decent exposure: AARON BLATT

I’ve known Blatt for a few years now and he is one of the most humble/laid back photographers I know. Which is surprising for his age and the quality of his work. Only 22 and coming out of VT, Aaron has already started to make a name for himself in the snowboard world. Currently, he holds the spot as the photo editor for East Coast Snowboard Mag, on top of shooting for multiple different clients. I’m expecting big things from him in the future…. no pressure Blatt. Check out his portfolio- adblatt.com. Or follow his blog. Read the interview after the jump.

Photo: Jin Saito

Place you call home:

I guess I had been living in Boston, MA in the fall for a few months… but now I’m on the road – currently in Western Canada living on an RV and shooting around… I’ve lived in Vermont, Oregon, and New Zealand in the last couple of years – NZ and VT for the longest.

What were you doing in NZ?

Riding, shooting, and traveling… Oh yeah, I took some classes down there too at University of Otago in Dunedin (South Island), I had some really good in depth design classes down there, and also studied some sound design (recording music is the best!).

But that place is insane, I can’t believe a place like that exists – Mountains, waterfalls, good snow, good surf, good people, some amazing little towns… if the chance is available to get to that country, jump on it!

Chris Bresford

A lot of people seem to think the life of a photographer is pretty glamorous, what do you have to say about that?

It’s funny in snowboarding because at times you can look around and you are getting expensive drinks passed to you at fancy parties, then at times you find yourself waking up on a dirty couch in some tiny mountain town… “this is not my beautiful life…” But it’s been fun to take it all in.

Brendan McInerney

You’re what, 22 right? Being young in the photo game, do you think your age holds you back, helps you, or do people just focus on quality of work not how old you are?

In this day and age, with the internet, and cell phones and whatnot – a lot of people that I do work for, initially haven’t met me in person – With introductions over the web being more frequent (and easily accessible) than face to face meetings I don’t think that age matters as much anymore. People can view someone’s portfolio online, decide they want to work with the photographer, designer etc., and then send off an e-mail to work out a contract all in the same day. So I guess I’ll go with quality of work for that question…

What’s your favorite thing to shoot?

Simplicity. When composition boils down to just a few ‘objects’ in the frame, be it snowboarders or jungle cats – that’s what I like best.

Black & White or color?

Depends on the situation, but when I shoot film I like color transparency the best. E-6!

Natural Sunlight or Flashes?

People that came up shooting on the east coast know how to use the flashes well. It’s grey out 90 percent of the winter – we know how to use flashes here, but once we leave it’s awesome to shoot with sunlight…

It’s a balance.

The most played out thing in photography right now-

People that take themselves too seriously… Definitely not to say it’s played out to take your work seriously, it’s important to stand behind your work – but it makes me nervous when people get too hyped on their work to progress their craft.

Chris Grenier

Favorite photographer outside of snowboarding:

I have a bunch of good friends that shoot outside of snowboarding, their work always keeps me pumped; However I think I pull more from designers/illustrators than photographers… Illustrators create with no limits and I’d like to do my best to shoot that way to some extent – hopefully more so in the future… my favorite at the moment is Frank Stockton – he’s so good at putting people into motion, and some of the angles he ‘shoots’ from are insane…

Luke Haddock

Do you think that people either have a good eye or they don’t…. or can someone learn how to become a good photographer?

I think learning by experience is key – I mean looking past all of the ‘tech’ stuff or book-smarts, anyone can pick up a camera and learn what it is that they like to see through the lens. People talk a lot about photo school, and I think it is a touchy subject… A lot of people get churned out of photo programs that have been built to create wedding/event photographers. I wonder if people enter that situation assuming that they will have all of this creative freedom when they get out and ‘become’ a photographer. I think that having the drive to shoot photos and the will to improve are the ingredients to becoming a good photographer.

Mikey LeBlanc

You went to college for graphic design correct? Do you think studying that helped you with your photography… as far as learning about composition etc?

Yes! I can’t be more thankful for the opportunity to get to go to school – I feel like studying design opened some different doors in terms of thinking while shooting photos, it was a very worthy experience…

What kind of projects are you working on now?

The winter is in full effect in the Northern hemisphere now, so I’m working on the fly… trying to put together a solid collection of images for mags/clients for the ‘09/10 winter at this point.

Yale Cousino

Did I hear something about you and a few friends starting a snowboard company or something? What’s that all about?

For sure! I met Matt Griffin while coaching snowboarding up in Vermont a few years back. He was studying business at Northeastern and his brother had a degree in engineering. They had this scheme to get a press and start making boards so I jumped in and helped out with some graphics and photo stuff – The Griffins are now some of my best friends, and the company is moving along. They are doing things at their own pace, and doing it right by revamping and perfecting every detail and process that they can look into… keep an eye out for the boards or check ‘em out at rhythmsnowboards.com

What’s next?

Extensively planning an image before shooting it. Creating scenes for a series is a goal for sure…