photo.net Interview: David Julian

Our second featured interview in the photo.net interview series is with David Julian, a pictorial photographer in Seattle, WA .

Background

David Julian works as a professional photographer, illustrator, designer and teaches annually at the Santa Fe Workshops. Working as an artist in related fields, David creates images for galleries and private collectors as well as illustrations for print and multimedia companies.

The Interview

Photo.net met up with David and asked him a few questions.

1. Tell us about your experiences getting started as a professional photographer.

   I began as most folks did in photography's pre-automatic days, by using a simple manual camera to record where I went and what features I liked there. I was quite shy and therefore avoided photographing people. I stuck to shooting macros, as I am a very detail-oriented person and love insects and other natural fauna. As I began to take the camera camping and on road trips, I added landscapes to my repertoire, keeping the best landscape photographers' work in mind to measure myself against. I also drew ideas and made notes of images I wanted to find. I trained myself to see more graphically, and learned to use the camera's features to obtain the results I desired.

   

   As I loved rich color and deep saturation, I shot only color slide film and louped or projected the results for friends. That grew as a source for critical praise and feedback, helping me see what worked or what didn't in my images. It also gave me lots of personal confidence- something I lacked in my younger days. I never got around to taking any photography courses, preferring to remain self-taught and largely un-influenced by any mentors. I therefore never optically printed my own black and white images, as most learning photographers did.

   I went to Trinidad in 1982 and Venezuela in 1984 for vacation, and fell in love with the tropical rainforests there. They excited my spirit and revealed a plethora of endless opportunities, both for personal explorations and for documenting a threatened environment. I made several trips back to the tropics over the next few years using every bit my staff job's vacation time. I began to market my tropical rainforest images locally, and created a traveling slideshow and wall exhibit, which donated to the Rainforest Alliance in NYC for use in conservation education and their fundraising efforts. That launched an avenue for funding my trips and writing off my expenses at tax time. It was a win-win situation for both of us.

   Since then, I've steadily added many thousands of images of nature, landscapes and experimental images to my files, choosing to remain semi-professional, in that I do not consider Photography to be my main business. It is mostly a personal pursuit and an integral part of my full-time profession as an illustrator and designer. This arrangement takes the pressure off of having to make 100% of my living at photography and possibly losing that personal freedom to shoot or not to shoot when I am motivated to capture what is before me. It also allows me to express myself in other ways that photography cannot fulfill. I could have easily gone full-time pro and become an environmental photographer or fine-art photographer, but my interest in illustration, design and financial stability veered me away from that at the time. I probably also felt that the commercial pressure would make my photography less than always enjoyable, which it now definitely is.

2. What advice would you have for other photographers who are considering becoming professional?

   My advice to beginning photographers is to first forget about the endless miasma of technical details of today's devices and train your eye to respond to and compose your favorite subjects. Learn to listen to your inner impressions and to make the kind of pictures YOU want to make, rather than emulate the scenes made by others. Become the filter in front of the lens, as a decision-maker and an artist. Where ever you go or whatever you shoot, endeavor to find a personal way of interpreting what you see. Experience your subjects without a camera first, making mental or written notes as to what you find interesting or moving. Allow yourself to react emotionally and artistically before reacting technically. Enjoy this simplicity as you learn how to make better images. Then, as you thoroughly learn your camera's technical features and how it manipulates and captures light, you will instinctively make more personally "filtered" images and not as many artless recordings. Take courses in composition and "seeing" if you need to. Study paintings, watercolors or other art to cross-train you aesthetic mind to see beyond physical reality. I spent a lot of time studying the early landscape painters to learn about light and composition. Later, I also studied the images of advertising photographers like Pete Turner and Eric Meola; compositional masters David Meunch, Richard Misrach, Walker Evans and Wynn Bullock; and conceptual masters Jerry Uelsmann, William Eggelston and Man Ray.

   My advice to advanced amateur photographers about to go professional is to work for a few excellent photographers who's work you admire, and to learn how they operate a business. I lacked that useful stage of development, and it made it harder on me without it. Don't hesitate to call someone nearby that you admire and be straight with them about your idea. Most won't bite - they like the admiration and recall how they got help early on. Be prepared to put yourself second, and offer the mentor your utmost. THAT will pay off for sure. Read PDN (PhotoDistrictNews) and other PRO pubs to keep abreast of legal issues and trends. Learn NOT to sell your work without proper compensation and rights control. Join or study ASMP, ASPP, or other industry organizations and their literature. Attend meetings and parties and above all, have some FUN as you learn.

3. Do you prefer working with digital or film cameras? Why?

   I prefer film cameras at this time, as I require a lot of dependable image quality and love to edit film on a light box with a high-quality loupe. I also feel that film offers a more stable platform for professional reproduction at this present time, and at a reasonable cost. I must add however, that a well-featured digital camera with manual setting options is a very useful and speedy tool for learning composition and experimenting with spontaneity. Digital images can also be immediately judged and edited, speeding up the learning process. Although you can see all of your shoot on the computer, I still love the sheer joy of first seeing my images days after they were created. It's like unwrapping a visual present. Someday, when digital cameras are as fully-featured, reasonably priced and of the same quality as film cameras, I will go totally digital. But even then, I will never discard my 3x5-foot light box and my Schneider loupe!

4. Can you tell us about your technical process.

   Ooh, that's a tough one. I use many processes, depending on my desired results. I use optical printing, digital printing and manipulation in roughly equal amounts. I use traditional cameras and a few home-made ones as well (my Kaputski is a modified 1966 Pentax 67 with a Russian projector lens on it) . I always take a photograph as if there were no digital tools available, but sometime later use the computer to "digitally darkroom" the image to its full potential. I am extremely facile in Photoshop, yet I limit most of my manipulations to those that also exist in the optical darkroom realm. I do this to insure that my photographs stay as Photography, and that my illustrations remain as Illustration. That's purely a personal issue, and a commercial one at this time. That could change as perceptions change. I reject photographers that use digital imaging to "create" scenes that they did not actually find in nature. That does not apply to enhancement or retouching imperfections out. I just dislike unartistic and obvious fakery that tries to depict reality.

5. Can you tell us about your creative process.

   As I stated above, I employ a very inner-focused approach. I also go into a receptive, almost meditative state when I first arrive at a scene. I use all five senses to learn about my subject. The smell of a dewy wheat field, the taste of seaside air, the texture of a new leaf and the gurgle of a creek all lead me to better interpret my reactions to a particular lace. Even the smell of rubber and gasoline has helped my shoot portraits of classic autos! One can only imagine what it was like when I used to shoot nudes... but that's another story entirely.

6. What about photography captivates your interest?

   Photography allows me to re-live my travels, share my artistic vision and enhance my spiritual connection to this planet. It may sound cliché, but it's all true. Through photography I notice incredible details and the effects of time better than without it. I see what most folks miss, and I record them as well. I also pre-visualize some of my images and then set out to hunt it down and capture it. That often happens years later!

What do you want to photograph that you've not yet shot?

I want to learn how to photograph people as a journalist does- developing a connection with them as I do with nature. That may also increase my repertoire and add dimension to my life.

For more information about David Julian visit his website