For a long time, the photographs Susan Ford Collins posted to Flickr were taken with her DSLRs. Her favorite subjects were flowers; travel photos, people, landscapes, and various large and small wildlife filled out the photostream and the albums
Tony Sweet says that smartphone photography “isn’t officially part of the show” at his photography workshops, but the subject does come up with increasing frequency. “They’ll do their big camera work first,” Sweet says of the students, “then they’ll pull out the phones and shoot a few things, discuss among themselves, and ask me some questions.”
[Column Note: Most people come to professional photography by traveling a familiar route: from an early fascination with cameras, to photo classes and courses, followed by assisting a pro to gain some real-world experience. Then comes striking out on one's own as photographer, which, if all goes well, is followed by the frequent printing of invoices. Others, however, arrive at a pro career sideways—that is, coming at it from another occupation. The stories these "second career" pro photographers tell tend to be quite interesting, even inspirational. And those stories are what this new online column, titled Going Pro, is all about.]
Gabe Rogel gets a kick out of viewers’ reactions to his photographs. “It’s fun,” he says, “to watch people look at the pictures and realize, Oh, you had to be there, too!”
It’s not your typical image of that place then, which means Mirjam Evers has done her job well. She has images of the colorful chaos of revelers in full regalia, but the challenge is to get something special. “The travel publications I work for ask for something different and unusual,” Evers says. “She was posing, and most of the photographers were shooting from eye level, so I crouched down.”
If you've glanced at the photos and you're not laughing, you might think about skipping ahead to the next story. On these pages we're going to spend some time in the bemusement park that's the mind of Chip Simons, and if the weird light he's shining into the darkness didn't bring at least a smile, you're probably not going to enjoy the...
(In March 1986, the Least Bell’s Vireo, a bird species that Moose Peterson had volunteered to photograph, was listed as endangered, and Moose, who was just starting out as a photographer, was about to learn the power of a single image.)
Most of the photographers were set up at the front of the pool for the 100-meter butterfly final, but Jeff Cable decided to try for a different view of Michael Phelps in that event. You wouldn’t know it from the photo, but he was actually 20 rows up in the seats on the opposite side of the starting block.
Midway in my talk with Daryl Hawk about his travel photography, he mentioned that it was relatively easy for him to approach people and get their okays for impromptu portrait sessions. “I’m polite, I know something of their culture, and I spend time with them,” he said. Then he added, “And I speak a universal language.”
He lives in a historic California gold-mining town about an hour out of San Diego, so the props for Ed Masterson’s Old West images are easy to come by: a barrel borrowed from a nearby winery, a pistol from a friend’s gun collection, a book from an antique shop, weathered wood from old barns nearby, and so on.