How I became an Architectural Photographer

There’s an old saying “A man should do what he loves, or what he does best. If they are one and the same, then he truly is blessed.”

Recently I have been asked about how I got started in photography and how I came to choose architecture and interior design photography as my specialty. Here is the short version of the story.

In 1987 in Denver, CO I was in business with my father building custom upholstered and finished wood furniture to the trade. One day while cutting the back panel for an Armoire  on the table saw I almost cut the fingers off of my right hand, twice.

I realized that all the guys who had been doing this work for very long all had severe injuries to their hands, some missing several fingers, or worse. I shut down the saw and never turned it back on.

It was early April and I realized I needed to find a job, but hadn’t interviewed in years. I looked through the classified ads and saw an ad for a photographer with no experience required. I thought this would be an opportunity to refresh my interviewing skills. Much to my surprise I was hired, despite never having picked up a camera before in my life.

The job was to travel around the hinterlands of Colorado, Wyoming, Montana, Idaho, Utah and New Mexico taking pictures of babies in K-mart department stores.

The job was great. I got to drive around the mountain states all summer long  spending a week in medium sized backwater towns. I got paid a decent wage and a reasonable per diem. I had a great summer and realized I loved photography but hated the job of shooting babies. I knew I had found my calling in life and set out to turn this summer job into a lifelong career.

As the seasons changed I realized that making a living driving on back mountain roads during the winter was not a good idea. So I quit, returned to Denver and found employment in a one hour photo labs, which used to be an ubiquitous  feature of every mall, large and small throughout the United States. This particular lab, Moto-Photo, had several photographic manuals for sale. These were books on how to take pictures such as, The Joy of Photography, Fashion & Portrait Photography, etc… The manual that caught my attention was “Photographing Buildings Inside and Out” by Norman McGrath. One look at the photographs Mr. McGrath created and I knew this was what I wanted to do. Before getting half way through the book I had decided I was going to be an architectural photographer and dedicated all my energy and efforts towards achieving that one goal.

I spent the next five years shooting small jobs for realtors and home builders while working in various photo labs both one hour retail labs and large commercial photo labs. I did this to build a strong foundation of experience in the background of the photographic processes and to pay the rent.

I worked as an assistant for another architectural photographer, Thorney Lieberman, for a brief time. My plan was to work with Thorney for a couple of years to gain experience and supplement my income, but one night we were both very tired and Thorney told me I was better at this than he was. I was shocked to hear this. I had a lot of respect for Thorney, he was a good shooter and I felt he knew what he was talking about when it came to photography. I decided that I should strike out on my own right away.

Finally on March 13, 1992 I struck out on my own and became a full time, professional, self employed architectural photographer and have been loving it ever since.

It is surprising that architectural photography is the one field where I can apply all of my past experience as a carpenter, electrician, machinist, upholsterer, cabinet maker and business owner. I tell people I am lucky to have found my calling in life and now you know why.

It’s been twenty-three years and each day I wake up excited and anxious to get to work. There’s nothing I would like to do more than spend every single day of my life creating beautiful images. It’s what I do, it’s what I am all about.