Chris Orwig is a portrait photographer, author, teacher and Sony Ambassador from Santa Barbara, California. Chris first came on my radar many years ago and his grounded, connected, intimate, natural-light portraits really stayed with me.

In his early 20s, Chris was hit by a car while skateboarding and during his recovery, his father gave him the gift of a camera. This camera gave him direction and purpose in life and he’s never looked back. Chris has gone on to work with clients including Google, SPaceX, Adobe and has his work published in places like Rolling Stone, the New York Times and Esquire. He’s also taught photography at College level for 10 years,  written several books and he’s a workshop leader and a mentor to other photographers around the world.

Chris has a lot to say about photography and what goes into being a photographer and I was delighted to listen. The whole conversation came in at about 90 minutes and that’s little longer than I like my episodes to run so this is the first of 2 parts - the second part of the episode will follow next week.

Of course, we talk about portrait photography but so much of what Chris says is about who we are as photographers and that’s transferrable to all of us so whatever you’re into, this episode is for you. Hope you enjoy this, here’s part 2 of my conversation with Chris Orwig…