Thanks for visiting my photo pages.
I am a birder and photographer living in Columbus, Ohio. I have been a
professional musician since the age of 20 and have been employed as the
English horn (cor anglais) soloist and oboist of the Columbus
Symphony Orchestra since 1986. I was born near Buffalo, NY, but grew
up in Rocky River, Ohio, a western Cleveland suburb. I was fortunate to
attend 3 years of high school at the Interlochen Arts Academy in the northern
lower Michigan peninsula after attending the summer camp there for 6 seasons.
I then studied at the Cleveland Institute of Music as a student of John
Mack, the Cleveland Orchestra's legendary principal oboist. My first professional
experience was during those student days playing the English horn in the
Akron and Canton Symphony Orchestras. My first full-time gig was serving
as the English hornist with the San Francisco Symphony for a one-year appointment.
The next year was spent in the soon to be defunct Kansas City Philharmonic.
My interest in wildlife photography originally began when I lived in South
Africa from 1983-1986, where I served as principal oboist for the Cape
Performing Arts Board Orchestra in Cape Town. Enchanted by the scenery
and wildlife, I purchased a Yashica FX-D and a few inexpensive lenses and
traveled extensively throughout southern Africa.
In the '90's I renewed my interest
in photography with the natural world of my native Ohio. I replaced my
FX-D's and low-quality lenses with wonderful Contax cameras and Zeiss lenses.
As I became a serious birder, I also added a Nikon F4s and the 500/f4P
to begin photographing birds. In 1998, I switched to one system, Canon,
to take advantage of their autofocus telephotos, namely the EF600/f4L.
In 2000 I replaced that 600mm with the Image-Stabilization version. This
lens helped my bird photography in leaps and bounds.
Most of the older film photos here were
taken with a Canon EOS3 body filled mostly with Fuji ProviaF film.
In October, 2003 I purchased my first digital camera and haven't used a
single roll of film since. My current cameras of choice are the Canon
1D MarkIV and the Canon 1D-X and am currently using the Canon 800mm f5.6L
IS lens as my main bird lens. My 600mm or 800mm lenses are always used
on a Gitzo carbon fiber tripod with a Wimberly head. I'm first and foremost
a musician and not a photographer, but photography has become an increasingly
important source of my income over the years. My photos are regularly used
in a wide variety of national and regional magazine and book publications,
calendars, and other diverse places. Credits include Audubon,
National Wildlife, ABA's Birding, Birder's World, Backpacker,
Jack
and Jill, Discover, The Boston Gobe, NewYork Times, and many
more. Book credits include numerous field guides, National Geographic books,
and countless state and provincial publications throughout North America.
I get a lot of "what should I buy?" requests
about camera equipment. I don't pay too much attention to what the
major camera makers are doing these days, and I can't answer those questions.
There is a lot of information available elsewhere on the Internet.