An Introduction to my Photography

I have always been fascinated with the lens. Even as a kid, I used to get creative with the camera, photographing my toy dinosaurs. Searching for that perfect angle to make them look bigger and more real than they actually were. As an adult, I strayed away from stills photography for a while and took up filmmaking as a career. It was here I worked as a cinematographer and got to apply those early learnings to moving images.

As my film career moved more into post-production, I found my desire to get back into still photography growing. I purchased my first digital SLR camera and discovered a new freedom being able to take as many shots as I liked with no extra expense. It wasn't long before I had a library of thousands of photos of everything I came across.

The one aspect of photography that I always found disappointing was the reality. Even though this is what many photographers seek, I always found it bland and lacking emotion. When seeing something with our eyes, it is filtered through a lifetime of memories and emotions. This is why everyone sees things differently. When taking a photo, especially with a raw digital camera, there is only the emotionless reality of the moment.

By using software like Adobe Lightroom and Photoshop, I am able to reintroduce the filter of my emotions and experiences, to capture what I was feeling about the image at the time I took it. Sculpting the light, finessing the colours, infusing emotion. I want others to experience emotion when they look at my work.

I am in love with the purity and beauty of the natural world, even when at first glance, there may be ugliness, decay and destruction. I am a firm believer that there is beauty in everything. Sometimes you just have to shift perspective slightly to see it.

James Cole