The argument broke out a few minutes into the rickety tram ride from Port de Sóller in Mallorca. Sisters Rosa, four, on the right, and Lois, seven, nearest the camera, were bickering with their friend Bibi, eight, all three a little cranky after a busy day on the beach. Their parents sat opposite, and Rosa and Lois’s dad, Joe Macdonald, used his iPhone 13 Pro Max to capture the scene.
“It was late afternoon, maybe five or six, so the lighting was just right,” Macdonald says. “I work with camera and lighting for film and TV, so spend a lot of time looking at monitors, and know how fortunate it is to capture a moment that has drama but is also real.
“My main camera is a Sony A7, but I would have missed the moment had I tried to pull that out and set it up. Along with the antique tram interior and the backdrop, their facial expressions created such a Wes Anderson moment, so I edited the photo to a movie-camera aspect ratio to mimic the symmetry his work is revered for.”
Macdonald doesn’t remember what the girls were arguing about, but thinks it was probably to do with the journals they’d just been given, and one of the details of the day they were busy writing up. “In my other shots right after, they’re smiling again.”
