I Did Everything Wrong (And That’s Why It Worked)

Let’s get one thing out of the way: I have zero formal photographic education. Zip. Zilch. Nada. Never sat in a classroom with a professor who wore a turtleneck and talked about "leading lines" while projecting a photo of a chair in dramatic lighting. I didn’t learn to shoot by reading manuals or taking notes—I learned by breaking every rule the photo world holds sacred… and honestly? I’d do it all again.

📸 Age 4: First Contact

I picked up a camera for the first time when I was four years old. Not in some cute, “smile for Mommy” way—but in a “what happens if I press this button while the dog’s mid-pee” kind of way. It was a little plastic thing, probably covered in peanut butter. But the spark was there. Fast forward to first grade, and I somehow inherited my mom’s Nikon film camera after she signed up for a photography class and realized she was pregnant so couldn't take it —thanks, bro— and she never touched it again. Dad handed it to me like a sacred torch (a very heavy, confusing torch), and I was obsessed. I didn’t know what aperture was, but I liked spinning the dial and pretending I did. Autofocus? I’m pretty sure I thought that meant “just get close enough and pray.”

🎓 Education? Never Heard of Her.

No classes. No certifications. I didn’t even know the “exposure triangle” was a thing until I’d been charging people money for wedding photos. By the time I realized there were rules, I had already broken all of them and gotten published for it. So. Instead of learning how to "properly" shoot, I just… shot. I shot everything. Overexposed? Yep. Crooked horizons? You bet. Blurry? Sometimes. But guess what? Emotion trumps perfection. I’d take a slightly soft shot with real feeling over a sterile textbook-perfect image any day.

🎞️ Tech Talk (Just to Prove I Know Stuff Now)

Let’s get nerdy for a second, because I do know my gear—now.

I shoot on a Nikon D750 (and a D7000 that’s been through hell and still works). My go-to lenses are a 35mm f/1.8 for that delicious creamy bokeh and intimacy, and a 70-200mm f/2.8 when I want to stalk people from a distance like a socially awkward hawk. I shoot in RAW, I edit exclusively in Lightroom, and I will die on the hill that clarity and dehaze are the most abused sliders in digital history.

I love backlight, lens flare, and a slightly too-high ISO because I’m not afraid of grain—grain is texture, and texture is story. My white balance is usually "wing it and fix it later," and sometimes my best shots happen when I accidentally knock my camera into a weird mode and panic-click the shutter.

💡 Dad Knew, I Didn’t

My dad always saw it. He told me I had “the eye,” but I assumed he was being dad-ish—like when they say you’re the fastest kid on the playground when really you're just winded and dramatic. But then in college, a friend looked at one of my photos and said, “You need to do this. For real.” And something clicked. That was the moment I started to believe it might be more than a hobby or a coping mechanism.

💍 From ‘I Do’ to ‘What If?’

I started with weddings and portraits—because if you can survive a wedding day with a stressed-out bride, crying flower girl, and drunk uncle hitting on you, you can survive anything. I loved the emotion, the chaos, the pressure. But then someone casually mentioned art fairs. “You should try one.” So I did. I packed up prints, paid a booth fee, and went to my first fair. Didn’t sell a single thing. Not one. But I was hooked. Something about standing next to my work and watching people look at it—really look at it—was magnetic. That was the moment I decided to be an artist, not just a photographer.

🎨 Built on Mistakes, Fueled by Curiosity

I built my career on mistakes, quick snaps, and getting lost (both literally and creatively). I wander. I shoot before I think. I chase light like a sleep-deprived moth. I’ve tripped over tree roots, snuck into abandoned buildings, and climbed into questionable ditches all in pursuit of the shot. The ones that move you? They’re rarely the ones you planned. I’ve had moments where my camera battery died mid-shoot, where I forgot my SD card, where I shot an entire series slightly out of focus and still fell in love with it. That’s the magic. Not perfection—but presence. Surprise. Authenticity. A little chaos.

So No, I Don’t Do It “Right”

I never learned the rules, so I never had to unlearn them. My art comes from instinct, from emotion, from screwing up and somehow landing in the exact right place. It’s a little bit light, a little bit shadow, and a whole lot of sarcasm.

And honestly?

That’s the manifesto.