Where am I?

I had a lovely paragraph about how I got here. Mostly I just miss my wife, lost to cancer and am rebuilding my life without her. Scouting has taken a big part of that space now, where I’m Venture section lead with 26th Galway Kilcoona. I’m part of Scouting Ireland’s Pioneering Team. I’ve also been camp chief twice for Ardán, a Western Province camp for pioneering.

Background

I've been shooting for over 25 years now, beginning right at the start of Digital photography as we know it. I started with a film SLR though, and began with Black and White photography, processing my own film in the darkroom. That doesn't mean much, it's just where I began. I'd truly love to do tintypes and wet plate now though. I have done a course in Wet Plate in the Gallery of Photography. I’ve even bought an Intrepid 4X5 large format camera and a 240mm Schnider lens. Maybe it’ll happen this year.

I started photography with Band work. I've shot a bunch of CD covers for a number of bands, as well as loads of promo and live band work. I've shot music videos-pretty basic ones, and I've done courses on documentary video. I'm starting to shoot more video as personal work too.

I'm widowed and live in a ground floor apartment surrounded by flower planters with my son Matt. For my photography work, I shoot commercial work mostly, from product, to property, to portraits.

Stuff I do/did

I was an official Fujifilm X-Photographer. I have been for a few years. I love the system. I'm an Adobe Community Professional for Lightroom. I wrote my first book ‘Photoshop Lightroom Made Easy’ for PIP way back in 2009. This was based on running Lightroom Blog. I also wrote Essential Development, an ebook for Craft and Vision which went through version for Lightroom 4 and 5. I updated this for Lightroom 13, and am do an extensive rewrite with the newer masking system and AI additions. My most recent print book is 'The Indispensable Guide to Lightroom CC' for Rocky Nook, but it’s well out of date now.

I was a regular columnist for Kelbyone’s Photoshop User/LightroomMagazine for 15 years. I’ve been writing for Digital Camera World Magazine for over 10 years, with a small break during the pandemic. I write opinion pieces for their website as well. I also wrote for Digital Photography School, which formally finished with Covid-19. I’m a regular speaker for both The Lightroom Conference and The Lightroom Summit.

I've been published in Acoustic, Bass Magazine, Photoshop User, Layers, Prudence, Galway Now, Hot Press, Flawless, The Thin Air Magazine among others, along with Sunday Independent Life, The Examiner's Weekender magazine, Sunday Business Post, RSVP magazine, The Sunday World, The Sun, The Mirror and The Star. I also did a stint with the Galway Independent, mostly shooting the Set List page, and a few news stories for good measure. I worked as a club photographer for Carbon Nightclub in Galway for over 3 years.

I’ve gotten awards and nominations for awards throughout my photo career, and if you want to know them, I’ll tell you, but really, you don’t care anyway. Some of them are hanging in my studio, some are in boxes somewhere. I think I prefer the front covers on the walls to be honest.