I am a student and will always be a student. The camera and the “digital” darkroom hold much continuing fascination and I hope you enjoy exploration of them as much as I have.

For many, this is an area on my site to skip. For others, particularly those who know me, or may get to know me, it may give some insight into my approach to photography.

As a young person, in the 1960's, I was given a Kodak “Baby Brownie” camera and have some vague memories of (mostly out of focus and poorly composed--may apply to both the photographs and the memory) black and white photographs taken with that box. I suppose that was the beginning of my fascination with photographic imagery. I don’t remember conscious thought about photography during that period. Yet many memories of those times have combined to bring to my photography a point of view. My dad was an “outdoor sportsman” and had a background in forestry before turning to his chosen profession in engineering. When I was in the Boy Scouts, he helped me when I wanted to learn about trees. On occasion, I had the opportunity to accompany him when hunting, looking for mushrooms, or just hiking in the woods. I still remember a number of down river canoe trips and camping with the Boy Scouts. From the age of 11 on, I spent every summer living and working on a Vermont dairy farm owned by my aunt and uncle. My uncle was also an avid lover of the outdoors and I learned much about forestry, lumbering, and general outdoor stewardship from him, mostly while working or recreating on his nearly 400 acres of Vermont hardwood mountainside. While I would not label myself a “nature photographer,” it is pretty evident from my site that I lean strongly toward “nature-oriented” and outdoor subjects.

In 1976, while attending a small, rural college in Vermont, something brought the long latent interest in photography back to the surface. That it was a particularly introspective time in my life may have been a factor. That one of my favorite professors (ironically, not my favorite subject - math, but I ultimately took a computer programming course he taught, which was the start of my fascination with all things digital) was an avid photographer and was (and still is, currently) published in Vermont Life Magazine may have been a factor. That I was living in one of nature’s premiere natural “studios” probably was a big factor.

In any event, I found myself returning from a Christmas vacation in Michigan with my dad’s Asahiflex 35 mm camera, replete with 55 and 135 screw-in lenses, an assortment of filters, a General Electric hand held light meter, and some Kodachrome 25 film (which, for those old enough to remember, was measured, not in ISO, but ASA speed). Early results were ugly, but this equipment was probably the best learning tool I could find for the “mechanics” of photography. This camera was made prior to the Pentax Spotmatic and all its “progeny.” The lens had a ring that you turned wide open so you could see to compose and focus. Then, you turned it back down against the “stop” (I have always thought this is why they are referred to as f “stops”). If you forgot, you got nice “transparent” transparencies. When I purchased my first “automatic” camera (the only thing automatic about them was that they stopped down automatically when you tripped the shutter), I truly appreciated something technology had done for us.

I also learned that color transparency film is a very “unforgiving” medium. But again, that was a good thing, because it really taught me about exposure. There was just enough “forgiveness” in negative film that you could be sloppy with exposure, and possibly never realize it. Not with transparency film. If I were teaching a serious new photographer today, I would want them to start with an all manual camera and transparency film.

I began to learn a little something about composition, and perhaps more importantly, the outlook that however “good” the photographic result is, there is always something that can be done to make it “better.” When I finally got a couple slides I was really happy with, I proudly took them in to my “professor-mentor” to share my “success” with him. He said something to me that I have never forgotten and I try to use the same philosophy whenever I ask someone to critically review my work and whenever I review someone elses. He asked me if I wanted him to say nice things about them, or if he wanted me to give an honest critique? Taken somewhat aback, I immediately responded that I wanted critique. I had really learned something in that moment. If you want to get better at anything, you can have no “pride in authorship.” Everything you do should be subject to constructive critique and you must be willing to listen with an open mind. This doesn’t mean, in my view, that you always have to agree with the person giving the critique. That’s the beauty of art. We all have different likes and dislikes. But it does mean you must be open and willing to listen.

If you were wondering, he indeed found a number of things that could be improved about my photo. He patiently explained what his comments were and why. I have had the benefit of that from many others over the years, and always greatly appreciate it. How can you not learn from that? As far as I am concerned, everything on this site is fair game for such a view and I hope, from this experience, to learn even more, so I welcome comment. The professor’s name was John Knox, and the college was Vermont Technical College. I was 20 years old back then and he was probably 15-20 years my superior. I left VTC after a year to transfer to the University of Vermont, and lost contact with all my professors there. He was one of 2 or 3 that had a lasting impression on my life. This year (2009) I went "looking" for John on the internet and to my great pleasure found him to be still at VTC, still happily teaching and still successfully photographing (his work appears in the Winter issue of Vermont Life, 2009), and I am sure, still successfully motivating others. Thank you, John!

In 1980 and 1981, I was a “staff” photographer for the my College Newspaper and for the College Yearbooks. The best part of that experience was the time I was able to spend in the darkroom. I learned much about exposure there -- both in the camera, and later, in the darkroom. My darkroom experience was limited to B&W. For years afterward, I dreamed of the day I would have the time and money for my own color darkroom. Little did I know that when that day finally came around, my color darkroom would be digital and carried around in my briefcase!

From 1981 to 1984, I attended Law School in Washington, D.C., and for most of the time, the cameras (by then, I had “graduated from the Asahi, to a Canon T-1, and then "traded up” for two Nikon Nikkormat bodies with assorted lenses) were sophisticated door stops. I got married soon after graduating from law school, and my wife and I spent the next 10 years or so, trying to get traction in our careers, raising two children, and making “home improvements.” The cameras, unfortunately, mostly collected dust in the basement over those years.

In the early 1990's, the spirit re-awakened, and it was time for something “new.” I bought my first “auto-everything” SLR, a Nikon N6006, and began anew my self-study in photography. Almost twenty years prior, I had started my journey into “serious” photography. During that time, I picked up a little knowledge here and a little there, and was able create some reasonably nice photographs. While I understood the basic relationship of f-stops and shutter speed and ISO speeds of film, I really didn’t understand how it worked. I wasn’t familiar with things like “exposure latitude.” I truly didn’t understand depth of field, and the concept of hyperfocal distance was a new discovery. Other than the old, hackneyed idea of “keep the sun over your shoulder,” I didn’t really understand the concept of lighting. While most of my exposures were reasonably good, I really didn’t understand why my shot, for example, of a silver barn on a sunny, snowy day in Vermont came out underexposed! There was certainly plenty of sunlight. Using resource materials like the Bryan Peterson’s “Understanding Exposure,” John Shaw’s Books on Landscape and Nature Photography, books by Arthur Morris and Larry West, and materials from the New York Institute of Photography, I began to learn the basic fundamentals of photography in a much more technical way. I also read some books by and about Ansel Adams and began to see some of the nuances of exposure. These resources taught me about the benefit of early and late day light, and about the direction of light and how it affects the textures and colors in a photograph. They taught me the benefit of using flash (who would ever think that one of the most effective uses of flash is in broad daylight, often in bright, sunny conditions?). They taught me techniques to isolate my subject and ways to insure that the important parts of the photograph were properly exposed. Most of the work on this website (for a number of reasons) comes from this “era” of photography. I did have some “successes” in prior years and some of those may appear here in the future as I find the time and inclination to work them into my “digital darkroom” workflow.

At some point, it began to dawn on me that there was another medium out there that deserved my attention. At this point, I still did not feel that I could justify the expense of a “darkroom.” At the same time, the “personal computer revolution” was in full swing and both my wife and I used them daily in our careers. I had added a used Nikon F2 as a “backup” to my N6006. I eventually traded them for a new N90S. I later sold the N90S and bought an F100, Nikon’s top “pro-sumer” camera body at the time. I loved its build and performance. Its AF was crisp and it felt like a professional camera each time the shutter tripped. At that time, it was still all about the film bodies and “GM and Ford” (Nikon and Canon) were fully engaged in the next best body, as were all the other competitors.

Digital bodies cost several thousand dollars at that time. At first, Kodak was

the company marketing and selling them (Using primarily Nikon and Canon body parts and adding the electronic digital components). Those first bodies were mammoth (by today’s standards) and were in the 1-2 megapixel range! Eventually Nikon came out with its own D1 and (Canon, its counterpart. I have been “married” to Nikon since the 80's and have followed their branding more closely. Not a vote for Nikon or against Canon; just a matter of investment in accessories, and of familiarity). These cameras were still several thousand dollars. The real digital revolution snuck up on everybody in the form of consumer digital cameras. My wife and I bought our first digital point and shoot, a Canon with less than 2 megapixel capacity, after watching QVC one Sunday. When I purchased a film-based camera body, I knew that If I took good care of it, it would retain a fairly high resale value. I also knew that a 20-year old body, in good condition, would still be able to use all the new varieties of films and render the same images from those films as the top “flagship” film body from any manufacturer. We were unfortunately soon to learn that, like the personal computer, the same could not be said for digital cameras. I still have that first point and shoot, as well as one or two others. But what the consumer point and shoots did was continually and inexorably upgrade and eventually, made the “pro-style” 35 mm bodies (in film, “SLR” and now in digital “DSLR”) “affordable” for us hobbyists.

Not being ready to jump in with both feet, and not really being able to afford the first available DSLRs, my first “serious” digital camera was a Nikon Coolpix point and shoot that was capable 5 megapixels and was eventually capable of shooting in RAW format. While I discovered the great benefit to me of digital with this camera, its shutter lag and lack of controls made it ultimately too frustrating for me. What I was learning, though, was that I suddenly had what I had always wanted, my very own darkroom!

I had always been a color transparency shooter, and had graduated from my old standby, Kodachrome 25, to some of the newer emulsions offered by Fuji and Kodak. I still had a freezer full of film for a number of years after I no longer owned a film based body. But one of my real frustrations was being limited, both practically and economically, in the prints I could eventually get from these transparencies. And for many of us, it is still, ultimately, the print, matted, framed, and hung, that we are working toward. Unless you lived in a major metropolitan area, there were no custom labs. You could send your work to Kodak, but the ability to have custom work done was limited. And custom work like contrast masking, was expensive even when you could find someone to do it for you. Now, suddenly, I was able to “customize” my photos in the computer, and print them on an inexpensive inkjet printer right in my family room!

Of course, the industry has come huge strides since those early days, with archival inks and papers, and today, I have the capability of printing 13 x 19 prints which rival the quality of any traditional photographic print I ever had. And Photoshop has come from its rudimentary (amazing that I can say that, since even the first version of Photoshop contained so much mind boggling magic that I doubt any one person could ever take full advantage of what is in the program) beginnings to become an incredible and full-featured tool for photographers.

Finally, in early 2002, Nikon announced its first “prosumer” DSLR Body, the D100. By December, I had, with some trepidation (I knew that I would be “compromising” my F100 body, because the new D100 body was clearly not an F100 body with digital parts), packaged up my F100 and my Coolpix for trade in on the D100. I have never looked back!

At about the same time, I was going along a similar track in my knowledge of my “digital darkroom.” I started out with the Photoshop Elements Version that came bundled with my printer. I also began, as I do with almost everything that interests me, to read everything I could find on the subject. Over the years, I have read, from cover to cover, such tomes as “Real World Scanning and Halftones”, by Blatner, Fleishman and Roth, (prior to acquiring my digital cameras, I had already begun experimenting with scanning my slides), “Real World Color Management,” by Fraser, Murphy and Bunting, at least two versions of Real World Photoshop, by Bruce Fraser and David Blatner, Real World Image Sharpening, by Bruce Fraser, and Photoshop LAB Color, by Dan Margulis. I have also read and have in my library, several (perhaps) easier reading and shorter reference books like “Color Confidence” by Tim Grey, Photoshop Color Correction by Michael Kieran, Photoshop For Nature Photographers, by Tim Grey and Ellen Anon, Scott Kelby’s The Photoshop CS2 Book for Digital Photographers, and several other special purpose books on particular techniques.

The purpose of the above listing is not to establish any “pedigree” on my own part, but partly to give credit to these photographer-authors for sharing their considerable experience and expertise, and also to make the point that, like every other worthwhile endeavor in life, being facile with digital photography and particularly the digital darkroom requires a significant amount of homework and practice. You cannot simply “Photoshop” a mediocre or worse image (however captured) and make it a good one.

I soon found that the early version of Elements (and ultimately any version of Elements) was not robust enough a program to do the things I wanted to do with my images. I Finally purchased the full version (6, I believe) and have upgraded each time, to my current version, CS3. While I have been a Photoshop user for a number of years, now and read thousands of “how to” pages, I still have only scratched the surface on what can be done with the program. There are, of course, alternatives to Photoshop. However, I realized early on, that Photoshop is the industry standard, and wanted to be using that program.

I look forward to continuing to learn about digital imagery through study, practice in the field, and work in the digital darkroom. These days, I have begun experimenting with HDR photography.