About Photography

Seeing

I once saw photography described as seeing for keeps. Years later, it's still my favorite description of the craft. In three words it separates the very human process of eye talking to brain from the technological process of recording reflected light. I'm a professional looker, and I stick to the belief that photography without seeing is like a knot without rope.

Taste

I am good at seeing the visual potential in ordinary things. I have an eye for detail and a taste for the simple. I like pictires that are direct and honest and that reveal something interesting about the way things are. I look for a comfortable spot between earthiness and elegance ~ a spot that photography allows me to share with others.

Light

In photography, light is what makes something out of nothing. Although more is sometimes helpful, less is often more. What you do with it is more important than how much you have. I've always used light as my primary tool for making good pictures. Its careful use can either reveal or hide both form and texture. Light tells you what to think of a subject. It can be loud or it can be eloquent.

Details

Personal differences affect the way we see the world. While some see their world as a complicated whole, mine is an interesting collection of parts. The closer I look, the more there is to see. This kind of curiosity leads to tecnical challenge. What does a green lacewing really look like? How do I get her legs uncrossed? Trying is the best way to find out.

Tools

Photography is a technological pursuit, so mastering the medium means developing a close relationship with its tools. Until recently those tools were camera and lens, darkroom and chemicals. Today they include comuters, scanners, flash cards, and hard drives. Good photography has always required the guidance of technology by vision. For this, I've never met a tool I didn't like.

Invention

Technology has helped with the photographic problems behind the lens, but has done little about problems in front of it. There, reality is not virtual and challenges are as real as ever-finding interesting subjects, making them look good, getting them to behave for just a moment. Solving these problems is an act of invention. As in any creative process, you start with nothing and build. For me, that's what makes photography interesting.