My love of the outdoors and landscape photography is indistinguishably entwined.  When I first started my journey into landscape photography, having a camera was a great excuse to get out and experience the awe inspiring Scottish landscape.  However, my early photographs were nothing more than record shots of the scene laid before me.  Now, through the development of my vision and camera craft, my photographs go beyond the literal, often revealing the hidden rhythms and nuances of the landscape.  Furthermore, my photographs are usually dynamic and graphic in nature and often encompass a passage of time rather than a moment in time.

More often than not the physical landscape is not the main subject of the photograph.  Intangible elements such as tone, mood, atmosphere, colour, contrast, time and suggestion are usually the main protagonists.  Once I have gone through the creative process to make a photograph, the end result is not a verbatim copy of the landscape.  It is not enough to replicate nature; the real art in landscape photography comes from the manipulation of nature through the use of composition, creativity and camera skills.  The resultant photographs transcend the literal. I have always thought it important to analyse and understand why and how we take photographs.  Such thoughts have led me to a comfortable place where I do not feel pressurised into making a photograph.  I am more than happy to leave the camera in the bag, safe in the knowledge that if a shot is to be made, it will find me.  This inevitably means slowing down and making fewer photographs.

Even though I happily make photographs of rural environs, ancient sites like castles and standing stones and even full on urban cityscapes my overriding passion is for the pure unsullied landscape, a landscape devoid of the apparent hand of man.  It is usually this discipline I indulge in when out making photographs for myself.

I have been making photographs for 5 years now.  Being based in the North East of Scotland has given me access to some of the most stunning and least known, photographically, coastal areas found anywhere in Scotland or the UK (especially the Moray Coast).  However, having grown up on the West Coast the highland glens, majestic mountains and alluring islands insatiably tug at me to return.

Over the last 5 years my journey into photography has encountered much success.  I was the principal photographer for the highly successful book “The Lost City, Old Aberdeen” which will soon go to a second edition.  I have also been commended in recent LPOTY and SWPA competitions as well as winning ‘Photographer of the Year’ in 2009 and 2010 in the world’s largest Whisky festival – The Spirit of Speyside.  My photographs have also appeared in magazines and newspapers including Scottish Field, Amateur Photographer, Practical Photography, Outdoor Photography and TGO (The Great Outdoors).

Published Books

• The Lost City, Old Aberdeen
• The East Highland Way Guidebook
• The Moray Coast Trail

Award Book Appearences

• Sony World Photography Awards Book 2009
• UK Landscape Photographer of the Year Collection 3