To a certain extent yes. I’ve always felt the need to exercise both sides of my brain equally, so balancing the creative with the technical through photography is the perfect fit. It took me quite a while to realise this, and looking back I probably should of gone professional much earlier, but I believe I was destined to become a photographer.
Why did you become a photographer?
I always had an interest in photography, but never felt I was ready to turn pro until my early 20’s. I have a background in Multimedia, and worked for a large new media agency in London in various technical and design roles. The job did involve buying large amounts of stock photography, and one day I showed the creative director some of my images and he suggested I should take charge of the photography for the next project. From that point I became the go to person the company photography needs, and found myself enjoying this part much more then the rest of the job. I still get a great buzz from what I do which is great.
Much of my inspiration would come from Books, films and even art. I like to tell a story in my images where possible. Also music is very important to me and helps me to de-stress and open the mind..
I’m lucky to have a large studio space in Dublin, and my aim is to get in as early as possible and maximize each day. It’s funny but the actual photography itself is just small part of the job. Image editing, Social media marketing, sales, client meetings, responding to emails, networking, and other aspects of running the business take up about 80% of my time. The great thing is that there is a no typical day so to speak, and every shoot is fairly different.
Invest in Yourself and your portfolio! Personal projects are a great way to try new things and create the type of work that will hopefully impress and get you noticed.
What are your favourite products to work with, in your kit?
I love playing with and shaping light. Using film lights as opposed to Flash or strobe lights where I can is preferable due to the much softer and richer light they produce. The light setups take much longer and usually require an assistant to help, but the resultant images usually look better, and require less work in post production.
What has been your favourite shoot/stand out moment to work on since you began your career?
I won an award for the image above and it has been published a few times. It was a completely spur of the moment image that hadn’t been preplanned (like most of my work). I find many times a location can give you great inspiration and seeing an old guy feeding the pigeons on the day led to this bridal image. Now I think this was image 15 of about 20 I took before the pigeons did what I want but we got there in the end! What do they say about not working with children or animals..
Create and follow your Goals! I believe the things you put your energy towards the most, will most likely come true over everything else! Good photography comes with time & Practise, and developing a profitable business is much the same. If you balance the time you put into both you’ll do well.
Any editing tips?
Most images are fairly flat straight out of the camera, and it’s important to bring these images to life and make them more three Dimensional. Decide where the main focus is in your image, and draw the viewer into that point. Dodging and burning is a great way to do this, and is the foundation of all my image editing.