Geoff Webber is a humble but deeply committed photographer with a keen eye for capturing engaging portraits and beauty shots. His signature style employs creative lighting, moody backgrounds, and sets or props to help draw the eye to the subject's face, body, and form.
While Geoff excels in beauty and portraiture, he is also an accomplished landscape photographer. Geoff’s landscape images provide a captivating perspective of the Australian landscape and its many forms throughout the year. His pictures portray Australia’s lush green rainforests and wide, abandoned beaches. What’s fascinating is Geoff’s capacity to capture a wide range of genres with his trusty OM System kits. While his socials tell the story of a beauty photographer, Geoff also dabbles in astro and architecture and extends his portrait and beauty work to boudoir. But the list goes on to include commercial work for products, events, corporate headshots, and university graduations.
Geoff’s photographic journey started at an early age. He recalls photographing friends riding in motorcycle events in Adelaide (Australia) with a Kodak Instamatic 126. While he has always had a camera around the home, it wasn’t until later that he took up digital photography. Before that, Geoff would take his Olympus OM2 SP (Spot/Program) kit away on travels to document his journeys. Geoff has stuck with the OM System (formerly Olympus) as he loves the image quality and sharpness of the OM lens range. His current kit includes his OM-1 workhorse, an EM-1 Mark II, and an original EM-1 converted to 720nm infrared. Geoff is especially committed to OM due to their leaps in in-camera computational photography.
It wasn’t until 2018 that Geoff found his love for photography (again) and committed to exploring the craft and making something of it. In 2019, he retired from the corporate finance world and embarked on a journey to make his photography self-funded. Geoff enrolled in an Advanced Diploma of Photography at the Photography Studies College in 2019 to support his drive, build upon his existing skills, and meet his goals. Unfortunately, due to the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic and the resulting move to online studies, Geoff found the content and delivery no longer suited his needs. Regardless, in the space of 5-6 years, Geoff has built a new career as a self-employed photographer exploring a wide range of genres and styles. It’s an impressive journey, especially given that almost two years were significantly impacted due to the pandemic and resulting shutdowns.
“My creative aim is to constantly improve and explore new styles and opportunities. “Niching-down” to specialise only in a particular genre isn’t yet on the horizon.”
Geoff’s portrait and beauty work employs complex yet compelling lighting solutions to engage its intended audience. Effective lighting makes all the difference in portraits, headshots, and full-body shoots. Geoff is able to finely control the fall and cast of introduced lighting to make the subject pop from the scene. Another key element in many of Geoff’s beauty shots is the inclusion of props and elements to add drama and dynamic definition. His studio portraits often feature candles, reflective objects, and even light poles in the foreground to play with light and shadow. His collection of portrait and beauty images also showcases Geoff’s ability to work one-on-one with a model to achieve unique poses, placement, and outcomes.
“I LOVE lighting set-ups and creative freedom and control”.
During our conversation, Geoff spoke of his recent work as a university graduation photographer. He spoke of the seasonality of the work and the way in which the graduation organisers create a production line approach to multiple graduations. Many of our Camera Life guests have spoken of the value of undertaking seasonal graduation and school photography work. It’s a great way to join a team of photographers conducting these shoots, where much of the decision-making is handled for you. Regardless, graduation and school photography is an excellent way for photographers to build their skills, practice their craft, and get reliable pay in the process. It was amazing to hear about this kind of gig and how it is all shoot-to-deliver with images available for students to access within minutes.
It was an absolute pleasure chatting with Geoff about his life and work. I know countless photographers and visual creatives who want to take the plunge into full-time photography. However, the reality is that we all need finance to get by, and that leap from safe and stable income to self-employment is a huge one. It’s certainly a decision that caused me many sleepless nights while considering my fate as a full-time creator. To Geoff’s credit, he has built skills and knowledge allowing him to take on commercial work whilst pursuing his passion projects.
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Find Geoff:
