Film has given way to digital imaging, and cameras have gone from a range of specialist equipment to being integrated into everyone’s mobile phone.

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In an age when most people are increasingly content to embrace the convenience of this technology – even taking steps to build photography careers using nothing but their phone and a mirror – Chris remains adamant that there is a vast gulf separating image capture with phones from genuine photography.

“When everyone thinks that they can do it, people stop bothering to learn what it’s really all about.

“There is a craft to photography – that is what I’m passionate about.

“That is what I love.”

Christopher John is a resident of Port Stephens, having followed the path of many who have settled in the area for what is ostensibly ‘retirement’, but in reality is a new opportunity to invest in a long-held passion.

“I suppose I’m in the third iteration of my photography career,” said Christopher.

“I’ve had a long career, although I haven’t always worked in photography.

“I’ve always worked at it though, and I always come back to it.”

Christopher’s journey began in 1974 on a family trip to New Zealand.

“I was about fourteen and my Dad gave me an Iloca Rapid B Rangefinder camera.

“He must have had a fair deal of trust because he just handed it to me and basically said ‘go for it’.”

Christopher would spend the trip working the camera, figuring out how to get the best results, and quickly fell in love with the process of creating still images that stirred the people who saw them.

In the 1980’s Christopher established his own studio for family portraits and modelling shoots.

When the industry became bloated with such studios, Christopher found that his passion for the craft had preemptively given him an edge over competition.

“When I was first taught by my mentor he asked whether I wanted to start learning studio lighting or outdoor lighting first.

“I told him ‘whichever one is more difficult’.”

The difficulties of outdoor photography lay in the lack of control over elements like the sun, clouds and movement of shadows.

“Studios offer more control and are easier to manage, so most businesses started there and in those days built a small industry taking family portraits.”

When too many studios competing in the same space made costs untenable, Christopher was able to transition easily to a relatively untapped market – outdoor portraiture.

Experience with this work opened opportunities to do wedding photography and to cover functions and events in and around Newcastle and the region.

“Photography is all about understanding light, and then about how to pose people in your image to tell a story in a single frame.”

Through the years and amidst other business ventures, Christopher has always maintained the camera by his side.

Readers of News Of The Area may have noticed some of Christopher’s work from the recent Williamtown Air Show.

A particular image from that event speaks to his skill and experience: a fighter jet coming into view from behind a control tower.

In the foreground of the shot sits a statue of a whale bursting out of the ocean.

The jet and the statue point in the same direction, at the same angle, with the whale’s fins sitting in almost identical fashion to the jet’s wings.

It was a moment that would have lasted less than a heartbeat, but captured by Christopher in the moment.

When asked whether such a shot is due to skill or luck, Christopher said, “There may be luck, or chance, in the moment that causes such an image to be possible.

“But the moment that I take a photograph is the culmination of thousands upon thousands of hours, and hundreds of thousands of similar moments.

“Years of me preparing and becoming more skillful and learning where to stand and where to look and how to react when the moment arrives.”

While Christopher happily still brings that skill and experience to clients when hired for corporate work, or commissioned for special events, he has discovered a new interest in portrait photography.

This time around, rather than posing families or couples for glamour shots, Christopher is working to capture real, raw emotion and personality in a series of works that are being displayed in a space at Club Lemon Tree.

“I did a series of portraits of men with beards,” he said.

“I recruited men from around the area from all kinds of backgrounds.

“Some who had lived rough, some younger, some old.”

Christopher is currently at work on a series involving couples.

“I’m working with a number of couples to produce some work that kind of reflects the essence of people when you look at the image.”

When reflecting on his years of work and his many and varied experiences, Christopher is a man content with where his work has led him.

“I’ve always been passionate about the craft of photography, from the very beginning.

“For many years I’ve had to combine that passion with a focus on the business side of things.

“These days I’m about the art.”

By Lindsay HALL