The Photowalk

Ian Randall is a sports photographer whose journey into the genre was as unexpected as it has been impactful to his life. Fate led him to photography, a twist of destiny in a life abruptly disrupted by an unwelcome visitor: cancer. His story resonates deeply with anyone who has faced this formidable foe, whether personally or through the lens of a loved one's struggle or loss. And his superpower?...

Storyteller Al Brydon is a walker with a camera enraptured by the landscape and human interaction with it. He's published and exhibited internationally, and his projects may surprise you, including his fascination with graveyard bins and an encounter with a phantom cat. Also today from the mailbag: a Route 66 adventure, the best natural medicine that we ALL have access to, Mexico in an RV, a story...

Imagine a five-pointed star. Now attach a word to each point and think of them as the core principles or values associated with how and why you create or make photographs. Today as we walk together on the Photowalk show, the philosophical YouTuber Sean Tucker discusses five that I have chosen, and we ask you to consider your own during this exercise of creative self-discovery. It's also an expande...

Stephen Dupont is an Australian photographer  recognised around the world for his concerned photography on the human condition, war and climate, earning him dozens of prizes including the W. Eugene Smith Grant, and a Robert Capa Gold Medal Citation. Today he talks honestly about books, the why of photography, life, death and the camera.  Also on the show, remembering and respecting, taking a pilgr...

As we walk today, two guests feature in the show. Photographer and creative retreat mentor Margaret Soraya from the Isle of Harris shares how the arts have helped her mental health immeasurably during a period of grief following the passing of her mother. Former school deputy head Emily Renier, now Fujifilm UK's latest ambassador, recounts how a mental breakdown reset her life both creatively and...

Welcome to a photography podcast where we walk together with a mailbag of stories and pictures. My guest today, John Dolan, understands and completely embraces the importance of the photographic moment over photographic perfection. The second edition of his best-selling monograph, The Perfect Imperfect, is about to be released, and in it, he invites photographers to look beyond the shot list and f...

Today, a holiday-special interview with the iconic fine art photographer Stephen Wilkes. Since opening his studio in New York City in 1983, he's built an unprecedented body of work and a reputation as one of America's most iconic photographers, widely recognized for his fine art, editorial and commercial work. Stephen Wilkes talks candidly about being mentored by a photographic great, Jay Maisel,...

Mary Jo Hoffman is an aeronautical engineer-turned-artist. Twelve years ago she began a daily practice of photographing found nature, no subject too small or ordinary. Now, Phaidon has published her first book Still: The Art of Noticing. This is a story about a creative serendipitous find that has become, a beautiful way to live. Also today, philosophical YouTuber Sean Tucker answers a question ab...

I'm joined on Surrey's Chobham Common for a photo walk with award-winning photojournalist Jason Florio to announce 2025's Photowalk Show Adventure, which is going to be in India, photographing and riding the urban-suburban and rural countryside trains in and out of Mumbai. There's an invite to make our adventure YOUR adventure as we explore Mumbai, including the cave temples of Elephanta Island, a...

Photographer Daniel Meadows has spent his life documenting British society, using photographs, audio recordings, and short movies. He is the creative architect of a sublime idea: putting a bed, a darkroom, and a photographic studio into a 1940s double-decker  bus, touring it to meet and photograph as many people as he could to document British life, which has become a historic gem. From the mailba...

As I walk with your letters and inspirational stories, I'm joined on the show by studio guest Michelle Valberg, the Canadian Geographic Photographer, Nikon ambassador, and international fellow of the Explorers Club. Michelle has just returned from an adventure voyage photographing wildlife of the Antarctic Peninsula, navigating icebergs and rough seas to make extraordinary photographs. Also on the...

On a long-distance bike adventure from London to St. Petersburg, an 'accidental' photographic find led photographer Christopher Herwig to subsequently cover tens of thousands of miles by car, bike, bus and taxi in 14 former Soviet countries, documenting unexpected treasures of modern art; 'Soviet Bus Stops'. This is an unbridled story of passion for a project that has consumed more than two decade...

Hans Johnson is an international award-winning film and television composer. He records and collects sounds from the cultures and people he spends time with, celebrating diversity and encouraging harmony and togetherness through his music. His videos and pictures often lead the compositions he makes and today, he shares the stories behind his music. Also, philosophical YouTuber Sean Tucker talks a...

This week, join me, Neale James on the show in West Africa and journey with our Photowalk team as we explore The Gambia with those attending this special Photowalk Retreat; Mat Bobby, Lynn Fraser, Michael Assmann and Shannon Coppin, guided by photojournalist Jason Florio and film producer Andy Thompson plus new-found Gambian friends. We walk and learn together about what makes this small, welcomin...

In 2015, Joshua Coombes, a British hairstylist, took his scissors to the street to cut the hair of the homeless community in a story that is as much about hope and humanity as it is about hair. He's now the architect of the international Do Something for Nothing movement, which our regular contributing photography mentor Valérie Jardin has photographed at work in Paris and New York. Today, both Jo...

Retreating home to the shires from another day working in the city of London seventeen years ago, Kevin Mullins announced to his wife, "I'm becoming a wedding photographer." What followed is quite the adventure, including almost quitting on day one of his new life! In the third of three specials interviewing friends in the photographic and creative industries, I talk to Kevin about his leap of fai...

It's a very cryptic show title, I grant you, but the question is answered by my good friend, documentary photographer Giles Penfound, a former British army photographer who has found that the story he wishes to dedicate his life to, is now within walking distance of his home. We talk about his life making pictures in areas of conflict, those who mentored him during this time, plus his conflicted m...

In the 'niche' of photography podcasts, there are a handful of names who stand out as pioneers of the genre. One of those is my guest today, Jeffery Saddoris, a multi-disciplinary audio and visual artist based in Washington DC. He paints, he writes, and for his podcasting, he crafts conversations with people who move and inspire him. This launches three weeks of special personal conversations with...

Canadian explorer, photographer, filmmaker and international speaker Jill Heinerth joins me today for a bumper edition of The Photowalk podcast. We talk about the medical importance of our oceans, cave diving, incredible creatures beneath the waves, swimming with Polar bears and the story of a sub-marine diving mission into and iceberg. Also today, the why of making sketchbook pictures, the nostal...

Today's guest is the celebrated Canadian wildlife photographer Michelle Valberg, who shares stories of her photographic adventures at the two poles and the incredible animals she observes as she creates emotional imagery that has the power to make viewers feel. From the mailbag on today's show, how introversion affects what you photograph, favourite places in the world to MAKE those pictures and h...

The final Photowalk edition of 2023 takes me to Oxford to visit Tony Lorenzo, who, in the early part of this century, found two fading 1930s photographs in a box on the floor of a shop in London featuring a girl called June. This is the story of a quest to find who June was in real life from those and other photographs subsequently found, a photographic detective story that takes Tony up and down...

Nine years in the US Navy, Rachelle Steele learned her photographic craft the hard way in operations that tested her resolve. She laid down the camera for five years before rediscovering a love for black and white photography, studying at the Academy of Art University , which lead to new adventures making collections of storytelling photographs of her life and for others.  Also today demons in mar...

Alastair Humphreys is a man who has the word adventurer on his business card. He's adventured to the most incredible remote places, cycled across the world on a modest budget, crossed the ocean in a rowing boat, run across a desert, though his view of exploration changed as he sat in a small red tent in a remote part of Greenland. Now he champions micro-adventures, writing about and photographing...

Roger Hutchings is an award-winning British documentary photographer who was mentored by the Magnum photographer David Hurn. Today he talks of a life spent making pictures about people and how they navigate their lives in the most extraordinary of situations. Also on the show today, your comments and letters: we revisit a letter from last week where Tony Lorenzo went about some pretty impressive d...

I'm walking this week with photographer Mali Davies in cultural Liverpool, birthplace of The Beatles, looking for the city's famous Liver Birds and challenging ourselves with low-light street photography, and as we're focusing on street photography, mentor Valérie Jardin returns for her monthly series, Visual Stories. Also today, letters from the mailbag; finding your why, how photography is a gre...