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Sam's Bio
“For me,” says Sam Camp, “photography is hiking around the landscape looking for that perfect painting.” And since 1976, Sam has been doing just that. He’s hiked the rugged mountains, verdant forests, and river valleys of the Pacific Northwest and Sierra Nevada - making his home among the enchanting redwoods of California’s Humboldt County. Sam came to the West Coast in a 1966 Volkswagen bus during the spring of 1980. He was on his way to pick cherries in central Washington when life dealt him an unusual roadblock. “Mount Saint Helens blew up,” explains Sam, “so I went to visit a friend who lived in Humboldt, a place I’d never been before.” He’s been on that wonderful detour ever since. During the last several years, Sam's home away from home has been the stunning canyon country of Southern Utah. "There is something about the red rock canyon country that has gotten into my blood, especially around Boulder, Utah, where the canyons meet the high country of the Aquarius Plateau at the top of the Grand Staircase Escalante", he says. Sam got started in photography with the help of his father, a former FBI agent who taught him how to shoot - with his 1950’s Argus C-3 35 mm camera, that is - and to develop black and white photos in the darkroom. In high school, he refined his technique in Mr. Templeton’s photography classes - “the only class I didn’t get in trouble for staring out the window.” Once he arrived in Humboldt, Sam invested in his own 35 mm camera and lenses. He quickly realized the value of a tripod for depth-of-field and sharpness while shooting stunning landscapes of mountain peaks, waterfalls, and sublime forests of every conceivable hue of color. Currently he is using 6 megapixel digital SLRs and a Mamiya 645 medium format system. “Sam Camp’s photography captures the wilderness in both its grandeur and its intimacy,” according to Mark Lovelace, founder and director of the local Sunny Brae Arcata Neighborhood Alliance which aims to preserve a 281-acre redwood forest near the community. “In Sam’s photos, the photographer takes a backseat to his subject, allowing the viewer to appreciate the wilderness on his own terms.” Sam has made a lot of friends over the years, and together they have backpacked all over the Trinity Alps, Sierra Nevada, and southern Cascades - when not trekking through southern Utah, Arizona, Mexico, Guatemala, Honduras, Costa Rica, Indonesia, and Spain. Sam no doubt owes much of his popularity as a wilderness companion to the fact that he’s rarely in a rush - but always willing to go. He simply follows the light around the landscape. “ It’s all about the light, and Sam’s landscape images show a willingness to go to great lengths to be at the right place at the right time. Totally unique and spectacular photos captured during clearing or approaching storms at sunrise or sunset demonstrate his willingness to head into or stay in the field during iffy conditions on the chance that the magic will appear. Hard work pays off, and clearly, Sam is willing to do the work. Sam’s images are an invaluable addition to the Ancient Image note card line.” says Dan Norris, owner of Ancient Images in Moab, Utah - the company that prints Camp Photo note cards. “ The trick is to show just how clean the high country is,” says environmental educator and long-time friend/Rudy Bruening. “After a few days on the trail, the outside world starts to leave, and the Spirit of the Wild Place takes over. Sam’s photos tell the story of that Spirit." In addition to his own line of cards and archival prints, Sam’s work has appeared in national and international outdoor and travel magazines, publications by book publisher Glencoe/McGraw-Hill, newspaper travel sections around the country with his writer/ sister, nature publications, and Regional Visitor’s Guides in Humboldt, Mendocino, Marin, Del Norte, Siskiyou, and Shasta counties, and southern and western Oregon. He was also photo editor of Wild Humboldt Quarterly, a magazine about the greater Klamath-Siskiyou bioregion. As Sam says “ a place with transition zones rather than borders” When not hiking and working, he spends time with his three young children, who already display their father’s delight for exploration and photography. “After a slide show on the High Sierra,” recalls Sam, “ one of my sons crawled into bed with me the next morning and said, ‘Daddy, I want to go with you to the big mountains.’” “ Sam’s images enlarge our idea of home,” says poet, author, and Humboldt State University lecturer Jerry Martien. “Demanding, hard to get to, requiring everything of us - beauty beyond words.” Suzannah Bowser - writer, painter, and poet - sums up the value of Sam Camp’s work: “These glimpses of the natural world help us to remember what’s important beyond our day-to-day lives.” |
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