This was the time well before digital photography, so that each and every shot was more individualized and personal than they are now. Getting your picture taken, or taking a picture of a place, was a much more "eventful" occasion—the posing, the framing, everything about the shot—so that I was being trained to think of pictures as something to be created not just "taken." It wasn't until many years later that I was taught the term "making pictures" by a photographer friend of mine.

Q: When did what must have begun as a hobby turn into something much more important in your life?

SB: I made the transition from strict amateur to hobbyist (and now semi-pro) in the mid-90s. I had, for years, been taking "memory" shots—those that are supposed to be records of events or travels or people. But even as a young boy I would work hard to make each picture count. I remember two in particular. One is of a model aircraft (one of the Thunderbirds, a children's show from England featuring puppets and special effects) that I positioned precariously on our mailbox and took a photo upwards, catching the sun behind the model to silhouette it. It was—and still is—a pretty convincing shot of an aircraft flying by.

The second picture is a picture of our dog, Pandora, as she followed me down a bike trail in the woods. The sky was a bright blue, and crystalline icicles hung from the branches of trees. Pandora had gone a little off the trail and was standing facing me, with the ice reflecting the sun. Luckily I had a camera with me. A Dalmatian, silhouetted in the snow, was, and still is, an interesting composition to me.

In college, I lived in the same dorm with John Knoll, the now well-known Special Effects supervisor at George Lucas' Industrial Light and Magic. John, at the time, was already heavily into creating special effects, and we spent some time together comparing work. John's enthusiasm was infectious. I began experimenting with light, particularly in the silhouetting of my subjects (primarily plastic models of aircraft or spacecraft). I used a 110 camera and a Polaroid. (John would later go on to co-invent Photoshop.)

I took a couple of courses at Long Beach City College and through Parks and Recreation (where I met photographer Craig Fucile, who had a profound impact on my work. I've lost touch with him, but he really got me to examine the image as a thing to be created, framed, and composed, and to be more creative in my process). I began charging for my work around 2001, and have had it used for a number of kinda cool purposes above and beyond simple collecting. I've been lucky enough to be involved in film publicity, product shots, magazine articles, and music CDs, among others. [NOTE: Craig Fucile now teaches at UC Irvine Extension.]

Q: Weddings?

SB: I tend not to shoot weddings (too much pressure), and prefer to pick and choose the way I approach other things. Too much input from others ("shoot it this way," "you should set it up like this") is pretty dicey with me. Other than from my wife of course, who has a terrific eye for composition. Often I will just wander around and shoot what catches my eye. Some things offer themselves up for a picture, other times I just have to wait for that moment to strike me. Even when I am shooting things for hire, my creative eye might catch an artistic composition and I have to stop, take that shot, and then return to the overall project.

An example of this sort of thing occurred just a few weeks ago at a wedding I had agreed to shoot as a favor to a friend. I was waiting for the bride to arrive. It had gotten dark and I noticed a beautiful bouquet of flowers on the as-yet still empty gift table. Knowing it wouldn't really be anything the couple would care about ("an empty gift table???"), I took a handful of shots, one of which I've added to my MORE THAN MEETS THE EYE portfolio. You can see the result, "Still Life in Shadows," at the top of this post, and full-size on my website.

THE FUN AND THE FLOW OF IT

Q: What's been the most gratifying aspect of photography for you?

SB: I'd be lying if I didn't say that the attention/affection of friends and strangers didn't make me happy. But that's only part of what I enjoy. Let me narrow it down to a couple of items.

First is—and this will resonate with photographers—that moment when you know you "caught" something magic and hope that what you saw through the viewfinder is what you have in camera. It's a terrific moment of "ah-ha!" that can make your day. It's much more a response to "taken" shots rather than "made" ones. To me, I know when I have good "made" shots. It's a cool feeling. But there's really nothing like that "gotcha" moment.

I was in North Carolina this last week and visited family. At one point we drove down to Emerald Island, a beautiful place not far from Camp LeJeune. The weather was fantastic, and my sister told her three boys to run up the beach towards a dense fog-like mist that was blowing off the surf. The sand was free of footprints, and as the boys ran they left a very clear trail of prints. As they got further and further away from us, the composition started forming in my head. I took maybe twenty shots in a two-minute stretch, but ended up with several portfolio level shots of kids playing on the beach, as well as some very interesting "footprints in the sand" shots.

I also find that when I really get going on my work that I tend to "zen" out [NOTE: similar to being in flow]. It's very relaxing and invigorating to wander about and watch for a composition to suggest itself, or to wait for that one person to walk into the frame and give you what you hoped for. I've taken pictures in very diverse places (the Las Vegas strip, New York's Metropolitan Museum, the volcano in Hawaii, glaciers in Alaska, a wedding in West Covina, etc.) and each and every one of them has something special in terms of composition. Ranging from landscapes to intimate shots of a person in a bar, there are boundless topics virtually anywhere you go. You have to be willing to be sensitive to it and aware when it's happening, which really only comes with experience.

Q: Tell me about the process you go through when you sit down to turn a "normal" photo into something "more."

SB: Usually something unprintable in a family website, but ... I've been told a number of times that I have a painter's eye in many of my pictures. That can work against a photographer, however, since what might make for a subtle and beautiful painting might make for a muddy or overly bland photograph. So, over the years, I've collected what I call the "almost" shots. Pictures in which I loved the composition, but somehow the execution of the photograph was lacking.