Raised in Brooklyn and Providence, Micheal first started taking pictures at the age of 11. He attended the Nova Scotia College of Art & Design (BFA 1983) and after apprenticing for some of the best photographers in the business, evolved as a NYC-based advertising and editorial location photographer. Along the way he has had three successful solo exhibits, and has amassed awards from Photo District News, Communication Arts and The NY Art Directors Club.

Because of his artistic abilities and enthusiasm for photography, Micheal is sought after and currently working with some of the most prestigious international ad agencies and design firms. He also manages to do editorial work and photography seminars.

With a busy shoot schedule, he travels a lot. "I spend about 75 shoot days a year on the road. With preparation and travel, it's roughly 4-5 months of the year", he says. "We're generally in pre-production, shooting, or post, and quite often there's a lot of overlap." He adds, "I'm rarely shooting in my home town of NY, maybe 7 days out of the year max."

A typical day may consist of preparing for a shoot a thousand of miles from home, remotely accessing his server for images to fulfill requests for files needing to be processed, color correcting images, sending files for approval - all done while on the road.

Times are changing.

It was only in the Autumn of 2005 when Micheal switched completely to digital. "The technology had finally arrived. I was able to downsize from a large studio with a darkroom to a 500sf office ," he says. "I don't need a dark room anymore. All the processing is done on computer and I keep all my files and archives on my server. And it's simply better for the environment. There are no more lab chemicals, no more scrap Polaroids and no more junk packaging. There's much less waste."

Some technologies advance and others don't.

"I prefer to do final file processing myself, and I work with some very large final files," he says. " At any time, the final images can produce a 90 - 200 Mb file." He says," I use Aperture, Photoshop CS2 for color correction, and Bridge as my imaging software. I have 4 color-managed Apple laptops that we use on location, as well."

Previous to switching to digital, film used to be hand-carried through airport-security, or sent via premium courier services like Bellair Expediting or Marken Worldwide Express. "Basically, electronic transfer has replaced those methods", Micheal informs me. "Initally, I set up an FTP server, and it quickly became a nightmare."

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