Our passion for photography is a product of the digital age. Neither of us had an interest in photography until we discovered the potential of the “digital darkroom” back in 2004. Initially this took the form of experimentation in different areas of photography – macro and still life, for example – but it was our wish to express in photographic form our appreciation of the landscape of East Anglia, a region to which we were at that time relative newcomers, that made us the dedicated landscape photographers we are today.

There are probably means of statistically analysing the chances of two partners in a relationship establishing an interest in the same subject at the same time. Judging from the number of photographers we know who express gratitude to their partners for tolerating the photographer’s tendency to drive off to distant locations at unsociable hours of the day, those chances are clearly remote; and we would be the first to acknowledge the good fortune that has allowed each of us to exercise a passion shared equally by the other. Quite how these chances have come about is something that neither of us can immediately explain, although the fact that we were both born and brought up in the surroundings of a beautiful, if contrasting, English landscape is undoubtedly a significant contributing factor.

Sue was born and brought up in the Lake District while Ian is a Hampshire farmer’s son. As a result we are both accustomed to living in the midst of natural beauty, and landscape photography is, in our view, the most articulate way we have to express our love for the natural environment.



Just as one partner’s enthusiasm for photography has engendered a similar enthusiasm in the other, so our affinity with the British landscape has engendered an eagerness to represent that affinity in photographic form. As our photographic experience develops and grows, so does our respect and affection for the British landscape.

When asked, we struggle to identify any disadvantages in the fact that we share a passion for landscape photography. Our enthusiasm is infectious, and our disappointments shared. On location we work together as a team, one pointing out what he or she sees as opportunities or shortcomings to the other. We may work separately at the same location, but there are no ”secrets”, no discovered gems that one conceals from the other. As with our passion for landscape photography, all is shared.

We have a great admiration for the work of photographers in other fields – wildlife and portrait, for example – but after our initial experimentation in such areas as micros and still life, we have never felt any inclination to broaden our scope beyond photographing the landscape.



Landscape photography can be immensely frustrating at times - a long journey to a chosen location can end in disappointment as the promised light never materialises. However, the frustrations pale into insignificance beside the rewards which landscape photography can offer. When the conditions come together and the scene through the viewfinder is just as we anticipated it would be; when we have only the natural elements as company, then that one special moment will be cherished long after the memories of the many disappointments have faded away.

Rarely an hour passes at weekends when we are not planning our photographic excursions with almost military precision. Ordnance Survey maps will be examined, memory cards formatted and spare batteries charged, lenses and ND filters rigorously cleaned.



A regime is followed fastidiously once we arrive in the field. Our two West Highland Terriers will be exercised while we assess the potential of the location. Once exercised and watered, the dogs curl up to sleep in the car, from the boot of which the Canon EOS 5Ds, wide angle lenses (EF 24-105mm and EF 16-35mm), Lee ND filters and Manfrotto tripods are then extracted.

Inevitably the East Anglian landscape features prominently in our work. We consider ourselves blessed to be living in a region that has some of the most photogenic inland and coastal scenery that England has to offer. Equally inevitable, however, is the almost magnetic force which the northern and western regions of the British Isles – the Cornish coast, Snowdonia, the Lake District, the Scottish west coast and North Yorkshire – exert over us, as they do over most British landscape photographers.

We have a great admiration for the work – and the words – of professional landscape photographers such as Joe Cornish and Peter Watson. These photographers do more than simply recreate within the frame the scene as they saw it – they recreate the scene as they felt it. This emotional engagement with, and attachment to, the landscape is the quality that we most admire in these professionals’ work.



For every professional there are ten enthusiasts or semi-pros whose work has that hallmark of engagement. Our colleagues in the Painting with Light Society, a group of digital photographers based and working in East Anglia, have talents that often intimidate and always inspire.

There are two gems of advice that have served us well in the last three years, and they come from Peter Watson, one of our favourite landscape photographers. In “Capturing the Light”, a book that is as remarkable for Watson’s wise philosophy as it is for his beautiful imagery, Watson makes the point that if the landscape photographer is productive for 1% of his or her time, then the 99% during which he or she is unproductive is of no importance. He also notes that a successful photographer’s reputation is built upon his or her successes, and not our failures.

If the ambitions we have for our landscape photography fail to materialise this year, or even next, we will not be downhearted. In landscape photography there will be success as well as failure. And, in Peter Watson’s wise words, it is success and not failure upon which a photographer’s reputation is built.