Rising Spirits Photograph

Welcome and thanks for visiting! Contact me at WilliamLeirer.art@gmail.com with questions or for any reason whatsoever. I'm open to requests for certain sizes, printing surfaces, or custom framing in keeping with edition limits and my artistic vision for a particular image. I gravitate toward scenes of nature - landscapes, water, mountains, wildlife, plants, and flowers. My style leans toward photo-impressionism, abstraction, and abstract expressionism. 'Straight out of the camera' with minimal adjustments is often all that I need to get my message across, but sometimes I use various techniques of digital art and traditional photography. For example I might use in-camera approaches such as long exposure, depth compositing, selective focus, multiple exposure, or intentional camera movement to capture a particular moment or feeling. Sometimes I make use of techniques of the digital darkroom, such as depth compositing, photo collage or image blending to emphasize a unique connection or an experience. Sometimes I add hand painting with digital paintbrushes to a photograph, or use the pixels from my images to create my own paintbrushes. Some of my work is created completely with digital brushes, based on my photo reference. I first got interested in photography as a young man, when a close relative loaned my his beloved twin lens reflex camera and taught me how to process the film and make prints in his basement darkroom. I've been shooting ever since. My first college was as a photography major at the Cooper School of Art. I changed my major when I transferred to Cleveland State University, but I continued to take photography and art classes along with my other coursework. I ended up with a Master of Arts Degree in Education. Retired now after 35 years of teaching, I continue to study photography and art. When it comes to the digital darkroom and the use of digital paintbrushes, I am mostly self-taught.