Sean is a commercial travel photographer and author specializing in adventure, lifestyle, nature, and travel; for ad, corporate, and editorial clients.
He’s had freelance and contracted assignments with hundreds of publications and companies worldwide including Amazon, American Express, Backpacker, California Division of Tourism, Centerra, Endless Vacation, Fuji Film, GEO Germany, Hewlett Packard, Icon Display, Microsoft, National Geographic‘s book, calendar, and online divisions as well as Adventure and Traveler, The New York Times, Nikon, The North Face, Outside, Random House, Rangefinder, REI, Timex, the Travel Channel, and Visit Florida.
Sean has shot 200+ assignments for Sunset, 150+ for Via magazine, and authored numerous feature articles for Engadget, Lightroom, Outdoor Photographer, Petersen’s Photographic, Photoshop User, and Shutterbug magazines. He wrote and provided all images for his two books – The BetterPhoto Guide to Exposure (Jan 2009 – Amphoto/ Random House), and his latest endeavor, The Complete Guide to Nature Photography (Dec 2011 – Amphoto/ Random House), both receiving five star reviews.
As the Photoguru, he has also appeared on numerous television segments, radio and web shows including ABC San Francisco’s The View from the Bay, CBS San Francisco’s Bay Area Focus, ABC Radio Southeast, Scott Sheppard’s Inside Digital Radio and Nik Radio, and Ibarionex Perello’s The Candid Frame discussing various aspects of the photo industry.
A native Californian, he received his Bachelor of Arts in commercial photography from Brooks Institute in 1991, began his business thereafter combining outdoor, on-location, and studio photography. To date he’s shot over a million images, written numerous articles, and currently working on a tv show on photography.
Shooting with a 36 megapixel Nikon D800E DSLR for all his jobs, Sean has used everything from a GoPro to 35mm, medium format to 8×10, film and digital. He been a Mac user since the 80s (currently on a MacBook Pro with Retina Display & iMac desktop), stores his images on Lacie hard drives, packs his gear in Think Tank Photo and Lightware bags, and works with a variety of software including Aperture, Lightroom, Nik Software, and Photoshop. Other gear he depends on are Gitzo tripods, Acratech ballheads, Tamron lenses, and The North Face clothing.
Sean has traveled around much of the US, and international locations including Canada, Mexico, Southeast Asia, and South America, and the UK. He has backpacked over mountain ranges, helicoptered above jungles, ridden horseback across plains, traversed mountain ranges, rafted down rivers, mountain biked along forest trails, sailed on oceans, and hung over cliffs, all to capture images he and his clients were in search of. Having lived in Iran in the 70s, he calls the San Francisco Bay Area home, base camp for all his travels.
Sean’s all over the web – join him on any of the social site links below:
AUTHORED ARTICLES:
Photoshop User: Moon Over My Yosemite – September 2014
Shutterbug magazine: HDR Realism – 2014 Digital Photography How-To Guide special issue
Lightroom magazine: The Develop Module – August 2013
Photoshop User: The Dynamic Range – July/August 2013
Photoshop User: The Dynamic Range – May/June 2013
Nik Software: HDR Efex Pro Webinar – April 2013
Photoshop User: Lightroom 4 techniques – January 2013
Digital Photography Review: A guide to iOS – October 2012 (online)
Outdoor Photographer: Fall photography tip – October 2012
Engadget: Camera Metering Explained – March 2012
PPSOP: How to Survive the Credit Crunch – January 2012
Engadget: What is aperture, and how does it affect my photos? – December 2011
Engadget: Why your camera’s sensor size matters – December 2011
Outdoor Photographer: The Moors of California – November 2010
Koloist.com: Image Making 101 – April 2009
Alive magazine: Image Making 101, Basic Tips and Better Picture Taking – September 2006
Alive magazine: Cleaning Up the Digital Clutter – August 2006
Marin magazine: Castles and Countryside – June 2006
Marin magazine: A Land Untouched – May 2006
Marin magazine: Finding Nirvana in the US Virgin Islands – December 2005
INTERVIEWS | WEBINARS:
Tamron Lenses eNewsletter – October, 2014
Tamron Lenses eNewsletter – August, 2014
ProNaturePhotographer.com – February 16th, 2014
The Candid Frame / Google+ Hangout – May 1st, 2013
Creating Realistic HDR Scenes using HDR Efex Pro 2 (Nik Software) – March 13th, 2013
Photoshop User magazine – August 2012
Via magazine – July/ August 2012
Scott Kelby’s Light It iPad magazine – January 2012 – also visit: http://kelbytraining.com/lightit
Bay Area News Group: San Jose Mercury News/ Contra Costa Times – January 2012
FreeDigitalPhotographyTutorials.com – January 2012
The New York Times – November 2011
Nik Radio with Scott Sheppard – October 2010
Bay Area News Group – March 2009
Inside Digital Radio – February 2009
The Candid Frame – October 2007
Rangefinder magazine – May 2007