Karen Ballard in the Atacama Desert in northern Chile, for the James Bond film "Quantum of Solace."
Karen Ballard flying across northern Iraq while on assignment for Time Magazine.
Ballard chats with Director Steven Spielberg and writer Tony Kushner on the set of Munich while in Paris.
Karen Ballard gets a hug from Director/Actor Sylvester Stallone on the set of "The Expendables" in Rio de Janerio.
Karen Ballard photographs Barack Obama as he makes his way to Washington on the eve of the Inauguration in Baltimore, Maryland..
Obama's historic swearing in ceremony, January 2009 by Karen Ballard.
Karen Ballard is a professional photographer specializing in reportage, portraiture, and unit photography for major motion pictures.
Editorial clients have included Time, Newsweek, U.S. News & World Report,
Paris Match, The Sunday New York Times Magazine, The Washington Post Sunday
Magazine and The Los Angeles Times among others. Entertainment clients include Universal, Sony/Eon Productions, Paramount Vantage, The Walt Disney Company, The
Weinstein Company, Lionsgate, and ABC Television. Ballard was based in Washington,
D.C. for 16 years, and recently relocated to Los Angeles.
As an accomplished photojournalist she has covered major news stories at The White House, on Capitol Hill, the Middle East, and most recently Haiti. In 2002 Ballard was embedded with the 101st Airborne in Kandahar, Afghanistan and the Persian Gulf for the ABC series "Profiles from the Frontlines" a Jerry Bruckheimer/Bertram Van Munster Production. Not too long after the Afghanistan adventure, Ms. Ballard accompanied General Tommy Franks on assignment for Newsweek Magazine as he entered Baghdad immediately after the fall of Saddam Hussein. Her classic photograph of the winning general, his fist clenched and held over his head, ran in newspapers and magazines worldwide.
A few months later, in another journalistic coup, Ms. Ballard was inside the courtroom as the pool photographer while on assignment for TIME Magazine, and took the dramatic photos of the deposed Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein, clad in shackles and handcuffs, as he made his first appearance before the Iraqi Special Tribunal. Those pictures again, ran on the front pages of newspapers and magazines worldwide.
In the spring of 2005 Ballard’s photojournalism work and her interest in film production caught the attention of Director Steven Spielberg. He wanted an experienced photojournalist to shoot the stills for “Munich” and hired Ballard. She was hooked, and since has worked on a number of feature films as the main unit photographer. Some of which include Edward Zwick’s “Defiance,” the last James Bond film, “Quantum of Solace,” directed by Marc Forster, as well as, Sylvester Stallone’s “Rambo” and the action thriller “The Expendables.” Her unique eye, life experience, and “fly on the wall” style have led to her success in today’s very competitive photographic world. Ballard has won numerous awards over the years from professional organizations including Pictures of the Year, the White House News Photographers Association, and the Associated Press.
The movie productions and her work as a photojournalist have taken Ms. Ballard around the globe including the Middle East, China, Vietnam, Thailand, India, Indonesia, England, Malta, France, Bosnia-Herzgovina, Croatia, Hungary, Lithuania, Austria, Italy, Panama, Chile, and Brazil, among other places.
In 2009 Ballard was one of the principal photographers for, “Barack Obama: The Official Inaugural Book,” which included more than two dozen of her photographs including the dramatic moment when Obama took the oath of office. The Smithsonian Museum of American History opened their show, “I Do Solemnly Swear,” based on the Obama book, which featured many of Ms. Ballard’s photographs. More than a million people saw the exhibition.
Karen Ballard can be reached at: 310.452.3777
IMBD profile: http://pro.imdb.com/name/nm2109536/