About the Photographer

I was working and attending a small community college in my hometown located in Eastern Iowa when I was invited on a trip with friends to go out to Steamboat Springs, Colorado for a week of skiing. I had learned to ski in Iowa and Illinois and was stoked to head out to some real mountains with snow instead of ice sheets. That week we had plenty of amazing snow, huge runs that seemed to last forever and some very fun parties. The views from the top of Storm Peak and coming down the face below the gondola at the end of each day had a huge impact on me- and the switchbacks on Rabbit Ears were amazing. We had never seen road signs with curves like that. The mountains were just so much more on many levels than the gentle hills in Iowa. I remember on the drive back home feeling that one trip to the mountains of Colorado each year was not going to be enough. After the trip I took a second job and moved to Denver 6 months later. I have called it home ever since. That was June of 1987 and the mountains have continued to be an important part of my life. Camping, hiking, biking and skiing with my wife and our 2 kids over the many years has made them our family retreat.

I got so excited to move to Colorado I ended up leaving home before I completed my degree in Drawing and Painting. I decided that yes, I want to be an artist, I just don’t want to be a starving artist. After moving, I worked multiple jobs to make enough money to buy my skiis and ski pass and go play in the mountains. I eventually settled down and decided to go back to school at CU in Boulder. I felt that a degree in architecture was an employable art degree since it would teach me to speak architect and how to read their drawings so that I could make their models. So, for the past 26 years I have been a professional model maker and have made hundreds if not thousands of tiny buildings. I have worked for some wonderful architects in the area and they have helped refine my love of all the details that come together to make a final design. It’s all about the details.

Photography has always been an interest for me since my Dad gave me my first SLR when I was 12. It was a Pentax Spotomatic and about all I knew was that if the needle in the view finder was in the middle when I took the picture I had a decent chance it would turn out. I would get one or two good shots from a roll I had to wait 10 days to get developed and back from the lab, and that was after the roll had been in the camera for a couple months saving the images left on the roll for a good reason to take a picture. Enough excitement and build up to keep me saving my allowance for another roll of film and development costs. Later in high school, learning to develop my own film and make prints in the dark room kept my interest and then having a family, I naturally stepped into the documentary type of photographer, photographing our family at all stages, vacations and outings.

The past 5 years I have used my photography for my Etsy business where I etch my drawings of animals, fish, 14er mountains.. into glasses. Photos of animals at zoos and aquariums are not going to sell, but I can draw the animals portrait and laser etch it into glasses that people select which 14ers or animals are in their set. It has been nice to combine my drawing with photography, but to have images that can stand on their own, tell a story or give someone the chills, those are the satisfying moments that kept me coming back when first learning 40+ years ago. I love seeing an image in my mind and being able to bring that out into the world and printed on a big, glossy metal panel.

I like to get out and explore with my camera, chasing light, looking for great shooting opportunities on both big and small scales. Large mountain valleys and sunsets are awesome to shoot, but finding tiny details, patterns, shapes and textures in everyday life can be even more exciting because it reminds us that beauty is all around us, all the time. We just have to slow down and take a look.

I hope you enjoy the prints I have assembled on this website. Stand back and enjoy the big picture, but don’t be shy about getting up close and check out the tight, crisp details that come together to make a timeless image. It is indeed all about the details! Enjoy!

My name is Chris Hartman and I am Detailed By Nature.