I’ve been actively involved in photography in various capacities for more than two decades. The beginning of my photographic journey probably sounds familiar to anyone who’s ever picked up a camera. Many years ago, I was struggling to take “good” pictures of my newborn son with a brand spanking new three megapixel point and shoot. Having never taken an interest in photography previously, I was literally starting from scratch. If you can pardon a horrendous pun, thankfully something “clicked” for me.

Because I’m a computer guy at heart, having the ability to reverse engineer the shutter speed, aperture, and ISO from the exif info baked into each photo from my fancy Nikon Coolpix 4500 was a godsend. Digging into the digital files of each shot sent me down a path of experimenting with the various settings on my camera in attempts to emulate the kind of photography I admired.

Bringing out the beauty in the everyday.

In short order, I was making photos of just about anything that crossed my path; flowers, toys, waterfalls, rust, and yes, several thousand frames of my growing family. My interest in shooting a wide range of subjects continues to this day. Whether I’m photographing food, junkyards, unique personalities, or the pastoral scenes of Lancaster County, almost every subject area speaks to me in different and engaging ways. I’m particularly drawn to details and vibrant colors and try to focus on revealing the beauty in commonplace objects and settings.

Everyone can get better, especially me.

One of the great things about being involved in photography is the wealth of freely available information. Because of this unprecedented amount of sharing, everyone has an excellent opportunity to improve their own photography in ways that are most interesting to them. Since I learned (and continue to learn) so much from these types of sources, I’ve been blessed to have some opportunities to give back some of the knowledge I’ve picked up along the way. For many years that took the form of leading the Lancaster County Photography Meetup Group. Established more than 10 years ago, the meetup group has grown to an organization of more than 1000 members that puts on roughly 30 events annually, most of which are free of charge.

What did I look at before I saw the light?.

I will be forever grateful that photography found me. It has given me an outlet for my visual creativity, connected me with amazing friends, and opened my eyes to a world that I was missing before I started looking for how well it was lit.