New Photos in Whitworth Today Alumni Magazine

Earlier this year I was hired by my alma mater Whitworth University to do two photo shoots for the alumni magazine Whitworth Today. Whitworth is located in Spokane, Washington, and the subjects were on my side of the state in Seattle and Tacoma, which is why they reached out to me as a local photographer. The magazine was published at the end of May, with my photos on the cover and on three pages inside.

The first project was to photograph a pair of stained-glass windows that had once hung in Whitworth’s original building when the school was located in Tacoma. They currently hang in Bethany Presbyterian Church in the appropriately-named Whitworth Parlor. I was prepared to rig lights outside to push light through the old colorful glass (you can’t guarantee direct sunlight in Pacific Northwest winters), but I timed it such that the sun showed up and did all the work for me, even enabling me to create natural starbursts. Whitworth Today chose a closeup of one window to grace the cover, and a photo of the pair side-by-side on the inside cover with a history of how they ended up at Bethany.

Here’s a look at the windows in context, where you can see what splendid light I got to work with:

The second project was an environmental portrait of alumnus Rich Caldwell (’95), who teaches and creates learning materials for pilots on how to fly Boeing’s 737, 777, and 787 airliners. I met Rich at The Museum of Flight in Seattle to pose in front of the Lockheed 1049G Super Constellation that once flew (and bears the markings of) Trans-Canada Airlines (TCA) near the museum entrance. (Fun fact: this plane was once made into a museum and a cocktail lounge in the Toronto airport before it was eventually sold to the Museum of Flight. Because there were other interested parties, even after the museum acquired it, the plane was shipped out under cover of darkness in the middle of the night.) I love that the editors chose to run the photo of Rich as a full spread.

And here’s a favorite photo from our session with Rich directly in front of the Constellation:

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