19/08/2026
It’s World Photography Day, so I thought I’d share a little about how it all began for me.
The first photograph is of me, aged three or four, playing with my grandfather’s camera. My next photographic memory is taking a camera on a Cub Scout camping trip and earning the only badge I ever received: the photography badge.
My school years were dreadful, but at 13 I discovered the school darkroom. There, I began printing pictures taken with my Kodak Instamatic and experienced the magic of an image appearing in the developer tray.
At 16, with two O-levels and resits ahead of me, I roamed the streets of Cambridge with an Asahi Pentax 35mm camera and 50mm lens given to me by my other grandfather. I turned my bedroom into a darkroom by covering the windows with black bin liners.
Then came art college and assisting. The letters pictured are replies to some of the many letters I sent to photographers in 1987, including Terence Donovan Archive and Gered Mankowitz | Photographer. I went on to assist Gered for more than three extraordinary years, and he remains a great friend to this day.
Photography has since taken me around the world and behind the scenes in extraordinary places I might never otherwise have experienced.
Here I am, still shooting, still learning, still making mistakes and still as passionate as that 13-year-old watching darkroom alchemy reveal itself.
Photography has changed enormously, but at its heart the picture remains the voice: having an eye, trusting your instincts, refusing to give up and learning from every mistake.
I eventually gained one more O-level, but my real education began in the darkroom at King's Ely, continued at UoW Photography BA Hons and, coming full circle, has included more than 11 years teaching BA and MA students at Ravensbourne University London.
Perhaps that Cub Scout photography badge turned out to be my most useful qualification after all.
