Someone asked me recently what I like to shoot for myself, so I thought I would show and explain what I shoot and why.
I was working in the USA a few years ago and by accident bumped into US Photographer Michael Belk. Michael was a high end Fashion/Advertising photographer based in New York who had just moved to Florida with a goal to shoot what he wanted, how he wanted.
He had set up a gallery displaying mostly landscape, he told me that for the bulk of his career he had shot what clients had told him to and he felt he was losing the passion for photography so he decided to start shooting for himself. As he told me I could relate exactly to what he was saying. As commercial photographers we try our best to work with clients and photograph their product or service so it will tell or sell their story and I found in myself that to relax I would actually put the camera down and turn off from photography. After talking with Michael I was determined from that point on to keep it in my hand when on holidays.
My wife and I are trekkers, our idea of a great holiday 
is to carry 24 kilo of food and equipment over a mountain range, preferably with no one else around, and I found this was the perfect escape for my personal photography, I don’t set out to create works of art I simply walk a trail slowly and allow nature to find me.
Sometimes I have to wait for some mist to clear or rain to stop and other times you simply look around and there it is. But the part I enjoy most of all is the silence or absences of man made noise. I can hear the wind or the water (be it running or falling) the sounds of nature, birds calling, but nothing else.
We can sit there looking at a scene knowing that we’re the only people at that place and time to experience the show that nature gives us and that is what I try and shoot for myself, that is my photographic passion.
As odd as it sounds we try not to walk when the weather is good because that is when most people choose to walk, we look for the fringe seasons when the weather keeps people away but creates the mood, light and feel that I enjoy.
