ABOUT

I’ve never been much of an artist—a storyteller. I have never been talented at painting, drawing, sculpting, singing, dancing, playing an instrument, or performing any other traditional art form. But to be perfectlly honest, I’ve never had much of an interest in any of these art forms, at least not in participating in them. But I have discovered recently that there is one mode of storytelling that I actually enjoy. It all started, I would say, with a road trip and an iPhone.

Back in the summer of 2017, my wife and I traveled out west for a summer vacation. We visited, among other places, the Grand Canyon and Zion National Park. I remember the feeling I had when I first looked upon the vast painting that is the Grand Canyon; words could never do this scene and my awe and wonder justice. All I had at the time was my trusty iPhone 6, but I remember photographing constantly during that trip. There was just so much beauty all around me, I could not help but attempt to capture it in a photograph. Now, I wouldn’t say I became a photographer at that moment: I didn’t care about post-processing, megapixels, lenses, camera specs, composition techniques, focal length, etc. The only thing I knew was that my phone had a camera and I was going to exploit it. However, I found that I actually started to care about making decent photos. I enjoyed the process of going out in nature and capturing those moments of pure and unadulterated beauty. Something sparked in me.

Fast forward approximately three years later to November 2019. My wife and I were in the process of planning yet again another adventure out west, but this time, rather than just make photos with my trusty iPhone (now an iPhone 8), I wanted to invest in a camera for better results. Even while shopping for my first interchangeable lens camera, I still had no interest in the finer points of photography. I just wanted something better than an iPhone for vacation photos. One of my coworkers is a professional photographer/videographer, so I asked him for some advice on an inexpensive, entry-level camera—one for around $500 or less. After a few conversations, I purchased my first and still only camera, the Canon M50 (I have invested in some lenses and other gear since then, but only one camera).

At the time, I had no idea how much I would love photography as a hobby. I really only purchased my camera for vacation photos. But as I played with it more and more and watched YouTube videos about the fundamentals of photography, I became obsessed. I spent hours watching educational videos about the process of making photos (settings, focusing, lenses, focal length, composition, etc.) and then several more hours watching videos on post-processing. I would take time out of my day to get up early in the morning and go out right after work to photograph whatever caught my eye. I was finding out that what I thought might be just a passing interest was becoming a passion of mine.

My interest in photography has not waned at all, but has in fact only increased. So, after almost a year of gaining photographic experience and knowledge, I felt the time was right to start up a website and see where photography might take me. It might turn out to be nothing more than a hobby or little side job for the rest of my life (and even that would be amazing), but I felt I had to follow this passion and at least give it a chance, so I wouldn’t have to live with any regrets of what could have been. And at the very least, even if a single soul never invests one second in this site, I at least found that maybe I have some art in my DNA after all.