I realized that this style of photography has been in development almost from the time I first picked up a camera to seriously start photographing people twenty years ago in Valdosta, GA as a portrait photographer. I didn't realize it at the time, but over the years I keep coming back to this very simple and elegant method of creating intimate portraits of people. 

     It's a simple lighting situation of either one or two lights in the studio to create the mood that I am looking for. Always in a field of black, I sculpt with the shadows as much as the light. The sometimes more tricky part of this process is getting to know my subject so that I can accurately tell a story with my camera as I create the portrait. As you can see, it's more than a snapshot of the person, it's a story of who they are at that time in their life. I can't do this without knowing them to some extent.

     These images can be specifically created in their own portrait session or as part of a regular session. I like my subjects to wear all black or at least a black shirt so that the image can be about them, not necessarily what they are wearing. This is a study of who the subject is. Normally these are done in my photography studio in Valdosta, but I can take them on location under certain circumstances.