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Alex Samuels
@alexsamuelss
Landscape photographer based in the US
Both my grandfather and dad loved taking pictures of the places they traveled to. While growing up, I was fed stories about trips to Guatemala, Indonesia, Canada, India… and I’d lose myself in the film photos they took during those adventures. As a kid, I couldn’t quite comprehend everything that was going on in those travels or why I even thought they were so fascinating. Looking back now though, it’s easy to see that’s where my desire to explore the world first began and why I eventually became interested in photography.
When I started college, I took my interest and enjoyment of the world to my studies, leading me to major in Anthropology & Geography. I learned to conduct map research, write persuasive papers, and discuss everything there is to discuss about cultures worldwide.
"All of my college experiences only served to reinforce my early childhood desire to get out there and visit new places."
After five years, when the time came for me to graduate, I relished the potential opportunity of long-term travel. With that in mind, I saved up as much money as I could that I’d made during various internships and jobs around SLO (short for San Luis Obispo, where I went to college) and booked a one-way ticket to Singapore so I could travel around Southeast Asia.
I remember those last couple of months before I left California fondly. It felt like momentum had been building in my life for quite some time, and even through a few ups and downs, I knew traveling was the next best step for me. I had my parents’ own travel stories in the back of my mind, a ton of gusto (best way I can put it), and a brand new camera to take with me.
"I ended up traveling through Singapore, Malaysia, Bali, and Vietnam. All of which ended up endearing themselves in numerous ways."
I got the chance to walk through the futuristic downtown of Singapore’s main city and explore its massive botanical gardens. Then in Malaysia, I ate delicious food in Penang’s streets and took a trip to the island of Borneo, where crocodiles lazed about on river shores and beautiful exotic birds moved about in the trees. Then there was my time spent in Bali. I wandered through it’s crowded streets, surfed down in Uluwatu, and explored the more isolated parts of the surrounding islands. Finally, in Vietnam, I got to witness some of the most surreal landscapes I’ve ever seen and embark on a four-day motorbike journey through the mountainous Northern Region of Ha Giang. There, other travelers and I stayed in remote villages and were treated to homemade Vietnamese dishes and dance shows.
To this day, those two months I traveled in that part of the world were some of the best days of my young life and continue to serve as inspiration for me to travel even more. Throughout the entire time, I kept my camera with me, documenting as much as possible and doing my best to remind myself to put it down just as often.
Even with all of those great, memorable experiences I had, there were plenty of unsavory moments as well. In Borneo, a friend and I watched as hundreds of mosquitos landed on her legs while we were out on a night hike. It was a rather horrifying moment since we hadn’t taken Malaria pills on our trip yet, but luckily she turned out fine. On numerous occasions in Bali, we came close to being run over by speeding scooters and had not so friendly encounters with the local monkey population.
During my motorbike journey in Vietnam, I saw another rider lose control of their bike, fall off, and watch as the bike skidded across the road and over the end into a canyon below. The rider was scraped up pretty bad, and watching the scene unfold in front of me gave me my first sense of mortality.
In the end, nothing negatively life-changing happened to me and in hindsight most of these unfortunate events are now laughable. Still, these experiences gave me a healthy dose of what can happen while you’re abroad, and, in a way, I’m almost more thankful for them than any of my other memories.
Recently, I’ve been living on the island of Oahu, Hawaii, and it has been an absolute joy. Over the past ten years, I’ve been fortunate enough to come and explore the island many times over. From surfing on the North Shore, to hiking along the iconic, lush ridgelines, and diving in clear, blue waters on the west side, none of it has gotten old. Living here has enabled me to visit those same spots more often and to discover more places that I didn’t even know existed before. As I said before, its been an absolute joy.
"Living here has been influential on my own photography style."
Many of the activities I enjoy revolve around the beach and ocean. As you can imagine, this leads to me always coming home with tons of photographs of swaying palm trees, crashing waves, and shorelines. However, what I’ve noticed most is a change in the colors that dominate my photographs. Being from California, many of my past photos consist of strong yellows and oranges from sunsets. Out here though, blues and greens characterize the environment and are what turn up most often now in my work. The new color palette has been a welcome change and I’m interested in seeing how it affects what I photograph in other parts of the world I travel to.
"Taking a photograph is only part of the journey. Editing, for me, starts "in camera."
When I’m out and about taking photos, I’ll always do my best to compose each photograph in a way that best represents the scene that’s unfolding before me. That means I’ll try to focus on what not to include in my photos as much as what I’d like to include. I’ll also think about what colors I feel most drawn to, how much the distortion from my lens affects the subject I’m photographing, and so much more. When I finally import my photos into Lightroom, all I need to do is a light touch-up on the colors to make them look as natural as possible. Basically, I’m just trying to make them my own and look good.
As time has gone on, my passion for photography has only grown. Its opened doors to new and exciting experiences, relationships with people I may have never met otherwise, and has been a source of reliable enjoyment even through tumultuous times.
"Most of my inspiration for photography comes from people, from anyone and everyone."
It’ll sometimes come from a stranger at a coffee shop telling me about a beautiful destination they hiked in over the weekend. Or a phone call with an old friend that’s gushing about their trip to the mountains. Most of all, I love observing people enjoy the world around them and documenting their actions.
I guess you could say my inherent love for the outdoors is amplified by hearing and watching other people enjoy time outside. And that’s precisely where I want my photography to continue heading towards, documenting people in the outdoors. Photographing divers swimming with sharks, surfers riding hollow pointbreaks, families hiking in the mountains, friends hiking under the stars, and outdoor photos with no one in them. Moments in time of raw landscapes that I can then share with other people who love getting outside.
Whatever direction I choose to go in, I’ll always want to memorialize my experiences through the medium of photobooks. The desire to self-publish a photobook initially came to mind as a gift idea for my mom’s birthday. Being an avid traveler herself, she cheered me on and supported me throughout my time abroad in Southeast Asia & New Zealand. But I wanted to have a tangible way to share the memories I collected.
I also wanted a way to engage with my photos that didn’t involve a rectangular digital screen. In this day and age, I view all of my work on a phone or computer. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with that, and it has the potential to help me share my work with more people, but it doesn’t always bring me contentment and it doesn’t always drive me to be more creative and study my photos critically.
It took me weeks to sift through thousands of my pictures, design a book layout, write a short synopsis to go along with each photo, and raise the money to publish it. But, it left me feeling more excited and inspired than ever before. When the process was done, and I sent out the books, I made the decision that I’d do my best to make as many more photobooks as I could for the rest of my life.
As more and more opportunities to collaborate/work with businesses and people have come to me, I’ve learned many valuable lessons along the way. Specifically the work I did with smaller companies through Southeast Asia and New Zealand. I was on a tight budget of around $15-20 a day throughout my time traveling. Within that, I was indeed able to make it in terms of paying for food, transportation, the occasional activity, and find accommodation at a cheaper hostel. Still, it wasn’t always easy to stay in that price range. So, I eventually started reaching out to hostels in the areas I was planning on traveling to see if they wanted to work together. I’d offer up my photo services in exchange for a night’s stay, and more often than not, a kind business owner would gladly agree to it. At these spots, I often took photos of guests having fun, dorm rooms, beachside pools, and the general ambiance that surrounded the hostel.
All in all, I enjoyed it, and it helped me develop rapidly into the photographer I am today. Going forwards, however, I have no expectations for how everything may turn out. Still, I know it’ll be a lot of fun whatever I end up doing.
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