jw@woodwardphoto.com
Hi,
I'm Jonothan and I create images of food, product and interiors for clients ranging from small internet retailers to large companies like Jacuzzi.
I started taking pictures in high school after getting a camera for Christmas. I still remember (and probably have packed away) the image that first drew me in. Walking on the beach on a brilliantly bright summer day, I was looking at the bright sand and the rocks embedded in it. My thought was that it would look great if only it was dark and moody, unlike the glaring reality I saw with my eyes. (Reality still strikes me as too glaring and intense.) So I under exposed the film, took it to the drive-through Fotomat and paid the extra for their "Pro" processing. I just prayed that they would print the pictures the way I shot them and not try to brighten them up to make them look "normal." When the pictures came back one of them was just as I had seen it in my head. I was hooked.
I attended San Diego State University, studying to become a lawyer and a politician in the hope of making the world a better place. My photo instructors told me I should be a photographer. I thought it was a crazy idea, but I spent the next few years assisting, first in San Diego and then in Los Angeles for a big production ad shooter. That "crazy idea" has turned into 25 years of successful shooting.
I live in the San Francisco Bay Area and San Diego with my parrot, Charlie, and two guitars, music being my most recent obsession.