SFist Interviews: Photographer Joe Budd

Make way for San Francisco photographer Joe Budd

I had first met Joe Budd taking pictures at fellow artist Ian Berry's wedding to Kate Duong, Martha Stewart's senior style editor, at a private residence in San Anselmo, California in 2006. Joe had noticed my crippling strut do to my battle with gout, I humored him about not being able to drink booze amongst our happy tipsy friends. A year later, we had met again when Joe married close friend and stylist Green Figueroa in San Francisco. At the time I had offered Joe a shared studio in my loft and that was when I first witnessed some of his photographs. Although Joe Budd does shoot commercial photography for companies like Adidas, American Express, AT&T, and NIKE, it was his travel images off the clock that I felt most drawn to. His subjects felt intimate, the images were soft, colorful and engaging. Most of the photographs I saw were taken on his global travels during on site location shoots that spanned the globe from the coast of Brazil, to the back alley's in Thailand, to the dusty roads of Africa.

Micke Tong: Tell me about En Route, your exhibit at DWR?

Joe Budd: The show chronicles my domestic and international travels over a period of 10 years. The concept of life on the road and being mobile while calling many locations home has inspired me to take these photos.

MT: Your first job as a photo assistant was on a cruise ship. Can you let those young aspiring photographers looking to become professionals know what that was like?

JB: My first assisting gig was with Jeff in Monfalcone, Italy on the Princess Grand during it's inaugural voyage through the Greek islands and up into Istanbul. It was a corporate advertising production during 4 weeks of interior/exterior photography. Jeff was amazing and made everything look natural and sophisticated with natural and artificial light. It was a pleasure working 20 hour days at a break neck speed. Enthusiasm goes a long way in this industry. You have to pay your dues and want it bad. I broke a small bone in my left foot but kept working because I was so amped. I'm not suggesting that anyone do that but...

I worked for Jeff Zaruba from 1998 to 2000 who shot mostly advertising and annual reports for Princess Cruises, Windstar, Marriott, and Hilton.I believe in working with as many different types of photographers as possible while you are coming up.

MT: When did you receive your first camera? and what was it? What do you use today?

JB: My Mother and step father gave me a Minolta SRT-201, which I still have. Today I shoot commercial work with a Canon Mark III 1ds with a 50mm and personal work with a Pentax 67 with a 105mm 2.4. I still shoot with a normal perspective lens because it seems most comfortable. Zoom lenses just confuse me when I'm trying to compose. I don't use zooms or wide angle too much. I think they have a trendy look. I started shooting with a wide angle lens in high school but the images just looked like everyone else's to me.

MT: Just by spending time with you, I've noticed that photographers are a close knit group. The system of support, learning and finding work for each other is pretty amazing. I mean, you've given work to pretty much perfect strangers, which says a lot about your generous nature. Tell me about what this sort of family relationship has done for your career...

JB: Community is very important. I try to pay it forward because people have taken chances on offering advice and potential client contacts to me.

MT: What's your take on photography as art? For some it is still an ongoing controversy.

JB: Oh hell yeah it's art! It's subjective for many though. I think curators are more accepting of photography in this day and age as the materials become more archival. As for the archival nature of photo materials, I think there are exciting things happening with the ink jet movement. The return to ink on paper is exciting! Still, prints with metal are the bench mark (Ex. Silver Halide, platinum, etc.). I would like to see more Dye Transfer from digital files. Whether it's from scanned film or original digital captures. Technological advances in media seem to go through acclimation periods. The transition from painting to photography is blurring more everyday. One medium imitates another. Some photographers are trying to make their images more painterly and vice a versa.

MT: I know you like to shoot in natural light, when is your favorite time of the day to take images? Is there any place light looks best? I'm talking any where in the world, your all time OMG I have to photograph here again kind of deal.

JB: Friscalating dusk light.

MT: I had no idea what the word friscalating was until I looked it up in the Urban Dictionary: An effect caused by the sun setting over the horizon creating an optical illusion of shimmering, liquefied light. Akin to a mirage. (Created by Wes Anderson for his film The Royal Tenenbaums)

It's now the digital age and companies like Canon and Nikon have produced affordable professional digital SLR's (single-lens reflex) that help even novice photographers take amazing pictures. How does this affect your industry?

JB: Everyone takes great pictures these days! Especially kids. I think the bench mark is actually rising. I think the digital age is enabling people to have more fun with the medium. The spontaneity comes through more in the photograph now. Stale images are a result of getting too wrapped up in the technical side.

MT: Is there anything you don't like taking pictures of? or subjects you find difficult?

JB: Myself. Myself.

MT: When your not working your surfing, in fact, there is an immense number of creative people I know that surf. Does surfing tie in with how you approach photography?

JB: With my personal work it does, because it's all about reacting to my environment in an unscripted manner.

MT: Last question and this is no softball hypothetical. San Francisco is hit with a major earthquake and your apartment is quickly splitting into three, but leaves you just enough time to grab one of three items. The first being all your important documents including your passport and laptop to your left, in the center is all your camera gear, and finally to the right is all of your wife's favorite fashion attire. What do you grab?

JB: All of the sauces and spices because Green's gotta eat well even in an apocalypse.