The perfect storm: how everyday artist Steve Garrington achieved internet fame
4 April 2016
Packed with high end photography over selfies, thousands of people upload their photos to sharing site Flickr looking for feedback, 'faves' and follows from other users. This week's Everyday Artist Steve Garrington has become something of a celebrity on the social media network, achieving international recognition for his photography - which is still only a part-time hobby.
In December, his photo of a crashing wave at Porthcawl, Wales, was voted the second best on Flickr for the whole of 2015, beaten only by a photo of a rocket launch from billionaire Elon Musk's SpaceX project. Get Creative decided it was high time to catch up with Steve to find out how he amassed internet stardom and what inspires his extraordinary photography.
With over 90,000 followers on Flickr, Steve isn't short of people to give feedback on his photography: and it's this 'Darwinian' process of uploading photos and receiving rapid feedback that he credits with improving his skills. He soon realised that his photos of dramatic landscapes were received particularly well - including his first series of storm photos from Porthcawl in 2008.
"You get to learn things as you go along - I'm better at producing images now than I used to be. It's a labour of love, and I'm always just trying to take the best picture I can of the scene as I see it", Steve says of his photography, "I'm completely self-taught - and that's not a boast, it's just I get bored!"
Despite a lifelong interest in photography, Steve didn't get serious about it until the first digital cameras came along. He started out taking snapshots with compact cameras until deciding to invest in his first serious camera in 2007. Having stopped using film due to the cost, the inconvenience, and feeling dissatisfied with the results, he delights in being able to shoot thousands of photos and go through them at his leisure with post-production programmes.
Staying safe while photographing the weather
While you can capture some fantastic moments during stormy weather, it's important to take care and stay vigilant while out and about. Steve recommends:
"Coastal photography during stormy weather has the potential to be very dangerous if you are not fully prepared. You need to have a knowledge of how the conditions affect the area you intend to occupy during your shoot.
Observe the area for some time before taking up position and ask yourself these questions:
- Where are the waves breaking?
- Is the tide coming in, or going out?
- Is the forecast for the weather to worsen?
- Envisage a worse case scenario, a wave two or three times larger than any previously observed, what's your escape plan?
Unless you can satisfy yourself that the spot you have chosen is not only currently safe, but will continue to be safe based on the answers to the above questions, you will need to chose again.
Finally, don't go alone, buddy up and only one of you take pictures at a time, the other needs to act as lookout because when you are staring down that lens you can become a little too absorbed in capturing the scene."
Rather than meticulously combing through his photos straight after taking them, Steve tends to back them all up, then leave the thousands of images to sit on his computer for a while, before going back, flicking through and deciding which ones catch his eye.
In particular, with his series of storm photos he had taken so many they all "blurred into one" - which is why 'Stormy Porthcawl' didn’t get posted online until almost eighteen months after it was originally taken, in 2014 – it had been sitting on Steve’s computer the whole time before he spotted it as a potential stand out photo. Even then, he didn't realise it was going to gain such popularity, having already uploaded numerous photos of the two storms he'd photographed. He was pleased to see his photo in the top 25 of 2015, and 'didn't mind' being beaten by Elon Musk.
"In some ways, I still haven't got a clue - I can put a photo up that I think is brilliant but it only gets 3,000 likes - and then something else I think is only alright gets loads more! There's another photo I took of the storm that I think is better, and it has more likes on Flickr, but it's had much less exposure."
Following the inclusion of 'Stormy Porthcawl' in the Flickr list, it has been picked up and used on the Weather Channel in New York as their image for stormy weather, featured on websites including Wales Online and This is Colossal, and led to Steve being tweeted about by the Saatchi Gallery.
Working at the National Museum of Cardiff means Steve is never short of inspiration.
Being around that level of beauty and art all the time does tend to rub off on you. It's given me an idea of how to frame a scene, from looking at Monets, and Turner's 'The Storm'
"Being around that level of beauty and art all the time does tend to rub off on you. It's given me an idea of how to frame a scene, from looking at Monets, and Turner's 'The Storm' - I've studied that quite intently! It's a big influence on me, that one". And the nature of his shift work also provides Steve with some unique timing opportunities, "sometimes I'll work all the way through the night, then finish at six in the morning, jump in the car and go somewhere to take photographs of the dawn. I do see more sunrises than most people - but that's because most people aren't looking for them".
Steve doesn't have plans to head out and capture any of the current storms battering the UK's coast. He’s only documented two big storms – in 2008 and 2014 – but each time took so many photos he was “like a kid in a candy store”, and has enough photos to keep re-visiting them and posting them. The conditions needed to get such good waves are more rare than just having the coast pummelled by high winds: you need the right combination of the wind, a high tide and good sunlight to capture a truly dramatic moment.
In the meantime, Steve will carry on taking photographs of whatever catches his eye and uploading them online to see what his followers think. He sometimes combines his three main hobbies: cycling, photography and looking for edible funghi - by taking off on his bike, with his camera, searching out mushrooms.
“Photography gets me out of the house. On a miserable windy day or a cold morning. It’s easier to not do things, and this gets me out of the house”.
You can look through Steve's extensive range of photos on his Flickr page here.
Steve's tips for getting going
“1. If you are a photographer and doing it in isolation – get online in some way! Flickr has changed my photography a lot – it’s focussed me and forced me to get out there and improve. I know that I’m chasing likes, but it’s still a good way to get better.
2. For people getting into photography – you don’t have to spend serious money on a camera. There are some great compact cameras out there and free programmes for editing. Enjoy any feedback you get and engage with people – I’ve done well because of the feedback I’ve received. Take your time, think about what you’re doing: wait for the sun if it looks like it’ll come out on a building in a certain way after another minute. So many times I’ve been waiting for the sun to come out and hit something in a certain way, and I see other people coming up, taking photos and leaving again, and if they just waited they’d have a much better photo. You’ve got that minute to wait – and all photography is just light!”
