Grateful for the Work

As I look back on the last nine months of 2008, I feel extremely grateful to the folks at Portland Monthly and Portland Spaces magazines. Not only have they entrusted me with some of their bigger assignments for this year, but they are just great people to work with and work for. I have read about the dreaded struggles between art directors and photographers. So when I did my first assignment last year and the art director said he wanted to be there during the shoot, I had my trepidations. I learned just how important these people can be to a successful shoot. And by successful, I mean delivering them the goods. As photographers, we are in a service business. And as much as I want the picture to be all mine, I realized the importance of having a good "push and pull" relationship with art directors. I have come to the conclusion that I really like working as a team as much as I like to be out on my own shooting. This viewpoint runs throughout my life now. I use to love to go fly fishing alone, but now I love being out with my close friends as much as I love to have a stretch of water all to myself. So thanks to Jason, Pete, Jen, Mike, Thomas, and Tim for being such great people to collaborate with. You all rock, and I enjoy working with you all. Every time my phone rings and I know it is one of you that are on the other side of the call contacting me for an assignment, I must admit, a feeling of excitement and gratitude comes over me.