Best Friend Photography

Michael -- I didn't initially set out to be a PORTRAIT PHOTOGRAPHER -- although I've always made portraits. I was an English major in college and a journalist thereafter. But, my father had a darkroom in the house I grew up in, and he taught me early on how to develop and print photographs. It's something I've always loved to do from the time I was twelve. I think my first true portrait was a photograph of a cow.

People always ask me, "What's the difference between a portrait and a great snapshot?" The answer is something I've come to understand over time. A SNAPSHOT CAPTURES A MOMENT IN TIME. It anchors a person in a place. A great snapshot will always evoke memories and good feelings about the subject. A PORTRAIT, on the other hand, IS MORE MYSTERIOUS. It's more like a painting in that you can look at it longer; you can see something altogether different each time you view it.