About Jonathan,
Hello, I'm Jonathan Robert Atkinson, I have been a professional Photographer for a decade in and around Rochdale in the North West of England. I have worked and continue to work in many fields of the art. from a Wedding in Liverpool to shooting equestrian appeal, sofa’s in Altrincham and more recently car care products, to teaching the craft.
But my real passion for photography lies in landscapes. Having Bob Ross on the telly right before bed as a child was always going to cause problems. Now the eagle eyed among you will notice I take photo’s…..Ross painted, Fair point, well made. But painting is really messy and I require no more help in that department. I still marvel at the fact he never got it on his shirt…that’s talent. I did try painting when I was younger with my Grandad, but it just wasn’t for me. But I still had this craving to create art.
My introduction to Photography,
My first steps into the photographic realm came when I was starting college at 16 years old. I was on a Media Production and studies course with the intention of learning video production and maybe becoming a video editor….how things change.
This year however the college had implemented a new policy. This policy basically meant every student must be studying an extra curriculum programme along with there original choice of programme. Our tutor at the time a chap called Howard had automatically enrolled all the media students onto his programme, which was photography.
As you can imagine a bunch of teenagers took this news of more work that they didn’t choose very well. I will be honest, I myself wasn’t thrilled.
Chasing waterfalls,
My apathy towards Howard’s course quickly faded over the weeks however. especially once I learned of ‘Long Exposure’ photography. I really enjoyed the sense of motion these images have. in fact I have shot so many waterfalls that after meeting people who had seen my images on local Facebook groups sometimes would refer to me as “oh, the waterfall guy”….I have more recently been working towards shooting less waterfalls.
My first waterfall shot and really first purposeful landscape shot was the one to the left. It’s a shot of Cheesden Lumb Mill. This is the remains of an old paper mill that closed down over 100 years ago. This shot was actually part of my coursework for Howard’s programme. he set a test where we had to take 2 images, 1 showing long shutter speeds and one showing a faster shutter speed. this shot was for the slow shutter speed image.
My first camera, and what I use today.
My first camera was a Nikon D5100. a crop sensor DSLR. A 16.2MP camera. A good starting point. this Nikon gave me the tools to learn and understand the exposure triangle, Focal lengths, Depth of field and unless your a photographer or have a passing interest you probably have no idea what I am on about so we will leave that there, point it it allowed me to learn the basics being a non-pro camera.
I then used a Nikon D7200. A 24MP crop sensor. The D7200 has been around since 2015 and at the time was considered by some to be the best crop sensor camera Nikon ever produced. the D7200 is a semi-pro camera and has served me well. The bulk of imagery seen on this site was shot with this camera over the last decade. In fact they have been shot with 2 D7200’s. you see a few years ago my first one I bought for starting University decided to go for a swim…This was not good. I replaced my now paper weight D7200 with….another D7200. this was in 2020. And while my second D7200 has served me well much like its predecessor I have now upgraded to the Nikon Z8, so the D7200 can take a well earned retirement on a shelf.
