Note: The following is an interview of a friend of mine from Sheridan, WY.  Continue reading to learn more about his work and why he got started in photography.

How did you start with photography?  When?

When I was 13, I expressed interest to my dad about his photographic work from his college days, how he made the photos, what he used and such.

He gave me his old Olympus OM-1 SLR camera and taught me how to use it. I learned everything he knew about photography, and I absorbed it like a sponge.

After that, I was hooked. I have been practicing and learning photography ever since.

Why photography?

I have always been an artist. I have also been fascinated with science and technology, and I love gadgets. I guess that the creative aspects of photography appealed to me because it is a combination of art, science, and cool toys, lol!

Title: Abend Ruhiger (Evening Calm)
Lake McDonald, Glacier National Park
Gallery link: http://sheelyphoto.com/p204447745

Do you have any formal education in photography?

I have not yet had any formal education on the subject of photography.

I have been mostly self-taught, apart from the training I had from my dad and fellow photographers. I have had the privilege of being exposed to some excellent teachers that come to Sheridan via the business that I work for.  I never miss a learning opportunity if I can help it!

What kind of photography do you do?  Why?

I do mostly Landscapes, some portraits and random street photography. Basically,  I only photograph stuff that interests me. I try not to let photography become a burden for the sake of photography.  If I am not interested in the subject, I find it very hard to care enough to do anything with the photo after it is taken.

Untitled.
Burned forest just outside of Glacier National Park.
Gallery Link: http://sheelyphoto.com/p797764006

Any type of photography you want to try but haven’t yet?

I would love to do more star photography. I have only dabbled in it and I’m fascinated with it.  I would also like to convert a camera to infrared to try doing more IR photography. I love the look of black and white photos that are shot using IR.

What equipment do you use?  Your favorite piece of equipment?

Right now I am using a Nikon D80 DSLR, Nikon FE SLR, Yashica D, Yashica GSN, Holga 120N, and my DROIDX phone for photography purposes. My favorite camera is my Nikon D80, it is my primary camera that is the most flexible and produces the best results. The film cameras are just for fun (or maybe to prove to myself that I can still use them) and of course the phone is on me all of the time, so it is good for spontaneous stuff.

What inspires you? Who inspires you?

I am amazed by the talent that is seen from photographers today. I am always being inspired and challenged when I pick up a photo magazine, or stumble upon something on flickr or 500px.com.  There are many local photographers and friends that have inspired me as well. It is always edifying to talk to a fellow photographer about the intricacies, and philosophies of photography, or to just complain about it!

Title: Splash
Macro shot of water drops.
Gallery link: http://sheelyphoto.com/p506200864

Any photographers you admire?  Why?

As a landscape photographer, I am inspired by Ansel Adams, I love his work – but I do not want to try to be like Ansel -  rather, I want to be inspired and learn from his work so that I can hone in on my photographic skills and vision.

I also appreciate Rick Sammon, who is a Canon Explorer of Light, and a very good teacher. His books have been a huge help for me with my endeavors of venturing into photographic areas that I am not entirely comfortable with: namely portraits and weddings.

Where do you want your photography to take you?

Across the world, I hope. I want to be able to travel, photograph, and have my photos pay off to fund more trips. This is wishful thinking, I know – but it is my dream nonetheless.

What do you want your viewers to take away from your work?

I am not trying to make a statement or wanting to change the world through images. I do not want my photography to define who I am, but to show people how I see things, and what they mean to me, and how certain images speak to me. Maybe some of my images will speak to the viewer, maybe not. That is not my ultimate goal, but it is very satisfying to know that people enjoy my work, or are inspired by it as well.

I am not going to be the great renowned photographer, but maybe I can be a humble photographer that is granted to be at the right place, at the right time, and have the presence of mind to remember to look through the camera and click.

Any last words?

Photography is ultimately just recording that which already exists. I am not creating anything new, I am just merely capturing a glimpse of it and doing my best to convey it to others.

There are many beautiful things in this world, most of which I take for granted.  We all do to some extent. We need to learn to see the very things that are right under our noses. Things that we are too busy to bother ourselves with, that we drive by everyday; things that we need to slow down in order to appreciate.

That said, I have learned to walk out of the door without my camera and enjoy a long walk.

I think that we can improve ourselves as photographers by learning to stop seeking grand things to rape with our cameras and to start looking for small things to appreciate without them. That is when you start to appreciate photography for what it really is, because cameras can actually become a hindrance to a photographer’s vision, when we are looking at our camera more than we are looking through our cameras. Like our own human eyes; we do not look at our eyes, but we look through them. Without our eyes we are not able to see, but our eyes are not even aware of themselves.  Likewise, with the photographer,  he must learn to see with his own eyes and not allow the camera to obscure his vision. He can only hope that the camera is up to the task to mimic what he sees.

All images shown are copyright by Justin Sheely and are used with permission.  You can read more about Justin and view more of his work here:

Website: http://sheelyphoto.com/
Blog: http://sheelyphoto.blogspot.com/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/pages/SheelyPhoto/182356141838423

What do you think of Justin’s work?  How do you feel about his philosophy of being a photographer?  Let us know by leaving a comment below!

Here’s the first entry of my new project, The Phoenix Light Rail Series.  (I may change the name if I can come up with something catchy!)

I’m going to be documenting life on the light rail here in Phoenix over the next month or so.  It doesn’t matter the time of day or night or the day of the week, there are always people commuting back and forth using the public transit.  And there are always unique characters, each in his or her own little world, to be seen.

Having a project like this has helped me stay focused while out shooting.  No longer am I just wandering around aimlessly hoping to get a good shot.  (Although sometimes just wandering is fun too!)

I have to thank Eric Kim of Eric Kim Photography for his blog post about starting a personal project.  Thank you!

So here’s the first image, titled “Cookie Monster”.

So what has this done?  It’s made me extremely tired!  I get home and still have a couple of hours of work, (we have laptops), and then it’s bed.  I feel like I’m letting you guys down by not posting very often.  But I want you to know that I truly appreciate the loyalty and understanding you have given me.  And I promise to try and post more in the future.  It may end up being only a couple times a week, but I really need to start doing it.

I’ve gone out a few times on the weekend to shoot the streets.  (This job is Monday-Friday, which is nice!)  And I’m in the process of processing those photos.  Come to think of it, I have a roll of 120 I need to pick up!

As a matter of fact, just last weekend, I met up with a guy who was in town from Chicago, Tyler Bedgood.  He contacted me through my blog here and we met in Phoenix and then headed to Mill Ave.  Mill has a lot more people and is always a good place to get some shots!  He’s a great guy and I highly recommend you check out his blog.

So I’ll leave you with this, my place of work.  It looks so tropical from the outside!  And until the next time, which will hopefully be sooner rather than later, keep snapping that shutter!

Today I thought I’d share a little information on Zone Focus and the Olympus E-PL3.  Just recently, within the last few months, I switched from using a Canon Digital Rebel XT to the Olympus PEN E-PL3.  This was mainly because I wanted a smaller camera for street photography, but still have the freedom to switch lenses.  So far it’s been great.

But, I also like using the Zone Focus technique while wandering the streets of Phoenix.  And that’s where I ran into somewhat of a hurdle.

You can’t really zone focus using the 14-42mm kit lens for the PEN as there are no distance or aperture markings.  But I did get a lens adapter so that can use my manual lenses.  This allows me to use the Zone Focus technique, at least sort of.

I say that because being that the PEN has a Micro 4/3 sensor the actual settings are going to be off.  Now there are forums that get into the technical details about this, which I won’t go into here.  (Truthfully, I don’t really understand it anyway!)  But I still wanted to know where my focus was at different distances.

So, being the scientist that I am, I conducted some loose experiments to try and figure this out.  They aren’t by any means spot-on-accurate, but they’re close enough for me to get out there and shoot without being afraid of the shot coming out too blurry.

To get started, here’s the photo equipment that I used:

• Olympus PEN E-PL3
• Fotodiox MD-m4/3 Lens Adapter
• Vivitar 28mm 2.5 Lens

I chose this lens because the crop factor for the PEN is basically 2.  This means multiplying the 28mm lens by 2 gives me a 56mm lens.  So I wanted to start as wide as possible so I wasn’t getting to much zoom.  If I used my 50mm I would basically be using a 100mm.  Make sense?  Probably not the best explanation but you get my point.

Also, using a manual lens means that you don’t control the aperture automatically.  You have to choose your aperture on the lens itself.  Therefore, I chose Shutter Priority and set it at 1/320, which is what I like to shoot in the street…..most of the time.  So I set the aperture to f11.  I also had it on automatic ISO so the camera would determine the best ISO for the situation.  No big deal here.

For my first set of shots, I set the focus to 5 feet.  According to the distance scale on the lens everything between about 3.5 feet to 10 feet should be in focus.  (Remember above I mentioned this isn’t necessarily accurate.  But we’ll see.)  The following images are from different distances using the exact same settings.  I chose not to do a 100% crop because for my purposes I will never need to blow it up that large.  For what I do, this is just fine.  (Oh, and please ignore any dog crap you see!  The kids haven’t been out there to clean it up and I was tip-toeing around like in a mine field!)

At 3 feet the focus is a bit off.  But I don’t get that close to my subjects anyway, so it doesn’t matter.  At 5 and 10 feet the focus was pretty good.  Good enough for my liking and I think images posted on the Internet would look just fine.

These next shots I rotated the focus ring so that the infinity mark was at f11.  At this setting, everything from about 4.5 feet to infinity should be in focus.  Was it?  Let’s take a look!

Again, at 4.5 feet the focus was a bit off at 100% crop.  But the image above isn’t all bad.  And also at 40 feet the focus was off a little.

Now before anyone starts bitching about how this wasn’t done “properly” or the measurements weren’t exact, street photography isn’t an exact science.  But what I found was that I probably won’t be getting any closer than 10-15 feet away from any subject with this camera/lens setup.  Why?  Because closer than 15 feet and I won’t be able to get an entire 6-foot person into view.  And I like shooting the environment around people in the street.  So for what I do, setting my focus ring to 10 feet will be perfect.  (5 feet to infinity should be relatively in focus.)

So go ahead and read those forum posts if you want to get into the technical details on all of this, but I did some real-world experiments and found what works for me.  Go try it for yourself and see what works for you!

As always, thanks for reading!

There was a large fire that day which gave the sky a nice warm glow.  And I loved the contrast of the dark streets in front of me against that beautiful setting sun.

So the next time you’re out and about, just look around when you’re stuck in traffic.  There may be something you would have normally missed.  Oh, and have your camera ready!!

There comes a time when shooting digital just gets so damn boring.  You shoot, chimp, change a setting, shoot, chimp, move on.  Right?

With all the advances in technology and cameras, and phones for that matter, getting better and faster, no one seems to know how to just slow down anymore.  That’s why every once in awhile I pull out one of the ol’trusty film cameras that I have; Holga, Diana, Brownie, or 35mm, and go out with it.

What I really love about the Holga is that it’s just a simple piece of plastic that can produce some amazing images.  There may be a light leak or two, but that’s okay.  That’s half the fun.  Then, waiting to get the film back is also fun.  Sure, there are times when I get a little impatient and want to see my images right away, but I also love surprises.

And when I do get the film back and see that most of them turned out better than I had anticipated, well, that’s just icing on the cake!

So I challenge you.  Put down the digital camera, leave your phone in your pocket, and go shoot “old school”.  You just might be surprised at what you see!

Wow!  It’s been way too long, hasn’t it?  (I feel like I’ve said that before!)

So much has been going on, I don’t even know where to start.  I guess I’ll start with the bad news first.  I had to take an emergency trip back to Wyoming because my Grandpa was really sick.  He had Multiple Myeloma, or basically cancer in the plasma cells in his bone marrow.  He was doing fine, but then it just attacked like crazy.  The good news is that I was able to see him before he passed away.  Miss you Grandpa!

So now the good news.  Well, there isn’t much really.  Except that the weather here in Phoenix is absolutely beautiful!!  I’ve been trying to get out and shoot as much as I can.  And I promise I’ll be sharing more photos with you all!

So with that, here is a sneak peak at what I’ve been doing lately!  This is an old image, but it’s kind of what I’m working on now….more on that later!!

Out of the Mist

Now, for those of you who know me well, (family, friends, etc.), this may sound odd.  You know me for doing other types of photography.  But things change.

It all started in 2005, when I won a Canon Digital Rebel XT.  At that time I thought, “Wow, ok, so I have a camera now.  This might be kinda fun.”  Little did I know that I was about to begin a long and wonderful journey.  I immersed myself into photography, learning as much as I could.  I read articles, bought books, and watched videos, trying to soak up as much information as possible.  I experimented with camera settings just to see what would happen.

I dabbled in every genre of photography out there.  From weddings to portraits, abstracts to landscapes, macro to commercial, I tried to find my niche.  And it was landscapes that eventually won.  (Although it’s the hardest to make any money from!)  I love going out on my own and capturing that colorful sunset, or dramatic fog, or snowy mountain range.  Mother Nature sure can put on a show!

However, I was never really satisfied.  Sure, people told me the images were great and that I should sell them.  But something was still missing.

I’ve always been drawn to crowds and bustling cities.  Ok, let me clarify something here.  Standing in line at the Kreutzberg Monastery in Germany, with people pushing me and tripping over my son’s stroller is not what I mean.  But I love being around people.  Maybe it’s from being in the military and traveling to European countries where there are always people and places to see that I love people.  Or maybe it’s because I’ve always liked to just “people watch”.  Whatever the case it’s people that fascinate me.

Since moving to Arizona from Wyoming I’ve loved going to Phoenix and walking around watching life in the streets.  (Not to mention the great weather!)  I’ve gone out solo and with groups, always seeing something new and exciting.  And after finding other Street Photographers online (Eric Kim, Charlie Kirk, and Bellamy Hunt just to name a few) and reading their blogs and watching their videos, I’ve completely fallen in love with Street Photography.  It’s unplanned, spontanious, and always surprising.  I capture life’s little moments as they happen.

I try to approach Street Photography like I’m documenting life in hopes that future generations (and maybe even visitors from out of this world!) will understand what life was like during my stay on Planet Earth.  Just think about it.  If there were no Street Photographers, there would be no real documentation of life.  Pretty heavy.

I’m extremely greatful to have such a loving family who supports me while I take this great journey.  Without them, I’d go nowhere.

I am a Street Photographer.

Sometimes this is all that needs to be said.