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" It&amp;#039;s Game 3, Bulls vs. Heat, in the Eastern Conference Semifinals. My colleague Yoav Attias and I are sitting courtside. I mean literally on the court -- no chairs, legs crossed on the hardwood floor. (I was supposed to be the only one down there, but Yoav talked his way through as my assistant cameraman. He&amp;#039;s a Miami native, and he wasn&amp;#039;t going to miss an opportunity to be that close to LeBron.) We&amp;#039;re on the baseline behind the basket with the rest of the photographers, and I&amp;#039;m looking across the court through a Canon C300. As I focus on Mayor Rahm Emanuel cross-court, a shot goes up on our end. Everyone goes for the rebound and, suddenly, LeBron James is flying in our direction. I move to the side as he comes crashing down, inches away from my lap. I glance over at Yoav. He looks shocked, having also barely missed getting crushed by his idol. &amp;quot;Where the hell are we? How did we get here?&amp;quot; He asks, only half joking. Tomorrow, when we walk into Cook County Jail, this will seem like a dream. In under 24 hours we will have been right at the center of two of the most profoundly different places in Chicago. We will be on our mission to investigate the deep contrasts at the heart of the city. As a Director of Photography for Chicagoland, it was my job to know the story lines, follow the action, to weave together the beauty, grit, and humanity of Chicago into one landscape. On a typical day our crew covered a cross section of the city. We would start in the morning with Mayor Rahm Emanuel at City Hall. We&amp;#039;d move to the far south side with Principal Elizabeth Dozier at Fenger High School. We&amp;#039;d end the day with inmates in Cook County Jail. I wondered: Did most Chicagoans ever get to see these vastly different sides of their own city? Did they ever get this close to leaders and survivors? Despite the initial thrill of embedding at City Hall, chasing Emanuel from press events to meetings was never an easy dance. We had a window of three-to-five seconds to clip a microphone to his collar. If we couldn&amp;#039;t do it in time, we&amp;#039;d missed our chance\u2014for that scene and maybe even for the rest of the day. Once the mic was on, I had to become as invisible as possible, careful not to step in the way or out of turn. If I accidentally disrupted the scene, Rahm had no problem putting back in my place.  But there was one place Rahm seemed relaxed: teaching his weekly civics classes at high schools throughout the city. These interactions with teenagers were some of the most intimate and revealing moments, and the most satisfying to capture.  Filming with Liz Dozier and the rest of the Fenger staff was the complete opposite experience. Liz was unguarded. We chased her through the halls, sat quietly across from her at her desk, and observed the challenges she, her staff and her students faced everyday. We zeroed in on the delicate balance the school struck with the wider neighborhood. It was one that, if tipped, could turn a hallway argument into a much bigger, much more dangerous problem. But the city&amp;#039;s strength was much more formidable than its immense challenges. Filming the Peace March and Prom (coming up in Episode 2 \u2013 which airs tonight, by the way) was particularly moving. We watched high school seniors, who had been freshman at the time of their friend and fellow student Derrion Albert&amp;#039;s death, proudly parade the message of peace into the neighborhood of Roseland. We filmed Fanger prom, too, and saw the students kick back and enjoy their final high school days together. Then there was Cook County Jail. Even though we were accompanied by guards and under the close watch of the jail staff, things could still escalate quickly. I remember walking through the tiers, hearing calls and screams. &amp;quot;Someone smack the camera out his hand!&amp;quot; When it came time to film with the inmates, the tension diminished. They relished the opportunity to tell their stories\u2014glad that someone was at last listening. Many of them were among the most authentic voices we&amp;#039;d heard on the challenges Chicagoans (and Americans) face with poverty, education and violence. Yoav and I were about the same age as many of the inmates we spoke to. As I stood across from them, filming, I reflected on opportunities I&amp;#039;d been given and the choices I&amp;#039;d made in my own life. Here I was behind the camera, and they were behind bars\u2014not for lack of will or ability, but because of influence, opportunities and the societies that we were born into. I saw and heard not just their stories, but also my own.  Chicagoland airs Thursdays at 10 p.m. ET on CNN. "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.esquire.com/news-politics/news/a27776/three-scenes-chicagoland/>