DWF – Let’s start off with a little bio, tell us a little bit about yourself.

Brendan - I got interested in Photography at the age of 13, getting my first SLR camera and a 50mm lens, straight off the mark I shot a wedding albeit as a back up to the main photographer. I learned my trade on a trial and error basics and admiring photographic work in books and magazines. All through my early teens I was funding my hobby by doing jobs for friends and family. I always describe myself as “an impatient artist” I had always big interest in art, especially oil and watercolour painting but could never wait for the project to finish, and often abandoned the project half way through.

Photography was a solution, I could get results almost instantly, and I still could be creative. The school that I attended had a darkroom that was made available to me and here I learned how to work images long before Photoshop was even thought of. When I finished second level schooling an opportunity came about to working in a local newspaper, and over the next 18 years I photographed everyday life in rural Ireland.

I still look back at my days as a photojournalist as great times, a time of learning and a time of maturing and most importantly a time when great opportunities were handed to me to record mixed emotions  in people’s lives.

Although living in a rural part of Ireland, I still had great opportunities to photograph some very famous people that came into the area, names like Michael Jackson, Bill Clinton, Michael Jordan, Neil Armstrong, Johnny Cash, looking back on it now I never realised the moment I was in, to me they were just another opportunity to earn a few pounds and to pay the bills.

But now as I look back at the photographs of them but more importantly most of my images I feel that I have played my part in telling a story, because to me, everything is a story and a story is everything. That what I do, I tell stories with my images, sometimes I get it right sometimes I don’t.

Over the years I probably have shot in excess of 3 million Images, a lot of stories, a lot of time in the darkroom and in front of a computer, but one thing I hope for, when I am long gone, is that my images will live on, that they will bring some joy some happiness and some memories back to the viewer. I know the Brendan Landy won’t be remembered but hopefully some of my photographs will.

Until then I still learn, I still see myself as one of the luckiest persons on earth to be in a job (if you can call it a job it’s more a vocation) that I love so much, that has such variety and that never stops evolving.

The passion that I put into my work is huge, but the rewards I get back are greater.

DWF – How did you become a photographer?

Brendan- As I said above I shot my first wedding at 13, from then on I just fell into the position, throughout my Photojournalism career I shot weddings, but I was never happy or comfortable shooting them, I never liked them because I was shooting them in a way that I was made believe that they should be shot, a set formula, shooting safe shots, been technically perfect and never been adventurous.

I was on the verge of quitting weddings in 2000 when I stumbled across an advertising magazine of photographers while on a news assignment in Sydney. The photography just jumped out at me for what I had been longing to do all the time. To shoot weddings with flair with creativity and with an open mind. I was able to  apply what I had learned in press work and introduce it to wedding photography. To this day I still have that magazine and I call it my bible, It is there to remind me when I finally found what I had been looking for , a way of introducing Ireland to a new style of wedding photography. I returned to Ireland and slowly started to change my style of shooting ( I had to introduce it slowly as I was not sure how the Irish client would take to it) from then on I began to love wedding photography  and so too did my clients.

My next milestone in progressing my wedding photography was actually finding the DWF in early 2004. This opened the world of wedding photography to me, now all of a sudden I was exposed to the world’s best; I had a bench mark, and a level I could aspire to. At the time the biggest names in the industry where very active on line, names like Yervant, Joe Buissink, JVS, Gerry Ghonis, David A Williams etc. every day I could be inspired, but also aspire to be like them one day, I still do !

The big thing I picked up from the DWF is that we all learn from each other, everyone has something to share, and we all can use another photographers idea or experience and put our own slant on it, as  a visual person I can get more from one image than I could from reading 10 books. I have learned through the years to dissect a image and understand how it was created how it was lit and try and understand why a photographer choose to shoot it a particular way, that’s how I learn, that’s how I get my ideas.

The third major turning point in my improvement in wedding photography came in 2006 and 2008, when I attended Yervants Venice workshop and Gerry Ghonis 4 day seminar in Florence; I got so much off the experience that it was like getting 2 of the biggest leg ups in life. I soaked up every minute of what they had to say and teach and I feel that my work today is the better for it.

I have learned to love wedding photography, I can be creative again, I can shoot weddings how I want to shoot them, Clients often say to me that they had high expectations of me prior to their wedding, but that I far out exceeded them, that to me is the ultimate payment.

Every wedding I shoot , I set my goal that day that this wedding has to be better than my last one. That way I never become stale or complacent.

There are a million and one things that inspire me, Life been the number one, we are surrounded by such a variety of things. We only have to get up in the morning and look out our window to get inspiration from the simplest things in life to be inspired.

In saying that I am defiantly inspired by other photographers, especially ones that can tell me a story with their images, Cartier Bresson were probably the greatest visual story teller.

DWF- Who or what inspires you as an artist?

Brendan - Painters, especially Caravaggio and Rembrandt the way they saw light and were able to put to canvas, is to this day mind-blowing.

I get great influence too from the cinematographers of today, where we have to just capture one still they often have to shot a full scene with stunning lighting and photography, an example of this is scenes in Joel Schumacher’s Phantom of the Opera, if you get an opportunity to see this and any other film like it that has stunning photography, be sure and watch it on Blue Ray, pause moments in it you will be truly inspired.

Having grown up in the theatre my late father was the lighting director i had a understanding of light and how it work from a early age .When I get a chance I  attend West End or Broadway shows to get ideas of lighting.

But in general every little thing can be some form of inspiration. I guess it depends what mood you are in at the time and if your eyes and mind are open enough to gain from the moment.

DWF- If we needed a photographer  today why would we book you? What makes you unique?

Brendan - I believe I can bring my story telling techniques to the wedding, mixed with years of experience , yet still with a young fresh creative mind , that will offer the client a unique yet stylish set of images that will be as fashionable in 20 years as the will be today.

Another reason would be that I am so passionate about what I do, I want to make my clients look great, but in doing so I want to make my work look great to, so it is in my own interest to make the wedding images stunning, as I depend on my customer been happy with their album that they will have no hesitation in referring me.

Plus I’m Irish; I’ll probably bring the party to the party

DWF - If you had to pick a favorite “Tool of the Trade” what would it be? and why?

Brendan - Ughhh A tough one, I love Lightroom, I love the way you can change an image with certain limitations, and with Photoshop you can go on and on, where as lightroom has though me to get it right in camera and just tweak it a little later if need be.

Not really a physically tool of the trade, but an imagination peppered with a bit of humour goes a long way in this game too.

DWF – Care to share your favorite photographs?

Brendan -

(see the gallery below for EVEN MORE of Brendan work)

DWF – How about some final words to live by?

Brendan - Enjoy what you do, and if you don’t change it until you do.

I am constantly evolving, I get bored easy so I never stand still, and I want to try new things.

Ghandi once said; “Live as if you were to die tomorrow. Learn as if you were to live forever.”

Location – Ireland

Business Name – Landy Photo

Websites - LandyPhoto.com

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