Photographer Profiles

“My dad won a Nikon FM at a company-sponsored event when I was 12, and, the moment he handed the camera over to me, it was love at first sight,” Nels Akerlund recalls. Six months later, he’d built a darkroom in his basement and that love affair with photography has not abated. It carried him through the Rochester Institute of Technology, an internship with a White House photographer in the Reagan administration, and assignments for the National Geographic Society, The New York Times, and photo shoots worldwide. He shares this passion with his wife Anna, who is also his business partner and fellow shooter. Aside from weddings, Akerlund shoots architecture, food, small products, and of course portraits in his studio and on location. He and his wife operate a spacious, two-story, 2000-square-foot studio behind their home in Rockford, Illinois.

Jeffrey Totaro (www.jeffreytotaro.com) didn’t plan on becoming an architectural photographer. After graduating Drexel University in 1991, he became an architectural engineer. In his job, he found himself working alongside architectural photographers and was soon assisting them, until finally he found the allure too great and switched careers. Now he runs his own studio near Philadelphia.

An educator since the early 1960s, Jerry Uelsmann began assembling his photographs from multiple negatives decades before digital tools like Photoshop were available. Using as many as seven enlargers to expose a single print, his darkroom skills allowed him to create evocative images that combined the realism of photography and the fluidity of our dreams.

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Born in India in 1967, Subhankar Banerjee received a bachelor's degree in electrical engineering before moving to the US where he earned a master's degree in physics and computer science. He later accepted a job with Boeing in Seattle, Washington, and became a successful scientist. So why would he switch gears and devote himself to shooting pictures in Arctic...

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...

All photos by Bob Lilly

Most of us associate the name Bob Lilly with the legendary Dallas Cowboys player--one of football's former stars, immortalized in the Pro Football Hall of Fame. Coach Tom Landry has stated, "I've said this before and I'll say...

For over 30 years Petersen's Photographic Magazine has been recognized as the leading instructional magazine for photo enthusiasts. Our goal has been to inspire readers with dramatic imagery, and to offer clear and simple instructional articles to help photographers improve their skills.

To further this mission, we have created the Photographic Faculty; a team of seven...