TITLE: From The Deep

A portrait of Ira White, principal dancer for Richmond Ballet. Ira is one of a handful of professional African American male ballet dancers in the entire country. My approach was to light Ira with dramatic down lighting much like you would see if he were performing on stage. I wanted Ira to look like he could be in a natural environment so we opted not to flash in the water. We rigged a continuous 2 point lighting setup above a dark indoor pool. Except for color, clean-ups and contrast no retouching or photo illustration work of any kind was done to this image.

AUTHOR: Tom Maher (United States)

ABOUT

Tom got his start hiring and working with photographers as a print producer and art buyer on the agency side of the business. When his advertising career evaporated he decided to take the leap, raid his 401K and start his own company. That first year in business was spent working odd construction jobs and stocking warehouse shelves to help pay the bills while gaining some valuable and humbling life experience not found on social media. 10 years later things are starting to come together - although he still has nightmares about digging 300lb cement footings out of the frozen ground with a pick-axe.

With a multi-disciplined and holistic approach to his craft as a director, cinematographer, photographer and editor, he now considers it the highest privilege to be creating authentic, inspiring and emotional work for clients around the world.

PHILOSOPHY

The tragedy and joy of life is that each moment is temporary, gone as quickly as we experience it. The role of the filmmaker/photographer is to capture those moments and alter them to reveal a deeper more meaningful truth. As artists we take those moments and curate them to better understand ourselves and the world around us.

AWARDS

4 time Graphis International Silver Award Winner, Photography 2020 and 2021 | 2020 APA Honorable Mention, Portrait Single | 2018 One Show Shortlist | 2018 Emmy Winner | 2015 through 2019 Richmond Show Gold, Silver and Bronze winner