ABOUT JOHN
John Shephard grew up in Washington State, surrounded by its forests, rivers, and wild places. That landscape became the foundation of everything that followed.
In 1998, while photographing tulip fields in the Skagit Valley at dawn, Shephard met the celebrated Australian landscape photographer Ken Duncan — who happened to be looking for a local assistant for a book project covering all 50 American states. What started as a conversation in a tulip field became a two-year apprenticeship that took them across 45 states together. Shephard then followed Duncan to Australia, spending another two years building his own landscape portfolio and learning the discipline of working exclusively on film.
It was during that time that Shephard committed to the panoramic format, investing in a Noblex 135U rotating-lens camera. The Noblex captures a 136-degree field of view on 35mm film — close to what the human eye actually sees — and that width became the defining quality of his work. The goal has always been the same: photographs that make you feel as though you're standing in the landscape, not looking at a picture of it.
Every photograph Shephard makes is shot on Fujichrome Velvia 50 transparency film. The original transparencies are drum-scanned by Michael Strickland on a Heidelberg Tango — the gold standard for film digitization — producing 16-bit files that preserve the full tonal range and chromatic depth of the original film. From there, each image moves through a precision color-managed workflow before being printed as a limited edition on Hahnemühle Baryta Rag.
Shephard was featured in Terry Hope's The World's Top Photographers: Landscape in 2003. He has spent over 31 years teaching photography, working primarily in the field, and continues to shoot and print from his home base in Washington State.
His first book, Washington Wide, is currently in production.
In 1998, while photographing tulip fields in the Skagit Valley at dawn, Shephard met the celebrated Australian landscape photographer Ken Duncan — who happened to be looking for a local assistant for a book project covering all 50 American states. What started as a conversation in a tulip field became a two-year apprenticeship that took them across 45 states together. Shephard then followed Duncan to Australia, spending another two years building his own landscape portfolio and learning the discipline of working exclusively on film.
It was during that time that Shephard committed to the panoramic format, investing in a Noblex 135U rotating-lens camera. The Noblex captures a 136-degree field of view on 35mm film — close to what the human eye actually sees — and that width became the defining quality of his work. The goal has always been the same: photographs that make you feel as though you're standing in the landscape, not looking at a picture of it.
Every photograph Shephard makes is shot on Fujichrome Velvia 50 transparency film. The original transparencies are drum-scanned by Michael Strickland on a Heidelberg Tango — the gold standard for film digitization — producing 16-bit files that preserve the full tonal range and chromatic depth of the original film. From there, each image moves through a precision color-managed workflow before being printed as a limited edition on Hahnemühle Baryta Rag.
Shephard was featured in Terry Hope's The World's Top Photographers: Landscape in 2003. He has spent over 31 years teaching photography, working primarily in the field, and continues to shoot and print from his home base in Washington State.
His first book, Washington Wide, is currently in production.