by Gerald Boerner
“My first thought is always of light.”
— Galen Rowell
“The most effective way to spontaneously react to ones environment is to avoid over intellectualizing, in other words, ‘don’t think.’ ”
— Tony Sweet
“I find HDR an incredible technology and a very useful tool to record images that are beyond the ability of the camera to record.”
— Tony Sweet
“With the constantly changing light, we are constantly changing shooting positions and compositions to accommodate the light.”
— Tony Sweet
“The art of observation and the subsequent creative treatment of the scene, either through personal vision or through software intervention is a hallmark of my approach to teaching.”
— Tony Sweet
“I’m much more interested in different creative techniques than photo gear. Equipment are only tools. Photographic vision and pre-vision is what it’s all about!”
— Tony Sweet
“I work in the moment, also referred to as the ‘zone.’ This is a mental ‘place’ where I am ‘One’ with my endeavor where time seems to be non-existent and we are unaware of anything but what we are doing at the moment.”
— Tony Sweet
“Basically, having total control over the process is great, and only photographers who relied on film processing and print makers to realize their personal vision realize what a quantum leap has occurred in photography in the past 10 years.”
— Tony Sweet
“The importance of the topics of all three books cannot be overstated. Although I do photograph different subject material, I find the photographing and teaching in nature the most rewarding and stimulating.”
— Tony Sweet
Tony Sweet (Born: 1949)
Tony Sweet is an American photographer, known for his widely published nature photography. He is also a jazz musician, workshop instructor, and author.
Tony Sweet worked as a professional jazz drummer for 20 years, playing with such jazz greats as Sonny Stitt, Joe Henderson, Tal Farlow, Cal Collins, Johnny Coles, et al. He started working in photography during that period photographing inside jazz clubs. Tony later changed careers and focused on nature photography. He is now best known for his fine art nature and floral images. He uses digital technology to produce fine art ink-jet (giclee) prints. His photographs are published worldwide and represented in the Getty Picture Agency. He has 2 images on Apple Macintosh computers desktop patterns.
Tony conducts photography workshops throughout the continental United States and Canada. Tony maintains an active speaking schedule on the subjects of nature and flower photography and marketing, lecturing at professional photography organizations, universities, seminars, and workshops in the U.S. and Canada. He is a member of the Baltimore chapter of ASMP, and is a member nikSoftware’s Team Nik.
Photographic Career
The first transition was from photographing in jazz clubs to photographing in nature. My first mentor, who also would fix my cameras and sold used camera gear, showed me a nature slide. That was a seminal moment, because I immediately asked what equipment I needed to photograph nature. So, I sold all the fast lenses and got a 20mm, 35-70mm, 80-200mm, and a 105 macro and began photographing nature. Actually, began a whole new career at age 43!
The transition was pretty seamless, really. When you think about it, nature photography is the "jazz" of the photography field. We’re always improvising and editing what’s in the frame on the fly. We never know what to expect and need to react very quickly to ever changing, fluid situations. The only difference is in the hardware. In my head, it’s the same.
I was very fortunate to have a great mentor who got me started and very closely coached me along for my first 18 months as a nature photographer, and continues to be a good friend to this day. After which, I’ve had the great pleasure of teaching with and learning from Pat O’Hara, John Shaw, Galen Rowell, Rod Planck, to name a few. These relationships were a direct result from my working with the Great American Photography Weekend, first as a "gopher", then as an instructor.
When getting started, I read all the books by John Shaw, Galen Rowell, Rod Planck, Larry West, John Netherton, Jim Zuckerman, Freeman Patterson, and Pat O’hara. I just read everything that I could get my hands on. The styles that appealed to my innate sense of design and photographic viscera were Freeman’s and Pat’s. After years of learning from reading the aforementioned authors to get a firm foundation, I began gravitating to the more impressionist, non representational photography, exemplified by Freeman, Pat and others.
It’s very difficult for one to describe ones own style of photography. In general, I look for color and graphic interest in most cases, however I’ve recently began looking for more sparse subjects for black and white renderings. We are all in a constant state of flux in any creative endeavor. Despite how people love to pigeon hole photographers styles, there really is only two kinds of photography: good and bad. Initially, I began photographing musicians in night clubs and portraits in my house in Cincinnati. When my first mentor, Tony Gayhart, showed me a nature slide, I decided immediately to pursue this as a career path. I also immediately swapped all of my fast, low light glass for lenses better suited for nature photography (20mm, 35-70mm, 80-200mm, and 105mm macro).
HDR is not new, being around since about 1937, but it’s new to the general photographic world. And the world has been flooded with a lot of HDR images, good and bad. I find that HDR is essential to get some scenes to work and can be another way to interpret a scene in a new, fresh way. Commercial market? Many video games have HDR style backdrops, architectural photographers use HDR (paying careful attention to processing the scene to record it as it is), stock photography (although the super real look is not a favorite, yet), and of course for book and article illustrations.
Workshops and Classes
These are two very different situations and can’t be compared head-to-head. But, let me say this. After years of conducting workshops and teaching at various venues, I was as skeptical as anyone of the efficacy of on line classes. But, I was very quickly convinced of what a powerful teaching tool the on line classes are. Location workshops offer the advantage of being in a face-to-face situation with the instructor which, as we all agree, is great. The on line class format enables anyone on earth to interact with some of the best photographers in the world, certainly some of the best ones I know are here on BetterPhoto.com, and get valuable critique information which is proven session after session to improve the students photography. It’s really not a question of which format is best. Both formats offer invaluable learning experiences and both should be pursued by the serious student.
Every successful photographer I know in every discipline has begun his/her career as a generalist. A generalist photographs everything. As one moves through the process, certain subjects engender a passion. The area that makes you want to get out of bed in the morning is the area in which you should specialize. But, even as a nature specialist, I’ll photograph anything that catches my interest. So, it’s fine to develop into a specialist, but don’t close your eyes to great imagery of any genre’.
Tony conducts “Visual Artistry” photography workshops throughout the continental United States and Canada. His articles and photography are featured in Shutterbug and Rangefinder magazines. He is a frequent contributor to Nikonnet.com and a staff writer for Nikon World magazine.
He has authored three books on the art of photography: Fine Art Nature Photography, Fine Art Flower Photography, and Fine Art Photography: water, ice, fog (Jan. 2007). All are published by Stackpole Books.
Where to Photograph
The Great Smoky Mountains in the springtime are breath taking. The dogwoods and early spring green are wonderful and the early spring green reflections in the rivers look like liquid mercury!
Maine and Nova Scotia in June are tremendous because there are acres and acres of lupine interspersed on the coast and in the fishing villages.
Coyote Buttes in December/January because of the warm light striking "The Swirl", is warmer than any other time of year because of the low angle of the sun peaking through a break in the mountains.
Background and biographical information is from Wikipedia articles on:
Robert Adams that can be found at…
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Adams_%28photographer%29
Other References:
Interview with Tony Sweet in an Interview with Photography24/7…
http://photography24seven.com/interview-with-tony-sweet/
Tony Sweet Interview in an Interview with Alain Briot/Beautiful-Landscape.com…
http://www.beautiful-landscape.com/Thoughts82-Tony%20Sweet%20interview.html
Tony Sweet in an Interview with BetterPhoto Interview…
http://www.betterphoto.com/interviews/Photographer-Tony-Sweet-A.asp
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