By Kathi Caldwell-Hopper
Images courtesy Philbrick Photography
For North Conway area photographer, Jay Philbrick, it is all about the light. To capture the light, which can be elusive, he will get up long before the sun rises. Also, he will travel to hard-to-reach locations, even if it means using his skills as a climber or driving with his wife, Vicki, for thousands of miles to the western United States, for example.
Photo trips are made easier by a van
Many people know Jay for his amazing “cliff photos” of models and just-married couples taken in the Conway area. The shots are beautiful, showing the valley far below and sometimes mist rising from the treetops or the sun rising, while a bride and groom embrace on a cliff outcropping. The shots have garnered accolades for Jay, but such work has taken years of experience as a climber, and of course, as a professional photographer, to achieve. In 2008, Jay won Digital Wedding Forum’s Wedding Photographer of the Year award in the couples category for the first cliff shot.
Along with these dramatic photographs, Jay and Vicki have done, over the years, a range of work from studio photos to senior portraits, landscapes, inspiration photo shoots in all sorts of places around the world, to photographing individual models and weddings.
Jay is originally from Connecticut and as a kid, he says he was fortunate to make family trips for mountain climbing in the Conway area. As a teenager, he took lots of photos to record the places he was climbing or hiking. “My first camera was an Olympus; it’s a relic now but I still have it,” says Jay. He had no idea at the time that taking those early photos was a prediction of his chosen art form years later.
“I was an Air Force pilot for 14 years,” he continues. “I was stationed all over before Vicki and I moved to North Conway in 1994. After moving to the area, I became a full-time certified climbing guide and did that until 2000.”
Jay says he realized he needed to “make some real money” at that point. He had done photography all his life, but more as a hobby. Vicki had a darkroom (she has a degree in photography) and has always worked alongside Jay as they shoot at locations all over the world. She has also stepped in as a model at times and some of Jay’s best work is of Vicki in places such as the desert or perched high on a rock formation.
Serendipitously, at the time he wanted to make some “real money”, Jay photographed a wedding. “I was totally surprised that I enjoyed photographing a wedding,” he recalls. “But I saw then that photography is a great way to capture emotions.”
A beautiful photo combining a model in red dress with a field and sky.
Jay has a talent for photographing what others might not see in the everyday world. A wedding, for example, would seem to be an occasion where the photographer lines up the family and wedding party and bride and groom for some traditional shots. Jay can do that, but his work goes far beyond. “I am interested in capturing different perspectives. I can get those shots because Vicki works with me. She gets the traditional shots, which allows me to work on the shots that capture different perspectives.”
He says, looking back, he was very lucky to get those wedding shots that interested him. “The biggest take-away is that it is really important to be into what you are trying to photograph,” he adds.
In 2008, the first “cliff shot” combined his experience of climbing with a wedding. He worked on the photos with a couple who had hired him to photograph their wedding. Jay learned, when meeting with the couple, that they were both climbers and loved to pursue the sport in the Conway area where they had a second home.
“I had wanted to do a cliff shot for about five years,” Jay recalls. “I had an idea to photograph a couple on the cliff. I told this couple about it, and they were excited with the idea. We decided to do the photo shoot and scheduled it for a few days after their wedding.”
The first day they set up for the shots, the weather did not cooperate and they had to reschedule for the next day, knowing the couple had to return home from their honeymoon very soon. With every safety precaution in place – Jay works with Marc Chauvin, an internationally certified mountain climbing guide from the North Conway area (www.chauvinguides.com) who does the rigging and accompanies the couple or model(s) for the cliff shots – the first cliff session took place with the bride in her gown and the groom in a suit. The weather was still uncooperative, rainy and misty, but they took the photos because of the couple’s schedule. Jay felt he had not gotten the shots he envisioned due to the weather. But when he got home and began to process the photos, he realized the haze/fog made for great images.
The next cliff session was in 2010 and then another took place in 2012. As awareness of the cliff photos spread, NH Chronicle did a segment and it won a NH Emmy.
Jay always stresses that the models are fully anchored and nothing in the photos is fake. The ropes and anchors are hidden by the camera angles but the shots are real; there is no photo-shopping. Marc Chauvin goes down onto the cliff with the couple and safety is everything.
Certainly, these unusual and beautiful shots are not the only work Jay does. His photos encompass magazine work, model sessions, and more.
A breathtaking cliff shot by Philbrick Photography
A few years ago, Jay and Vicki outfitted a van so they could live in it short term and travel to pursue photography and outdoor activities such as hiking, biking, skiing, and climbing. This led them to make the decision to drive to the western United States, often for weeks at a time. They camped at various remote locations and worked with models to get great “desert shots” as Jay refers to the images. Again, his ability to find the unusual and beautiful in the every day have to be seen to be believed.
Much of Jay’s work relies upon the ever-changing light and glowing sunrises and sunsets. He often photographs dancers and other models in downtown North Conway as the sun rises and the sky turns from inky black to gray to pink. The shots are breathtaking and rely upon Jay’s fascination with the light.
These days, because of the Covid-19 pandemic, Jay and Vicki are curtailing their travels and staying closer to home in the Conway area. With years of experience as photographers, they can now pick and choose what work they wish to take on; they certainly hope to return to the western part of the country in the future.
For now, when the mood strikes, they get away from it all and into nature by packing up the van and going off grid in New England for a bit. They embrace the quiet, the chance to hike and be in the woods, and always, Jay looks for the fascinating, elusive and wonderful light.
To view Jay’s photographs, visit www.philbrickphoto.com.
(Editor’s note: The cliff shots Jay Philbrick achieves are always done with a hired, experienced internationally certified mountain climbing guide; do not try this at home!)
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Chasing the Light: the Photography of Jay Philbrick - Thelaker
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