I was born in North Devon in an era of slow pace and British beach holidays … of ice creams sold wrapped in paper, pop bottles that had a deposit to claim when you returned them and memories of going to school smelling of Vick menthol rub.
From about the age of eight I can remember taking my Fathers old Kodak folding camera and composing pictures of people and seascapes in its upside down view finder, amazingly more than 50 years on that old camera is still in my possession.
From those early days the seed of photography was sown and it has brought me through many transitions.
At the end of the 60’s I was a surfer so my love was for taking surfing pictures, with so few photographers around at the time the results were unique and resulted in images being published in magazines both here and abroad.
In 2011 the early surfing images became a focus of interest again as a social record this time with some pictures being printed in a national surfing magazine and also in a book about the history of surfing in the UK.
I still take surfing photographs but as my wife and I live only a mile from the Exmoor park boundary I have gone more frequently there for the variety of opportunities it offers with its red deer herds and wonderful moorland and coast which is why this site has been created … please enjoy … “Images Of Exmoor” … and beyond!
Inspirations
I get asked from time to time who inspires me to take photographs and who’s work do I most admire.
I don’t actually think I am inspired by anyone, yes I see pictures that are beautiful and well executed but they themselves do not inspire me to go and emulate what I have seen necessarily.
Back in 2006 I was talking to an old surfing friend who I have known since the 1970’s and he said to me after viewing some of my (then) latest pictures “you see things differently to everyone else” and I suppose the answer lies right there in that statement … I am my own inspiration.
As for who I admire well that has to be Sally Mann whose fabulous black and white images have stayed with me since the first time I saw them.
She has been criticised by many for the pictures she took of her children for her third collection “Immediate family” but the images are superbly executed and for me anyway speak of childhood and remind me of my own back in a more peaceful and innocent time.
Equipment
It seems that no photographers background is complete without the list of paraphernalia that in some way is seen as a window into his soul.
It is true that a good photographer can take a brilliant picture with a cheap camera but the fact still remains that the cheaper the camera the more limited your options are in respect of lens choice, filters etcetera. Also the brilliant picture from the cheap camera will not blow up well and will more as like be a jpeg file as well, that’s fine if you’ve got a picture you took last week of Elvis, Lord Lucan and Princess Di eating in Mc Donalds Leicester square because it will make you a fortune even if its noisy and with shallow depth of field but it won’t cut the mustard if you are doing landscapes for a living. So what do I use? … All my adult life … from about 1965 on I have been a Nikon man to the bone and its no good talking to me about other makes as at best they will only equal Nikon. I have … one D2X body, it used to be two but I totally trashed one in 2011 … two D3X bodies … one 14-24mm Nikkor lens … one 24-70mm Nikkor lens … one 105mm Micro Nikkor lens … one 70-200mm Nikkor lens … one 300mm Nikkor lens … one 600mm Nikkor lens and a van load of filters and other “must have” items … well it seemed that I must have them at the time! Holding it all up out of the heather is a Manfrotto carbon fibre tripod or if I am at the beach with the 600mm lens I use a Manfrotto studio tripod which is built like the Golden Gate bridge. My philosophy in the choice of camera equipment is simple … I have bought the very best you can buy so that if the result is inferior it is my fault and mine alone, there is no way I can blame my cameras!
