me 01

My introduction to photography was as a young boy around the age of ten when my father took me to a funfair and I won a very cheap plastic camera.
Being bitten by the bug and happy just snapping away at nothing in particular, I progressed from the plastic camera to my father’s very old Petri he stored in the back of a cupboard.

At college in the mid 80’s I studied general art and design which also included photography.
Gaining experience in the college darkroom I convinced my mother to allow me to set up my own darkroom in my bedroom, much to her annoyance. I certainly do not miss the days of having to make my bedroom light tight every time I wanted to develop prints and then washing them in the bath. My mother missed her clothes rack as well, as it was my only method of drying prints.

By now I had moved onto my first SLR, a Nikon F501.
In 1987 I went to night school for a year to gain more experience in the art of photography.
In 1989 I entered my first printing competition held by Agfa and Practical Photography magazine. To my surprise I finished in the top fifteen with a black and white image I had taken of a friend leaning against a wall outside the Savoy hotel in London.

My interest in photography fell by the wayside for a number of years until in late 2004 when working in Tuscany for three months my passion for photography became rekindled with the breath taking scenery in this beautiful part of Italy.
I went out every weekend to capture the spectacular colours being presented to my eyes as I saw summer turn into autumn.
Although I was shooting images for the specific reason to sell my work, I photographed things that caught my imagination and what I personally found pleasing.
By this time I was a complete convert to digital photography, using a Sony DSC V1 and then on to a V3.
The freedom of not being restricted by cost of film or processing opened up a whole new way of looking at the world around me.