PatitucciPhoto New Portfolio

Stella Alpina - Edelweiss

In 1999 it wasn’t quite “in” yet to do a version number of your site. While Photoshop was at about V5.0, Janine and I were very much at V1.0 – beta even. Now, in 2010 we must be around V9.0 for websites – but a better way to benchmark our progress is V.ery happy. This has been a phenomenal year for us for both work & fun. But, the last couple of weeks have been terrible for photography (rain) but great for office time (rain). So we thought, “Let’s get a new site up and running”.

Our last portfolio was up for almost two years so we had some serious editing to do. Where to begin? What are the image categories? We want to show our best work but not too much, less is more, all that sort of thing. In the end we want to honestly and accurately present who we are and what we do for our clients; new, old and those searching for the best mountain sport photographers. Now it is ready, this new site is us.

Our photography is perhaps a bit unique in the outdoor industry. After 12 years in this business we still prefer to shoot our own experiences, our own friends, our own travels. Of course we do commercial photoshoots, editorial projects where we document stories, and production stock shoots. But the real Dan & Janine Patitucci love nothing more than to head out with friends trail running, skiing or mountain biking, one lens in the pack, and see what we find. If we don’t find anything, we make turns. Come November, we enjoy traveling with a simple camera and lens to shoot purely what we run across. Our Travel Photography is telling of exactly how and what we see as image makers, photographers just doing what they love.

While editing 12 years of work down to 87 images, we had some decisions to make. It is often difficult to not just show personal favorites, or images we are emotionally attached to, we need to show what we can do as professionals –  a balance must be found between these things. There was one image I kept coming back to, a personal favorite of mine, yet one I wasn’t even there for. In 2006 we were set to go to Morocco for a Patagonia ski shoot. Our gang met in Chamonix where we first spent some days skiing. Immediately upon arrival I crashed and split my tibia & fibula. I was out, Janine was bumped to lead, and solo, photographer. Off she went.

Months later, with the job delivered, I was clear to trash the outakes. One image in the folder caught my eye, it was nearly black, but some details were trying to come through. I decided to open it in Photoshop, bring up the exposure and have a look. I found the image below. To me it is perfect, I may not have been there, but this one image made it all present. Our friend Susie Sutphin, inside a tent with a Moroccan guide, writing in her journal. So simple but so perfect for revealing life while traveling. We love making images, we look forward to another 12 years.

If you have thoughts on our work, we’d love to hear, please feel free to comment on this post. Thanks.