I'm a working professional, and don't take the whole Flickr thing too seriously - as you can tell by my sparse uploads. I do appreciate people's comments though, and hope my comments on others' work is appreciated too.

Why do I do what I do...?

"Sensitive people faced with the prospect of a camera portrait put on a face they think is the one they would like to show to the world … Very often what lies behind the facade is rare and more wonderful than the subject knows or dares to believe."

Irving Penn - 1975

The long and the short of it is that photography is my way of showing people the world through my eyes. We all have such different perceptions of the world and I find a certain beauty in being able to capture a 'moment' - whether that moment is 1/1,000th of a second or a few minutes.

The shots we take are a culmination of a lifetime's experiences, all of them leading to that second when we fire the shutter, consigning that moment to the permanence of film or a memory card.

I believe there's beauty in everything, which is why I refuse to retouch my portrait shots. We live in a world where the fashion and cosmetics industries have presented a false image of what 'beauty' is, and I have no wish to proliferate the expectation that men and women are flawless. Our lines, wrinkles, curves and blemishes make us who we are, and tell the story of our journey through life - a person holds no interest to me or my lens if they have no tale to tell.

Oh, and in spite of all that serious stuff above, I do love taking photos...