My interest in Photoshop was birthed out of necessity. As a young upstart musician in the middle of everywhere, I couldn’t afford to do a lot of the things that bands need to do in order to survive. This led to a lot of inside bickering between my teenage bandmates that all had jobs and income that I didn’t have. They would want to do banners, album art, logos — all things that cost an insane amount of money to someone that never seemed to have more than ten dollars in his pocket at any given time. My solution wasn’t to go out and find employment (ever the pragmatist), it was to learn how to make those things myself so I wouldn’t have to pay someone else to do it. At the very least, I thought, it would cut down on the arguments at band practice.

It was a natural extension to start using my own photos for that same purpose. Why pay somebody to take our pictures when I could get a cheap camera and do it myself? I begged my dad for months and finally, on my fifteenth birthday, he bought me one.

His only requirement for buying me a camera was that I had to use it every day. No exceptions. He didn’t want to drop a couple hundred dollars on a piece of equipment that I used a few times only to lose interest and never touch again. I gave him my word that I would do that and here we are some thirteen years later, and I am still living up to my end of the bargain.

This has left me with an impressive catalog of eras gone by and I can pinpoint the exact moments that my life shifted to new territories. I see foreshadowing in the form of portraits. I see life in the form of seasons, death as the seasons end, birth, self-destruction and personal resurrection in otherwise insignificant moments. I have a keen understanding of myself due to the process and am unforgivably self-aware as a professional nostalgia addict.

Featured above and below are key moments in my life as a young person. I wanted to pay tribute and this is the only way I really know how to do it.