Featured Artist Rick Berk

The landscape photography of artist Rick Berk captures the senses with vivid color, dramatic perspective and a sense of place. Visit his website to see more.

 

 

I picked up my first serious camera as a college student to fulfill a requirement towards my degree in graphic design. My first inclination was towards sports photography, which I pursued at the beginning of my career. I began freelancing for newspapers, and eventually landed a contract with a trading card company photographing professional baseball, football and hockey.

 

 

My love for landscape photography began gradually. I was traveling quite a bit for work and began photographing the places I traveled.

 

 

I found being outside calming and therapeutic. I continued to find places I wanted to photograph, adding my unique vision to the images. As my career evolved, sports photography gradually faded to the background for me. I began a career as a trainer and technical specialist for Canon USA, which allowed me to travel even more and have time to photograph the places I visited.

 

 

In my twenties, I visited Maine for the first time and instantly fell in love with its coastal landscape. I decided then that I wanted to live there to explore the landscape with my camera. Finally, in 2016, life threw me several curveballs and it was clear that the time was right to make the move to Maine. I settled just north of Portland and have spent the past two years photographing as much of the state as I could.

 

 

While I do occasionally work in black and white, my work is most noted for it’s use of vibrant color and fine detail.

 

 

I love to use wide angle lenses in my work, emphasizing foreground elements while creating a sense of place.

 

 

Additionally, I use Benro filters to manage my exposures. Neutral density filters are integral to getting just the right shutter speed to record the movement of water in specific ways. Graduated neutral density filters enable me to capture a scene with high contrast in one shot, rather than using post-processing techniques such as HDR to combine images.

 

 

All of my images are captured in RAW format and then processed using Photoshop. I always have a vision of what my final image will look like, even as I’m capturing it. I enjoy the process of using the digital darkroom to bring my vision to the image I’ve captured.

 

 

I print my work on archival papers using the latest inkjet technology. In addition, I embrace new printing processes such as using metal, canvas and acrylic.

 

 

When I began, I drew a lot of inspiration from the work of Ansel Adams. While my work differs greatly, the way he was able to communicate mood through his images is something I continually strive for.

 

 

I also take an immense amount of inspiration from the photographic community at large. Social media has made the world a smaller place. It’s much easier to connect with other photographers around the world and integrate aspects of others’ work in my own.

 

Artist Rick Berk invites you to follow him on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter.

 

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