Photographer Profiles

All photos by Ron Kimball

A veteran photographer of 25 years who specializes in automobiles and animals, Ron Kimball is possibly the most published calendar and poster photographer in the country. He markets his work through Ron Kimball Stock, which features over 500,000 of his...

Dutch photographer Scarlett Hooft Graafland is a nomadic photographer who travels the world in search of unique people and places to shoot. Whether she’s in the salt deserts of Bolivia, the Canadian Arctic, or on the remote island of Madagascar, Graafland’s goal is to merge with her surroundings and capture the local sights and culture in unique ways.

Tara Wray found a way to turn a personal dark cloud into a hope-filled ray of sunshine for thousands of others. A highly esteemed and award-winning filmmaker and photographer, Tara generously shares some images from her latest book, Year of the Beast, and answers some photography questions for Shutterbug.

Astrophotographer and professional astronomer Sergio Montufar makes some gorgeous images of starlit skies. And we thought the romantic image you see above, of Montufar proposing to his girlfriend beneath the Milky Way, would be a fitting shoutout to all our fans on Valentines Day.

Legendary celebrity photographer Terry O’Neill always wanted to be a jazz drummer. When he was 10 he made his own drum kit from cookie tins, and by the time he was 14 had quit school and was playing in jazz clubs with a local band. After a stint in the army, O’Neill thought he might get the chance to travel to the U.S. to play in clubs there if he worked as an airline steward. So he applied to what now is British Airways and was very surprised to be handed an Agfa Silette camera and told to take pictures of people around Heathrow airport.

He stands in about 3 feet of roiling surf, wetsuit jersey glistening from repeated dunkings. The sky above Oahu’s North Shore is deep blue. Undertow currents grasp his legs—eroding sand beneath his swim fins—as water rushes seaward to build the next huge wave. He holds his bulky waterproof camera housing tightly, faces west toward the setting sun and checks the long tether attached to his wrist. He turns his head to watch the wave rise ever higher—a towering blue-green monster that’s starting to curl, white spume blowing off its top. He braces himself as best he can against the forces raging around him, points the camera toward the golden Hawaiian sunset, and waits as tons of water begins to curl over him, forming a tube. At what he hopes is the right instant, he fires off several shots and prepares to be pounded and rag-dolled by the massive wave.

From the photos that Ben sent us prior to his graduation from Appalachian State with a degree in commercial photography, we were not surprised to learn that he grew up wanting to be a film director. “It was a big dream from the time I was a little kid,” he says. But when he got into photography, he found the still image had its own esthetic attractions, and practical advantages. “I can get my models to places I wouldn’t be able to get a film crew to,” Ben says, “and I’m able to create images that are visually more appealing than anything I can do on film right now.”