When I met him on location in Atlanta in ’94 he was quite cooperative and a really nice guy. It was a shoot for The Source magazine, and he arrived early. Tupac was the ultimate professional, and he respected my time and my skills. The public might not know that about him. They think he was just this crazy guy who had no real limits, but he completely understood who he was, and if he understood what you brought to the table, he was easy to deal with. In fact, we got along great. I think a lot of people want to buy into the ‘thug life’ image and the younger side of him, because he was still a young man. Let’s be clear, you kind of forget the ages of these folks. To be so prolific and so young, and have so much power — it’s hard to imagine

Even with all the childishness — which I believe was age appropriate in a lot of ways—when you throw power and money in there, even with all that, he had a lot of care and love for his community and for the less fortunate. He always spoke on behalf of black people who were struggling.

Even though he wrote songs that many would consider typical hip-hop party music, he also included a lot of black empowerment in his lyrics — “Brenda’s Got a Baby,” “Dear Mama” — which I believe is why women liked him. They loved him because he was real and he cared. We knew the silly side of him too, but who isn’t silly at the age of twenty five? So that never surprised me when he did the zany stuff. He was young and full of power in a world that’s biased against blacks, so what do you expect?

Normally when I would see Tupac, I would always think of him being on blast — excited and moving at a hundred miles an hour. But when I first met him he wasn’t really like that. It’s funny how everyone always thinks about Tupac and the ladies, but I never really saw him chasing women that much. He was much more focused on his mission. I think that’s what made him stand out so much from his peers. Because while everybody was partying, this man was trying to make sure he created his legacy. And so here we are decades later talking about the man as if he’s still around. I don’t think you can take lightly the fact that this is two decades later and we’re still talking about this man.

After we finished his first Source cover shoot in Atlanta, we went back to his home in Stone Mountain, GA to hang out. He called me aside and showed me his entire gun collection in his bedroom—all his AKs, banana clips, Glocks, everything. Then he moved a picture on the wall in his bedroom, revealing a bullet hole. This was from when he fired a shot in his bedroom because he was on probation and prohibited from going to the firing range. We all laughed afterwards.