had a calendar in my kitchen and I just kept marking the days off.. You know, how many more days.

Bill Brett met me at Gerard’s restaurant in Dorchester. We talked about his new book. -- pictures of Boston in every season. Every mood. People. Animals. Places. Faces. Mostly in color. Rich, vivid. Color.

This is the first book that I did color. There was a few black and white. The woman in East Boston on valentine's day. -- she **had** to be in color.

Bill was a Boston Globe photographer for thirty-eight years, ending up as director of photography and retiring early at 55. But he knew his native city was still begging to be photographed. “I always wanted to do books by myself, something on the city.”

His book is called: Boston -- a year in the life. A photographer's chronicle.

“Somedays I shot hundreds. Other days was less.” ultimately he chose one picture to mark each day of the year. beginning not on new year's day, but ...marathon day, April 16, 2007.

Because I thought marathon day would be significant for me, since I covered probably thirty-five marathons in Boston, the finish line.

The marathon picture captures the winner at the finish line -- and the motorcycle-mounted tv cameraman and his driver almost wiping out.

He flipped behind him. This could have been

a major accident. Thereafter, page by page, come tender, vivid, quiet, raucous instants indoors. Outdoors, winter. Summer.

All captured by Brett’s digital Canon Mark Three.

Sometimes the work went quickly, sometimes slowly.

So some days I had to work until midnight to find something I thought illustrated what took place that day. But every day as I went through it, I knew that it got better and better.

Jonathan Papelbon pennant victory dance on the Fenway dugout came just after midnight-- and became the picture for October 22nd.

a public moment in a book of mostly private moments -- like the traveler searching for his luggage at Logan airport's terminal "d" on December 21st. Amid the Christmas rush ,the shortest day of the year.

There are the bit players in the city's daily drama. And like this woman here. She's been feeding birds for twenty six years on Boston Common.

THAT WAS AUGUST FOURTH.

NOVEMBER 30TH -- ENTER THE STAR AND HIS MAKE-UP ARTIST.

Morgan Freeman was doing a movie in the Public Garden. MARCH 11TH. This is Miss America. She was at Mass General Hospital one morning.

This is Tom Brady and his super model girlfriend, leaving a Newbury Street restaurant, August 29th.

Did you feel like a paparazzi at that point? -- I did, but it was so easy. I was just standing at the corner and I just -- he never, he never -- never saw you? Never saw me. I mean I was across the street.

Bill was always across the street. Looking and waiting. These people never saw him, either.

Just a simple day. Just a quiet day. And the person looking out the window looking at these workmen coming down State Street

BILL HAS SOME FAVORITES. “I love this. This was South Boston. --On December 15th. I love the faces, the excitement of the children.”

January 25. Another favorite. Greek men playing poker upstairs in Roslindale square. “They invited me in, and I walked in and I see them all sitting here. It was just a beautiful moment. And I said, I have to photograph this.”

There are dinners, parties. Poignant moments for stars on stage. For the mayor back stage. A horse race. A 10k foot race. Ordinary moments in offices. Sacred moments in churches. Quiet moments in museums. there are firefighters and policemen.

This is a graduation class of the police academy.

AND IT ALL ENDS WHERE IT BEGAN, WITH THE MULTITUDES CROSSING THE MARATHON FINISH LINE.

BILL'S PROJECT WAS FINISHED, TOO.

God was good to me that I never got a cold or was sick.

And now he can share his year in pictures like a family album, prepared by a loving son of Boston.