my story and my process

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In 1971, back in the dark ages of film, I received my first 'real' camera.  A 35mm fully manual Russian SLR.  It was a Zenit brand (defunct since 2005) and being a completely manual camera, it forced me to learn about the holy triad of photography: Exposure, ISO and shutter speed.  Understanding these 3 variables was the secret to shooting good pictures.  As the years went by, I remained an avid shutterbug, but life, family and work got in the way of pursuing photography on any serious level.

In 1997, I started taking flying lessons and received my pilot's license.  Flying for fun and relaxation I became enamored of the view from the airplane and started bringing my camera along (I had upgraded to a Canon DSLR by this time).  As the years of flying went by, I started to realize how striking and beautiful the images of Cape Cod were coming out.  It didn't take long before friends were asking for copies of my pictures.  I started producing enlargements, sold a few, and as the saying goes...the rest is history.

Any photographer will tell you that we often shoot 200 to 300 images to get 5 good pictures.  That is 100% true.  Among my personal loves are sunsets and sunrises.  The lighting at sunset and sunrise changes by the minute, so when I shot the blazing red sunrise in Chatham (see Panoramic and Seascapes pages), I started by setting up my equipment at 4:00 am and shooting until about 7:00.  I easily shot 300 exposures during that time.  It is rare that you get lucky when shooting landscapes and seascapes.

Another image, for example, turned out to be the total opposite and an anomaly.  The two shots of Scusset Beach were almost an afterthought.  I had been driving around the Cape Cod Canal area and decided to see if the lighting and scenery were any good at Scusset Beach.  If you've ever been there, you know how beautiful and serene it can be during winter.  It was January, which is the only time of year you'll ever see the Scusset Boardwalk empty, so I started walking toward the beach on the boardwalk.  After a short distance I stopped to take one shot of the boardwalk ahead then I turned to my right and shot the dune grass.  When I looked at the images on my camera, I decided that I had two excellent images and packed up and left.  Two shots.... two winners.  Some days you get lucky.

I generally do the bulk of my photographic safaris in the fall, winter and spring.  I then spend the summer and early fall selling at art fairs and enjoying life.  While my camera is never far away, the summer isn't the best time for photography.  And those, are almost exclusively mornings and evenings.  The winter and spring air are clearer than summer, and the sky is more vivid and dark.  One of my passions, astrophotography (night sky imaging), is really only possible during the winter.  I have spent many a cold night capturing images of the different phases of the moon and stars.  In particular I have one image I shot at the Pemaquid Point Lighthouse in New Harbor Maine.  I was attending a photo safari with a photography school/group, and we were in that area shooting night sky images.  When I realized that the milky way was partly visible behind the lighthouse, I clambered down toward the water, laid down on the rocks, set up my tripod and camera and started shooting.  Again...I easily shot 200 images and produced only one that I deemed sellable.  It is on the astrophotography page.