A little bit about me !

I think it's nice to know a little bit about the person behind the work, whether it's the author of a book, a photographer of an image or the artist of a painting.

So, without getting too boring (I hope), here are a few facts about me.

My name is Steve Thompson, (that's me in the photo admiring the view and being camera shy !). I live in the moorland village of Princetown , just a stone's throw from the entrance to Dartmoor Prison (hence my Ezine called "Jail Mail") , situated at the very centre of the Dartmoor National Park in Devon.

I was born just a few miles from where I am sitting now, in the city of Plymouth, where I spent my growing years. My only flirtation with photography during all this time, was a very old Kodak "Box Brownie" and a couple of rolls of film !

After school ended for me at 17, I joined the Royal Air Force and trained as a technician. On returning to Plymouth, a very good friend of mine, who was at the time a photography student, loaned me a Pentax Spotmatic 35mm film camera for an evening. I took the camera up onto Plymouth Hoe, and from that moment on, I knew that photography was going to be a huge part of my life. That moment was thirty years ago !

After that evening, I digested everything I could get my hands on about the subject. Books, magazine articles, videos, (no internet at that time of course !), nothing escaped my attention if it had anything to do with photography.

I then spent quite a few years as a commercial photographer, which opened up a whole new area, including weddings, pet portraits , stock images, and much much more besides.

My passion for Dartmoor began while I was still at school. I joined the Air Training Corps and our squadron entered a team for the annual Ten Tors Expedition. Until then, I had only experienced Dartmoor from the car, on family Sunday outings. The Ten Tors introduced me to "the real" moors, of crystal clear rivers, mile after mile of open wild land, hidden sylvan valleys and stunning panoramic views from almost every Tor. I was hooked !

Landsape & Travel Photography.

So, it was quite a natural step to combine my two passions, and I began to photograph Dartmoor , at first just to share some of the things I experienced on my walks with family and friends. As my collection of slides grew, I decided to try to place some with an agency, and to my great surprise, they accepted my submission and asked for more !

Then followed magazine work with titles such as "Country Walking" , "Trail", "Best of British" (my first published illustrated article).

And now, my very own website ! That's the biggest shock of all to me because before I discovered SBI, my computer skills amounted to emailing and Ebay !!
One to one instruction.

Do you want to improve your images overnight? I wish that I had taken some instruction about the basics when I was starting out, rather than have to pour over all those books and articles, much of which wasn't really relevant anyway ! After many requests, I now run 1/2 day and 1 day courses for beginners, here in Princetown .

Why not join me on the moor, and I'll demonstrate many of the photography techniques I use.

I am also always happy to consider commissioned work (subject to availability).

And although I love to go away to photograph many other places, Dartmoor has always been, and will always be, a special place to come back to.