Photographer Profiles

Today marks the 116^th birthday of Ansel Adams (February 20, 1902-April 22, 1984), a passionate environmentalist and one of the most iconic image-makers of our time. Were he alive today, Adams would no doubt be somewhere in Yosemite Valley, and he’d likely be pioneering new forms of photography—perhaps in the digital darkroom.

Inspired by Marilyn Monroe’s quote, “I don’t mind living in a man’s world, as long as I can be a woman in it,” photographer Mandira Bahl set off in early 2017 to document the lives and rides of Sirens MC, New York City’s oldest and largest women’s biker group. We recently caught up with Bahl to find out more about the project and how she became interested in telling the story of these “Tough Beauties.”

When Yiming Hu was a freshman in college he rented a camera and fell in love with photography. After he moved from China to the United States he was drawn to landscape and travel photography and learned advanced photo techniques from books, magazines, the Internet, and lots of experience. Today he works as a computer engineering professor at the University of Cincinnati doing research, and as a second career he shoots landscapes and travel subjects in many locations to satisfy his photo appetite. I spoke with him recently about his work.

Travel and nature photographer John Shaw lives his dream, traveling the world with his camera, without deadlines or obligations. His images go toward stock sales worldwide, in addition to being used in his many books. While he doesn’t shoot on assignment, magazine editors familiar with Shaw’s work will come to him when needed, or he’ll occasionally pitch story ideas to them when planning a trip.

Trevor Pottelberg’s “Lighthouse Project” proves that you needn’t travel far from home to create a spectacular photo essay. The Canadian landscape photographer spent an entire year photographing the same lighthouse near his home in Brownsville, Ontario with absolutely beautiful, and different, results.

“It was a two-month expedition, and it had taken weeks just to hike into the area and weeks to get to this point on the mountain,” photographer Tom Bol recalls about the above image.

Pro photographer Jim Reed’s specialty is images of severe and unusual weather; in short, he’s a stormchaser.