Who IS Vincent Shay?
Livin’ the Dream.
I live in Avila Beach, California with my wife Em and pup, Frankie. Photography has always been a large part of my life. At the age of 52 I can say I have been taking photographs for 35 years now, which is sort of insane for me to realize since I go through different projects and ideas in my life a lot. Photography is the only interest in my life that has held my attention for this long.
I learned how to take photographs with a used Nikon FA which is a film camera. I was not the financially secure in my youth so just purchasing film was a big feat for me at the time, not to mention the costs to process the film. And the hours and hours of time I spent learning!
When I was first starting out I was given some advice by another photographer way more wise than I was. He said the only way I would really learn was to take my camera and take photos with different apertures and speeds and look at them to figure out how my camera worked. So I did.
I would write down what number of photo I took and jot down the settings on my camera. I then took my slides and put on a light table and would look at each slide (usually just 24-36 images at a time) with a loupe so I could try and understand depth of field and what each aperture and speed would do to an image. This took quite some time.
After several years of taking photographs I began to figure out how to get what I was seeing in my head and create that in the camera.
My Photographic Philosophy.
I am not that interested in manipulating images. Before we had Photoshop, we all used a darkroom. Sure we cropped, a bit, and sure we would dodge and burn, but really different type of films would create a certain look. I try to get the image I want in the camera, as I take the shot. I don't even really crop my images and only use Photoshop to fix horizon lines and clean up the image and for sharpening. Every image from a digital camera must be sharpened for the most part. For my black and white images, I use NIK Color Efex Pro and Silver Efex Pro.
Pretty much that is it. I try and stick to my vision of what I want to get that day shooting. With the subjects I am shooting sometimes the action outweighs the ‘perfect lighting’ situation.
As far as taking photographs of sea otters, whales, dolphin and other creatures that call the ocean home, I truly ask for permission first when I am in their realm. I am very respectful when I am photographing these animals and would never do anything to jeopardize their safety nor mine.
I truly believe that most animals are just curious. I will never forget the time that a gigantic humpback whale swam under my kayak and as he passed underneath mere inches from me, he looked up at me. It was checking me out as much as I was checking him out. Magical.
Current Status.
In the last few years I have been really concentrating on taking photographs that center around local sea life like whales and sea otters. The abstract sunsets and waves have always been a big passion and interest for me because I have always wanted to be a painter, but I learned very early on, I cannot paint to save my life. So, I stick with photography.
I am truly thankful to live on the Central Coast of California where the diversity of photographic opportunities are endless. In the last few years I have been concentrating on creating a body of work I am proud of. If people like the art, then I am also very happy.
In 2022 I will be launching Limited Edition Prints in three different sizes and I am very excited about that. These will be numbered and each photographic file will only be produced 100 times. Each image will come with a Certification of Authenticity, signed and numbered.
You can still purchase images but although signed, will not be number and won’t be Limited Editions. Thanks for visiting the site and if you see an image here that moves you then get ahold of me.
-Vincent Shay