As the youngest of four children raised in smalltown Brockville, Ontario, I was afforded a lot of time to develop a rich imagination and creative personality - always colouring, but rarely within the lines. Never a fantastic student, I clung to the subjects which allowed me a little more freedom of expression, such as Art, English and Creative Writing, while shying away from Mathematics and History, subjects with sets of hard and fast rules and - worst of all - questions with only one answer.
I never went out of my way to pick up a camera until after high school while on a year-long Creative Arts course at Sheridan College in 1987. The course itself was not photographically intense, touching only on the basics. It was more about the experience: first time away from home, in a place where no one knew me; an opportunity to re-invent myself. (I won't go into details, but I don't recommend it. However, neither do I regret it.)
From there it was Summer at home, followed by Fall and Graphic Design at Saint Lawrence College in Kingston. Graphics was more about developing and honing my own sense of design, something that was already there, than about learning new things. The one major exception: photography. I picked up my first K1000 and fell in love.
Even so, after the three year course ended in 1991, I didn't pick up a camera in earnest for almost a decade. Truth be told I sold my cameras after falling on hard times a couple of years after I finished college.
My break into the Graphic Design field finally happened in the mid-nineties when a fellow Saint Lawrence alumnus hired me to work with him in a small design shop in Kingston. I had no computer experience, but he'd remembered my style and thought I'd make a valuable addition to the team. That began my love affair with design and photo editing software, to be married soon after with photography.
As all things are apt to do, that job ended. No opportunities presented themselves, and not for a long time. I approached a small print house with a proposal that I keep the shop open after regular hours, in exchange for a percentage of sales or design jobs I brought in and, more importantly, the chance to work on up to date systems with current software.
When that ended, I had experience, a recognized name and - most important of all - contacts. I was hired as a digital editor at a prominent photographic retailer, thus bringing me back to the photographic beginnings I'd all but forgotten. Shortly after I started, I picked up my second K1000. Then an MZ50. Then a digital SLR. Snowflake becomes blizzard.
This is what I see. Not what I see through the viewfinder of my camera, but in my mind as I'm taking the picture. If I don't see what I imagined, then you won't see it here.
Randy deKleine-Stimpson lives by the lake in Verona, Ontario, Canada.. is in love and married - same woman - has a dog, two cats and an unspecified and fluctuating number of fish .
